Underground Wrestling

Well I have solved the mystery of whatever happened to John Morrison.  We haven’t discussed him since he appeared on an episode of Resistance Pro Wrestling in October 2012.  Now he has surfaced on a weekly Mexican wrestling show called Lucha Underground where he is known as “Johnny Mundo.”

His look and attitude have not changed — he is cocky, dextrous, gorgeous, and flirty.  I’ve missed my buff, talented JoMo and his chesty physique — it feels good to see him in the ring again doing what he gets off on!

This match against Prince Puma (whom you may recognize from his unusual tattoos as Indy wrestler, Ricochet) appeared on the November 1st episode of Lucha Underground.

I’m not sure how I got so lucky to be able to watch this series.  I found it recently on one of those Spanish channels — UniMás or something — way up high in my channels.  I don’t even speak Spanish, so I’m often not sure what’s happening on Lucha Underground until somebody recaps it in English, but I still enjoy the wrestling and the bodies of course.

Don’t you just love it when you’re flipping around in your television channels and stumble upon a rare new source of pro wrestling content?  It’s one of my favorite things, like discovering a fun new toy that someone stuck in the toy box a while ago, or finding a crumbled $10 bill in your pocket.

The wrestling action on Lucha Underground isn’t my usual cup of tea.  There is more flipping and running than I’d prefer, but still some mouth-watering grappling like this sexy Leg Nelson applied by Puma.  The suffering is gorgeous.   The show is filmed like a movie — the frame-rate and the camera angles very cinematic, it’s hard to describe.  The between-match scenes are also more melodramatic than other wrestling shows as well, like a Mexican telenovela.

The theme of most episodes of Lucha Underground seems to be: “Let’s beat the fuck out of pretty-boy Johnny Mundo.”  Maybe that should be the sub-title of the program.  Johnny’s hard body takes a pretty solid thumping, often from multiple assailants, and now you’re grasping why I get into this show even though I don’t speak the language…

The production quality is high, the gear is spectacular (although more skin is concealed than in our typical trunks ‘n boots costume), and I foresee myself getting roped into the storyline and actually caring when poor Johnny suffers another humiliating set-back.

One got the sense that this always-popular, always-fit Superstar was unfairly dismissed from his most famous role and couldn’t find a well paying gig in the USA.  So he was forced to find work south of the border where he must endure gut-wrenching punishment and abuse.

Maybe the Mexican wrestlers resent him because he is white and American and had been a huge success.  Maybe they’re extra hard on him in the ring, kicking and punching him during his matches because he is an entitled pretty-boy “Gringo.”  This sort of back-story can add more flavor and excitement to the in-ring action — like a porno that bothers to develop the plot before they just start banging away.

Of course they just can’t end the show with Johnny defeating Prince Puma fair and square and happily celebrating with his former rival/new boyfriend.  No – a gang of street thugs must storm into the ring and beat down the two hunks, stretching out their hard stomachs so they can punch them with gloved fists.

The huge black guy in jeans is called “Big Ryk” (rhymes with “Big Dick.”)  He is also a former American superstar — Ezekial Jackson.  I used to dig seeing him in his stretchy red boner trunks.  Big Ryk is the clear Alpha Male in this gang of thugs — the unbeatable beast — the Big Monster on Campus.  They love to film him standing in the jizz-on-his-chest pose over poor, broken Johnny Mundo.

Some of you are thinking: We’ve SEEN this unfair JoMo abuse before, this is nothing new.  He was beaten down by everyone in the WWE including by Ezekial Jackson (and the commentary was in English), so what is so innovative, fresh, or exciting about this?!

What’s great, for me, is that it’s a new context, a different venue, a different language.

He is now suffering on a creative new program in an “underground” federation in a different nation. Relocating JoMo to a foreign country and continuing his public humiliation there, before a foreign audience, just adds to the cruelty and unfairness of it, and makes it feel somehow different and novel in my brain, like getting some strange once in a while.

So check your local listings for “Lucha Underground” and set your DVR.  Some of you horn-dogs have probably already done so.