Lucha Underground Season 3 Episode 17: The Gauntlet

Ladies, Gentlemen and most importantly, fellow believers it’s once again time to Lucha!

We open tonight in a mysterious lair. Well, that or a storage warehouse for broken fog machines given all the smoke. A resurrected Prince Puma is training and much like we’ve seen with Pentagon in previous seasons, pledging himself to his new master, Vampiro. More on that later, but right now, it’s time for our first match.

Match #1: Jeremiah Crane vs. Mil Muertes

As we saw last week, Jeremiah Crane requested this match and apparently has a history with Catrina. I don’t know if it’s that he has powers that we don’t know about or if he’s just really stupid, but Crane wasted no time going after the man of a thousand deaths with a big boot. Unfortunately for Jeremiah, Mil was mostly unfazed and took complete control of the match from there. Mil picked apart his opponent like he was nothing. There was one moment where Catrina licked her finger and rubbed it on Jeremiah’s face, perhaps marking him for death. However, just when it looked like Mil had the match won, Puma emerged from the shadows wielding a kendo stick, attacking Muertes and distracting him long enough for Jeremiah to hit a pump kick and cover for the win.

Winner: Jeremiah Crane

After the match, Puma continued to decimate Mil Muertes with that kendo stick, before kneeling towards his new master, Vampiro.

In the back, Sexy Star is approached by Ricky Mandel who praises her for all her accomplishments but also inadvertently irritates her with his fan-boy crush on Johnny Mundo. However, he’s really here because he found a gift for Sexy Star at catering and wanted to give it to her personally. Ricky has no idea who it’s from, but thinks it may be from some sort of admirer. Sexy opens the box to once again find a spider. Enraged, Sexy crushes the box and let’s loose a cry of pure rage.

Elsewhere, Texano is exercising when he’s approached by Famous B. B offers a Texano a chance to be represented by him, but Texano wants no part of it. B goes on to say that while the fans like him, they’re not passionate about him like they are with Cage and just asks him to consider his offer.

Match #2: Son of Havoc & Angelico vs. Jack Evans & PJ Black

Angelico has been looking to get his hands on the World Wide Underground since he made his return and he’s brought his old trios partner, Son of Havoc, along for the ride. Jack Evans and Angelico started things off. What you may not know is that outside of Lucha Underground, Angelico and Jack Evans have actually been tag team partners in the past, and the way they fought in the opening of this match really showed that. They know one another so well and can read each other’s moves almost as if they share a psychic connection. They dodged everything the other threw at them, making for an exciting sequence of events. However, take nothing away from Havoc and PJ, who are also impressive in their own right. Unfortunately, part way through the match, Angelico appeared to suffer a dislocated elbow. In the wake of the injury, Evans took advantage of the distraction and got the pin on Son of Havoc. Winner: The World Wide Underground

After the match, we visit Dario’s office when a pissed off Sexy Star comes barging in. Sexy demands a match against Mariposa next week, apparently not convinced that she has nothing to do with the spiders. Dario agrees and Sexy leaves in a huff.

Main Event: Texano vs. Cage: Match Four in the Best of Five Series

As we’ve come to expect from these two, this match was as brutal as it was exciting, but unfortunately, it came to an abrupt end after Cage was busted open by an exposed turnbuckle, allowing Texano to take advantage and get the win.

Winner: Texano

It was at this point that your humble writer thought that for the first time, he would have to write about a fairly lackluster Lucha Underground, until I realized that we still had nineteen episodes left of the episode. As if on cue, out comes Dario Cueto who has decided that he doesn’t want to wait another moment to see who wins this series and we’re having the final match right now, and as an added bonus, anything goes.

Real Main Event: Texano vs. Cage: Final Match in the Best of Five Series

Now this is more like it. From here on out, this match was a spectacle of brutality. They went everywhere they could. They fought amongst the believers, they fought in the cheep seats, they used steel chairs, bull ropes and anything they could find to inflict as much pain as possible on one another. It is no easy task to make a guy as big and powerful as Cage look like the underdog, but after the beating he took from Texano in the last match, Texano dominated for most of the match. However, it takes more than massive blood loss to take the big man down and with a well place pile driver, Cage won the match and the best of five series.

Winner of the Best of Five Series: Cage

After the match, Dario once again emerged from his office inviting Cage inside to receive his prize, claiming the award for winning is too incredible for the minds of the fans to comprehend. In the office, we finally get to see what’s in that box. Turns out, it’s some kind of armored gauntlet, and I can’t help but notice that it’s very similar to the one worn by Dr. Claw from the first episode of the season. Cage refuses the gift as he’s “not a ren-faire guy” but Dario insists he at least try it on. Cage slips on the gauntlet and suddenly a mysterious energy flows through him. Cage then picks up El Jefe effortlessly with one hand and says that, on second thought, he’ll be keeping the gauntlet.

Match of the Night: The finale of the best of five series was right up my alley. I’ll be honest with you, up to this point, the best of five series matches have been, enjoyable, but not up to the standard I’ve come to expect from both of these guys. Turns out they were saving the best for last. Both of these guys are known for their brutality and in this match, they both dialed that brutality up to eleven. Texano in particular managed to impress me in a big way, biting Cage and painting his chest with Cage’s blood like war paint. This was an Ultima Lucha caliber match and a great way to cap off this best of five series.

Spot of the Night: I’m giving it to Texano biting Cage and then immediately transitioning into a top rope hurricanrana. There’s nothing particularly flashy or innovative about it, at least by Lucha Underground standards, it was just a nice one-two punch of brutality and athleticism, which at the end of the day, is what Lucha Underground is all about.

Segment of the Night: Definitely giving it to Cage receiving the Gauntlet. We’ve been building the prize for the best of five series up for some time, but keeping it a secret. Now that we finally see what Cage and Texano have been fighting for, a huge mystery is solved, and yet, even more mysteries arise. What is this gauntlet exactly? Has it truly granted Cage godlike powers, or has it taken control of him? How does this connect to the ultimate plan of Dario and his employers? We don’t know, but what we do know is that the Machine has just been upgraded and now, he’ll be more dangerous than ever.

Final Thoughts: It’s a good rule of thumb in Lucha Underground that when the opening matches are shorter, then the main event is going to be something special, and that was certainly the case here. Cage and Texano brought the house down with their match and we finally got to see what they’ve been fighting for. If I could make one minor complaint, it’s that we didn’t get any further development of the story between Catrina and Jeremiah Crane. I’m sure we’ll be following up again soon, but not following up tonight feels like a missed opportunity. However, this weeks episode of Lucha Underground was still an overwhelming success.