EDITOR’S NOTE: The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of Lucha Central and Masked Republic.
It was just over a week ago, as I was wrapping up my review of IWRG Thursday Night Wrestling, where I found myself wondering if this was something I could do every week, or if I would get distracted by yet another replay of the Uncharted series. Well, I don’t mean to spoil anything, but judging by this bad boy that I’m typing out and you’re reading right now, it seems I decided to do this again. Hit the “Last time ON DRAGON BALL Z!” music and let me do my best voiceover impression.
*clears throat*
Last time, ON IWRG THURSDAY NIGHT WRESTLING, Hell Boy and Las Shotas imploded facing Revolution Crew, leading to Hell Boy and Chicano agreeing to face Jessy Ventura and Diva Salvaje tonight. Meanwhile, in the Lucha Random match, Heddi Karaoui defeated Veneno, who gave a performance so bad, that I sat there begging for the sweet release of a Dalys match. Yes, it was that bad. Even earlier on the show, two masked men attacked all the luchadors in the second match, with one of the masked men resembling the build of recently fired AAA star Nino Hamburguesa. And through it all, IWRG showed at least 9,001 videos hyping their current tryout competition, which would’ve been forgettable if not for the fact that many of them featured Diosa Quetzal (who I am definitely, absolutely, 100% biased for). Will there be 9,002 tryout videos tonight? Will Diosa Quetzal appear in more than half of them? Will Las Shotas and Hell Boy make amends? Is one of the masked attackers Nino Hamburgesa? Did they steal the idea from Seth Rollins? And can Lucha Random possibly get worse than last week?! Find out…TODAY!
Angelux & Fauno defeated Angel Kid & Kavuky after Angelux and Fauno submitted Angel Kid and Kavuky with a rather complicated double submission. They had no time to celebrate though before the larger masked man with the long hair came out (alone) and laid waste to everyone. The dude’s mask came off slightly during a Sitdown Powerbomb spot, but not enough to reveal his identity before he left. I will say; I’m a bit more skeptical now that it’s Hamburguesa. Granted, I haven’t seen Hamburguesa in a hot minute, but I have never known him to do sitout powerbombs. It would be the equivalent of Aaron Judge actually coming through in the clutch.
Quite frankly, this angle was the most interesting thing about this whole ordeal. For a moment, it felt like this match could be good when the tecnicos and rudos were feeling each other out. Then Angelux slipped on a springboard and it was like watching the second half of Gone With the Wind. The tecnicos tried to salvage things later with a pair of rope walk sentons to the floor, but unfortunately they did so while looking like they could slip and fall any moment, so it was hard to be impressed. I get it; they don’t have the confidence of an Aramis or Komander yet, but that’s got to develop sooner or later if you want to try cool stuff, otherwise you’re just going to wind up Rey Samuray. Of course, it didn’t help that their rudos were Fauno, who showed even less than the first time I saw him last week (and he wasn’t that great then either) and Angelux, who gave off serious Canelo Casas vibes. And let me tell you; the last luchador you want to remind people of is Canelo Casas. A total dud of an opener. * ½
It’s that damn tryouts hype video AND IT’S THE DIOSA QUETZAL ONE! You win this round IWRG.
Just in case you didn’t know Hell Boy was the star of the show, for the second straight week, he was out early in the show to cut a promo hyping up the main event. There was one key difference here compared to last week though. Spanish remains a language I am unfortunately not well versed in, but I’m not sure I needed to be to understand what was going on here given that Hell Boy came out wearing an IWRG shirt with the IWRG logo crossed out. Then there was the fact that he pulled out the double bird to fans as the segment ended. Now I’m not a genius, but that kind of suggests Hell Boy has gone the way of Angel in Buffy Season Two, no? Perhaps I’m wrong though and he was just acting out. I just wouldn’t be surprised if we see Hell Boy now accepting Revolution Group’s invitation, or him being the Seth Rollins to the masked goon’s wannabe Seth Rollins.
Kali & Sagittarius defeated Krista & Mirvan after Kali pinned Mirvan and Sagittarius pinned Krista after Sagittarius Iconoclasm’d Krista onto Mirvan. Sagittarius cut a promo after the match, seemingly issuing a challenge to someone, though this is again where my lack of Spanish has failed me. What didn’t fail was this match. It wasn’t a masterpiece by any means; Krista and Mirvan had some green moments, and things were kept pretty basic overall. Even still, it was a much more satisfying watch than the opener, probably because these four worked within their abilities and didn’t try to do too much. Sometimes that’s the right way to go, especially if you’re still limited. On another positive note, I can see what IWRG sees with Sagittarius (who is their Intercontinental Women’s Champion last I looked). I’d need to see her against better competition, but she carries herself well, and never looked out of place in the ring. Neither did Kali, who showed off some good looking strikes. An average match, but I’ll take it after that ghastly opener. ** ¼
Iron Kid defeated Danessa in Lucha Random after pinning Danessa with a Spinning Screwdriver. You want to talk about a strong recoveries, THIS was the strongest recovery Lucha Random could make from last week. Going from Veneno to the gorram Iron Kid, one of the best independent luchadors (if not the best) out there? Not since James Cameron went from directing Piranha II: The Spawning to The Terminator has there been this big of an upgrade. Yes, James Cameron made a movie called Piranha II: The Spawning and yes, I have photographic proof this film exists.
Surely the fish just wants to be friends and not eat her face!
Now I am going to level with you; when Iron Kid came out, I got very excited. When Danessa, who I was not familiar with, came out after him, I was a bit less excited. It almost felt like a tease, giving us a world class high flyer like Iron Kid and then putting him in an intergender match where he can’t really show off the full arsenal? It didn’t matter in the end because these two made it work. Iron Kid did a great job playing rudo in this one while still throwing in the cool move here and there (that Step Up Standing Shooting Star Press was nice), and Danessa was a really good underdog babyface, and was able to pull out some cool sequences (such as a pin reversal into a stiff dropkick) that showed she wasn’t just being carried. I still probably would’ve preferred a great base for Iron Kid to face, but this was a very good match, and it certainly made me more excited to see Danessa in the future. *** ½
There was a lot of house cleaning after the match, including Iron Kid cutting a promo (which hopefully means more of him!), more tryout stuff, and a Revolution Crew hype video like last week. Say what you will about some of the in ring quality, but IWRG at least doesn’t have trouble hyping what they feel is important.
Lunatik Extreme & Super Boy defeated El Hijo del Alebrije & Hysteriosis after Extreme pinned Hysteriosis and Super Boy pinned Alebrije after Extreme hit both with a Swanton Bomb. Let’s get the negatives out of the way first; Lunatik Extreme is not worthy of his name! Come on dude; you cannot call yourself Lunatik Extreme and then go out there and wrestle like every other heel known to man. What are we doing here? Other than that complaint, and a couple iffy moments with Super Boy, this match was really good! This was the performance I wanted to see from Hysteriosis last week. It wasn’t perfect; he almost slipped on a dive to the floor, and he at times seems to be out of control, but good Grodd he is creative, athletic, and out of his mind. In my book, that’s a great combo, and he barely got to show any of that last week. He did this week, in part because Extreme and Super Boy are just better talents to work with than Shocko and Jasper seemed to be. Yes, Super Boy had the slip ups, but aside from that he was there for everything (while also showing he too can hang in there air) and Extreme, while not living up to his name, always seemed to be in the right place. Oh, and Alebrije was solid too; I fear that may be his problem (he never gets past that gear every time I see him), but better to be solid than bad, amirite? Good match! *** ½
More hype videos and tryout videos. One day, and though that day may never come, I hope to see Diosa Quetzal on this show doing something that isn’t hyping tryouts. Maybe we can put her with Danessa? Sagittarius? LUDARK?!
El Hijo del Pandemonium, Gran Pandemonium, and Pandemonium defeated Jasper, Mosko, and Shocko after one of the Pandemonium’s pinned Mosko with a Lionsault. In some ways, this match was all over the place. It began with Jasper and Shocko not wanting to help partner Mosko at all, which led me to think they would turn on him later to cost him the match. Instead, they seemed to forget about all their issues with Mosko minutes later, and the match turned into a smorgasbord of brawling, the Pandemonium’s using an air horn as a weapon, Shocko pulling a sock out of his trunks Mick Foley style, some Pandemonium strutting, and a few dives thrown in. I’m not sure all of it made sense, but I found it entertaining. After showing very little last week, Jasper and Shocko were a lot more interesting here, though they still felt like they were missing something compared to their partner and opponents. Frankly, I think what made this work was the Pandemonium’s. They weren’t setting the world on fire, but they’re committed to their act, they’re entertaining, and the crowd loves them. When you’ve got that working for you, what else do you need? In the end, I’d call this forgettable but fun, aka every rom-com you’ve ever watched on a plane. ** ¾
Diva Salvaje & Jessy Ventura defeated Chicano & Hell Boy by DQ after the masked men, led by Chessman, ran in to break up Ventura’s pin on Hell Boy. The masked men, who were wearing the same IWRG shirts with the logo crossed out like Hell Boy then turned their attention to Chicano, beating him with what looked like a metal board, with Hell Boy joining in. Hell Boy proceeded to reveal he was in league with the group (thus making me look like a genius several paragraphs ago), and he and Chessman seemingly offered Las Shotas a spot in their group. The duo instead left, allowing Chessman, Hell Boy, and the masked dudes to beat on Chicano some more. Personally, if I was Chicano, I’d be more upset with Las Shotas at that point. Not only did they watch him get wrecked like Gabe Kidd in that Darby Allin car stunt on AEW Dynamite, but they then left him to get punked out even more. Even Fernand Mondego would’ve thought twice about being that bad a friend, and don’t get me started on how that dude screwed over Edmond Dantes.
Believe it or not, there was some wrestling that occurred in this match (some of it even quite good too), but it meant absolutely nothing because this was all about the show long story that began with the large masked man attacking the opening act wrestlers and culminated here. Some elements worked better than others; I thought Hell Boy’s character work was overall really strong, but his stalling tactics at the beginning of the match were so long, it made that one Star Trek: The Motion Picture sequence look like a scene out of Speed Racer. You also can’t help but laugh at the irony of a new group being revealed with two of their members remaining unknown because they didn’t take off their masks. I guess IWRG wants to draw that out, but I’m not sure there would’ve been a better time to do this reveal than, I don’t know, right now?! Throw in Las Shotas doing nothing to help poor Chicano (making them look like dicks quite frankly) and there were more than a few comical hiccups in this angle. And yet, I have to admit it’s something. I have always liked Chessman, and even though he’s older now, he still is a decent presence and a good heel stooge. And even with the off moments, Hell Boy did a really good job throughout this show building to the turn and making it count. They’ll need to tighten things up, have good reveals for the two masked guys and probably find a better foil than Chicano (even if he did play his role well here). But if nothing else, it was an intriguing angle, and I’ll give them a chance to see if they have a good plan in the weeks to come. And hey, if nothing else, they’ll be giving me a lot of material to make fun of this whole thing if it winds up being the drizzling shits. ** ¼
It’s time I disappear. Let’s do this again next week, shall we? In the meantime, here’s a Session Moth Martina gif. Why? WHY NOT?!
