Name: John Bannon’s Detour De Force
Price: £11.99 (
www.abrakazam.com )
Type: Card Prediction Effect
Difficulty: 1
Performance time: A few minutes
Examinable: No.
Reset Time: Instant, but you couldn’t repeat it to the same spectators
What you get: A specially gaffed deck of Hoyles and Bannon's usual detailed instructions.
Effect:
The performer writes down two predictions, each on a separate piece of paper, and places them on the table in full view. The performer deals the cards in a face-up pile. The spectator can stop at any card! This selection is placed aside with one of the predictions. The performer shows the cards are marked by having the name of a card printed on each of the backs. The deck is then shuffled and the performer deals the cards into a face-down pile. Again, the spectator can stop at any card! This second selection is placed aside with the second prediction. Both predictions are now turned over to reveal and they are wrong! The predictions don't match the cards. The performer then explains that the cards may be marked, but the names on the back of the cards do not match the face. The two selections are turned over and the predictions now match perfectly!
Comments:
A great trick, which I have as yet only performed to my long-suffering wife. She begrudgingly admitted that it was "quite impressive" when, really, I knew she was devastatingly overawed by the whole thing. In fact, she woke me up in the middle of the night and asked me what would have happened had she stopped at different cards. I will not repeat here, on this family board, what my response was in that cold, dark hour of the morning.
The fact that the cards are a nasty Hoyle deck, doesn’t matter a jot. If you always use Bikes and then produce this deck, I don’t think people would be suspicious, especially when you flip the deck face down to reveal huge card names (6H, JD, 10C, etc.) printed all over them; it’s obvious that the deck is different.
Also, the way the cards are selected and the “proving” of the deck to be mis-marked are so fair, that there’s very little heat on the deck.
There is no sleight of hand involved and, if you want, you can throw in a couple of Hindu shuffles, but it’s not vital.
All in all, a stunning effect, very easy to do. It’s also great fun if you like hamming it up and pretending you’ve made a huge a**e of yourself only to show, triumphantly, that you are a Mindreader Extraordinaire. In fact, after the brilliance of Twisted Sisters and then this, I am convinced that John Bannon is a genius and have ordered his Strangers’ Gallery, too. But if you were a real mindreader, you’d have known that.
Overall Rating:
9/10. Only because it’s not examinable.