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Regular visitors to this forum probably know that dynamo picks up a bit of flack for various reasons, including presentational opinions, camera and editing dependent performances, and generally for dressing like a bit of a chav. I should know because I was one of the people who called him out for this nonsense and continually grumbled away about it... as such I was putting off watching the full session 9 of this year's EMC because of his interview. I thought it would be one of two things, either he really would be as big a tosser as I'd imagined and I simply wouldn't enjoy it or, and this was the more worrying possiblity, that he would actually be a really nice guy and I'd feel like an utter bitch for going on about him so much.

And wouldn't you bloody know it was the second?

The more I listened the more terrible I felt. All my assumptions were shot down. Though I'm not a fan of the way his show is edited, he has the best of motives for theming it the way he does, trying to use his own story as a compelling narrative to make it more than just trick after trick. That's what I try to do.
In addition he was bullied as a child (guilty) unpopular for having an incurable medical condition (ditto) and learnt his magic from the ground up starting with the classics (which sort of makes him more traditional than me). To top it all, at the end of his interview he gave a shout out to Paul Daniels, calling him a Genius and Godfather of magic, showing that he's respectful too.

I'm now starting to think the only tangible reasons for me to have had such an adverse reaction to his performances I can therefore extract from this are snobbery and jealousy and damn, that makes me not a very nice person at all.

Good luck to the guy I guess, though he probably doesn't need it.

-Stacy

Its not Dynamo I dislike its the people who idolise him. You can see from a lot of his effects he does put the time in with things such as the muscle pass etc its just when he starts walking on water etc. that kind of stuff sets the bar high for me as an amatuer magician. Fair play its bringing in the wonga

The style of his shows are aimed at a very specific market and, as such, certainly don't appeal to me. However, I've met him and he's a genuinely nice geezer, very talented and an excellent magish. As craigie says, if the money comes from doing that sort of show then he'd be totally bonkers to do anything else!

I'm not a big fan, if I'm honest.

Fair play in terms of where he's come from, and where he has got to.

In terms of his magic, artistically - I don't think he makes the most of it. I've heard him talk about presenting the trick, just as the trick. It's that argument about, is magic interesting in and of itself, without any presentation? or with just a descriptive presentation? What do you think? For my audiences - I prefer to give them something more, something to think about, some part of my personality, some drama, something more than just 'a trick'.

I'm one of the few people in the UK who has never even seen a clip of him performing. I don't watch TV and I've never felt the need to look him up on YouTube.

I will chuck in my two penneth worth to this thread as I'm one of the people who idolise him to be fair, idolise is probably the wrong word but he inspired me to further my magic career!

Long story short, some friends at work were watching his show and comparing me to him and asking me to do more and more tricks, so in a way he is responsible for my venturing further into magic than i ever probably would have hadn't he been on tv!

So really he has a lot to answer for and I'm sorry all, if you need to blame him for anything else, then me being here can be one of them! Haha...

But it's nice that people are seeing that he is a genuinely nice guy and he does love all things magic!

Much love

Aza