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Season 2: Back in Vegas


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I would have liked it better if he'd let Jonathan select his deck from the bin instead of having it pre-selected. 

 

I know! And he totally could've done it with the method he used. That's such a simple and obvious thing. The fact that he didn't let him pick one out of the 52 just screams "this deck is special". It's not special, but he's let the audience comfortably assume it is, so that deck selection process loses all of its tension. It's such a frustrating and obvious error in routining.

 

(I'm a huge nerd about structure and routining, so forgive me if I geek out about this too much :))

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I loved the bowling ball and handcuffs trick, even though I have a suspicion as to how it was done (I've been wrong so often before that I could be wrong again.)

 

There are three parts to the 52 decks trick that bugged:

 

 

I would have liked it better if he'd let Jonathan select his deck from the bin instead of having it pre-selected.

 

YES!

 

Second, if he had used 52 trick decks that would be a good (if expensive) way to hide it.  He didn't go that route, but he could have.  I liked the commitment to a trick, but there might have been a less drastic way to hide his methods.

 

Third, it was too easy to tell which deck had been used, even without sight.

 

Still, I liked the episode a lot, and it's always fun to see someone win, especially if they're clearly a good magician who has honed their craft.

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Solid show, though I kind of feel like the theme for me was "tricks that I've seen other people do better". 

Victor and Diamond - Man, I love a good dove act. It's not the kind of magic I do, so I can just sit back and be amazed. I really enjoyed this act, they were really polished and energetic. Not quite Lance Burton, but who the heck is?

 

Francis Menotti - I love the magic of Francis Menotti. His presentations are so creative and unique (you can watch his fantastic act at the magic castle on Youtube). I'm a little surprised he fooled them, since I got at least half of the method on the first watch, but I'm glad to see it since I love him so much. 

 

Nash Fung - Strong trick, and he actually did a pretty great job selling the "magician in peril" moment, which is way harder than you'd think. Still, his patter was really sloppy, which was particularly evident coming after Menotti, whose presentation and scripting was so polished. 

 

Chad Juros - There was definitely some good stuff in there, but he also did a few of the classic rope moves that really annoy me because I feel like they give away exactly what you're doing. Also, the rope he's using isn't examinable. That's fine for stage work (and it lets him do that beautiful restoration at the end), but it's also one of the first things that people think of when they try to figure out what you're doing. I much prefer something like David Williamson's rope routine, which is full of magic and comedy and allows the spectator to examine the rope both before and after the trick. 

 

As for the P&T trick, I really love that style of trick. It's a really cool piece of magic for just one person. Again though, I've seen it done better. It's fine, but it really pales in comparison to the Jamy Ian Swiss version, where he imparts meaning to what he's doing. 

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Victor and Diamond was my favorite; they were on the "fool them or not, they belong on stage."  It was magic with storytelling and style.  

 

The Francis Menotti trick was great, because it was a "card trick" with Scrabble tiles.  

What's amazing is that Penn & Teller describe the trick with the pencil and dictionary in "How to Play With Your Food" (they have you use a pen, which is easier.)

 

That rope trick was done in the finale of America's Got Talent. I heard you can buy it on Amazon, but I don't know the name (closest I found was "Ropes of Equality" which is at least part of the trick.)

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Rope trick was not performed that well. The first "linking rings" bit led directly into the rope he had in his hand (where he was holding the gap in the loop closed to make it look like it was a circle) falling open to a straight length of string, without any motivation for it being cut.

 

That is, it went from a circle to a straight line without him doing anything but letting go of one end where he was holding it closed. Which destroyed the illusion he just accomplished of it being a solid ring of rope.

 

 

Also, Johnathan Ross needs to stop asking "if you understand the speaking in code" when Penn just repeats "I found your personality MAGNETIC! You are just so MAGNETIC!" 

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Thank you for all the links.  I enjoyed following them up.  I particularly liked Francis Menotti at the Magic Castle.  I loved the idea of the one sided coins that are, of course, invisible when turned over. So clever.  

 

You're very welcome. I love sharing great magic, and I've built up quite a list of youtube links I like to point people to (maybe I should make a thread for that). I just love Menotti's presentations. Covering up a coin with a piece of nothing, who thinks of something like that? It's so zany and clever and unique, I just really enjoy watching him.

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I know a fake blood pack when I see one, but really that Shadows trick is still insanely great and entertaining nonetheless. 


Forget the blood part.  If you rewatch and stare straight at the plant WHILE Teller supposedly cuts the shadows, it's creepy just seeing things seem to fall by themselves.

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Penn pounding away on the word "magnetic" was the most overt giveaway of a trick he's ever done. I hadn't really thought through yet how the trick might have been done, but the moment he said that the whole thing became 100% obvious.


I won't go into detail of what I concluded... but I bet I don't HAVE to.

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Derek Hughes - Dear Derek, that's the trick you should've used as your finale on America's Got Talent. I like Hughes' style a lot. He's a genuinely funny dude, and his interactions with the spectators were great. The trick was well-structured, funny, and really fooling. 

 

Ruben Moreland - I've seen this act before, and I really like it. It's really clever, and the moments of the dice vanishing are really beautiful. His handling (outside of a slight flub at the end) was much cleaner this time around. Great, great trick. 

 

Suzanne - I was a little disappointed by this one. It's a fine trick with a nice little story, but it just felt underwhelming to me. I also felt like there was too much fiddling with the bandaid for it to feel natural. Suzanne is great, and I feel like she's got better material than this. Still, she fooled P&T, so what do I know?

 

Jared Kopf - I agree with what Penn said about his presentation. The clarity and confidence of his speech makes the trick feel elegant in a way I really enjoy. I wasn't all that enamored by the trick itself. I'm bummed that he didn't do something with cards, because he's a real top of the line card guy who specializes in some of the old classics

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Derek Hughes - Dear Derek, that's the trick you should've used as your finale on America's Got Talent.

 

Yes--even with the giveaway it was so well done.

 

Ruben Moreland - I've seen this act before, and I really like it.

 

I liiked how he did it, but the whole time I thought "it's the cups and balls trick, but with cards as cups and dice as balls."  That might not be exactly how it's done (in fact, I could be way off), but that's how it looked to me.  It was also a good example of why you don't repeat a trick; the second time through made it look like I could see how it was done.  Even if I'm off, as an illusion it didn't work for me.

 

I loved Jared Kopf's line about what P & T expected vs. what was in the envelope already fooling them.  The presentation was great for what was, as Penn noted, a relatively simple trick.

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I know this is a little perverse of me, but I wanted a little more from the finale -- the magicians were very good, of course, but the whole episode was very low key.

 

 

Was this episode possibly shown out of order?  The reason I ask is because Jonathan said "join us next week for more Penn and Teller Fool Us" or something like that.  Also, I agree, it was kind of a let down for a season finale, they had much, much better episodes IMO.

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I liiked how he did it, but the whole time I thought "it's the cups and balls trick, but with cards as cups and dice as balls."  That might not be exactly how it's done (in fact, I could be way off), but that's how it looked to me.  It was also a good example of why you don't repeat a trick; the second time through made it look like I could see how it was done.  Even if I'm off, as an illusion it didn't work for me.

 

It's actually a variation of a classic coin trick called a coin matrix, which Penn refers to in the show. Here's what a very basic coin matrix looks like:

 

 

Moreland has taken that trick and made it dice instead of coins, which is significantly more difficult. Adding that third dimension means you need entirely different methods. Though the mechanics share a little bit with how the cups and balls work, this trick is significantly different in how it works.

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OK, I get it with the coins, but I can't imagine how he did it with the dice. If I'm recalling correctly, didn't the cards that were balanced on the dice drop down flat without him touching them? I am so gullible.

 

You are recalling correctly. You can watch another performance of it here:

 

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Was this episode possibly shown out of order?  The reason I ask is because Jonathan said "join us next week for more Penn and Teller Fool Us" or something like that.  Also, I agree, it was kind of a let down for a season finale, they had much, much better episodes IMO.

I'm not sure to what extent they even have episodes when taping. There's no reason they have to and it would give them the flexibility to choose acts as best fits the time limit. But I agree it was an odd choice for the finale. This is also what I was getting at earlier in the season when they did Cell-Fish and Bullet Catch back-to-back. They can always put together another trick but there are only so many show-stoppers.  

 

Maybe it's just me but I felt like Kopf was belaboring the drama a bit. I get what Penn was saying about having to dress it up, but on the other hand when I know what a simple trick it is there's only so much "Randomness ... fate ... what are the odds!?" that I can take.  It's an OK act but just a little forced in my opinion.

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Ruben Moreland - I've seen this act before, and I really like it. It's really clever, and the moments of the dice vanishing are really beautiful. His handling (outside of a slight flub at the end) was much cleaner this time around. Great, great trick.

 

Great trick, indeed, but there were a few flashes here and there, where you could see dices and cards where they shouldn't have been, that kinda bothered me, and killed some parts of the trick.

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Was this episode possibly shown out of order?  The reason I ask is because Jonathan said "join us next week for more Penn and Teller Fool Us" or something like that.  Also, I agree, it was kind of a let down for a season finale, they had much, much better episodes IMO.

 

 

I'm not sure to what extent they even have episodes when taping. There's no reason they have to and it would give them the flexibility to choose acts as best fits the time limit. But I agree it was an odd choice for the finale. This is also what I was getting at earlier in the season when they did Cell-Fish and Bullet Catch back-to-back. They can always put together another trick but there are only so many show-stoppers.  

My Comcast on demand episode listings sometimes had different episodes than what had actually aired, so that's more evidence for possibly airing out of order.  I also seem to recall Jonathan saying "welcome back" at the beginning of the very first episode, and that episode 2 or 3 had the most elaborate introduction of Penn and Teller which seemed more "premier-like" than them just walking out on stage.  And I suppose it could be taped "Whose Line" style, where they record way more material than they need and can splice material as needed (and even have enough for a "special" episode of mixed leftovers).  I haven't been paying attention to what Penn, Teller, or Jonathan are wearing to see if different segments in a single episode are from different days.

 

I don't think this episode needed to be a grand finale.  As long as it entertained me, I was happy.  And it did.  I might like some performances more than others, but there hasn't been an episode of the series that I've disliked.  I imagine it's a relatively cheap show for the CW to produce, so I'm hoping it gets brought back.  

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I suspect that because it's a summer show, they want to do their flashy stuff earlier on; and the end of the season they don't care as much about (since it dribbles into the Fall season where Summer shows tend to get demolished by the returning juggernauts) So I'm not *too* surprised that they lit the season trail off.

 

That said, I enjoyed the tricks for the most part.

 

Koph's trick was pretty obvious, but I'm surprised Penn 'spoiled' it so detailed by mentioning the signaller. Really the trick is just 99% set up and 1% hoping the signaller gets the right indicator for the first two bags. But the story and the patter sold the trick. 

 

Ruben's trick was neat to watch, but pretty obvious how it could be done. Still it should become his signature trick and with more practice it can become very smooth. The key element of the trick is figuring out how to get the cards to stand up on their edges like that without support. I suspect magnets or a special mat, but I'm sure there are many other ways it could be done as well. 

 

Derek's trick should have been his AGT final trick, no doubt. Seeing how smoothly he did that vs the rope trick on AGT makes me think he threw the AGT finals; talk about night and day. 

 

Suzanne's trick, I wasn't paying close enough attention to, so I probably missed some elements. There seems to be one way it could be done, but I suspect Teller would have guessed that right away. Since he examined the bandaids after and acknowledged he was wrong, there must be another way. Probably the best way to tell would be to freezeframe examine the heart's(I think? The second symbol) and see if they match up.

 

As for Penn and Teller's egg trick, it felt a bit rough due to the camera style. It's a good quick trick that feels pretty obvious after how it has to be done. 

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Moreland has taken that trick and made it dice instead of coins, which is significantly more difficult. Adding that third dimension means you need entirely different methods.

 

That demonstrates the challenge of this show.  Doing a trick primarily for other magicians is different from doing it for a non-aware audience.  I was too unfamiliar with the (original, coin) matrix to know that trick, so I saw it as a cups and balls variant--which actually made it easier to see how it was done, since as SomethingClever notes, different methods than with a coin matrix.  (Also because although everyone does the cups and balls, Penn and Teller do it really clever.)  The cards standing up was really cool, but a special mat would help.  Penn and Teller see either how they would do it, or how classic magic says it should be done, but that's not how it *looks* to a less experienced person like me.  (This is also a challenge with "you think I'm doing x, but I'm not" trick faux-reveals, when the audience is thinking "we thought you used Y, and you were.")

 

I wonder if Derek Hughes thought the rope trick was more impressive (and might have seen that someone else on this show did it; not sure if the magicians get to see what previous magicians have done).  That's part of what makes a magician great; knowing what wows.

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A normal deck? Not quite... Think more along the lines of a half normal deck. Note Teller got to shuffle his half..  and Penn never got to actually shuffle HIS half.. Kostya did it for him.. for a reason.   

 

It was a normal deck. It's done via a specific technical, and Kostya is just ridiculously skilled at it.

 

Kimlat was fantastic, and watching Penn's reaction to it made it even more fun. It's one thing to pull off a trick and fool them. But to pull off a trick that they know HOW it's going to end, and STILL pull off a switch right under their eyes is even more impressive. At least that's the only way I can think of how it was done, but I have no clue one way or another.

 

The BEST part to me, is finding out that P&T did the exact same trick on the Today show, 2 months before Kostya appeared on the show. The exact same trick. In this video, Penn explains to Jonathan Ross what happened. It is a bit vague, so I also was looking around trying to get more information on it. Basically, P&T went up there, they were like "okay, we know how it's done", relaxed a little and just enjoyed the trick for what is was worth. But at the very end, he did the exact same ending of the trick differently, and with such skill and finesse that Penn nor Teller caught it. That's what blew their minds, along with the fact that he took a trick THEY DID a couple months ago, and showed them up. Hence Penn's reaction of "I hate you". Because they got fooled and fool bad.

 

Just loved it and thought it was an amazing trick. Kimlat is skilled and amazing.

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