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The Effect
Spin Doctor - John Bannon (Part 3 in Fractal Card Magic)
Twisting the aces with a kicker!


Cost
£10.99 from Alakazam
here


Difficulty
(1=easy to do, 2=No sleights, but not so easy, 3=Some sleights used,
4=Advanced sleights used, 5=Suitable for experienced magicians only)
A nice easy 3 (Sleights required but taught - a nice simple effect!!)


Review

They say:
Why twist when you can spin? The doctor is in !

Author and creator John Bannon remixes a classic Ace trick. Four red-backed Aces, held face-down, are spun. After each revolution, a different Ace turns face-up.

Then the Ace of Spades vanishes - it turns blank - in your spectator's hand, and reappears among the other Aces.

Finally, each ace has a different back design and color - four different colored backs. Everything is clean and examinable!

I say:
A short review for a short effect.
Firstly - you get everything you need to go out there and perform this.
You show the four aces and then twist them in a simple fashion with a double kicker at the end. the moves are discrepant but this will fly right by when performing (and has done for me everytime!)
The DVD tuition is first rate as you would expect and the magic is direct and simple.
On the downside you do only get one effect for your £11 which when you look at some of the great tomes out there reflect poor value for money but you do get the full package (Cards/DVD/Pdf) so I suppose there has to be a balance.
On a positive note I have now taken the routine and added it to my repertoire as a new presentation of find a spec card (using a regular/borrowed deck!) so I feel that I have had value for money from it.

Overall
I would give this a good 7 for the trick as it does get some good reactions but it loses points for Value (maybe that is because I am a tight ar$e though! )

Found this review while searching for some comments of a couple of my favourite tricks... and just had to add to it!

This was one of the first proper bits of magic that I bought, and I love it! (Even though I haven't actually performed it for a while... )

I got it to learn the E*****y c***t but it's a lot more than that. The day after I bought it I was flying to Budapest on holiday, so I was sat on the plane at half nine in the morning, with a printout of the pdf that's on the DVD and the cards trying to learn it. I'd just sort of got it, when the drunk lads flying out for a stag do noticed me playing with the cards and loudly (but nicely)asked to see the trick... so hesitantly I did it... They were stunned when the blank card reveal, and the final colour change got a round of applause! The fact that I did it so lacking in confidence and performance and it still got that reaction showed me that this was a rather fine trick!

So that night, I was out with the friend I was staying with and a group of her English students, and I did a short show for them, which, and as they were Hungarian I figured lets go for visual stuff, and opened with this one... and again, a fine audience response

This was one of my most performed tricks, in fact, the only reason that I stopped doing it was that I had about half a dozen tricks that I was doing, and practising and really working on, but decided that it was about time to freshen things up and introduce some new things... that said, this has reminded me how good this is, so I think I'll dig it out again

Anyway, I recommend this a lot! I like the pacing of it, almost 3 phases, the ace twisting is a nice gentle introduction, not to long, but long enough to lull them into a false sense of security, then the ace going into the hand of the spectator which really involves the spectator, and then the unexpected colour change at the end! An excellent packet trick!

(I've played around with this and added it to a rainbow deck, so that it appears to come from a normal pack of bikes, but as an additional finale, I can then say,"And look, the whole deck has now changed!" ... but I've never performed it for anyone... Not sure if ti's a good idea or not!)