Xplosion Nacional de Lucha Libre
Good Table Restaurant (Santiago, Chile)
This would be the first Chilean pro wrestling match I ever watched. I will probably watch some more.
Overall, this felt like a good Lucha indie match where you see some cool moves and neat spots, but with very little in the way of polish. That is about what I expected going in. All the dives looked fine. There were some creative flying moves that looked good and there was some that didn’t, but that’s fine. What surprised me the most was that all six guys worked relatively stiff. The striking was one of the better (or at least pleasantly surprising) elements of the match.
The easy comparison would be to Chikara (lucha that is not quite lucha), but I don’t think that is entirely on the spot. I got more of a pre-ROH Jersey All-Pro Wrestling feeling from it – some athletic guys mixing flying with generally stiff work to mixed (but never dull) results. Like with that era of JAPW where you could see a bunch of guys like Dixie, Deranged, Homicide, Izzy and whoever else had a lot of talent even if they were still putting it together, you can see that all of these guys have varying degrees of potential.
Xtra Large – both from what I have gathered and what I saw in this match – is the star at least out of these six. He tours NOAH this month while his partner – Hellspawn – heads to Mexico. XL was clearly the most polished in the group, hit some nice dives, and worked really snug. He seemed like a decent bumper too. Everyone worked hard and nobody stood out as being the weak link, however.
At least one Chilean wrestling fan called this match the best his country as ever seen. The six wrestlers got a big standing ovation post-match so certainly there were others who were impressed to. That probably says more about the state of pro wrestling in Chile than anything else, but there were a lot of positive elements to the match.
Spot Fest | Watchable | Spectacle
