Day: December 21, 2017

Recapped: 12/16/17

All matches were taped in Gimnasio Municipal Josué Neri Santos, Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua on 11/19/2017.

Matches: 

Dark Cuervo, Dark Scoria, Pagano beat Marty The Moth, Monsther Clown, Murder Clown
(8:16, Pagano Noa Noa Driver, Marty, ok, via Lucha Libre AAA)

Hijo del Fantasma beat Rey Escorpión for the AAA Latin American Championship
(13:09, Phantom Driver, good, via Lucha Libre AAA)

Hernandez & Johnny Mundo vs Dr. Wagner Jr. & Hijo del Dr. Wagner Jr.
(17:33, Mundo Fin de Mundo Dr. Wagner, ok, via Lucha Libre AAA)

What happened:

Announcers talk about Heranndez and Mundo being the new Gringos Locos in their match. End game of the main event has Hernandez puling Wagner out and giving him a shoulderbreaker on the floor. Mundo fouls Hijos, drops him with the moonsault drive, and pretty much whiffs on the Fin de Mundo but that’s the finish anyway.

Fantasma connects on the Flecha Negra about ten minutes in, after going for it earlier but Escorpión moving out of the way before he could. Fantasma gets back up on the apron, only for Texano to run out and hit him in the back of the head with the lasso. (Tirantes watches it, but he’s back to being evil this week.) Texano gives Fantasma the Texano Driver. Escorpión isn’t sure about it, but goes for and connect on the top rope legdrop, only for Fantasma to kick out. Tirantes holds Fantasma for an Escorpión lasso punch. Psycho Clown’s music starts to play and stops, distracting the fans but not the wrestlers, who must know that wasn’t his cue. Escorpion punches Tirantes by mistake. The music starts up again, and now Psycho Clown comes out. Psycho Cleans house, Fantasma gives Escorpión the Thrill of the Kill (called the Phantom Driver here), and Tirantes come back in to count a fair three count.

Security has a slow first step, so Pagano is mobbed by Juarez fans the moments he steps out on the entrance. Cuervo & Scoria have new music and a new look, so they’re not giving up yet. They’re also attacked by the Clowns (which explains why Pagano entered before them.) As always, Marty wears Casaus gear, the graphic lists him as Marty the Moth, and the announcers call him Marty the Shaman. The announcers do finally mention the Monster High nickname Vampiro has been using for this group for months (presented here as an Arturo Rivera idea.)

After about five minutes, Dave the Clown wanders to ringside to help his friends by throwing a chair at Pagano. La Parka hobbles to ringside with music, and goes after Dave. They kind of disappear until the match is over. Pagano kneels in front of Parka and shakes his hands, which causes the announcers to scream “VAMPIRO” because of course.

We last saw Texano with the Latin American belt. Fantasma has it here, with the idea that Vampiro made Texano give it back off screen (and that AAA belatedly decided they couldn’t really have this title match unless Fantasma actually had the belt.)

Thoughts: 

Fantasma/Escorpion was one of the better AAA matches of the year, definitely among the best singles match. AAA still had to spend the last couple minutes of it making it clear that the matches we actually are supposed to want to see are Fantasma/Texano and Escorpión/Psycho and it took away from the finish here. I did like that they gave Fantasma a kickout on his own before Psycho made the save. The music cue being screwed up was amusing, as was Psycho obviously telling Escorpión to roll out of the corner so he could do his dive. Escorpión & Fantamsa built the action well on their own and it would’ve been better if they got to finish it on their own, but this match wasn’t the priority.

The main event was slower paced than a usual AAA match. You can skip the first eight minutes without feeling like you missed anything, and then the next even minutes are the rudos slowly working over Hijo. It does work, in that the crowd gets loud for a moment when Papa tags in, but it’s a long time to get there and it doesn’t get that much interesting when they’re there. Hijo de Wagner was fine in his big chance, but didn’t really come across as a star. Hernandez taking Wagner’s cutter as a back bump was weird, and Mundo probably should’ve redone his finish because they AAA couldn’t hide the miss.

The trios match was a decent encounter to give the Juarez fans the Pagano they had come there to see. It seemed like they might be taking away from his spotlight with the loud La Parka run in, but Pagano still got the moment at the end. I was distracted by AAA seemingly changing camera angles during every move – Scoria’s thru the ropes tornillo is unwatchable, sadly. The match itself was just about the level you’d expect but with a far hotter crowd than usual. They might have waited until the rudos got a win to try to get over the Monster High nickname. Given this crew, it’s possible they’ve been trying to get that name over for months and this just happened to be the week they remembered to do it. They’re not detailed oriented.

Noti AAA includes luchadors singing Christmas songs at a charity event. They also had a meal with make a wish children. The Luchando Por Mexico event is hyped.