Instead of magic in between shows I wish they would do more magic demonstrations and a “this is how we do it” kind of thing.
I know that’s against the magic code or whatever, but some of the tricks that are forever old I think would be interesting to learn how it’s done
This week, I agree with the judge’s comments about the two guys, they didn’t get the attention early, they were dull, and worst of all, the calculator trick wasn’t clear. It wasn’t specified if they were adding or multiplying, and given the answer it would have to be multiplying, but then the math didn’t work out. They just made up a number and used obfuscation to make it look like it came out.
The other two were better, but it was obvious to me the maple syrup bottle was going to be the reveal. When magicians give something, it’s a part of the act, and they made too big a deal out of it. Given that they use hidden assistants freely, as we were shown with the horse, it is no challenge to see how Billy slipped the maple leaf to an assistant from below who then swapped out the syrup bottles.
One thing about the keys, Penn said something about how delicate the key order was. Um, no, the keys were on a keyring. If they had been spread on the table, that might matter, but keyrings keep keys in the same order. You can’t juggle the keys around. Maybe he meant picking it up in the wrong place, but that is what a keychain does, it sets the reference point.
I assume the trick with the order of the magnets
an invisible assistant reached up from below and arranged them after the volunteer left the stage but before the reveal.
Then we got the professional demo. I see how he got the card to rise from the deck (and it’s especially clear with rewind and slow forward), but not how he got the correct card. My guess?
Maybe he talked to the audience member early and told her to select the 4 of diamonds and he’d make something special happen. She’s amazed by the rising card, others who guess that are amazed he got the right card.
For the Wizard War, I agree the Wizards won. I saw the changeup happening, and it was given away a bit when the poncho opening shifted down revealing the green shirt, but they made a good effort.
The horse tail was a nice addition to make the horse mask thing work better.
And here was a case where the backstage gave away one of the jokes - the shrinking Shimshi. Could have been better if they made the car we knew shrink and surprised us.
I think he meant that since the keys were settled, beforehand, it would be easy for the refrigerator to not match using whatever method it was that they were using.
I was pretty underwhelmed by almost all the performances this week. The best one was the winning first round performance. The losing first round performance was probably the worst one we’ve seen (and I felt like the judges thought so too), and both of the main performances seemed pretty lackluster.
I agree that whatever arrangement of magnets we saw on the fridge, it wasn’t what the lady arranged.
The lady who kissed TZ just HAD to be a stooge, right?
The one guy with the permanent show in Vegas was, I think, most impressive for the sheer quantity of spray-on tan or makeup or something. I wonder if coating yourself orange makes it easier to hide things on your body.
I can’t think of any other ways to do it. She sure was a looker though.
(Yes, both of my comments are superficial.)
Actually, thinking about it more, there’s the possibility that she wasn’t a stooge, but that their selection of her wasn’t completely random. In the modern age, all you need to know is some identifying information about who will be in the audience that night and, after some Googling, you’re going to be able to find a few items of personal information to work into the show. Probably you would prepare a few items in advance, in case someone who was on the list doesn’t show up, but after that, it’s all pretty straightforward.
Yea, but that’s why its a good trick. The audience knows something is going to happen with the bottle, so they keep an eye on it. Having the revel involve some prop that wasn’t shown beforehand is less impressive.
I dunno. That seems pretty dependent on the guy they gave it to putting it on the ground. If he’d held it in his lap or next to him on the chair they would’ve been screwed.
Plus if the trick involved having an assistant lift the bottle, you’d think they’d give it to someone other then the guy that works picking pockets into every trick. Seems like he’d be literally the hardest person in the world to lift it off.
Not only would it make the trick simpler, but model-pretty magician’s assistants are pretty traditional, especially when you need to distract the rubes.
The problem with her being a stooge, though, is that once you suspect that, the entire act become absolutely trivial, in the “even I could do that” sense. If there’s collusion, then all you have to do is tell the model to pick “Larry” and repeat the initials “TZ”. So you’d think that if the girl was a stooge, they’d go through some hoopla to make it appear that she was picked randomly.
What was the flash that the judges were talking about?
I rewound the DVR like 5 times and I couldn’t see anything…
For most of the trick, there was a solid purple curtain at the back of the stage. When Marcus ducked under the green sheet draped over the swingset, he pulled it up enough to accidentally reveal that there was now an apparatus behind the swingset (which presumably was wheeled out from behind the purple curtain). That apparatus was attached to a pole, and that’s how the levitation was done. Also the judge said that when he was trying to do a proof, he flashed instead, which is a pretty serious mistake.
Thing is, I decided the “Larry” trick is easy even with an honest volunteer: Show everyone the top four nametags with different names on them. Put those back on top of a stack where all the other tags say “Larry”. Fan out the stack so it’s impossible for the volunteer to pick any of the top four. Amaze everyone when you say that she picked “Larry”.
So they clearly don’t need a stooge for the nametag trick, but if she wasn’t one, then I have no clue how they got her to say “TZ” (guessing that a first kiss was at age 13-14 wasn’t rocket science, and pretty easy to go in a different direction if she hadn’t immediately agreed). It was pretty clear that the letters were engraved in the whole time, covered with some kind of wipe-off-able putty or something, but I was kind of impressed by how good the putty/whatever it was looked when I rewound and looked closely.
Finally watched it, but had to catch in On Demand, so no slow review.
I agree that Lance Burton’s group was better. The other challengers had a timing issue. It was slow, with dead time that didn’t do anything, and the magic payoff was weak. When they had a phone booth, I knew it would be an appearance, and knew they were going for the gnome switchout.
For the second act, I tried for the life of me and couldn’t find the flash. The closest I could get was watching the black guy as he slips around the back, he does a weird foot slide at a one point.
For the Wizard War, it really sucks that my first inclination is to think it was a stooge. That pretty much ruins all magic to think that stooges are in play. But she sure felt like one with her reaction to the first initial reveal.
I agree the levitation of the swingset was a better use of the swingset, so they win.
I didn’t see an apparatus. I saw the base of one of the columns. If you look, the purple curtain has several columns in front of it. I didn’t see anything else, try as I did to look.
Thin panel of wood held on by adhesive. He peels it and palms it.
I wonder whether they deliberately front-loaded the more entertaining episodes at the beginning of the season. I felt like this last one was pretty boring.
That said, the trick in the middle with the pepsi bottle and pepsi can was really impressive. Assuming, that is, that those audience people he was interacting with were real people with actual pepsi cans and pepsi bottles, rather than ones he planted.
Ack, my everyone-is-a-stooge paranoia is now ruining magic for me entirely!
A good Christopher Walken impersonation is always welcome, needless to say.
I thought that the second, winning demonstration was pretty good. I agreed with Teller that it was “You could charge money for this” good.
However, I do think that the format needs switching up. A tournament-style show would be more interesting. Having new people every time, with at least dud act, isn’t as good as seeing a gradual improvement, with more to win/lose. And we aren’t getting any “character development” with the participants.
Agreed. I think that Justin Flom is the only wizard who’s actually all that good.
I was just thinking about that Pepsi trick. In blind taste tests, people can’t tell red from white wine - maybe the bottle just had some sweet liquid in it, and relied on the expectation of the taster. The colour change was obviously a chemical reaction. I’m going to ask my chemistry-teacher friend if she can think of any likely reagents…
The Wizard Wars this time was clearly superior to the first round. The first round (both performances) were maybe the worst we’ve seen.
But the problem with the second winning demonstration was, again, the stooge issue. Clearly they knew ahead of time based on the confetti what word it would be. Therefore, really the only magic in the act comes down to two things:
(a) get a stooge lady to pre-choose ducks 274 (or whatever) (I can’t remember whether they revealed the numbers on the ducks before putting them down… I suppose another approach would have been some kind of duck-force involving blank-bottomed ducks and heavily inked spots on the table).
(b) palm the piece of paper out of the locked box, and replace it with another one (or have a few more stooges)
If none of them were stooges then it was SUPER impressive, and I’d have to watch it over again. But now that the specter of stoogedom is raised, it just kinds of makes everything involving audience members depressing.
I don’t think the confetti pushed anyone into choosing the word. I’ll have to watch the trick again, but I don’t think that this one relied on or had to rely on stoogery. Certainly they forced the word to be the word, but I think it’s through plain sleight of hand.
That’s what I was thinking. Add sugar and a few transparent flavorings to clear water, along with some chemical that turns brown if agitated.
I’m willing to accept chemistry as magic. It’s certainly outside of my range of abilities.
Yeah I think the way it worked was something along the lines of:
[spoiler]The little table had both-side-black stickers, with the numbers printed in white, laid out on it. When he sets the ducks down, the stickers replace whatever had been under the duck originally. That guarantees the page number. Since they ask for the first word on the page, the person with the dictionary is forced to pick the word they chose.
Everything after that is pretty straightforward, for “conclusion”.
The guy who called out Johnny Carson/German/Christopher Walken was probably a stooge in some way, though.[/spoiler]