Post by Manos del Muerte on May 21, 2007 2:29:03 GMT -6
[Fade up.]
[First, the two men jump down from the back. One of the two men is really not all that imposing. Average build, neat haircut with jeans and a tight T-shirt.]
[The other one, while no taller than the first, is massive. As he jumps out of the truck, the thing sways back and forth. He’s dressed in rockstar classic gear – old jeans, white T-shirt, black leather vest. His dark brown hair is long and hangs to his shoulders, his face darkened by both a scowl and a five o’clock shadow. This larger man extends his arm to help the young woman down out of the truck.]
[The woman is extremely pretty, but there’s something cold in her eyes. She wears a red halter top and black stretch pants, her face made up, her hair tied back. Hanging onto the large man’s arm, she swings down out of the truck cab, landing lightly on her feet.]
[The doors of the truck open and shut. Out of the drivers seat, a man, a man who we all recognize as Hidealgo 19 of the Manos del Muerte, jumps. He grins a shit-eating grin and ruffles his spiked hair with one hand.]
[The last of the men looks to be a good deal older than the others. His face is heavy and lined, with a five o’clock shadow and a thin mustache. While not the size of the one man, he’s fairly big himself.]
[Following the older looking man, the five head inside a building.]
Old guy: Here we are.
Hidealgo: So what, this is our new digs while we’re wrestling in POW?
Old guy: Yes. What do you think?
[Hidealgo looks around the building, and the camera follows his gaze. It’s not well furnished. Four beds against the back wall, a well furnished gym taking up half of the building, and a small kitchen.]
Hidealgo: Um…
Old guy: Yeah. Um.
Unassuming Guy: Seems to me that it’s exactly what we’re looking for.
Old guy: Precisely. Now…
[The big, scary-looking guy has walked off. He now comes back with a bunch of folding chairs tucked under one arm. Setting them up in a row, he sits down in the middle.]
Old guy: Let’s get this started. But first… something I want to make clear to all of you. I don’t EVER want to hear ANY of you speaking Spanish, on television, ever again.
Unassuming Guy: But why?
Old guy: Fortunately, since POW has few multilingual fans, no one was able to hear you and Hidealgo arguing like little brats about who lost the match, and who’s fault it was. But at the same time you sounded inane, like that damn Loony Toons Mouse… Seedy Gonzales.
Hidealgo: Speedy.
Old guy: YOU KNOW WHO I MEAN. Listen. We’re wrestling in Kentucky. People here are not familiar with Lucha Libre. I told them that Death Adder here knows Llave, they all said, what? Puroresu’s a bad word around this place. Foreign wrestling in general is a bad word.
Hidealgo: Half of them survived Lions Road. Can’t say I blame them.
Old guy: Indeed. And therefore, you will speak English at all times. Every single one of you. Bàrbaro, if you decide to speak, it damn well better be in English. Hidealgo, no shouting random words in Spanish. Clear?
Hidealgo: Yeah.
Old guy: Right. Now lets get the formal introductions started.
*****
[Camera’s on now. All four men – none wearing masks – face the camera. The young woman is angled in her chair, her legs crossed, not looking directly at the camera.]
Old guy: Power On Wrestling. It’s been a tough start for us, what with the incident in New England, and the two losses here in the Mid West. But that… is behind us. It takes time to adjust to a new federation… to new rules, to new people, to new styles. Now that this is under way, POW is on notice.
[He cracks his knuckles.]
Old guy: My real name doesn’t matter. You can call me Electric Head.
[From somewhere, he pulls out a blue and gold mask, pulling it down over his head.]
Electric: I’m the founding father of this stable. We, the five of us and a friend who stayed behind in Mexico, are the Manos del Muerte. In your language? The Hands of Death. Our little group has roots dating all the way back to 1995. Since then, we’ve gone on to become among the biggest stars in Mexico, and of fair reknown world wide. Bàrbaro, Death Adder and Hidealgo have wrestled as a trios tag team in Mexico, the UK and Australia, as well as in Japan. Our list of titles has grown long enough that I can’t remember them all.
Hidealgo: Maybe you’re getting senile, pops.
[Electric Head backhands Hidealgo, toppling his chair over and sending him sprawling to the floor.]
Electric: Can still kick your ass if you ever feel like trying it.
Hidealgo: S’ok.
[Electric Head turns back to the camera like nothing ever happened.]
Electric: The United States is the final frontier for the Manos del Muerte. Everywhere else we have walked, we have dominated. Everyone else we’ve faced, we’ve destroyed. Without the help of Cyber Raptor and the American Wild Child, we have leveled entire federations and walked out draped in gold, leaving them destitute. And while these last few weeks haven’t been impressive… that ends, now.
[The unassuming guy leans forward.]
Unassuming Guy: My name is also irrelevant. You will call me Death Adder.
[He, too, produces a mask, pulling it on over his head and lacing it as easily as you’d tie a shoe.]
Adder: Some people have said that I’m not interesting enough. That I’m a dull spot in the lineup of the Manos Del Muerte. I say… so what? Hidealgo talks. Bàrbaro talks without saying a word. Me?
[He points at his chest.]
Adder: I wrestle.
[He slowly clenches his fist. The bones in his hands crack as the joints shift.]
Adder: I’ve been doing this since 1992. I did things a little bit differently than most of you may have. People in this sport, tend to learn one style, or maybe two. They pick their place, be it Sports-Entertainment, Puroresu, Lucha Libre… and while they may adapt over the years, they stick to one thing. I’m not like that. I’ve done it all.
[Adder folds his arms like he’s praying.]
Adder: I’ve studied the noble art of puroresu.
[His voice suddenly takes on a country twang.]
Adder: I done did that there southern style wrasslin, y’awl.
[His accent changes to something more ‘sophisticated’]
Adder: Why I dare say I’ve even been to the old country and partaken in a spot of catch as catch can grappling.
[Hidealgo tries to hold back a laugh.]
Adder: Let me ask you all this. Do you know what Llave is? It’s what was invented when someone tried to combine the Puroresu junior heavyweight style with traditional Lucha Libre. The result was a fast paced submission based style of wrestling like no one had ever seen. Few people have been able to learn it successfully. I’m one of them. You, perhaps, think of wrestlers who can take you to the mat and tie you up, or who can fly around the ring. I can do both.
[Grin from behind the mask.]
Adder: At the same. Damn. Time.
[Electric Head looks at the camera.]
Electric: And he says he can’t talk. Tell you what… Hidealgo, why don’t you let Luz here have a chance to speak?
[The cold looking young woman turns to the camera.]
Woman: They have named me Luz Rojo. That means ‘Red Light’ in your language. Pay attention to me, and you may be lucky enough to find out why… from a distance. Get too close, and I’ll have to cut you.
[She smiles, still coldly.]
Luz: I am not a valet. I am a professional wrestler, who takes work as a MANAGER when there is no wrestling to be found. Women’s wrestling is harder to find, obviously, and while mixed competition against cruiserweights is something I have in the past done quite well at, no one has to tell me that my effectiveness in the ring against some of the 350 pound monsters that stomp around POW would be… nil. But don’t confuse that with what may happen outside it.
[She laughs. Sounds not unlike a witch, to be honest.]
Luz: The Manos del Muerte are good at winning. And I? I’m good at making sure they win. A DDT on the concrete can incapacitate anyone, and if you’ve decided to bring some sort of pretty morsel to the ring with you? …I’m 80% straight. The other 20% is when they cry. I don’t go back for seconds, either.
Adder: …you worry me when you talk like that.
Hidealgo: She scares me.
Electric: All yours, big guy.
[El Gran Bàrbaro sits with his knees apart. He leans forward to look straight into the camera.]
Bàrbaro: My name is El Gran Bàrbaro. Listen to my words well, as I do not care to talk, and will say more now than I will for the rest of my time here.
[He pulls out the brown and gold mask, and pulls it on over his head, leaving it untied in the back.]
Bàrbaro: In Mexico, they say I am a monster. A colossus, a juggernaut, an unstoppable force. I can lift any two luchadors with one hand. I could lift the biggest man on the POW roster above my head and throw him out of the ring. And yet I can do a back flip from a standing position. I can balance on the top rope – not the turnbuckle. Just the top rope. I possess the agility of any other luchador, and the power of all but the most monstrous giants in the sport. People fear me, and rightly so.
Bàrbaro: I lead the Manos del Muerte. I am not the technical wrestler that Death Adder is, not the talker that Hidealgo is, and not the coach and trainer that Electric Head is. I am the destroyer. I lead, and they follow.
[He sits back.]
Hidealgo: And lastly…
[Not waiting his turn.]
Hidealgo: I’ll admit it. I’m not the wrestler that Adder and Bàrbaro are. I can’t pronounce layvee or whatever, let alone DO it. And I don’t bench press tractor trailers for work and pickup trucks for fun. Maybe could coach, but I don’t have the patience for that. And the only time I make the women cry is when I leave the next morning. Lemme put it this way… You know the King of Rock? HE BOWS HIS HEAD TO ME, BABY!
[He laughs.]
Hidealgo: Hidealgo’s my name, 19’s the highest number of groupies I’ve gotten into my room at the same time. It ain’t the number of titles I’ve held, cos that’s WAY higher than 19. Tryin to put my title reigns on my name? Like trying to put a new stripe on the flag of, how you say, Los Estados Unidos every time they added a new state. Can you picture that with 50 stripes on it? Crazy.
[Another one of his trademark shit-eating grins.]
Hidealgo: Here in the Manos del Muerte, we all got our jobs. Bàrbaro provides concert security. PREEMPTIVE security. He’ll secure your shoulders to the mat for the three so damn fast and hard they’ll need a spatula to get you up again. Adder? He wrestles. You ain’t ever SEEN a man who can do what this guy does. He’s no snake, he’s a wizard. Little lady Luz? She tilts the slopes, smoothes the curves… clearly, she’s an expert on curves, wouldn’t you say? Head? Aside from having the second best taste in music in the world, he knows how things work. Wanna mix concert security, gratuitous sex appeal and wrestling wizardry? He’ll do it for you. And as for me… I talk.
Hidealgo: Like you haven’t noticed.
[Everyone except Bàrbaro nearly laughs. He just glares cos that’s what he does.]
Hidealgo: I contribute in the ring, of course. I play the hangover music, dotcha know. But what I do, is say what’s what. And what I have to say is… Final Cut? They will be addressed later. But they will also be made examples of. From now on, the Manos del Muerte prove why they have been one of the most dominant forces in the wrestling world. And Final Cut’s on some kind of undefeated run I understand. NOT NO MORE THEY AIN’T!
[He cracks his hands.]
Hidealgo: See you in a day, y’all.
[He walks over and turns off the camera.
[End.]
[First, the two men jump down from the back. One of the two men is really not all that imposing. Average build, neat haircut with jeans and a tight T-shirt.]
[The other one, while no taller than the first, is massive. As he jumps out of the truck, the thing sways back and forth. He’s dressed in rockstar classic gear – old jeans, white T-shirt, black leather vest. His dark brown hair is long and hangs to his shoulders, his face darkened by both a scowl and a five o’clock shadow. This larger man extends his arm to help the young woman down out of the truck.]
[The woman is extremely pretty, but there’s something cold in her eyes. She wears a red halter top and black stretch pants, her face made up, her hair tied back. Hanging onto the large man’s arm, she swings down out of the truck cab, landing lightly on her feet.]
[The doors of the truck open and shut. Out of the drivers seat, a man, a man who we all recognize as Hidealgo 19 of the Manos del Muerte, jumps. He grins a shit-eating grin and ruffles his spiked hair with one hand.]
[The last of the men looks to be a good deal older than the others. His face is heavy and lined, with a five o’clock shadow and a thin mustache. While not the size of the one man, he’s fairly big himself.]
[Following the older looking man, the five head inside a building.]
Old guy: Here we are.
Hidealgo: So what, this is our new digs while we’re wrestling in POW?
Old guy: Yes. What do you think?
[Hidealgo looks around the building, and the camera follows his gaze. It’s not well furnished. Four beds against the back wall, a well furnished gym taking up half of the building, and a small kitchen.]
Hidealgo: Um…
Old guy: Yeah. Um.
Unassuming Guy: Seems to me that it’s exactly what we’re looking for.
Old guy: Precisely. Now…
[The big, scary-looking guy has walked off. He now comes back with a bunch of folding chairs tucked under one arm. Setting them up in a row, he sits down in the middle.]
Old guy: Let’s get this started. But first… something I want to make clear to all of you. I don’t EVER want to hear ANY of you speaking Spanish, on television, ever again.
Unassuming Guy: But why?
Old guy: Fortunately, since POW has few multilingual fans, no one was able to hear you and Hidealgo arguing like little brats about who lost the match, and who’s fault it was. But at the same time you sounded inane, like that damn Loony Toons Mouse… Seedy Gonzales.
Hidealgo: Speedy.
Old guy: YOU KNOW WHO I MEAN. Listen. We’re wrestling in Kentucky. People here are not familiar with Lucha Libre. I told them that Death Adder here knows Llave, they all said, what? Puroresu’s a bad word around this place. Foreign wrestling in general is a bad word.
Hidealgo: Half of them survived Lions Road. Can’t say I blame them.
Old guy: Indeed. And therefore, you will speak English at all times. Every single one of you. Bàrbaro, if you decide to speak, it damn well better be in English. Hidealgo, no shouting random words in Spanish. Clear?
Hidealgo: Yeah.
Old guy: Right. Now lets get the formal introductions started.
*****
[Camera’s on now. All four men – none wearing masks – face the camera. The young woman is angled in her chair, her legs crossed, not looking directly at the camera.]
Old guy: Power On Wrestling. It’s been a tough start for us, what with the incident in New England, and the two losses here in the Mid West. But that… is behind us. It takes time to adjust to a new federation… to new rules, to new people, to new styles. Now that this is under way, POW is on notice.
[He cracks his knuckles.]
Old guy: My real name doesn’t matter. You can call me Electric Head.
[From somewhere, he pulls out a blue and gold mask, pulling it down over his head.]
Electric: I’m the founding father of this stable. We, the five of us and a friend who stayed behind in Mexico, are the Manos del Muerte. In your language? The Hands of Death. Our little group has roots dating all the way back to 1995. Since then, we’ve gone on to become among the biggest stars in Mexico, and of fair reknown world wide. Bàrbaro, Death Adder and Hidealgo have wrestled as a trios tag team in Mexico, the UK and Australia, as well as in Japan. Our list of titles has grown long enough that I can’t remember them all.
Hidealgo: Maybe you’re getting senile, pops.
[Electric Head backhands Hidealgo, toppling his chair over and sending him sprawling to the floor.]
Electric: Can still kick your ass if you ever feel like trying it.
Hidealgo: S’ok.
[Electric Head turns back to the camera like nothing ever happened.]
Electric: The United States is the final frontier for the Manos del Muerte. Everywhere else we have walked, we have dominated. Everyone else we’ve faced, we’ve destroyed. Without the help of Cyber Raptor and the American Wild Child, we have leveled entire federations and walked out draped in gold, leaving them destitute. And while these last few weeks haven’t been impressive… that ends, now.
[The unassuming guy leans forward.]
Unassuming Guy: My name is also irrelevant. You will call me Death Adder.
[He, too, produces a mask, pulling it on over his head and lacing it as easily as you’d tie a shoe.]
Adder: Some people have said that I’m not interesting enough. That I’m a dull spot in the lineup of the Manos Del Muerte. I say… so what? Hidealgo talks. Bàrbaro talks without saying a word. Me?
[He points at his chest.]
Adder: I wrestle.
[He slowly clenches his fist. The bones in his hands crack as the joints shift.]
Adder: I’ve been doing this since 1992. I did things a little bit differently than most of you may have. People in this sport, tend to learn one style, or maybe two. They pick their place, be it Sports-Entertainment, Puroresu, Lucha Libre… and while they may adapt over the years, they stick to one thing. I’m not like that. I’ve done it all.
[Adder folds his arms like he’s praying.]
Adder: I’ve studied the noble art of puroresu.
[His voice suddenly takes on a country twang.]
Adder: I done did that there southern style wrasslin, y’awl.
[His accent changes to something more ‘sophisticated’]
Adder: Why I dare say I’ve even been to the old country and partaken in a spot of catch as catch can grappling.
[Hidealgo tries to hold back a laugh.]
Adder: Let me ask you all this. Do you know what Llave is? It’s what was invented when someone tried to combine the Puroresu junior heavyweight style with traditional Lucha Libre. The result was a fast paced submission based style of wrestling like no one had ever seen. Few people have been able to learn it successfully. I’m one of them. You, perhaps, think of wrestlers who can take you to the mat and tie you up, or who can fly around the ring. I can do both.
[Grin from behind the mask.]
Adder: At the same. Damn. Time.
[Electric Head looks at the camera.]
Electric: And he says he can’t talk. Tell you what… Hidealgo, why don’t you let Luz here have a chance to speak?
[The cold looking young woman turns to the camera.]
Woman: They have named me Luz Rojo. That means ‘Red Light’ in your language. Pay attention to me, and you may be lucky enough to find out why… from a distance. Get too close, and I’ll have to cut you.
[She smiles, still coldly.]
Luz: I am not a valet. I am a professional wrestler, who takes work as a MANAGER when there is no wrestling to be found. Women’s wrestling is harder to find, obviously, and while mixed competition against cruiserweights is something I have in the past done quite well at, no one has to tell me that my effectiveness in the ring against some of the 350 pound monsters that stomp around POW would be… nil. But don’t confuse that with what may happen outside it.
[She laughs. Sounds not unlike a witch, to be honest.]
Luz: The Manos del Muerte are good at winning. And I? I’m good at making sure they win. A DDT on the concrete can incapacitate anyone, and if you’ve decided to bring some sort of pretty morsel to the ring with you? …I’m 80% straight. The other 20% is when they cry. I don’t go back for seconds, either.
Adder: …you worry me when you talk like that.
Hidealgo: She scares me.
Electric: All yours, big guy.
[El Gran Bàrbaro sits with his knees apart. He leans forward to look straight into the camera.]
Bàrbaro: My name is El Gran Bàrbaro. Listen to my words well, as I do not care to talk, and will say more now than I will for the rest of my time here.
[He pulls out the brown and gold mask, and pulls it on over his head, leaving it untied in the back.]
Bàrbaro: In Mexico, they say I am a monster. A colossus, a juggernaut, an unstoppable force. I can lift any two luchadors with one hand. I could lift the biggest man on the POW roster above my head and throw him out of the ring. And yet I can do a back flip from a standing position. I can balance on the top rope – not the turnbuckle. Just the top rope. I possess the agility of any other luchador, and the power of all but the most monstrous giants in the sport. People fear me, and rightly so.
Bàrbaro: I lead the Manos del Muerte. I am not the technical wrestler that Death Adder is, not the talker that Hidealgo is, and not the coach and trainer that Electric Head is. I am the destroyer. I lead, and they follow.
[He sits back.]
Hidealgo: And lastly…
[Not waiting his turn.]
Hidealgo: I’ll admit it. I’m not the wrestler that Adder and Bàrbaro are. I can’t pronounce layvee or whatever, let alone DO it. And I don’t bench press tractor trailers for work and pickup trucks for fun. Maybe could coach, but I don’t have the patience for that. And the only time I make the women cry is when I leave the next morning. Lemme put it this way… You know the King of Rock? HE BOWS HIS HEAD TO ME, BABY!
[He laughs.]
Hidealgo: Hidealgo’s my name, 19’s the highest number of groupies I’ve gotten into my room at the same time. It ain’t the number of titles I’ve held, cos that’s WAY higher than 19. Tryin to put my title reigns on my name? Like trying to put a new stripe on the flag of, how you say, Los Estados Unidos every time they added a new state. Can you picture that with 50 stripes on it? Crazy.
[Another one of his trademark shit-eating grins.]
Hidealgo: Here in the Manos del Muerte, we all got our jobs. Bàrbaro provides concert security. PREEMPTIVE security. He’ll secure your shoulders to the mat for the three so damn fast and hard they’ll need a spatula to get you up again. Adder? He wrestles. You ain’t ever SEEN a man who can do what this guy does. He’s no snake, he’s a wizard. Little lady Luz? She tilts the slopes, smoothes the curves… clearly, she’s an expert on curves, wouldn’t you say? Head? Aside from having the second best taste in music in the world, he knows how things work. Wanna mix concert security, gratuitous sex appeal and wrestling wizardry? He’ll do it for you. And as for me… I talk.
Hidealgo: Like you haven’t noticed.
[Everyone except Bàrbaro nearly laughs. He just glares cos that’s what he does.]
Hidealgo: I contribute in the ring, of course. I play the hangover music, dotcha know. But what I do, is say what’s what. And what I have to say is… Final Cut? They will be addressed later. But they will also be made examples of. From now on, the Manos del Muerte prove why they have been one of the most dominant forces in the wrestling world. And Final Cut’s on some kind of undefeated run I understand. NOT NO MORE THEY AIN’T!
[He cracks his hands.]
Hidealgo: See you in a day, y’all.
[He walks over and turns off the camera.
[End.]