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Lucha Underground Analysis (June 7th, 2017): A betrayal leads to gold

[media-credit name=”Lucha Underground” align=”alignnone” width=”620″][/media-credit]

Welcome back Believers! Finally Lucha Underground is back and for the women, we quickly pick up where we left off in the saga between Kobra Moon and Drago.

But, before we get to that, Sexy Star makes an appearance to help her friend Mack during his second chance at the Lucha Underground Championship. She also helped him even the odds last week during the “All Night Long” match that ended in a tie.

However, Sexy isn’t enough to help ward off the Worldwide Underground and Johnny Mundo retains his title with help from Taya.

We head to a break after Temple proprietor Dario Cueto announces the Cueto Cup! Beginning next week, there will be a single elimination tournament for the new trophy. The winner wins the Cup and a title match at Ultima Lucha Tres.

After the break the Trios Championship is on the line as Drago, Fenix, and Aerostar take on Vibora, Pindar, and Kobra Moon.

Pindar and Aerostar square off first. Pindar blocks any and every attempt Aerostar tries to fly. Aerostar eventually hits Pindar off his feet with a corkscrew. Aerostar then reverses a powerbomb attempt by Pindar into an arm drag.

He continues to rough up Pindar with typical high flying action, launching Pindar outside after a hurriacanrana. Aerostar poses in the ring as Kobra confronts Pindar.

Pindar hits Aerostar with a big boot and tags in Vibora. Vibora wasts no time slowing down the action with a rest hold. Kobra Moon looks in in approval. A suplex and a bit hit take Aerostar outside the ring.

Pindar gets tagged in and goes for an avalanche piledriver but Aerostar fights back and tosses Pindar off the top rope with a avalanche huricanrana. Fenix rushes in and takes down Vibora. They fight outside the ring. Vibora pulverizes Fenix with a tombstone piledriver.

Aerostar gets to his feet and stumbles to tag in Drago. But, Drago spits green mist in his face!

Pindar hits a devastating twisting manevuor on Aerostar as Kobra beckons Drago to her team. Drago gets the pin for the Reptile Clan after an assisted splash. The Reptile Clan is now the new Trios Champions!

Kobra Moon chains up Drago as he hoists the title in the air.

After the match, Taya approaches Johnny in the locker room and they talk about his upcoming match up with Rey Mysterio.

Johnny admits that Rey will pose a difficult challenge.

After the segment Catrina accompanies Mil Muertes in his “Boyle Heights Street Fight” match against Prince Puma.

Towards the end of the match, Catrina hits Puma with a foreign object. Vampiro evened the score by handing Puma a brick, which he used on the head of Mil Muertes to pick up the win.

Thoughts: I’m personally in a precarious place with professional wrestling right now. As you know I also cover NXT and that brand has slowly degraded in quality. As for Lucha Underground, I’m a bit frustrated for a different reason. I’m beginning to see the cracks in the brand’s marketing and reach. As someone who loves genre shows and is deeply involved in niche hobbies, activities, and interests, LU definitely does not appeal to everyone and I understand that. But when the season returned, I feel like there was almost no fan fare to hype up the masses.

Many sleep on Lucha Underground and that’s very unfortunate. The brand is a mix of really interesting visual story telling and wrestling. Everything means something, usually, and everyone has a place.

This season should have returned with this episode instead of showcasing the “All Night Long” match up last week. My reasons are this, LU has a cast of rotating characters and feuds and that need to get precedence, especially after a five month long hiatus.

Last night’s episode did well to move forward several storylines and we have new Trios Champions!

I hoped to see more of Kobra’s in-ring progress but I sit by my support for her current role. She still needs some practice in the ring, which I know she’s doing right now on the Indy circuit. But she commands her tribe and now they are on top. This role does her well in hiding any performance weaknesses in the ring.

The match itself was the typical fast paced baby face lucha style vs the big hoss power team. Unfortunately though, sometimes it was like watching Aerostar and Pindar wrestle in slow motion. That might just be me though, I prefer fast paced, high flying action. The Reptile Clan will definitely not move that fast.

Taya, Catrina, and Sexy all played their roles well last night too. Taya still remains the Worldwide Underground’s “straight man” even though when she gets in the ring, she’s unpredictable and lacks strategy. I like the dichotomy and can’t wait to see her role expand. Rey’s legendary status should put kinks into Johnny’s reign and the Worldwide Underground’s status.

Sexy and Mack’s friendship still remains so pure and wonderful. Please continue this! It’s so rare in wrestling to see a friendship between genders based on just mutual respect like this.

And Catrina and Mil’s feud with Puma is far from over. Puma has now gone from the hometown golden boy, to a servant of the dark side. Catrina and Mil will not take kindly to anyone infringing on their territory.

What did you think of last night’s episode? What will Catrina do next? What will the Reptile Clan do now? What do you want to see on this half of Season Three? Sound off in the comments below.

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