El-P

ORIENTAL FETICHISM !!!!! "Smoke week everyday"

Raven vs Sean Waltman So, Jeff Hardy doens't show up. Thank God for drugs ! So instead of having to suffer through another abomination of a match, we get fucking 6-Pac instead and the best Raven showcase in more than a year ! Fat Raven hasn't looked very good for a long time, after an excellent first stint in TNA. No issue between the two, but it's kinda like a late 90's dream match of sorts. Waltman is all fired up and make Raven bleed immediately by rubbing his forehead in a cage segment. This is a House of Fun match, so it's all gimmicked up, ECW style, with not that much long term selling but heavy on garbage shots, bleeding buckets and keeping the pace relatively fast. Raven does beats the shit out of Waltman including a severe Singapore cane lashing, while asking the Kid to submit. Quite beautiful in its ECWness. Some neat transition, although Raven's execution is never the smoothest, but the ideas are there. Waltman looks as good as ever, almost, and this is quite the intense affair for a match thrown at the last moment. Some insane table spots which don't amount to much, but this is clearly leading toward chaos and shock and to a beautiful and brutal finish. Raven's facials and body language are as good as ever. Very good/excellent brawl. And the match of the PV too (Jarrett vs AJ Style wasn't that good, as Jarrett at this point is a lost cause to go beyond "solid at very best").

The more I read this thread, the more absurd it gets. So, pro-wrestling fans getting tired of US wrestling in the 90's got hooked on puroresu because of its "hypermasculinity" ? Like, Jushin Liger vs Great Sasuke and shit (don't even argue, the J-Cup was the gate for 90% of us) ? And the fact joshi was huge at the time, a validation of fandom through "hypermasculinity" too ? I think some people have major insecurity issues around there. Like, huge ones. I remember when I was reading the old DVDVR issues (the really old ones), which was a big part of me getting onto japanese stuff, among other things, in the late 90's, it was all about the absurdity of it all. Buckets of blood, kicks in the face, bitchy heeling, goofy clowing, cool masks, lumpy heavyweights and whatnot. I do think that some people take pro-wrestling way too fucking seriously nowadays. Which is too bad, because now is less the time than ever for this.

Honest question : why do you care ? Seriously ? What the fuck does that mean anyway ? Nothing. Unless you value other people's taste and opinion more than your own enjoyment of watching and pleasure you may take out of writing about the stuff you love. It's like bitching against a year-end list from Pitchfork (or NME or whatever). What is the point ? It has 0 value anyway. Only good way to act out is to write about the stuff you love, the best way possible, and if some people watch it and love it too (or even get interested) thanks to your writing, then it's cool (although you don't even have to know about it). That's about it.

Not sure I'd agree with the supposed negative cultural stereotype about Lucha though. As I said, I do think Lucha is actually the coolest form of pro-wrestling in pop culture because of it's very strong aesthetics. Again, there was (still is ?) a lucha bar in Paris,despite lucha not being showed on TV, ever, Puscifer's last album had a lucha theme. Maybe the in the very japanese oriented gamers community do you get more references to Japanese pro-wrestling (if at all), but I wouldn't be too sure about that. I never see any reference to puro anywhere. So, I do think there's an inherent "coolness" of lucha libre, at least from the outside, because it's visually pleasing while good ol' pro-wrestling still remains cheesy as shit. Hulk Hogan vs El Santo, whose picture do you really want in a cool urban spot ?

"Old man grapplelucha", as a mere concept, sounds quite awesome actually.

Same for me, watched the most big stuff lucha for the 2006 GWE poll. And most of what was pimped as great, I indeed found terrific. But it was a time where you couldn't yet get entire TV seasons for zilch like today, and I wouldn't spend a dime on wrestling anymore. There was always something else I really wanted to watch instead and when torrents appeared, it was easier getting your hands on shitload of Mid-south or Memphis TV seasons, stuff I was more curious about. I've been saying I'd watch WWC for ever now. Downloaded and deleted my stack a dozen times. You only got that much time and you get burned out and you have your odd little priorities (like watching old TNA). At some point, you've just gotta choose. Like I've been saying since the beginning : it's mostly contextual. In an odd way, the pro-wrestling TV that got me back watching as it happens and really have fun with it, first time since the very early 00's with ARSION, is Lucha Underground. Yeah, not exactly "lucha libre", but still. If I had to cut down to only one show to watch at this point, that would be it. Back to binge watching that S3 next week BTW. Can't wait.

Shoot-style is nazi wrestling. Lol.

Damn, in France I'd call you a "centriste".

With a guy dressed as a Tiger doing lucha spots. Kinda. Pro-wrestling is ridiculous. It sure is! And that's why it's great. Let's not kid ourselves. Last match I've enjoyed a lot (thought it was legit great actually) is an AJ Styles vs Abyss cage match from TNA 2005. Abyss. In my mind, a truck-driver (actually, a lawyer in kayfabe) with an S&M fetish badly playing a monster.

I know. UWF 1.0 still has lots of pro-style stuff like dropkicks and shit, only UWF 2.0 really found the way.

With a guy dressed as a Tiger doing lucha spots. Kinda. Pro-wrestling is ridiculous.

I never cared one bit about martial arts. Like, at all. I understood shoot-style immediately and it remains the most beautiful pro-wrestling style I've ever seen.

Actually, that's rather well put. Glad I'm neither here nor there though.

I also said lucha isn't actually "hard to get into". To me it's mostly all contextual. People have made good points about it like I said.

The way facts are presented in the title comes off as a bit whiny to me. Very "us vs them" mentality. It sets a predecent even before the discussion begins I think. Not that it should excuse "blah, lucha just sucks" kinda answers though. Did I ever say "lucha is inferior" ? I don't think I have. Plenty of people have expressed plenty of perfectly reasonnable ideas and conceptions of why they don't really get into it in this thread.

About immaturity, no offense Grim, but the very title of the thread came off pretty whiny to me. As it's often the case with lucha being discussed in comparison to Japan. Poooor lucha. Must be some kind of "higher art" in pro-wrestling that people not willing to "put the effort in" (please) just can't understand. I'm sorry, but that tone is a bit of a regular occurence when lucha is discussed, and as Charles mentionned, the fact purist lucha fans sometime have that kinda "high horse" attitude talking down to the puroresu-loving bozos who must be Evil Meltzer disciples and post-colonialist lazy pro-wrestling fans not able to understand a culture not permeated by US tropes. Whereas, as it been pointed many times, including by Goc, who no one will accuse me of agreeing with a whole lot usually, there are a lot of common elements between lucha and good ol' rasslin'. What is more foreign ? A bunch of clear defined heels and faces in colorful costumes with beatdowns and comebacks or a bunch of undistinctive japanese guys in black trunks, black books, no kneepads doing some bizarre back and forth, sudden quick selling strikes and odd looking selling ? There are reasons why, most of them contextuel. But Lucha ain't "hard to get". I said myself I never really "got it", but not in the way of "this is too foreign, this is too odd". Just in a "this isn't really drawing me completely", despite having seen some great old-school bloodletting. I would point out to a lot a stuff that have been talked bout, like announcing, production, presentation etc...

I couldn't stand Mundo in S1 either. The heel turn and the Taya connection in S2 did a lot of good. And I wasn't the biggest Puma fan either in S1. Fenix was a much better technico. Again, I warmed up to Puma toward the end of the season and in S2, with the great Muertes feud.

1A - 2B Check mate. Lucha Underground won.

Negro Casas really didn't showcase very much crossover appeal when he showed up in New Japan to me. He mostly looked like a fish out of water much like Barry Windham in All Japan a few years before, at a time he was arguably the best active US wrestler (yeah better than Flair). Those luchadors from the late 70's showing up against Fujinami on the other hand, they just blended easily and brought tons to the style that would become the "junior" style of NJ, which would evolve into the lucharesu, US cruiserweights, and X-div workers of the world. So, there. Lucha Libre may be my favourite pro-wrestling I don't actually like watching very much.

At least I learned that Mexico wasn't in the western world. Learnin' everyday about geopolitics thanks to good ol' pseudo intellectual pro-rasslin' debates. Joshi ? Blah. Who cares ? Women and creepy fans. Yeah, creepy fans (like that Mick Santa guy). Because those good'ol' boys from the South during the glory days of Memphis were great people ya know, chanting against faggots and raising ol' Glory. Hey, Trump is your new president, so I guess gotta turn everything into low-brow politic and moral arguments now. Lucha is fine. It's surprisingly still the most purely "popular" form of wrestling and the most "hipster" as well, thanks to its aesthetics. Pro-wrestling is cheesy. Always will be. Hulk fucking Hogan, bro. But Lucha Libre is cool in a B-movie kinda way. There was even a lucha themed bar in Paris, despite having no lucha TV at all in the country. That's interesting to me. Probably why Lucha Underground works too, because it's so heavy on aesthetics.

This. Pretty much. I've been a fan for more than 25 years now. Never really *got* lucha libre. And never ever got *into* it. Probably never will at this point. Don't care anymore. LU rules though. (not Lucha) I know. And ?

Only watched Charlotte Flair (since when ?) vs Sasha Banks, since I couldn't care less about the rest (Rusev in a stupid angle in the pre-show with a complete tool, what a waste of talent). I thought it felt a little bit too choreographed after the opening matwork section, with both girls going through their dance. It did pick it up with the first serious submission. And that Sasha bump on the stairs from the apron was a thing of beauty. Then was very good. Ok, so first fall had a nice slow build into it and I didn't think the equalizer came too awkwardly. Then the final third picked up and the match got excellent, then great despite... stupid booking. Which made the figue-four kinda weak in a way, and Sasha taping out three seconds before the bell doesn't make sense. A babyface either faints or just doesn't give up at this point. Of course one could argue she couldn't imagine the referee would be a complete dick a la Gorilla Monsoon with this sudden death overtime, which reeks of favoritism and kinda makes the whole thing booked like Sasha was the heel (really, giving up three seconds before the bell, and having to still defend her title with overtime). That aside, that overtime was all kinda great, with the damn hardway adding a dramatic visual aspect. Sasha really grew as a babyface worker, although I really wish she had the opportunity to be all bitchy and mean again. Charlotte has improved so much on the facials and attitude that it makes up for some shaky execution at times (those low dropkicks), she really brought a lot in term of character (everything Randy Orton tried to be but never managed to in term of predatory tactics). She overdoes it a tad at time, but she's a lot of fun to watch react to the dynamics of the match. Very involving. The booking is kinda baffling really, with Charlotte beating Sasha on PPV *again*. At this rate, Charlotte will beat her father's title record in a matter of two years. Only other negative, did this crowd suck or what ? They were dead for most of the match it seems. Did hurt the aura of the match, which deserved way better. Overall excellent, with a great final stretch. (despite the booking, but this company is useless on this matter anyway)

So that was the Third Face. How could I forgot ? But yeah. That elbowdrop on the concrete. Looked amazing but...

Well, I will watch Sasha vs Charlotte going 30 mn. If Rusev is on the card, I might watch him too.