By: E. Young
BrightNightmares.weebly.com
This week on Lucha Underground we fought homophobia and put some respect on Ricky Mundo’s name!
It’s the night of Johnny Mundo (or John E. as we later find out) and Taya Valkyrie’s wedding and Johnny has invited his former tag-team partner Joey Mercury—I mean, Joey Wrestling to be in the wedding. Full disclosure: I’m a complete MNM mark so this made my heart happy. Joey has been doing pretty good for himself since his mutual release from the WWE. And as the meme goes, he’s looking real jacked, baby. If you only know him from J&J Security a few years ago or the Ladder Incident, do yourself a favor and check out his older and current indie runs. Oh, and ROH.
Joey joining the party means Ricky and his doll have been demoted to ring bearer. It’s pretty been obvious that Ricky was going to wreck this wedding Carrie style, but Worldwide Underground laid it on thick tonight. The best part about this storyline is that Ricky pretty much forced his way into WU and they’ve been treating him like garbage since. You’ve had, like, three whole years Ricky!
But of course, we have a match or two to get through. Melissa is still in the hospital so we have Famous B handling the announcing. Hey kids, did you know Famous B officiates weddings as well? Is there nothing this man can’t do?
First match of the night is Jake Strong versus the other Super Friend, Drago. Drago’s gone back to his red gear and I love it. Being the stouter muscle between himself and Aerostar, Drago fares a little better but still gets trapped in Jake’s vicious lock. And for added brutality, Jake tries to break Drago’s leg with Drago’s own nunchucks. Fortunately, Aerostar runs in for the save. Jake’s gonna have to find someone his own size to pick on!
Up next, Groomsman Jack Evans is taking on Xo Lishus in a no màs match (an “I Quit” match by any other name). This match has shades of Sexy Star’s no màs match with Mariposa in season 2 right down to Xo’s “ffffuuck you!”, but admittedly this match is better structured. Jack and Xo have way better chemistry, and if you didn’t believe Xo could wrestle well beyond his gimmick before, you must believe it after this. Xo beats the hell out of Jack and Jack’s no slouch himself. In fact, the only thing that hurts this match is that they should have played up the very obvious homophobia subtext. Xo repeatedly calls Jack a bully and Ivelisse and Joey run in at different intervals to save Xo from Jack, but the emotional impact is a little lost without saying the obvious out loud. It’s good that they don’t make a huge deal out of Xo’s flamboyance but the build up for this match would have been a case where just being blunt would have served well.
Wait, did I say Joey Ryan and Ivelisse ran in for face interference? Xo handles this match well all by himself but that’s not to say both run ins didn’t help. Xo ultimately makes Jack submit and say “no màs” and sends Jack crawling to the back of the bridal line. And Joey celebrates with Xo and forces his own redemption face turn. What a time to be alive.
Main wedding event time! As Famous B officiates/announces, we finally get to see who Taya’s bridesmaids are: Beautiful Brenda and Cheerleader Melissa (aka Mariposa)! Beautiful Brenda quickly becomes a highlight of this ceremony with her running stream of White Girl Wasted commentary. I don’t even think she’s mic’d, you can just hear her. That’s the friend you need to have at every wedding. And even though it’s mostly her ring gear with a skirt and garters, I daresay Taya’s wedding dress is great and very much her style. Famous B asks if anyone objects to the marriage, we all rub our collars a bit and… Antonio appears! Turns out Antonio does not hate the Mundos and wants to give them a gift. The gift is…. DE—I mean tacos!
But wait, where’s Ricky? After delivering the rings and suffering further verbal punishment, he sits out in the audience. Taya and Johnny say some incredibly awesome and terrible vows to each other, and right before they seal the deal with a kiss—WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?
The monster Matanza comes barging in on the wedding looking for carnage! Yes, little Ricky finally had enough and cut the monster’s chains unbeknownst to everyone else. One has to wonder why Matanza ran straight for Johnny and Taya without prompting, but maybe he likes tacos. Matanza murderizes, murks, runs up on, et cetera the entire wedding party, including busting Taya’s face open and throwing her into the wedding cake. Brutal!
And so we end this episode on stunned silence, with promises that the carnage is not quite over yet! I can’t think of anything more dismaying than a brutish monster possessed by an Aztec God wrecking an expensive wedding, but I’ve been proven wrong before. We shall see what next week has in store!
