AAA on Televisa: 2017-05-27 

who cares if it looks terrible: this AAA show in a gif

Recapped: 05/30/2017

Matches: 

All matches were taped at Paleqnue del Centro Expositor, Tlaxcala, Tlaxcala on 04/29/2017

Averno & Pimpinela Escarlata beat Mamba & Ricky Marvin   (4:05, Averno Devil’s Wings, below average)

Big Mami defeated La HiedraGoya Kong, and Lady Shani (4:27, Mami splash Goya, below average)

Australian Suicide & Bengala beat El Mesías & Pagano (9:03, Bengala senton con giro Pagano, ok)

Kevin Kross beat Psycho Clown (8:05, exploder suplex, bad)

What happened:

here’s a Kross suplex

The main event goes a (solid!) two minute and eleven seconds before the run-ins start. Pimpinela runs out for no reason, and doesn’t make it to the ring before Mamba attacks for some really bad hair pulling. Lady Shani comes out for no reason – look, everyone comes out and brawls for no reason, I’m going to spare you reading it a half dozen times. It’s Mamba & Pimpi, Shani & Hiedra, Nino Hamburguesa & Dalton Bragg, Joe Lider, Big Mami, Monster & Murder, Goya Kong, the other referees, Bengala and Suicide (who just get beat up), Pagano & Mesias & Cuervo & Scoria (who don’t even make it out of the back before they’re fighting), Argenis & Ricky Marvin, the OGTs, La Parka (gets his music played! Both a spot immediately!), Poder del Norte, and Hijo del Fantasma. Fantasma at least ends up with Kevin Kross, who spent most of this time standing outside brawling slightly with Psycho Clown. Fantasma goes to dive, but Suicide attacks him (for no reason) and lands his finish on Fantasma. It doess’t come off as a heel turn, just another random moment in a segment of randomness. There’s no connection to Kross and Psycho coming in to finish, Suicide just steps out of the ring as Kross gives Psycho his suplex.

Everyone keeps fighting because whatever. Faby Apache appears from nowhere, 100% fine after being murdered last week, and fouls Kevin Kross. All the técnicos attack Korss, who now is too invincible to be knocked down until many of them try. Hiedra & Goya end p with the faces, which seems like a mistake. Kross tries to leave, but the rudos toss him back in to get stomped. And then they stomp Piero for comedy’s sake.

We’re told Vampiro made Suicide/Bengala vs Pagano/Mesias a no DQ match when the match starts (but everything seems to be no DQ tonight.) Tecnicos get off to a hot start, rudos turn it around, then Pagano and Mesias argue over who gets to choke Suicide for no reason. This continues on for a little while until the técnicos use it to make a comeback, mostly keeping Pagano out and working of Mesias. Pagano makes the save after Suicide lands a 450 and clears house, but Mesias won’t tag him. Cuervo & Scoria walk slowly to ringside (it’s tough to walk fast down all those steps), and Pagano gets whipped into a distracted Mesias. Pagano shoves Mesias off the apron, Bengala boosts Suicide into a – uh, double shove because they come up short on the move. A following dive onto Bengala works better. Scoria slides in a chair to Bengala, but Pagano kicks it into his face. Pagano goes for a chair assisted moonsault, which predictably fails. Pagano turns over, places the chair on his own chest, and Bengala lands a top rope senton con giro on it for the win. Jesus Zuniga reacts to Bengala’s big win by yelling “Pagano! Pagano!” Mesias walks out on Pagano.

here’s the other Kross suplex

Niño Hamburguesa came to ringside to watch the women’s match, since the winner would team with him. Arturo Rivera makes a point in not shaking hands with him. The other announcers try to ask Niño who he’d like to team with and Arturo talks right over him. Niño at least sounded impressed with Big Mami after the win.

OGT are arguing to start the show about getting beat last week and who’s fault that was, when they’re interrupted by Pimpinela. Pimpinela informs them that Vamprio made her and Averno partners this week. Chessman & Super Fly laughing at Averno at least breaks the tension. During the intro, another Averno/Pimpinela vignette is wedged it, when Averno demanding Pimpinela be serious . That doesn’t take, Pimpinela gets Averno to dance before the match even starts, but they do use it to get the jump the other team.

The graphic for this match lists it as a four way tag match with Chessman & Super Fly and Argenis & La Parka as teams. Maybe that’s to justify the run-ins which start about 2m30 in, with the rest of OGT coming into beat up Marvin without their being DQ. La Parka & Argenis are not long behind them. I think maybe they would’ve been better just deciding it was no DQ or something. Averno beats Ricky Marvin clean after everyone’s cleared out, but a few moves later – it’s not like the run-in seemed like it caused into the outcome.

Averno gets to taunt Ricky Marvin for about three seconds in before Kevin Kross turns up, has a face of with him, fakes help Ricky Marvin, and suplexes Marvin. Averno bails like he’s seen a monster. Hijo del Tirantes tries to break it up, but Kross ignores him and throws Marvin out. Kross demands Tirantes lift his arm, but Tirantes refuses. Tirantes decides it’s a good side to stay in the ring at that point. Kross overs him a handshake, and Tirantes confirms his switch to AAA tecnico by being dumb enough to take it. A back suplex knocks out Tirantes. Tirantes is stretchered out while Kross spends a lot of time standing in the ring. This seems to has nothing to do with anything that happens with Kross later on.

Noti AAA featured part 2 of the third La Lave de la Gloria tryout. He’s never identified, but you can clearly see Ricky Marvin hanging out in the background of the tryout, sometimes with Stephanie Vaquer. Muneca de Plata is among the many who are interviewed, and she mentions her father Super Porky and trying to return to AAA. They announce the winners, though they don’t really identify them.

Thoughts: 

I don’t know what Mesias is doing here

This entire taping, the last week and this show, was just a disaster. The matches on this show were not worth watching and, as I tried to put my thoughts in to words after the main event, I realized this is a show no one should be watching in it’s current state. I can’t believe a promotion that had a match as good as the Taya/Ayako match just a couple weeks ago has descended into total unwatchable garbage, but that’s what this Tlaxcala taping has been.

The main event was like so much of the rest of AAA right now, a hot mess. What do I even say? The brawl was unfilmable – there was a moment where Ricky Marvin was heading for a dive, and they cut away because there were so may things going on at once – and didn’t make any sense and was much more dumb than it was exciting. It was exposed as a complete joke, a “haha, we don’t even care any more” moment when they sent referees out there to be part of it. It exposed the booking as being nonsense: they spent last week’s episode and part of this week’s episode and the Texano match building up Kevin Kross as this cold killer so he could just be beaten up by the entire roster in a comedy segment. They had Faby take a crazy bump just to come back an hour later. This is a promotion that isn’t taking itself seriously and it impossible to take seriously. I hope it works out for them, but I’d give up on the show at this point if there was anyone else writing a recap of it on a weekly basis so I could find out when it got good again.

Suicide dive

The Suicide/Bengala vs Pagano/Mesais match was better than everything on this show, which isn’t saying much. They had more to work with, they got time and they got a story to play off. The work just was a little bit too iffy for me and it was a bit boring at times, but I appreciated the effort. Pagano & Mesias seemed to no sell a lot of the técnico’s offense, but they rallied back to get in key shot that matter. It just would’ve meant more if Bengala & Suicide weren’t made clear to be the third most important team in the segment even after the win – they needed a moment to be clear they wanted in line for the tag titles at least before being brushed aside. The Mesias/Pagano break up going on forever with no real reason explain why they’re together (or even the root of why they’re mad at each other, now that Dave has become a non-person) is a drag, and feels like something that should’ve been addressed in one of the many skits they have now. The comedy of the one night Pimpinela/Averno team up was more important, I guess.

The women’s match never developed into anything, felt like two different matches taking turns happening (Shani/Hiedra and Mami/Goya), but it at least felt like there was start, beginning and end. That’s not really the minimum to have a good match or even OK one, but that’s better than the opener. I couldn’t imagine ever willing watching this again, so it gets a low grade, but it really doesn’t matter.

Everyone actually in the mixed tag had good energy for the time they were wrestling, and we even got a glimpse of a rudo Pimpinela while it lasted. Maybe they had a lot of energy because they knew they were only going about two minutes before the run-ins came anyway. This was lame. Averno seems to be one of the few guys doing well in this new environment, excelling on the promos, but I get the sense he’ll be telling stories about this era to his friends for the rest of his life. The match being a setup to get Kevin Kross over is a weird choice for a guy who doesn’t have a feud; it’d be interesting if it got people more interested in the main event, but I’m not sure we (or maybe even they) will even know. Post match went 5:00, longer than the actual match.

Gran Alternativa, The Crash, CMLL Heavyweight tournament, AAA TV in the UK

tonight

The CMLL Gran Alternativa returns tonight. CMLL’s sometime annual tag team tournament featuring a rookie and a veteran teaming isn’t as it was in the early days, when it was the only way to get a glimpse of the younger members of the roster. Still, it’s kind of an indication of who’s CMLL might be high in the moment.

You can see the entire history of the tournament on the luchawiki (and I’ll get the wiki logo back soon once I can find it.) Esfinge won last year with Volador, Esfinge is back in the tournament this year, so it hasn’t quite worked out for Esfinge yet. It did work out better for Barbaro Cavernario when they ran it prior in 2014. Recent winners prior to that include Bobby Zavala (who kind of stalled out until being fired), Euforia (moved him up a little) and Rey Escorpion (which ended up meaning a lot.) Winning this tournament doesn’t mean you’ll become Mistico, but it can pull someone up from the pool of guys in the third match to the pool of guys in the fourth match, and the fourth match guys actually get things to do.

This is block A of a two block tournament. It’s not the most loaded block. We can rule out Pegasso & Blue Panther, Stigma & Titan, and Espanto Jr. & Kraneo without a second thought. Forastero has yet to be as pushed as hard as his cousins when he’s on his own, so nah to him too. CMLL’s cooled down on Esfinge and it would look silly to have him in the final two years in a row; CMLL is willing to look silly, but I don’t think they’ll do it here (though a run to the block final is possible.) Star Jr. hasn’t gotten any special attention, but he’s with Mistico so he has a shot. It’s really more a matter of which of the Cien Caras sons CMLL prefers more in the moment, if they’re that much higher on Sanson to put him in two straight rookie tournament finals, or if they’ll make us endure four Mascara 2000 matches to give Cuatrero the spot this time.

It’s an overloaded CMLL card, 12 matches if you include the battle royal. The battle royal is dumb because it’s a match no one should bother to win, but it’s especially dumb on this kind of show. Even people jumping out of the ring like they’re abandoning ship will still kill about seven minutes of time, and this is a show that needs to save as much time as it can. CMLL added Rey Cometa versus Dragon Rojo to show, a match which I’d normally want to see, but is only going to compress things more. There’s a time limit to these shows, and they’re going to have a hard time meeting it as is.

The other matches are Hechicero, Pierroth, Rush versus Negro Casas, Rey Bucanero, Vangellys, and Drone, Fuego, and Guerrero Maya Jr. versus Disturbio, Misterioso, Virus, and Shockercito & Stukita versus Mercurio & Pequeno Violencia. Some of those matches look good, but they’re not going to be what they could be because there’s just not enough room. It’s a rare CMLL card where the results are going to be more interesting than the matches.

This show should air on ClaroSports at 8:30pm.  However, last week they started airing the show on Facebook Live on the Marca Claro’s account. They seem to moving away from the old streaming software (the last remaining page of the their old site) and I think eventually it’ll be a Facebook only deal. We’ll figure it out tonight, but prepare for some change.

CMLL has a preview of the show. Shocker talked about his return to ClaroSports.

Meanwhile, the more exciting show tonight is in Tijuana for the The Crash. It’s a benefit show for Nicho/Psicosis I to help pay for an operation. He’s still working, teaming with Mr. Aguila & Damian against Daga, Garza and old rival Rey Mysterio. The semimain is Penta & Fenix against Black Terry & Skayde; that’s the logical place for La Mascara & Maximo to make an appearance. I hope they don’t, because I really just wanted to see that match.

The undercard includes a great looking Flamita versus Rey Hourz title match, Arkangel versus Latigo in another title match, a five way that continues the feuds going in the undercard, and Jack Evans & Zorro versus Bestia 666 & Hijo del Pirata Morgan. That last one follows up Jack Evans selling Bestia’s valagueza so back that people thought he had real medical condition, but I don’t think anyone’s really thought about it much since.

There’s no telling when/if we’ll see this show. Their shows have ended up on YouTube in the past, but I have no idea what will happen here. It’s a shame if we’ll miss it, but it’s been a shame for half a year now and the closest they’ve gotten is “they’ll get it done next month.” I don’t know much, but I know it’s not that hard to put something on YouTube if you want to put it on YouTube.

AAA TV starts in the UK on Front Runner TV on June 14th at 7pm, and will air Wednesdays. I’d assume this is the same show that’s airing on The Fight Network, and airing a bit inconsistently there. Front Runner is a new station; I think it’s been around about a year, but it doesn’t even seem to have a wikipedia page. They list a big reach and it is over the air, but I’m guessing it’s along the lines of LATV in the US, where people can get it but don’t know or aren’t normally seeking it out so it may not be a big deal.

+LuchaTV has a new interview with Pierroth, Rush, Septiembre Negro II and Mistico.

LuchaWorld has a new edition of Lucha Classica talking about the start of AAA.

Ram el Carnero took Gemelo Diablo‘s hair in Pachuca on Sunday in a match that wasn’t scheduled. Diablo showed up halfway during the main event, a match he wasn’t in, challenged Ram el Carnero to a hair match, and lost.

Lineups

CMLL (TUE) 06/06/2017 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara
1) Cosmos, Shockercito, Stukita vs Mercurio, Micro, Relámpago Azul
Micro replaced Pierrothito on 06/01.
2) Magnus, Star Jr., Starman vs Puma, Sangre Azteca, Tiger
3) Mr. Niebla vs Rush, Marco Corleone, Gran Guerrero, Pierroth, Terrible, Dragón Rojo Jr., Rey Bucanero, Kráneo, Euforia [CMLL HEAVY, cibernetico]
Cibernetico for vacant championship (Maximo), probably final two advance to next week.

Tuesday’s card from Guadalajara is all changed around to accommodate the heavyweight tournament. It’s strange of CMLL to do that – they could’ve just as easily had it take place the following week. The wording says this is a cibernetico to determine a new champion, but they usually end up having the final two advance to next week.

Rush, Marco and Terrible seem like the three guys with a best shot. CMLL almost never puts title on the foreigners, so probably more so Rush & Terrible.

AAA TV (FRI) 06/30/2017 Gimnasio Miguel Hidalgo, Puebla, Puebla
1) Aerostar, Drago, Raptor vs Carta Brava Jr., Mocho Cota Jr., Soul Rocker
2) Argenis, La Parka, Lanzeloth vs Averno, Chessman, Súper Fly
3) Bengala, Hijo del Fantasma, Máscara de Bronce vs ?, Australian Suicide, Kevin Kross
4) Johnny Mundo © vs Texano Jr. [AAA HEAVY]
first defense
5) Dr. Wagner Jr. vs El Mesías
list as a rematch of TripleMania XXIV, actually XVII
6) Psycho Clown vs Pagano
rematch of TripleMania XXIV

These lineups appear to be meaningless, so I’m not bothering with writing much about them. (That’s why you’re not reading a Verano de Escandalo preview on VOW today, too.) It is notable that Johnny Mundo is booked for this show, since he’s always on the shows when they scheduled him for a match. He’ll be back before this show but, the last time we saw him in AAA, Vampiro had ordered him to defend his title against Hijo del Fantasma. Guess they forgot.

Hijo del Fantasma promoted this show locally by noting it was the same venue he debuted in AAA four years ago. I’m uncertain if he’s any better off from the day he started in AAA. Lanzeloth looks like he’s been places in Ricky Mravin’s spot and I still have no idea.

The Crash: 2017-03-25 

starting to think Rey’s opponents are baiting him

Recapped: 05/23/2017

Matches:

All matches took place on March 25, 2017.

Mirage, Oraculo, Súper Caló Jr. beat Black Danger, Jonathan, Último Maldito (11:19, Oraculo Spanish Fly Jonathan, via videoslucha3000, ok)

Flip Gordon & Mr. 450 beat Arkángel Divino & Black Boy (18:28, Mr. 450 splash on Black Danger, via videoslucha3000, good)

Bestia 666, Extreme Tiger, Laredo Kid  beat Dezmond Xavier, Famous B, Shane Strickland (13:22, Bestia 666 valagueza Dezmond Xavier, via videoslucha3000, good)

Matt Jackson & Nick Jackson vs Daga & Rey Mysterio 619 (17:04, Meltzer Driver, via videoslucha3000, great)

What happened: 

Extreme Tiger, still doing the legdrop

You can’t see it on the version up there, but the post match promos in the main event set up Young Bucks versus Lucha Brothers.

Also, after the opener, Orcaulo and Black Danger argue and are now feuding. James Storm interrupts to beat up all the guys in the opener, then get into a fight with Garza Jr. Konnan makes some stipulations for their match tonight, but that match never went up complete and the stipulations don’t go anywhere, so we can safely ignore it.

For whatever reason, the Máscarita Dorada vs Septimo Dragon and Garza Jr. & Sami Callihan vs Black Taurus & James Storm matches were not put online complete.

Thoughts: 

double headscissors

These were four matches of a similar type and differing quality. The matches got better as the night went on, but the variety could’ve used some help. I’m not sure I’d be rating the other two matches that highly, but maybe they would’ve offered something different to help. It’s a lot to watch these four matches heavy on spots in a row and I wouldn’t recommend watching all four.

It does really go ok, good, very good, great in order, probably by design. The Bucks and Mysterio in particular looked like world class professionals in the main event, taking the crowd up and down and keeping them for the entire match. There were definitely guys below them who can do things athletically those three guys can not, but they had much more polish and sense of the moment than anyone else. Daga was not bad by any means, he worked fine as a Young Bucks opponent and they made sure to give him a moment of hope before finishing him off, but he’s didn’t come off as on those guys levels yet. There was education to take from that match, and I hope he learned from it. The crowd reactions were interesting on their own: Rey was the biggest star to them, but they were completely OK with the Bucks winning. This is a lot different audience than usual lucha libre shows.

The fourth match (or third of what we got to see) probably was hurt the most for all the similar type of matches. The main event had the aura of the top guys to overcome what had come before (and also they’re quite good), the match prior didn’t have as strong a reason to exist and had to surpass everything that had been done for it. I think it worked, with Laredo, Strickland and Xavier standing out. It just all started to blend together in my mind by that point. I had to walk away and clear my mind before watching the main event (but those in the building didn’t seem nearly as overwhelmed.)

Daga with the double take out spot

The Gordon/450 vs Divino/Black Boy match was a better laid out than opener, especially early on. It also felt like it went 5-7 minutes too long. It’s not like they over ran a peak, but more that it felt like it kept going to keep going – it would’ve served them and the rest of the show to cut it a little shorter. Mr. 450 is not someone I’m really interested in watching at this point, but he and Flip Gordon looked much more polished than the guys in the opener and their opponents in this match. Arkangel and Black Boy had his moments, when Akrangle not having as many broken spots as he usually does without his brother. This one had two different comeback spots. Not that the técnicos (the Mexicans) came back twice, but that they did one comeback spot (Arkangel headscissoring both guys at once), put a halt to it to put the rudos back in control, and then had Black Danger get in his spot too. That did not flow together well, but it was fitting with the idea of doing more just to do more.

The usual The Crash opener, got the crowd excited but was sort of numbing for me. There’s problems with three fall setups, but it at least causes the matches to have valleys and peaks. These matches feel like never ending chains of one guy in random gear going in, getting in his moves, and the next guy taking over with no particular meaning to it. Some of it looked better than other; the crowd was into Oraculo and his finish looked good, but he and Black Danger didn’t work well together at all (and that’s the feud that came out of this.) This was the first time I’ve seen a full Super Calo Jr. match I believe. He didn’t stand out much, I mean, I spent the first half of he match betting totally unsure if I had him on the other team, because Último Maldito’s mask looked just about as Super Calo as Super Calo Jr.’s. It was confusing to me. At least they figured out a way where Garza Jr. might actually get cheered by putting him against Storm