787 Talk: Zero Fear Or Limits – The Rise Of Pentagon Jr.

IMG Credit: Major League Wrestling

I was struggling for a topic this week. Then I realized the perfect topic was staring at my face almost literally every time I watched a show that wasn’t WWE. Pentagon Jr holds quite the unique privilege. He along with his brother Fenix appear in more televised wrestling promotions than any other wrestler. And by quite the insane margin too. This week alone Pentagon was featured in MLW Fusion, AAA Worldwide, CMLL Viernes Espectacular, Lucha Underground & Impact! Wrestling. That’s FIVE shows! The only reason Fenix isn’t in the same amount of shows is because he was “killed” last week on Lucha Underground. But he was there for the other four. Hijo del Fantasma/King Cuerno, Drago, Aerostar & Killer Kross get to appear for 3 of those 5 with CMLL & MLW being the excepcions. Think about that for a second. Outside of that group of people, the most other people can do is work 2 shows with ROH & NJPW. And I’m not even counting Video On Demand shows like PWG & AAW (guess who are there?).

After being bashed over the head with Pentagon, I figured I should talk about him as I had the privilege of watching him and Fenix from their debuts in 2012 for AAA. Like a total hipster. Except I’m very glad of how these two have exploded in popularity. But Pentagon stands above, especially after this week’s Lucha Underground and Impact! Wrestling. Impact had him and Fenix in the main event but in Lucha Underground, he shocked the crowd by being seated with them and attacking Cage. Afterwards cutting a very confident promo. Pentagon felt like a Megastar. But where did it begin?

Pentagon first appeared in AAA as ‘Dark Dragon’. He almost looked like Super Dragon from PWG and was nothing more than a filler wrestler for its insane amount of ‘Trios’ and ‘Atomicos’ tag team matches. He did nothing of note until ‘Guerra De Titanes 2012’. The year-end show for AAA where heel group ‘La Sociedad’ promised to exterminate two legends, Octagon and La Parka II. The legends duo recruited help from a wrestler who debuted earlier, Samuray Del Sol. And under Octagon’s tutelage, he was re-branded ‘Octagon Jr.’. Today you might know that wrestler as Kalisto. But who were their opponents? La Sociedad ordered Silver King to team up with two new recruits. The first one being La Parka Negra and the other was none other than Pentagon Jr. Rebranded after his stint as Dark Dragon.

AAA has a tradition of creating “dark” counterparts for crowd favorite wrestlers. Very much like NJPW has done with Tiger Mask/Black Tiger and Jushin Liger/Super Liger. This would be the fourth incarnation of a ‘Pentagon’, the opposite to Octagon and the first for La Parka with Parka Negra. Pentagon Jr got his “Jr” because of the debuting Octagon Jr. Pentagon and Fenix are not second generation wrestlers.

At first, Pentagon was nowhere near as captivating as he would become by his Lucha Underground debut. Being an evil counterpart to Octagon and Octagon Jr, he dressed similarly. Using very baggy ‘kung-fu’ inspired gi. He didn’t have facepaint, just a villanous looking version of Octagon’s mask with a few highlights. He looked dull. In contrast, Parka Negra (who was then played by ex-AAA Megachampion El Zorro) had an incredible look. A pure black style of La Parka’s look with red eyes and silver highlights as well as what looked like a satanic looking staff. Parka Negra breathed cool and his attitude was impressive. Every single match he was in, he would do his entrance before just charging to the ring and attacking his opponents at ringside. You could say he was Pentagon Jr before Pentagon Jr himself. It wasn’t until mid-2013 that he just started to find his look. And the look became a big thing for him as he became far more attractive to the crowds. The mix of facepaint and mask gave him his signature skeleton look and changing his gi for a far more modern look only aided that. He slowly started to find his confidence. Then Lucha Underground happened.

KB and guys in the WrestleZone Forums can attest. When Pentagon first appeared on the second episode of Lucha Underground and lost to Chavo Guerrero, I told everyone “watch that guy”. Most guys weren’t immediately impressed but others could see it just from his look. Weeks later he said he had a “Master” and started breaking people’s arms. So it started. Pentagon’s popularity sky-rocketed as the mystery grew. This amazing looking wrestler with such an intimidating character. It peaked with his amazing, bloody match against Vampiro at Ultima Lucha. Once the TV show started being more lenient with the US dates for its roster, many took advantage right away. PWG, AAW, Pentagon started to spread through the US. But it wasn’t all rainbows for the skeleton faced guy.

See, AAA is a curious company. If people think WWE’s creative seems to be in a weird bubble, shielded by their ego, AAA is ten times worse and without any of the success WWE has. Despite Pentagon’s popularity, AAA NEVER showed the interest in pushing him higher than being a midcarder or a guy to headline in Trios matches. Headlining Triplemania seemed out of Pentagon’s reach given AAA’s obsession with veterans and Psycho Clown (you could say he’s Mexican Roman Reigns, except not as talented in the ring). 2016 came and Pentagon’s contract was coming up. So to entice him to stay by 2017, he was given a feud with Psycho Clown and won Clown’s Latinamerican title. Except Psycho Clown headlined Triplemania. Pentagon defended the title in the midcard against Johnny Mundo. And lost. As the months went on, AAA positioned Pentagon and his group Los Perros Del Mal (inherited from the late Hijo del Perro Aguaya) became the top rudos of the show. He and Joe Lider won the Tag Team titles but was still not in the plans for headlining Triplemania. That was already locked to be Psycho Clown vs Dr Wagner Jr. So Pentagon left.

The parallels to Roman Reigns and CM Punk are somewhat scary.

Leaving AAA just seemed to open more doors for him as he started to be on high demand now in Mexico too. But he wouldn’t take the next step until the present. When Lucha Underground and Impact! Wrestling reached a working agreement. It was that and Alberto El Patron’s constant personal issues that opened the door for an unexpected occurrence when Pentagon won the Impact World title. Impact has put massive power on top of Pentagon, routinely headlining TV shows and even naming a pre-taped PPV after him. On top of that he and Sami Callihan are now the semi-main event of their upcoming Slammiversary show. In the revived MLW, Pentagon was the first challenger to it’s World title and then with Fenix became their first Tag Team Champions. In Lucha Underground, he’s World Champion and has been pushed stronger than any other character on the show. He’s been AAW Champion and it’s where said rivalry with Sami Callihan first started. In PWG he’s been Tag Team Champion with Fenix too. His popularity is such that both AAA and CMLL agreed to hire him while allowing him to work for the other company. And more over, he’s finally slated to headline Triplemania by being a part of it’s rather contrived ‘Poker of Aces’ match with he, LA Park, Hijo Del Fantasma and [that dang] Psycho Clown will face each other gambling their masks.

As such, Pentagon’s career comes full circle. His growth has been amazing. He is the biggest star not in WWE or NJPW/ROH today. From finding his way out of AAA’s constant booking turmoil to becoming a sensation through a new project in Lucha Underground, to breaking through and almost literally being in every wrestling promotion you can think of. What will the future hold for the man with Zero Fear? We will see, but it feels he can only get bigger from here.

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Thank you for reading. My name is AB Morales, Puertorican Dirt Sheet writer, a friend of KB for years. You can find and follow me here:

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