Season 4: Penn & Teller & Alyson &... A Chicken?

[Nalkarj]

OK, question--did this one air? I didn't see it, Wikipedia has it as "unaired," and there's nothing available on the 'net--so does anyone know anything about this? I'm sure it's something I just don't know, but--I'm confused. YouTube has the promo for it, but neither the CW's website not YouTube has it. 

[Nalkarj]

Searched around and found out they cancelled it because of the terrible Vegas shooting. 

[Charlesman]

Postponed because of Las Vegas. CW also postponed the iHeartRadio concert they were going to broadcast. It was rescheduled for the week of Thanksgiving. Very likely Fool Us will move this episode to that week too. They have all the fall shows on now (Arrowverse etc), and don't have repeats or anything open until then. 

[The Crazed Spruce]

Locking this thread 'til the episode's rescheduled.

[The Crazed Spruce]

Unlocking 'cause they finally announced an airdate.

[rmontro]

The magicians were enjoyable enough, but my main comment here is that is seemed really, really obvious from the get go that those girls were upside down.  I might add that the effect of the gravity on their breasts was fairly obvious as well.  And if it wasn't obvious enough for you, there's even a clue in the episode title.

[Amarsir]

I knew the trick so I have to rely on others to say how obvious it was. But yes that certainly is a way of getting a breast lift.

[Charlesman]

Heh they did that routine themselves on Saturday Night Live 30+ years ago 

[theatremouse]

Yeah it was super underwhelming. Even if it weren't obvious by looking at them, once you get to the third thing that amounts to an object floating up, and they just keep repeating that same gag, it explains itself.

[marketdoctor]

Amber actually sounded familiar; was she on the show as a contestant before?  (They might have both been, but Amber had some distinct diction.)  They both captured the P & T sense of "we're having fun, and we're going to take you with us" sense of magic.

I enjoyed this one, and wonder how the $100 bill trick was done.  The crossbow trick wasn't completely original, but it was done extremely well.

Edited December 5, 2017 by marketdoctor

[Amarsir]

On 12/4/2017 at 6:07 PM, marketdoctor said:

Amber actually sounded familiar; was she on the show as a contestant before?  (They might have both been, but Amber had some distinct diction.)  They both captured the P & T sense of "we're having fun, and we're going to take you with us" sense of magic.

Jen Kramer was the Yale grad in season 2 who did a card trick that apparently turned on her memorizing card order. Amber Lynn you more likely know from America's Got Talent. (She came on Fool Us to assist the guy who escaped from a washing machine in Season 3, but that wouldn't be how you remember her.)

[marketdoctor]

Thanks, Amarsir!  I thought they were familiar, and glad they were back.

[The Crazed Spruce]

Quote

Celebrating some of Penn & Teller's favorite moments with behind-the-scenes footage, special guests, never-before seen tricks and a few other surprises.

[Amarsir]

Not a lot of new stuff to see there, but I did appreciate Penn's commentary and the insight it gave. I also liked seeing Handsome Jack again. He's a Las Vegas local who has worked with them since, and I think his comedy works well although Penn doesn't fit into the "dumb guy" role as much as he'd like to.

Also there was an educational angle by the camera before Teller turned the $20 into the $100, but that's OK. I feel like any Fool Us viewer who was looking for that would be happy to see it.

[theatremouse]

I was confuser about the guy who got his fooler this time for the performance he did in the past. So the gist was, Penn said some vague thing about the method used when guessing (to not completely give it away), and the guy assumed Penn knew what method he used because he was using a common one, but the method Penn had mean to suggest was not the method the guy actually used, ergo fooler? And the guy just didn't realize in the moment that what Penn was suggesting was not what he'd actually done?

[marketdoctor]

Quote

So the gist was, Penn said some vague thing about the method used when guessing (to not completely give it away), and the guy assumed Penn knew what method he used because he was using a common one, but the method Penn had mean to suggest was not the method the guy actually used, ergo fooler?

That was my take as well.  The guy thought Penn had the correct method, so he admitted "defeat" even though Penn had it wrong, and neither of them realized it, because Penn was speaking cryptically.

[Amarsir]

I believe Penn has mentioned that Piff technically beat them as well, but said they were right. Most of the magicians get the message that it's about appearing, not winning. So they'd rather be charming and leave on a friendly note than risk seeming like a sore loser.

[sarthaz]

On 7/14/2017 at 12:17 AM, SomethingClever said:

I was blown away by Kayla Drescher. That's a great magic trick. I'm always jealous of a great wordless trick because I can never pull them off, myself. It was entertaining throughout, is infused with meaning, has a killer payoff, and happens in the spectator's hands. Awesome, awesome trick. If I had less scruples, I'd steal it and do it myself.

Probably my favorite performance on the show so far. I loved this so much.

[sarthaz]

On 7/28/2017 at 1:19 AM, SomethingClever said:

I don't know quite how I feel about Shin Lim. He's a massively talented sleight of hand artist, but there's something very self-serious about his magic that I find a bit off-putting. 

I really like what he's doing, but particularly in contrast to everyone else on the show. So much of this show is the same thing over and over: someone's hiding in a table, convoluted audience participation with boring patter to setup a 2-second trick, goofy guy does goofy things, "mentalism" that's exposed in the first 5 seconds because the selection isn't random, etc. So when Shin comes out and does this intense artistic piece, I'm 100% on board. It would likely be too much for an entire show, or if everyone was doing the same thing, but it's a great reprieve from what most of these performers are doing.