Why does puro get so much love? Why does lucha get so dismissed?

[Mrzfn]

For me it boils down to the fact that Lucha mostly sucks.

 

Boooo.

 

I'm probably not savvy enough to break down the various reasons for the divide better than those before me have done, but I will say on a personal level I checked out the pair of Volador Jr/Barbaro Cavernario matches CMLL did in Sep/Oct and I thought they were as good as just about anything I saw in the G1 Climax this year.

[JerryvonKramer]

The thing that makes Negro Casas great is that he doesn't wrestle like a luchadore, ditto Mocha Cota and other Lucha people I like.

[Eduardo]

What does wrestling like a luchador entail or even mean to you? Negro Casas, Mocha Cota, El Hijo del Santo, Perro Aguayo, Brazo de Plata don't wrestle anything like one another, and they are all luchadores.

[JerryvonKramer]

For me it means floaty dance wrestling in which nothing makes much sense and moves lack impact.

[Eduardo]

Lol. It's cool if people don't like it or 'get it', but there are so many different styles and forms within lucha libre that that description makes no sense. It's the same shit in certain music circles when I've seen people write of Mexican music all together, when there are so many different styles and traditions.

[GOTNW]

For me it means floaty dance wrestling in which nothing makes much sense and moves lack impact.

When's the last time you were in an actual real life fight or a combat competition.

[Herodes]

Reposting something I wrote post-GWE:

 

 

This leads into the wider question of the influence of American imperialism in the context of GWE and pro wrestling, which is undoubtedly true. I think it's worth exploring. There is the obvious power of influence of US wrestling which most if not all of us grew up on, but the question is then for the subset of fans like us who expanded our horizon beyond the mainstream of what we saw on TV as children, why do so many disproportionately flock to "traditional" Japanese wrestling rather than lucha, or shoot style, or world of sport. All are very much readily available now but we are told the latter styles are niche, difficult to "understand" or "get" and other similar language which reinforces the notion of what is mandatory to consider for GWE and what can be easily dismissed and disposed of outside of some obvious token picks.

 

In many aspects the story of traditional Japanese wrestling is offensive; relatively few years after two nuclear bombs were dropped on the country by the US, the Japanese are willing to passively accept this American import while the horrors of Nagasaki and Hiroshima are so fresh is beyond belief. Beyond some concessions to the host culture to make the style more conservative, it is nevertheless the same fundamental American product forced wholesale upon the same people who were nuked. However, when the American standard is challenged, in the form of shoot style which rooted itself proudly in the native martial arts traditions, western audiences are not ready to accept its legitimacy alongside imported new Japan and all Japan wrestling which is much more aligned to "correct" wrestling.

 

Similarly lucha has always for the most part been completely ignored beyond the surface and to this day we hear the same stock dismissals about "not getting it". The entire wrestling culture of Mexico quickly developed its own traditions and conventions, it's own style of working and even movement, very much tied closely to its own host culture and proudly so, until recent years not conceding to its geographical neighbour and in a defiant manner. So relative to its place in its culture, western influenced fans can so nonchalantly ignore it yet embrace traditional Japanese wrestling which fits much more neatly in the comfort zone.

 

If anything the project has been fascinating and it really is a snapshot of fandom in more ways than one. Primarily it shows how early wrestling criticism is in its evolution, we are now at the point where we can acknowledge token entries like Casas or Dandy based on legitimate championing, by only willing to sample a small set of curated picks while still enforcing the perception of lucha as "the other" but never to the point where it can be thought of on equal terms with the American hegemony. The final list serves as a reminder than in 2016, while "the other" has made in roads, we are still not at the stage where we can truly argue the case for the "niche" as an equal without being dismissed as contrarian.

 

The main point is that the narrative of Japanese wrestling is a direct reaction to America, it's evolution and style is heavily influenced by the west and there was always major western presence throughout its entire history giving it an easy accessibility to the western fan. While more conservative in its nature, it developed in the western tradition. Whereas Mexico, while a geographical neighbor, developed independently and its tropes, characters, rhythms and style consigns it to being "the other" as it explicitly rejected the American influence and became its own entity and mythology. We are still at the stage where the majority struggle to "get it" as seen through the prism of western influence but there is nothing inherently difficult about the style unless we seek to judge it solely on western standards which lead to wholesale dismissals of no psychology, no selling, looks fake etc. But those criticisms carry no weight if the fan refuses to engage with it except by American standards thereby ignoring the context and failing to understand that it has its own cultural identity. We see our first Japanese tapes and see many familiar faces and a familiar style and narrative, whereas we see lucha for the first time and see what appears to be chaos that lacks familiar conventions. The old Mexican lady at arena colisseo "gets it" which means it is valid.

[goc]

For me it means floaty dance wrestling in which nothing makes much sense and moves lack impact.

Aren't you the person who just marked out over a Dragon Gate match?

 

Give me lucha over puro any day. It has characters, hatred, selling and tons of personality. That's what good wrestling is.

 

Japanese wrestling is just like someone saw American wrestling and said "oh this is cool but I'm gonna remove all the promos and characters, take out a bunch of the selling and make all the matches needlessly long"

 

Aww but the moves "lack impact." I guess they need to add in the burning hammers, backdrop suplexes and Ganso (Golden) Bombs so that everyone in lucha can be completely broken down (or dead) by the time they hit their mid/late 40s like the vaunted Four Pillars.

[JerryvonKramer]

Just comes down to what you like, it is what it is.

 

I don't like lucha and I don't like shoot style. You don't like puro. The world keeps turning.

[goc]

Just comes down to what you like, it is what it is.

 

I don't like lucha and I don't like shoot style. You don't like puro. The world keeps turning.

Why are you falling back on the "personal taste" argument now? You're the one who came blazing into this thread with your hot take that "lucha mostly sucks" instead of saying there was any personal taste involved.

[JerryvonKramer]

 

Just comes down to what you like, it is what it is.

 

I don't like lucha and I don't like shoot style. You don't like puro. The world keeps turning.

Why are you falling back on the "personal taste" argument now? You're the one who came blazing into this thread with your hot take that "lucha mostly sucks" instead of saying there was any personal taste involved.

 

The question asked was "Why does puro get so much love? Why does lucha get so dismissed?"

 

My answer was "it's cos lucha mostly sucks" (clearly an opinion).

[fxnj]

The anti-lucha and pro-lucha people seem to talking past each other. Chalking the difference in views up to some invisible racism against Mexican culture or American colonialism might allow you to enjoy a moral high horse, but it's not going to sway anyone to your side.

 

Plenty of people here have expressed enjoyment of the big pimped matches while pointing out specific things that stop them from following the overall product. It's like if I was trying to sell the board on workrate US indy wrestling and, instead of addressing any of the common complaints or breaking down why the matches are great, I rushed into blaming people's inability to get it on some hegemony of mainstream promotions. Could something like that be true? Possibly, but no one is going to take such an argument seriously if they weren't already a fan of the style.

 

I also notice that despite lucha fans repeatedly talking up how diverse it is, there is a strong focus on a single company with a highly restrictive style (CMLL). Meanwhile, the other major promotion in AAA seems to largely fall by the wayside despite being much more accessible to fans of US wrestling.

[Herodes]

Apparently I've been tainted with the dreaded "SJW" label over on twitter for using long words. Well let's embrace the post-Trump anti-intellectualism and reduce the argument to "Puro sucks" (I'm not up to date on my YouTube videos....is this what the right call "virtue signaling"?)

[JerryvonKramer]

It's not anti-intellectual to mock the idea that a suplex is a form American imperialism or that a reverse knife edge is symbolic of Japanese cultural capitulation post-Hiroshima.

 

These claims are absurd and someone needs to tell you that they are. Say stupid shit and expect to get called out for it. Tis the way of the world.

[Herodes]

I'm inclined to dismiss anyone over the age of 12 who uses the term "SJW", a refuge of the lazy and easily influenced. It may be easy to mock amongst the lads on twitter, but the reading of Puro as seen through the viewpoint of the American wrestling tradition should be rather obvious, but perhaps the discussion is a lost cause with someone who unironically labels others as SJWs.

[WingedEagle]

 

For me it means floaty dance wrestling in which nothing makes much sense and moves lack impact.

When's the last time you were in an actual real life fight or a combat competition.

 

 

Almost all real life fights or combat competitions are horribly boring. Not something to emulate for entertainment purposes.

[GOTNW]

 

 

For me it means floaty dance wrestling in which nothing makes much sense and moves lack impact.

When's the last time you were in an actual real life fight or a combat competition.

 

 

Almost all real life fights or combat competitions are horribly boring. Not something to emulate for entertainment purposes.

I disagree, and judging by the fact UFC is worth more than the WWE and their public perceptions most people seem to as well.

[WingedEagle]

 

 

 

For me it means floaty dance wrestling in which nothing makes much sense and moves lack impact.

When's the last time you were in an actual real life fight or a combat competition.

 

 

Almost all real life fights or combat competitions are horribly boring. Not something to emulate for entertainment purposes.

I disagree, and judging by the fact UFC is worth more than the WWE and their public perceptions most people seem to as well.

 

 

That's got zero to do with the quality of the fights. They've done a better job creating stars in recent years than WWE, although even if WWE did a great job of it they'd never see the same TV money.

[JerryvonKramer]

I'm inclined to dismiss anyone over the age of 12 who uses the term "SJW", a refuge of the lazy and easily influenced. It may be easy to mock amongst the lads on twitter, but the reading of Puro as seen through the viewpoint of the American wrestling tradition should be rather obvious, but perhaps the discussion is a lost cause with someone who unironically labels others as SJWs.

Dismiss all you want, call "SJW-ism" what you want I've given up looking for an acceptable label, it's a cancerous form of thinking for which I have zero time and even less patience.

 

The Japanese adopted the form, so what?

 

Americans were heels in Japan post-WW2 for obvious reasons. The Funks have talked about how with the older generation, there was mutual animosity and genuine hatred between Japanese and Americans. It figures, they were at war. People did nasty things on both sides. The atrocity of Hiroshima and so on also. That stuff isn't going to fade easily.

 

But to call the Japanese appropriation of an American form as a form of imperialism is ... just stupid. Nothing to do with it. JWA made money. NJPW and AJPW both made money. They were in the business of making money. If they were doing that by pumping WWF straight into Japanese households, you might have a point, but they didn't. They made unmistakably Japanese stuff for a Japanese market. Just like World of Sport is unmistakably British, and Lucha is unmistakably Mexican, etc. etc. Wrestling by its nature has a habit of reflecting the character and values of its host nation.

 

The idea that Gotch or Thesz were importing "hegemony" is just a load of old wank and nothing else. That EVIL Rikidozan!!! What a terrible man hoisting this American form onto the innocent and unsuspecting Japanese! Talking total crap.

[Matt D]

I'm glad Parv's doubled back to at least try to engage this. It's not something that should be dismissed out of hand. Granted, a little more maturity and a little less snark might be the adult way to go? Right now it comes off as you being defensive as much as anything else.

[fxnj]

I'm inclined to dismiss anyone over the age of 12 who uses the term "SJW", a refuge of the lazy and easily influenced. It may be easy to mock amongst the lads on twitter, but the reading of Puro as seen through the viewpoint of the American wrestling tradition should be rather obvious, but perhaps the discussion is a lost cause with someone who unironically labels others as SJWs.

The deep flaws underlying your argument were pointed out even when you posted it the first time, so I don't see why you would take such offense at getting called out for them when you repost it.

 

Treating puro as the lone product of American imperialism is racist in itself. You paint a narrative of the Japanese as powerless victims, failing to account for their own agency in accepting pro wrestling and the historical booking style of the native wrestlers triumphing over monster foreigners as a way of rebuilding national pride after WW2. You also fail to account for how those nationalist undertones led to the development of puro as its own tradition with its own innovations that might seem alien to traditional American wrestling fans; namely, fighting spirit spots, finisher kick outs, and the aforementioned extended strike exchanges. Ironically, all three of those things seem pretty well maligned by the lucha crowd you paint as so accepting of cultural differences

 

Mexico is also far from an island. There has been quite a bit of influence from lucha on wrestling in the US and Japan going back to the 70's both in terms of incorporating things from the style and exchanging talent. If lucha was such an alien style, you wouldn't see NJPW sending guys to CMLL to refine their craft or AAA freely incorporating workers from US promotions.

[soup23]

Why does joshi get so dismissed? No one that was a joshi worker finished in the top 25 of GWE. Honestly, I have watched a good bit of joshi in 2016 along with lucha and I prefer the output of the Joshi.

[JerryvonKramer]

There may be cultural reasons why Japanese wrestling connects with me specifically (or anyone else) than does lucha, but it would probably have more to do with the fact that Britain and Japan probably have more cultural cross-over points than do Britain and Mexico.

 

I suspect, though, that the reasons are just a lot less complicated than this. I like grown men hitting each other very hard in the chest and maybe doing a suplex or two. Puro gives me that and lucha doesn't. Sometimes the answers aren't very complex.

[GOTNW]

 

 

 

 

For me it means floaty dance wrestling in which nothing makes much sense and moves lack impact.

When's the last time you were in an actual real life fight or a combat competition.

 

 

Almost all real life fights or combat competitions are horribly boring. Not something to emulate for entertainment purposes.

I disagree, and judging by the fact UFC is worth more than the WWE and their public perceptions most people seem to as well.

 

 

That's got zero to do with the quality of the fights. They've done a better job creating stars in recent years than WWE, although even if WWE did a great job of it they'd never see the same TV money.

 

As long as people continue to pay and enjoy shows they pay insanely high ticket prices and PPV money for your statement that "almost all real life fights or combat competitions are horribly boring" simply isn't relevant.

[Matt D]

 

 

 

For me it means floaty dance wrestling in which nothing makes much sense and moves lack impact.

When's the last time you were in an actual real life fight or a combat competition.

 

 

Almost all real life fights or combat competitions are horribly boring. Not something to emulate for entertainment purposes.

I disagree, and judging by the fact UFC is worth more than the WWE and their public perceptions most people seem to as well.

 

Just to muddy the waters further, I wonder sometimes how much your distinct opinions about "realism" in wrestling have to do with when you were born relative to most of the rest of us. In that you've come into watching wrestling in a world where MMA is a much more fully developed sport. It takes up a cultural space. I've likened it to how learning more about science in the 20s-60s changed Science Fiction and what was accepted and not accepted as tropes. We've learned more about fighting and it seems to color your opinions more than it does a lot of us who have been watching since the 80s or early 90s.