Lucha Underground Season 3 Episode 20: All Night Long... Again.

It’s been a while since you guys have heard from this blog. That’s mostly my fault. two jobs, one of which requires a lot of late nights and early mornings, leaves little time for blogging. That said, neither the promise of a naked Karen Gillan dispensing large sums of money and pastrami sandwiches nor the threat of a rabid grizzly bear wielding a large chainsaw that intends to strap me down in the chair from A Clockwork Orange and force me to watch the “Martha” scene from Batman v. Superman on a six hour loop before I am inevitably chopped up and eaten can keep me away from my beloved Lucha Underground. So, without further preamble, what say we get right down to the biscuits. So, if you remember the episodes leading up to the depressingly long hiatus, The Mack was set to face current reigning Lucha Underground Champion Johnny Mundo for his title in a match that would go… ALL, NIGHT, LONG! And naturally, after Matt Striker and Vampiro introduce the show, we go to the ring to get this sucker started. Match #1... and only: The Mack vs. Johnny Mundo: All Night Long for the Lucha Underground Title

First announced, it’s The Return of The Mack. I wish I were clever enough to have come up with that but actually, later in the match, in what has to be my personal favorite chant in my twenty some years as a wrestling fan, the crowd actually starts singing Mark Morrison’s “Return of the Mack.” Yet another reminder of why I love being a fan. Next up, it’s the champion himself, Johnny Mundo, who unlike the Mack, has experiences in these sorts of matches.

Now, before we go any further, I want to make clear that, with a few obvious exceptions, I am not a fan of Iron Man Matches, which, though under a different title, this match essentially is. I tend to find them very tedious and can often be seen looking at my watch as I view one. Despite the incredible talent of the two men involved, I found that the early goings of this match had a lot of the same problems. Sure there were some exciting spots, but that only gets one so far. If this match was going to elevate itself to the spectacular standard to which I and my fellow internet wrestling critics hold this show to, we were going to have to start injecting some chaotic elements.

Fortunately for us, after Johnny took a nasty fall and seemingly injured his leg, things started to get pretty nuts. Johnny was about to be stretchered out of the arena, but when the Mack, being the sportsman that he is, checked to see if his opponent was okay, Johnny revealed that he was playing possum and went after the Mack like a true blue heel. Well, as one can imagine, Mack doesn’t exactly appreciate being duped, so he takes the stretcher board, ties Johnny to it, and slides him down an entire flight of stairs in retaliation. Johnny looked to be in trouble, but that was when reinforcements arrived in the form of Johnny’s World Wide Underground colleague, The Darewolf, PJ Black. Mack is a big guy, but even he isn’t immune to the numbers game and gets taken out of commission by Johnny and PJ armed with Kendo sticks. However, what the World Wide Underground should have counted on was the fact that they have made many enemies besides just The Mack, many of whom have a vested interest in seeing Johnny lose that title. One such individual, the badass biker known as Son of Havoc, arrives in the temple dual wielding kendo sticks and taking out Johnny and PJ before trying to revive the Mack. However, before he can do that, Havoc needs to swing by Dario Cueto’s office for a couple beers. Why? Get this, apparently beer has much the same effect on Mack as Spinach does on Popeye in that it gives him his second wind and gives him temporary superhuman strength. However, even despite the numbers now being even as well as Mack’s alcohol fueled zenkai boost, the World Wide Underground is simply way too devious and quickly regain the upper hand. In what I found to be a clever callback to the original All Night Long Match, Johnny tells the band to play some victory music so Johnny can stall for time. Unfortunately for Johnny, the music quickly turns into mayhem as the maraca player dive bombs the cocky champion before revealing herself to be Sexy Star. From there on out, the match was complete and utter chaos, just the way I like it. Table, ladders, chairs, blood, violence, pain, everything that we’ve come to love about Lucha Underground came into play. The climax of the match came when the score was tied three to three, Johnny was unconscious on top of a table and Mack was slowly ascending a ladder. The clock only had a few precious seconds left. All Mack needed to do was make the jump onto his opponent and pin him to win the title. However, Mack’s moment was spoiled by Ricky Mandel, Johnny Mundo’s biggest fan… well, second biggest after our friend Jon over at TwitWow(which you should all be watching). Regardless, Mandel’s distraction may not have prevented Mack from making his dive, but it did buy just enough time that Mack was unable to get a three count before time went out before time ran out, ending the match in a draw.

As you can imagine, a draw doesn’t sit well with your average wrestling fan, never mind one of Lucha Underground’s true believers. None too pleased himself, Dario Cueto emerges from his office and announces that there are no draws in his temple, and so, as Lucha Underground goes off the air, El Jefe announces that next week, Johnny and Mack will go at it again until there is a definitive winner, even if it once again takes… ALL NIGHT LONG!

Match of the Night:

Well, since we only had one actual match on this show, the All Night Long match wins by default, if that wasn’t the case, I still think it deserves it. I felt that Lucha Underground had captured lightning in a bottle with the first all night long as it got me engaged in a match type I did not particularly care for. The fact that they were able to do this twice proves to me that this was not a coincidence.

Spot of the Night: While Mack’s dive from the top of the ladder was a spectacular to behold, I’m awarding Spot of the Night to Mack rolling through Johnny’s cross body and reversing it into a power bomb. I really enjoyed it.

Segment of the Night: This technically took place during the match and would be otherwise ineligible, but since this week’s episode didn’t actually have any cinematic segments, I’ll bend the rules just this once. It is my blog after all. As such, I’m granting Segment of the Night to Son of Havoc reviving the Mack with beer. I personally just found the idea that Beer works like a Phoenix Down in this universe very amusing.

And now, before we sign off, it has indeed been a while, but this is still an episode that ends in five or zero, and as such, it’s time to reveal the frontrunner for the Wes’s Blogs and Reviews Lucha Underground MVP. This time around, I’m very pleased to announce the leader of the pack is none other than…

DARIO CUETO

I said from the beginning that non-wrestlers were eligible for this award, they were just working with a handicap. However, if a non-wrestler was to climb to the top of the heap, I’m not surprised that it was El Jefe himself, and frankly, I can think of few more deserving. While characters like Prince Puma, Sexy Star and Johnny Mundo are the ones who draw us to Lucha Underground, if anyone is truly the heart and soul of the temple, it’s the man who built it in the first place. From day one, Dario has proven himself to be devious, sleazy, cunning, and a blast to watch. However, the aspect of El Jefe that I personally have latched on to is his legendary love of violence. In many ways, Dario personifies a similar love of violence that is present in all Lucha Underground fans as well as wrestling fans the world over. The reason we love Dario is because we see a part of ourselves within him. Though his time at the top may not last, I will leave you with these final words. Lucha Underground has had many champions, but there will only ever be one boss. And that about does it for this week’s Lucha Underground review. It’s great to be back. Join me next week for more.