CMLL
CMLL (MON) 05/20/2024 Arena Puebla [Porra Fresa]
1) KeMaltio & Tengu b Micro Gemelo Diablo I & Micro Gemelo Diablo II
2) Arkalis, Pegasso, Rey Samuray b Crixus, Difunto, Raider 
straight falls, setting up a title match
3) Tessa Blanchard b Zeuxis [lightning]
4) Blue Panther Jr., Dark Panther, Star Black b Felino, Felino Jr., Rey Bucanero
5) Fugaz, Star Jr., Valiente b Hijo de Stuka Jr., Stuka Jr., Villano III Jr.
Villano III Jr. replaced Niebla Roja (injury); Fugaz did wrestle.
6) Averno, Euforia, Soberano Jr. b Esfinge, Flip Gordon, Volador Jr.
I haven’t watched anything from this week yet. Fugaz and Flip had the more visible injury moments on CMLL, while I couldn’t tell you when Niebla Roja got hurt Friday. It turns out he’s the one who’s out and the other two are back wrestling. Not a great sign for Raider to return immediately in a title program.
CMLL aired the top 4 this week, so airing the top “whatever number” seems fully to be an arbitrary choice. They could air the whole show if they wanted to and we just don’t know why they didn’t want to. They also are no longer sending a CDMX announcer to work with the two Puebla local ones. I wonder if the Televisa Puebla bit is about making money off reusing the YouTube video or perhaps about using a local production crew so few people from Mexico City have to make the late night drive back from Puebla. The shows look differently after Televisa Puebla starts would be the sign.
CMLL (TUE) 05/21/2024 Arena México [CMLL]
1) Fantasy & Pequeño Magía b Full Metal & Pequeño Polvora
2) Apocalipsis, Cholo, Disturbio b Astral, Capitán Suicida, Valiente Jr. 
3) Fuego, Histórico, Max Star b Dark Magic, Espanto Jr., Raider
4) Guerrero Maya Jr., Pegasso, Stigma b El Coyote, Pólvora, Vegas
5) Atlantis Jr. b Euforia
6) Flip Gordon, Valiente, Volador Jr. b Hechicero, Soberano Jr., Terrible
Terrible replaced Niebla Roja on Tuesday afternoon
Atlantis/Euforia was said to be pretty good.
CMLL (TUE) 05/21/2024 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara
1) Thunder Boy & Yaky Boy b Amenaza Negra & Maximus
2) Emperatriz, Lady Shadow, Miss Guerrera b Adira, Hatanna, Náutica
3) Furia Roja, Guerrero de la Muerte, Ráfaga b Cris Skin, Gallero, Halcón Negro Jr.
4) Adrenalina, Explosivo, Fantástico b Hijo de Stuka Jr., Hijo del Villano III, Villano III Jr.
5) Persephone, Tessa Blanchard, Valkiria b Kira, La Catalina, Lluvia
Persephone beat Kira after a mask pull
6) Star Jr. & Stuka Jr. b Ángel de Oro & Star Black [Relevos Increíbles]
Stuka Jr. beat Star Black, asked for a MEX HEAVY title match
That title match seems to be happening but maybe they’re also doing the women’s match.
NJPW confirmed Hechicero will appear on the FantasticaMania USA show. (They’re not technically calling it “Fantasticamania USA”, just FantasticaMania but I’m going to keep doing it for sanity’s sake.) Their posters tease ZSJ also on the show. It’d be cool if both the Mexico and USA shows got that 1v1 match, but I’d be surprised if they did it twice in a short time. Meanwhile, with Mistico/Hirmou locked in for FantasticaMania Mexico, that means CMLL is either doing the Michael Oku/Angel de Oro or Hechicero/ZSJ match on that show because it’s unlikely they’re running three singles match. It’s still possible Oku/Angel de Oro just happens on a different day and it works out fine. If not, if CMLL is instead running a ZSJ/Bad Dude Tito/Che Cabrera trios match against Hechicero and two partners, they should be prepared for a strongly negative online fan reaction.
CMLL may provide answers today. CMLL Informa guests include Angel de Oro, which likely means a date set for his match with Michael Oku. Other guests include Kojima & Okumura (appearing as a team Friday), Neon (cruiserweight title win), Star Jr. (Copa Jr.) and the family teams of Felino & Felino Jr. and Stuka Jr. & Hijo del Stuka Jr. The CMLL Copa Dinastia took place in June last year to peak at Father’s Day and those guests may be a sign it’s returning for a June 16th final.
Titan is 5-2 in the Best of Super Juniors. Since last I remembered to update him here, he’s lost to Blake Christian and Clark Connors, then gotten wins over Kevin Knight and Kosei Fujita. Titan is leading his block with matches against Yoshinobu Kanemaru and TJP remaining. Desperador is at 10 as well and three people (including the two he lost to) are at 8, so Titan is not secure in the top 2 by any means.
Box y Lucha has 3604 has Mistico and Neon on the cover.
Nitro will make his annual visit to France’s APC for a teaching seminar from July 1st to July 7th. Maybe FantasticaMania France will happen once day.
El Hijo del Santo
The El Hijo del Santo retirement tour press conference took place Tuesday afternoon. The announced dates:
- 09/22 Mexico City (Arena CDMX)
- 10/05 Queretaro (Arena Arteaga)
- 10/06 Leon (Palenque de Leon)
- 10/13 Monterrey (Arena Monterrey)
- 11/01 & 11/02 London (York Hall)
- 11/09 Puebla (Arena CCU)
- 11/10 Veracruz (Arena Veracruz)
- 11/24 Guadalajara (AGDL)
- 12/08 Foro GNP (Merida)
- 03/02/2025 Xalapa (USBI)
I watched the press conference. Do not watch the press conference; it was full of press acting like fans and devoid of content. Who else is on the shows? “No one yet, but there will be surprises.” Will Santo Jr. wrestle on this shows? “His life has taken him down another path but there will be surprises.” What kind of matches will be on this show? “It’ll be like the old Todo x el Todo shows, maybe with a mask tournament, but also surprises.” What will he do after retirement? “You’ll still see me as Hijo del Santo, just not in the ring, but in other projects – I have lots of surprises.” Santo talked about working with Bobo Production because they clicked and had a similar vision for these shows, but there was no vision expressed beyond Santo saying goodbye to fans across Mexico. (One of the higher ups in Bobo Production took El Hijo del Santo to show for his birthday, and that’s where they decided to do this deal.)
I think Mexican wrestling fans would absolutely come to wrestling shows just to say goodbye to El Hijo del Santo. They’d pack them in at 2000-6000 seat buildings at elevated prices, like AAA’s generally doing with Vampiro this year. These shows are running at 12,000-20,000 seat buildings at TripleMania like prices. Maybe the demand is there, but that sure is going to be a test. The simple comparison is the the Que Viva el Rey tour built around Rey Mysterio Jr. in 2015, where AAA and music tour company/producer ZZInc built it around a rare chance to see Rey Mysterio in all these cities with a bunch of TNA/US Indie names at high prices in big venues. The first few shows drew poorly, and many of them just ended up not happening. ZZinc no longer has a website.
Mas Lucha’s Bernado Guzman asked about the large venues in a follow up interview with Hijo del Santo. He acknowledged it’ll be a challenge, but he’s always been a great ticketseller, he has confidence in Bobo to promote these shows strongly, and he plans on doing whatever press they need to get the word out about this events. (Also, he has surprises, big surprises.) El Hijo del Santo says he’ll be the one putting together the lineups for the events. Guzman talks about a lot of names he’d like to see Santo in again, hitting on Negro Casas a couple of times. Santo says it’s impossible with Negro Casas working AAA, they won’t give him permission. Guzman points out Santo said anything was possible with Bobo involved and Santo allows that, and seems to say they’ll do their best. He won’t be pinned down to any other names appearing but says the fans will like what they see.
El Hijo del Santo did explain the opening day was chosen to be as close to the day El Santo was born (September 23rd.) There’s also a chance that’s the same weekend as the CMLL Aniversario show; I don’t know for sure. He couldn’t give an answer why it was ending Xalapa – three months after the other shows even – and wasn’t 100% definite that would be the last show. Other dates may be added after. He pushed back on the idea it would be a 3-4 year tour like others, but did say he’d like to go Toluca, Acapulco, and Aguascalientes if he had the right promoter to work with and wouldn’t overexert himself with the schedule. (Preserving his health and wanting to leave in a good way where the reasons given for retirement.) Santo also pushed the idea he’d like to say goodbye to his fans in Japan and Europe if they can make it work. He kept mentioning wanting to go to Europe without mentioning two of the dates were for London; the Guzman interview clarifies that Santo want to extend that trip to other places in Europe if interest. Guzman asks about the US (specifically California) and Santo says he’d also like to that.
The one (almost) definite answer came when someone asked about the possibility of Blue Demon Jr. appearing. El Hijo del Santo said he doesn’t talk or communicate with him, though anything is possible in the future. Blue Demon Jr.’s ranted angrily in the past about how Hijo del Santo will have nothing to do with him, without really giving an explanation. The timing off the falling out seemed to be after the Blue Demon/Dr. Wagner Triplemania match (and could’ve been about working with AAA), but it’s one of those things no one wants to talk about.
In a follow up interview, El Hijo del Santo says he thought about this retirement for two years. He’s asked if he thinks he surpassed his father and gives a definite no: his father transcended wrestling and became a film star in a way he didn’t do. El Hijo del Santo believes his father would’ve been proud of what he did accomplish. Another ESTO article has El Hijo del Santo ruling out returning to Arena Mexico, saying he enjoyed the opportunities but he no longer has any connection to the building.
AAA
This week’s episode on Space will air at 3 pm local, about three and a half hours early. I am going to write about this two posts in a row in hopes of remembering it.
AAA noting a TV time change on a Tuesday is unusual for them; usually I notice first and there’s a mention late Friday night. This is a good improvement! It would be better if they could get it all the way to “mentioning it on the previous show.” These sort of time changes happen to AEW (on sister US WBD networks) often this time of year, and the two consistent things are AEW pushing the time change frequently during their previous broadcast and still a big chunk of viewers doing something else. There is no reliable public information for TV ratings in Mexico that I’ve been able to find, but I wonder the dropoff is whenever AAA gets moved around like this. It would seem to be massive.
IWRG
IWRG (THU) 05/23/2024 Arena Naucalpan
1) Águila Oriental & Príncipe Centauro vs Histeriosis & Sky Man
2) Bengalee & Danessa vs Kali & Mary Caporal
3) Noisy Boy & Spider Fly vs Cerebro Negro & Cerebro Negro Jr.
4) Gran Pandemónium, Hijo de Pandemónium, Pandemónium Jr. vs Ivan Rokov, Puma de Oro, Vangellys
5) Hell Boy, Hijo de Canis Lupus, Máscara Sagrada vs Fishman Jr., Pig Decapitador, Pig Destroyer
This is a free show, because it’s also a promotional event for local political candidate Isaac Montoya.
Other News
Puebla luchador Rey Komodo (Yonathan Aguilar Ramos) was beaten and stabbed to death Tuesday. The suspect is known to police but fled the scene and had not been captured.
Segunda Caida writes about 2022 Black Terry.
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They changed the Puebla show to only the Fan Leyenda tier, didn’t see any announcement of that.