Lucha
Underground came around seemingly out of nowhere in October 2014 and
it has taken the indy circuit by storm. With it's telenovela filming
style, unique storylines and a variety of both established and up and
coming wrestlers it continues to grow in popularity, and rightly so.
It has brought something new and fresh to the world of televised
wrestling and fans have sought it out as an alternative to the
monotony of other larger promotions which seem to be producing the
same dull storylines week in week out. But how does it work? Why has
it gotten so big in such a short space of time, whilst other
companies who have been around for so much longer struggle to sell
tickets and keep fans invested?
Well,
everything. Everything I mentioned earlier and then some.
The
style in which it's filmed is very telenovela, which is basically the
Spanish version of Eastenders but with ten times more drama and a
hundred more mental lassies going about screaming and slapping each
other. It's extremely intense and very high drama, which makes for
very exciting television (when it comes to wrestling anyway,
Eastenders is fucking gash, sorry Phil). This all integrates
perfectly with their dramatic story lines; we've got dead wrestlers,
a missing owner, a psychotic vampire and a dragon. Aye that's right,
a big scaly winged demon bastard of a dragon.
This
leads on to one of the best bits about the show - the variety of
wrestlers that it showcases. I've seen far too many new companies
spring up from nowhere and all they do is book a bunch of ex-WWE or
ex-TNA guys, have them involved in complete spot-fests without any
logical story line and call it a promotion. Lucha Underground has
been different from the very beginning; in the first show they had a
variety of "big name" stars from various promotions and
they also had a lot of indy talent that wasn't very well known
outwith their own circles. They used names like Ricochet (Prince
Puma), Johnny Mundo and Matt Cross (Son Of Havoc) to
bring in existing fans of WWE, PWG, Dragon Gate etc. whilst at the
same time introducing them to wrestlers like Blue Demon Jr. and Sexy
Star who - to the common wrestling fan like myself who's never found
the time to watch any Mexican promotions - aren't known but are
fantastic at what they do. I've never really seen any females
take on the luchadora gimmick properly so Sexy Star has introduced me
to a whole new realm of wrestling to explore.
As
the series continued more people started to get introduced, like
Pentagon Jr., Fenix and Drago who again are again all big names in
promotions like AAA but aren't as well known to a lot of Western
fans. They're names that I'd heard of but had never bothered
looking into because let's face it, I struggle to keep up with the
promotions that I watch to begin with never mind getting myself
invested in new ones, but Lucha Underground has gone far and wide to
bring the best of them into the sights of the Western world. By
putting these "unknown" guys on to mainstream television,
on a show that airs weekly, they're helping us to broaden our
horizons whilst entertaining us and keeping us invested at the same
time. Without it I wouldn't have discovered a lot of the
wrestlers that I have; I started watching because I'm a big fan of
Ricochet and I wanted to see how he done under his luchador guise of
Prince Puma but I didn't keep on watching just because of him, I kept
on watching because there wasn't a bad match on that card and I
wanted to see more of all of the wrestlers on that first show.
Christ I even enjoyed watching Chavo on it. Then, a few
episodes in, Drago - the aforementioned dragon - appeared and he kept
me even more interested; I had seen him on AAA's Triplemania back in
2014 after hearing about it being an absolutely amazing show and I
was mesmerised by him. I'd never seen such a Gwar-esque
character in wrestling before and I wanted to see more of him but
failed to keep up with the happenings of AAA because as I said
before, there's just too much good shit out there to be able to keep
up with all of it, then when I realised he was in LU I was
overjoyed.
It's
been so refreshing to watch all of the different characters and
styles come together on to one show that's so easily accessible. And
the best thing is, there's no daft adverts appearing halfway through
a decent match! For breaks they show video packages and promos
that help to build up towards a match or something developing in a
story, so you're getting an hour of pure uninterrupted, unadulterated
wrestling. How
many of you still sit up and watch RAW on a Monday night like it's a
chore that you have to do even though you really don't want to and
get no enjoyment from it? Watching half a roster do the same
thing week in, week out then
moaning about how bad it is on Twitter as if you've no other options
to explore. If you're one of these people then ditch it. Get
it dumped like that psycho lassie ye went out with last year that
panned in your window because you never got her a Michael Korrs watch
for Christmas. Get up on a Thursday morning and get Lucha
Underground watched. Or if you're not sick of the sight of Kane
interrupting matches and Roman Reigns stuttering through promos,
stick to your Monday routine and start up a Wednesday night/Thursday
morning one too. Let's face it, there might not be enough hours
in the day to keep up with every good promotion out there but Lucha
Underground is more than deserving of an hour of your time every
week.
Lucha
Underground airs every Wednesday at 8PM ET/PT (1AM UK time) on the El
Rey Network.
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