REVIEW: Pro Wrestling EVE - 12 Year Anniversary Show

Credit: Pro Wresling EVE

Pro Wrestling Eve: 12 Year Anniversary Show
Patchworks XYZ, London
Saturday, May 7, 2022
Reviewer: Iwan Mackenzie (@iwanmack)

MY DAY started off with a trip to the Bromley as my Defend Indy Wrestling bag had finally broke after eight years, so I bought myself a new RUN-DMC bag - which has been great thus far. Plus there was a visit to the local Caribbean stall for some deep fried plantain and a can of Lilt, lovely.

After that I was finally on my travels and headed to Stratford and met everyone at Wendy’. Food in here was the Baconator meal with a Chocolate Frosty, plus you have to fill your own drinks but nobody gives a shit in there so you can basically get a load of refills - I had about four or five. The actual burger was fantastic, Wendy’s is definitely a highlight of a trip to Stratford. After that we got the 158 Bus to the venue, which was just outside the bus stop.

Venue itself was decent, kind of a warehouse aesthetic which reminded me of Fight Club Pro’s old venues. Drinks were cheap for a wrestling venue as well. What I will say though is that their cafe area was very middle class, which probably brought out my working class side more through the night. It was hard to tell the attendance figures due to the layout of the venue but it was a good attendance for the first time they ran the venue.

Let’s get onto the show itself, which had an 8pm advertised start time and actually started at 8:20. We had Beau Belles as our MC for the evening and much like at Resurgence, she did a very good job through the evening.

Laura Di Matteo vs Nina Samuels: SHE-1 2022 Qualifier Match

This was our unannounced dark match and also a qualifier for next month’s big series. LDM came without the International Championship here which is a pet peeve of mine in wrestling.

Now I’ve seen these two wrestle a lot over the years and this was their usual good match, a lot of Nina dominating Laura and trying to squeeze the air out of her and soften her up for the GTS, but Laura fought back more going for submissions.

My only criticism of the match would be it went a bit too long for an opener, especially with a new crowd onboard as well. Laura wins this with the Three V’s Submission to move onto the SHE-1.

Nightshade vs Rayne Leverkusen

Another unannounced match as Rayne gets a second crack of the whip to get her first win in EVE. A good match with a very good dynamic - Nightshade being the hoss against Rayne who used more speed to manoeuvre around.

Both women played their part well here and I do have to say that Rayne is very good considering her experience levels. We had Nightshade demolish Rayne towards the end of this match and finished her off with the Prince Albert Choke Bomb for the win.

Rhia O’Reilly vs Debbie Keitel: SHE-1 2022 Qualifier Match

Credit: Pro Wrestling EVE

Debbie did not initially make her entrance here and then second time round, she was carried in by Nightshade and Skye Smitson. We did all think the Uprising had planned an attack on Debbie but it turned out that she was actually asleep so the first part of this match did work out as a tribute to the hit film Weekend at Bernie’s, it was very funny.

Eventually Kamille Hansen turned up with a coffee for Debbie, who powered up like a woke Popeye and took the battle to Rhia. Overall this was a decent match but it feel it went down after the initial comedy, not a lot clicked here for me. Rhia won this with a Roll-Up to go through to SHE-1.

After the Match, Rhia announced that Joshi Legend Chigusa Nagayo was going into the EVE Hall of Fame and Rhia stated her intentions to fight Nagayo at the SHE-1 Weekend in a Non-Sanctioned Match. Whilst this is a cool announcement, and if all goes well it will be fascinating to watch, I found this to be the wrong place and wrong time.

I’m not a fan of heels announcing something big like this, case in point Adam Cole announcing the Forbidden Door Show. Plus, for something very niche like this it really should have been announced at the 229 show when more of those kind of fans were there, instead of the casual fans who were in that night who I felt acted surprised.

Kasey vs Clementine: SHE-1 2022 Qualifier Match

Credit: Pro Wrestling EVE

This was my favourite match of the show. These two are both characters who are very much opposite ends of the spectrum and I do think that dynamic worked wonderfully here. This all kicked off when Kasey Pearl Harboured Clem and attacked the knee a lot before throwing her to the outside followed by a Suicide Dive.

On the outside the two went brawling with Clementine getting the advantage by chucking the contents of a bin on her - which included some liquid and left Kasey looking none-too-pleased - before they headed to the bar where Clementine hit a Suplex on the bar and then dove off the bar with a Crossbody. We all started the Sweet Clementine chant which got over big here as well.

Back in the ring and despite some fiery comebacks from Clem, Kasey enacted the Spirit of EVE and used a bike chain on Clem’s injured knee to take that away from her and leave her prone for a Punt Kick to put the Zesty One away to get the win and make her return trip to the SHE-1.

We went to our interval after this, advertised for 15 minutes and actually went 22 minutes. During this time I visited the pizza place they had at the venue and got myself a sausage and spinach focaccia for five pounds, it was absolutely amazing, some of the best food I’ve ever had at a wrestling show and I’ve been to a lot! 

Rhio vs Charlie Morgan vs Skye Smitson vs Debbie Dahmer

Originally on the EVE Newsletter, Rhio vs Charlie Morgan was announced but the match was changed on this night to a Fatal-4-Way instead, no reason was given as to why.

This was a pretty fun match considering we don’t get these kinds of matches at EVE often. I have to say that I thought Charlie Morgan was the VIP here, thought she brought everything together really well and was flying about the place with such speed.

Rhio and Skye always impress me, but as you know I’m not a big fan of Dahmer and just could not get behind her offence or her spots here. At one point all four of them were down and our section started chanting “Anyone but Debbie” - she gave us the middle finger. They went to the bar for shots, we sung Tequila. Rhio won this match by pinning Dahmer after hitting the Purple Haze off the ropes. 

Emersyn Jayne vs Alexxis Falcon: SHE-1 2022 Qualifier Match

Credit: Pro Wrestling EVE

Even though Clementine/Kasey was my favourite match of the show, this was the best pure wrestling match of the show. Both wrestle very aggressive styles and I knew this was going to be good and they duly delivered here.

Really good action between the two of them, lots of Suplexes and big slams including Emersyn’s Sliding German Suplex which is always impressive. We had Emersyn win this with a French Keylock Driver to enter the SHE-1. I will say that I was hoping Alexxis would win here but there’s always next year.

Jetta vs Lizzy Evo: SHE-1 2022 Qualifier Match

Credit: Pro Wrestling EVE

Lizzy had a pre-match promo having a go at the fans who reciprocated with many anti-Scouse chants and a chant that even broke Lizzy into corpsing. Lizzy changed her a direction towards Jetta and said that her time was up and reminded that she had beat Jetta’s partner Charlie Morgan before now.

A very good match here, Lizzy worked well against Jetta and did enable Jetta to show a lot of aggression and fire in her comebacks which I thought really worked well. Even though Lizzy tried to take down the champ, she ultimately came up short as Jetta won here to stamp her name to the SHE-1 Weekend.

Overall, as a show there were a couple of really good matches and some entertaining moments in between. The overall experience of the show wasn't for me though, I think the venue has a way to go before it suits EVE and the crowd really did bother me for a majority.

Now the crowd itself was very odd indeed, a mix of the usual EVE fans/wrestling fans but a large majority of casual fans who reacted in a very different way to normal at the show - from just staring blankly, reacting to stuff in a way that came off very patronising and some that did actually seemed to enjoy it.

I had a woman who looked like Slim Shady ask me and my mate Carberry how we knew when to chant and also asked “What is a Shithouse?”. 

I am worried about EVE at the moment as a product and don’t feel it’s really building anything up or giving fans a reason to come back month to month, hopefully that changes after SHE-1.

Thanks for reading my review, you can follow me on Instagram @IwanMack