Chavo Guerrero Jr. (right) in a scene from the wrestling series, Lucha Underground, by Emmy Award-winning producer Mark Burnett.

It was a meltingly hot October day outside the East Los Angeles warehouse converted to a wrestling ring. Inside, things were about to get equally torrid.

In match after match, as about 400 fans cheered and whooped, heavily muscled men executed high-flying leaps to slam their opponents to the floor. Some wore fearsome disguises to conceal their identities. In one match, the male wrestlers competed - shockingly - with a woman.

But this was far from a neighborhood event done on the fly. It was a taping of the ambitious 39-episode TV series Lucha Underground, a reimagined version of Mexico's grand tradition of lucha libre wrestling that aired on filmmaker Robert Rodriguez's El Rey network on Wednesday.

Fans on hand that day knew to expect the fast-paced, aerial action and florid drama that the sport with often-masked competitors delivers. They also applauded a group contest featuring a guy decked in a pink leotard and a bouffant of red curls and a little person competing against far bigger rivals, part of lucha libre's comedic edge.

All this in the raw, unfinished interior of a vast warehouse converted to a studio, its walls covered with atmospheric graffiti and bold paintings of ancient icons of Mexico's pre-Columbian Aztec and other cultures - a Rodriguez film come to life, as one wrestler happily observed.

Rodriguez, whose movies include the gritty Sin City and From Dusk Till Dawn as well as the charming Spy Kids, sounds almost like a delighted kid himself when he talks about Lucha Underground.

"For fans of lucha from Mexico, we're adding to it, making it even more mythical and exciting than it's ever been presented before," he says. "And for new fans it will feel like a new thing as well."

The series combines wrestling matches, slices of backstage conflict and a story arc that connects the action, with pro wrestlers plucked from North America and Mexico as its stars.

The series' home, El Rey, is a hybrid itself. Rodriguez founded the fledgling network to address the lack of English-language programming with a Latino sensibility, but it's aimed at a general audience - with young men and what Rodriguez has called "kick-ass females" especially welcome.

The "luchadores" of Lucha Underground include Blue Demon Jr., Fenix and female wrestler Sexy Star from Mexico's Lucha Libre AAA franchise, as well as US wrestlers such as John Hennigan, whose ring names at home include Johnny Nitro but on the show is billed as Johnny Mundo.

Chavo Guerrero Jr., with family roots in Mexican wrestling stretching back to his famed grandfather, Gory Guerrero, says he wouldn't have joined the production if it didn't honor the artistry, athleticism and entertainment of the lucha tradition.

"We're creating something different and new for wrestling fans and non-wrestling" viewers, and both get their money's worth, says Guerrero, who deems that a lucha obligation.

"Other (wrestling) organizations, the TV shows propel their live events," with the emphasis on box-office receipts for the next match, he says.

"This is a TV show, propelling our next episode and next episode after that. It's a different concept."