Results
- Team Canada (Allie, Taya, KC Spinelli) defeated (Cheerleader Melissa, Santana Garrett, Sienna) to win women’s third place. [good]
- Taya double stomped Santana at 8:16
- Team Rest of the World (Spud, Mil Muertes, Apolo) won the Victoria Cup over Team Japan Ouduo/Zero1 (Akebono, Masato Tanaka, Ikuto Hidaka), Team Mexico Leyenda (Canek, La Parka, Blue Demon) and Team USA/TNA (Ethan Carter 3, Eli Drake, Tyrus) [ok]
- Eli Drake thrown out by Blue Demon Jr. (1:25),
- Spud eliminates himself rather than continue to fight Akebono (2:46)
- Blue Demon dropkicked out EC3 (3:20)
- Apolo clotheslined out by Canek (4:59)
- Canek thrown out by Akebono (5:55)
- Akebono thrown out by EC3, La Parka, and Mil Muertes (6:26)
- EC3 thrown out by Tyrus (6:58)
- Tanaka thrown out by La Parka (8:14)
- La Parka dropkicked out by Ikuto Hidaka (9:41)
- Ikuto Hidaka heabdutted out by Mil Muertes (10:23)
- Tyrus pinned by Mil Muertes Flatliner (12:57)
- Pentagon Jr., Texano Jr., Psycho Clown defeated Taiji Ishimori, Naomichi Marufuji, Maybach Taniguchi in the men’s semifinal [good]
- Psycho Clown top rope splashed Maybach Taniguchi in 9:18.
- Cage, Johnny Mundo, Chavo Guerrero Jr. defeated Rey Mysterio Jr., Dragon Azteca Jr., Dr. Wagner Jr. in the men’s semifinal [good]
- Cage defeated Dragon Azteca via Drill Claw in 9:57
- Lady Apache, Mary Apache, Faby Apache defeated Aja Kong, Sumire Natsu, Yuki Miyazaki to win the Women’s 1st Place [good]
- trios match went to a 10 minute time limit draw
- Faby Apache and Aja Kong went to a 5 minute draw
- Mary Apache defeated Yuki Miyazaki via Michonku Driver in 3:40
- Rey Mysterio Jr., Dragon Azteca Jr., Dr. Wagner Jr. defeated Taiji Ishimori, Naomichi Marufuji, Maybach Taniguchi in the third place match [good]
- Dr. Wagner Jr. and Naomichi Marufuji went to a five minute draw
- Dragon Azteca Jr. and Mayback Taniguchi went to a five minute draw
- Rey Mysterio Jr. defeated Taiji Ishimori with a frogsplash in 4:04
- Cage, Johnny Mundo, Chavo Guerrero Jr. defeated Pentagon Jr., Texano Jr., Psycho Clown [good]
- trios match went to a 10 minute time limit draw
- Texano Jr. and Chavo Guerrero went to a five minute draw
- Psycho Clown and Cage went to a five minute draw
- Johnny Mundo defeated Pentagon Jr. with Fin de Mundo in 4:12
Awards
- Best dive: Johnny Mundo
I think this was the winning dive. It was sweet, definitely. - Best luchador:
Johnny MundoPentagon Jr. - Best luchadora: Mary Apache
and this is how she won - Best match: Team Lucha Underground versus Team Mexico International
Like the Friday night show, this was a generally lot of fun. It was a little on the long side – the ideas they had to shorten the show didn’t seem to work out, since it was nearly as long as last year after all – and two long shows in three days made it a little tiring by the end. It’s a weird denouement: the main event finish happens, everyone’s angry about it for about five minutes, and then everyone has to stand around together for another fifteen minutes while they hand out awards.
The matches were pretty much all good. The two women’s matches flowed better then in Puebla. The battle royal match wasn’t much, but it at least had the novelty of the weird matches. It seemed like a waste of Tanaka to only have him in for 90 seconds after he was so good in Puebla. The two semifinals were pretty good; I’m not sure I would’ve picked the LU/International match as the best match on the show but it’s a reasonable selection. The third place and first place matches suffered a little bit in drama because the layout, it was obvious they weren’t going to end without Rey and Pentagon Jr. getting in. Rey looked good in all his appearances, and really match up well with Ishimori.
I’d like to see Tanaka & Hidaka back. I’d really like to see Ishimori around more than once a year, or AAA guys over there. I wouldn’t mind see Aja Kong against the Apaches again, though I’m concerned a bit about diminishing returns on that. Yuki was good too, though she wasn’t presented in a way that would mean much if she was brought back. (Sumire wouldn’t make me list of callbacks but she was definitely more interesting on this show than the previous one, and didn’t hold the match back.) EC3 and Spud got over as personalities but didn’t really show a lot in the ring, not that they were in a great position to do so. Taya and Allie were trying to set up a title match over Twitter and I’d be OK with that, especially in the service of Taya defending that title more than once a year.
Pentagon looked great and got the strongest reaction of his team when his face was shown for introductions. (The announcers seemed to be putting him over as the star of the team too.) And, so, as it happens, he took the pin in the end. Up to then, they had followed the same pattern as last year: Texano got the pin in Puebla, Psycho Clown got the pin in the semifinals, this was Pentagon Jr.’s turn (and he did get the near victory but time ran out in the first segment.) Mundo beating Pentagon is actually OK if Mundo’s coming back to be a big part and he and Pentagon are going to do more work down the line – that’s a matchup not really yet done in either Lucha Underground or AAA, the fans already see Mundo as a world class star, and that’s the level of guy Pentagon needs to going at now. It’d be exciting if it happened, but there’s just not a lot of just not a reason to believe AAA sees this as any more than a way to get Mundo some attention. Pentagon’s off feuding with Pagano, and there’s no particular reason to believe Mundo’s going to be back, since he’s only been in shows with Rey and this seemed to be it for Rey. It’d be great, but this is just taking a hot guy and having him fail on a big stage to get heat for a finish, but with no real long term plan.
(Chavo did hit Pentagon Jr. with a chair, so that’ll be the excuse – though that seemed to annoy the Mexican fans, who felt a screwy finish was too much like the parts of AAA they don’t like. The whole thing would’ve worked better with Texano and Cage, since that feud is actually happening.)
It would’ve been such a huge moment if the AAA team had actually won, and they did overall get treated much better than they did last year. There were no really big surprises with the booking, or much to complain about, beyond that. I could’ve used a few less overtime periods, same as said in Puebla. They probably should just do the ‘normal’ rules for the men’s third place game if they do it again next year, because the idea of shortening it by going straight to sudden death feels like it’s lengthen it again – it’s about 20 minutes once the breaks between the periods is considered if they got all three falls, where they could be in and out in 8 minutes if they just did it like normal. It was manageable because Rey/Ishimori was good at the end, but we had to go thru Taniguchi/Azteca to get there. Both Mil Muetes and Dario Cueto’s presence made some sense in the end: Dario cut some great rudo promos before and after matches, and Mil winning the consolation match gave Lucha Underground a clean sweep.
The announcers (though not Melissa) got Dragon Azteca Jr. correct, and avoided his mistake on La Parka. There weren’t as much TNA plugs as the show prior, and most of those seemed started by Hugo. There was some sound quality issue early, but either they fixed it or I got used it. There were some production issues – the clock was shown only part of the time, there were crowd shots at the wrong time – but nothing major. The feed held up well; I had to hit refresh a couple times, but nothing major. It only seems like the Sunday show was up there last time I checked, which doesn’t work with their promise of being able to have 10 days up after, but maybe they’ll fix it later.
Attendance was not great, definitely down from last year. They had lots of competition – the Mexican national team was playing, there was a minor election among other items – but they also just didn’t have the star power or the promotion they had last year, and the event is still new enough that it means a lot just to have it. Very early on, Hugo said they were hoping for 13,000. Apolo Valdes mentioned on Twitter that it looked 70% full to him. The building looked set up for 16,000 with the stage cutting off seats, but 70% would still put it around 11 to 12,000 (with a fair amount of free tickets given out.). It’s probably still fine as long as Victoria is happy – this is a marketing campaign as much as a wrestling event.
They didn’t make any definite statements about next year’s show. Next show for AAA is in two weeks for Verano de Escandalo, and I’d guess we’ll get that lineup very soon.