Jump to content

Type keyword(s) to search

S05.E08: Here Lie Penn & Teller


  • Reply
  • Start Topic

Recommended Posts

I've seen Murray Sawchuck before and found him entirely underwhelming...he was equally so on this. I mean, I guess I appreciated his fanboyness of the guy whose trick he chose to do but...he had no intention of fooling anyone. They knew the bit. He knew they knew. He didn't modify it in any way. And I disagree with Penn that he executed the proovers well. I thought the first spill was way fake and overexagerrated. I wasn't even trying to figure it out yet and I could see what was happening. I guess maybe the editing did him no favors but I thought it was very poorly executed and conspicuous. And also over very fast. Not that I think a trick needs to go on and on but this one was very "that's it?" Maybe it was more exciting when the original magician performed it back in the day, or being there live.

  • Love 3
Link to comment

I don't mind an honorary performance, even if it doesn't seem as smooth as it would from the original. But I thought Penn's reception of it was lukewarm as well. He didn't mention "Mr. Electric" or the guy's real name, only "we know the trick". That was weird to me considering how much he has gushed over others in the past. Maybe he was just being brief though and I'm reading too much into it.

I really liked the blank cards trick, even if some of the moves weren't done with perfect smoothness. (Especially with the close up camera work.) That's one I know I'll seek out to watch again.

It surprised me they guessed "force" for the puppets. My instinct was "assistant", although I'm probably underestimating the effort involved to make that happen. Someone on reddit pointed out another possible method, which I admit is plausible.

Link to comment

My guess was "a button for every emoji, plus a peek", which wouldn't require an assistant or a force. I wasn't surprised they went force, but I think they were probably in the "well it could've been A or B and we didn't spot him doing something that leans more to one or the other and we have to just pick one guess". 

The funny thing I was actually watching with some other people, and a couple of them were like "I would've picked the umbrella too" right when it started...so I was also thinking it must be a force initially because that was a weird coincidence.

  • Love 1
Link to comment
22 hours ago, Amarsir said:

I don't mind an honorary performance, even if it doesn't seem as smooth as it would from the original. But I thought Penn's reception of it was lukewarm as well. He didn't mention "Mr. Electric" or the guy's real name, only "we know the trick". That was weird to me considering how much he has gushed over others in the past.

Penn may not have gushed, but Teller's expressions communicated all the gushing that was needed.

11 hours ago, theatremouse said:

My guess was "a button for every emoji, plus a peek", which wouldn't require an assistant or a force.

That's pretty much what I was thinking.  The camera didn't even follow the guy once he had all the paddles back, it didn't show what he did with them.

I was thinking it was kind of a simple trick to get fooled on, but like you said there were several different possible methods, and they just guessed wrong.  The puppets were cool though, especially for a one off trick.

The Penn and Teller grave was kind of interesting, even though I'd seen it before.  The best part was the video of the kid's reaction.  Otherwise, kind of underwhelming for the show's finish, but a cool bit for what it is.

  • Love 1
Link to comment

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Unfortunately, your content contains terms that we do not allow. Please edit your content to remove the highlighted words below.
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Restore formatting

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...