Lucha Strange Is Your New Obsession

Lucha Strange, the only YouTube show where you can see a wrestler rolled down a hill in a tire
Screenshot via Lucha Strange YouTube

Wrestlers are just like you and I. When they're penned up because of a quarantine from highly infectious disease, they start to get stir-crazy. While lucha libre promotions have started up doing some empty arena shows, it's just not scratching the itch for some of these wrestlers, Arez in particular. The freelancer whose big-time lucha work most recently has been for AAA has started a YouTube channel called Lucha Strange. So far, the channel has three videos, all of which feature him fighting against his fellow luchador cohorts, namely Latigo, Tromba, and Toxin.

If you're familiar with Dramatic Dream Team, specifically the Ironman Heavymetalweight Championship, then the conceit for this almost pop-up wrestling promotion will be familiar to you. In place of the belt is a small, golden plush figure of Arez himself that he "defends" in each video on the streets in Mexico. It's a fun and creative take on lucha using its surroundings to enhance the action. Perhaps the funnest part is that there's no steady referee; they just recruit passersby to make counts and check for submissions. The three videos run between seven and ten minutes apiece, so if you wanted, you could knock out the entire run right now and be ready for the fourth video, which if release patterns hold should drop this Thursday, June 11.

Longtime readers of the blog know that I love both gonzo wrestling and when wrestlers show entrepreneurial spirit enough to do their own thing on channels beyond what their parent companies would provide. As the Chuck Taylor Instagram 24/7 Championship innovated in the field of 90-seconds-or-less matches that still told an entire story, Arez brings cartoon shorts to life on the streets and back alleys of Mexico, in homes and shops. Again, it's only three episodes in, so you can pretty much get in on this on the ground floor. It's not just the lack of wrestling that's talking here though. I love this shit three episodes in, and I can't wait to see where they go, no matter how many more episodes they have in the tank.