The infamous “Magic’s Biggest Secrets Finally Revealed” has a new season that began just a few weeks ago.

The original five episodes composed the first “season”, the first four coming out in 1997/1998 and the fifth coming out in 2005. Magicians all over Canada and the USA quickly took classics out of their show like the ZigZag girl and the Metamorphosis. Fortunately for us magicians, the show was pretty boring to watch and laymen quickly forgot which tricks were exposed. The “Masked Magician” was later found out to be Val Valentino. In this new season Val Valentino is seen in the credits as the producer of the show. The Magician seems to be somebody else from what I can gather.

The format of the show is the same as the original. The Masked Magician shows you an effect stripped down to the bare mechanics void of any presentation while the narrator explains the effect in a monotone voice along with cheesy jokes. Then the Masked Magician exposes the effect in the same lackluster way as the trick was presented in the first place. And, you guessed it, cheesy narration throughout the explanation as well.

Tricks exposed:
• Walking through a giant wall of steel (Copperfields Great Wall of China Illusion)
• Buzz saw (David’s again)
• Turning a Bentley into a Lamborghini (Criss Angel)
• Making a soda can float (TT with suction cup.. wth?)
• Pushing a coin through a rubber sheet into a glass (Ha!)
• Vanishing a toothpick (Same trick Criss has exposed and taught on many talk shows)
• Cap penetrating a glass bottle (PK ring)
• Cut and restored rope (Extra piece method)
• Vanishing a string quartet
• Vanishing woman (Using a chair)

I found it hilarious that they included vanishing a toothpick and cut and restored rope in the show. As if vanishing a toothpick is one of Magic’s Biggest Secrets. Although my girlfriend watched the show with me and was excited to finally learn how I cut and restore a rope. She was very disappointed when the secret was revealed though. Not because she finally knew, but because she knew that the method that was exposed isn’t what I do in my routine.

During the show they never say who performed the original version. During the exposure for the “Walking through a wall of steel” they never say “Walking through the Great Wall of China” but they infer it in basically every way imaginable.

Magic is really boring when there’s no presentation and the method is exposed two seconds later. I’m sure these new episodes will have the same effect as the old episodes, they’ll quickly vanish and be forgotten.

Hopefully you got to see David Blaine’s “Dive of Death” last night on TV. As I posted over on itricks I thought the show was amazing.

The Bullet Catch was amazing.

I’m not sure if the magic lived up to the hype of “the best magic he’s ever done”. I still enjoyed watching it though.

The ending of the show was very confusing. I watched the program with a bunch of friends, and we were all very confused as to what was going on. He jumped, touched the stage, and then went flying up on the cable. Then the announcer said that he had “vanished”. It really didn’t play well for the TV at all. I’m interested to hear what the ending looked like live at the event.

If you were like me and the ending confused you- David explained on the Regis and Kelly show what was SUPPOSED to happen.

Still, David Blaine is a living legend.

[via magic unlimited]

Here’s another Jc Penny ad, it isn’t magic themed but its still great. The AD agency that put these together is brilliant.

I love Rocco’s work and I’ve posted a few video’s by him on my blog before. I’ve never seen or heard of this routine, and its quite unique (like all of his work).

I had heard that “Cards as Weapons” by Ricky Jay was a valuable book before, but I never knew that it was worth in the $200-400 range. I’ve got a copy of that book sitting in a box downstairs that I got a long time ago. I don’t remember what type of condition its in though. I think I’ll hold onto the book though, if its worth that much now, it will only increase in value

Ricky Jay is so unique, his performance is brilliant.

I love David Stone and his DVD’s that he’s put out. While trying to find something else today on youtube I came across this wicked clip of David Stone doing productions/manipulations with food.

Awesome!

Wade Robson, the Choreographer for Criss Angel’s BELIEVE, and judge on So You Think You Can Dance, previewed this piece on So You Think You Can Dance. Its supposed to be a preview of what to expect from the show BELIEVE when it starts in September.

Choreo Wade Robson. Performed by Cirque du Soleil. Copyright Dick Clark Productions. !!!! Hypnotizing!!! Equal parts amazing and nightmare. (and that’s exactly how I like my amazing)

Last Comic Standing
Thursday, August 7th, 8 p.m., NBC
Penn & Teller are scheduled to appear on this, the Season Six finale.

So You Think You Can Dance
Thursday, August 7th, 8 p.m., FOX
Sixteen members of the cast of BeLIEve will be performing “Homage to the Rabbits” on the first of the two-part Season Four finale. The number, choreographed by Wade Robson, does not feature any magic or Criss Angel, but it should still give us a feel for this new Cirque du Soleil production, which goes into previews September 12th and is scheduled to officially open October 10th.

[ Thanks MAGIC eUpdate! ]

Great piece of magic.

On the Much Music website you can see some full episodes of Celebracadabra. Thanks to Murray for his facebook status message to keep us in the loop! Enjoy Comedy magic.

With all the people who are watching Celebracadabra in Canada now it seems like there’s more and more people talking about the judges that were on the show.

I saw Rocco perform live once in Calgary several years ago, but I was too young to know anything about him. I did pick up a couple of d’lights though and I remember playing around with them in the hotel room. The only trick I remember Rocco doing was something where he takes a dice and slams it between his hands and it goes flat. I can’t remember if there was more to the routine or anything. I seem to recall something about it appearing on somebodies shoulder a few times, but I honestly can’t remember.

I’ve looked for videos of Rocco performing online but most of them are really bad quality with poor lighting and camera work. I came across this video today of Rocco’s award winning act. He won “Most Original Magic Act” in 2006 at FISM.

Great stuff. I love the smoke in the glass, the appearance of the popsicle, the fruit, and the glass filled with confetti at the end. Just fantastic!

It also looks like all of the Celebracadabra episodes are available as a digital download from amazon now. If you missed an episode then it might be worth it to check it out: