Penn & Teller: Fool Us

Penn & Teller aren't strangers to the tube. They've hosted game shows, appeared on reality shows and talk shows, and hosted the long running Showtime series "Bull*hit". However, they are best known for being a magic act in Las Vegas that combines comedy with illusions and some great effects as well. They finally have a show on TV that gives them the platform to do what they do best, but now they've opened it up for other magicians as well on "Fool Us."

The concept is pretty simple. Four magicians from around the globe come to Vegas to perform one act in front of Penn & Teller. The magicians range from masters of card tricks, to mentalists, to prop artists and many more. After the act, Penn & Teller briefly confer and, in traditional magician form, declare they know how the trick is done using code words (like all magicians, they follow the code of not revealing how a trick is done) or admit they have no idea how it's done. If their guess is wrong or they are stumped, they tell the magician that he/she "fooled us" and the magician wins a trophy and is invited back to Vegas to open for Penn & Teller. After four magicians, Penn & Teller perform a trick of their own from their wide array of tricks.

The best part about the show is how unlike other reality shows it is. Penn & Teller are positive, encouraging and very supportive of the magicians, whether they fooled them or not. There seems to be a certain level of respect between the hosts and the contestants that you don't see on many shows these days. Also, there is little "drama" or side stories like some reality shows like to emphasize now. It sticks to magic, the art and love of it, and letting up and coming magicians have the opportunity to display their skills to a wide audience.

It's enjoyable, informational, and even educational. I recommend Fool Us to anyone looking to be awed.

I don't do reality TV. I don't do all these so called talent shows. Nor do I watch celebrity this, Z factor that, nobody's got talent, or celebrity get me out of here dancing with has-beens on ice Big Brother. I'll stop myself there before I write paragraphs of rant about the turgid state of current prime time television - because I could quite easily. This, however, is *exactly* what *should* be on prime time TV. Family friendly. Amusing and entertaining. Two unquestionably talented guys at the peak of their profession, watching along with the audience and us at home, fellow practitioners of their art trying to "fool" them. There are no *freaks* put in front of us for us to laugh at (unless you count Jonathan Ross), nor are there any talentless buffoons for us to pity. This is a proper talent show. People at the top of their game - Penn & Teller - giving fellow (talented) magicians and illusionists a platform to showcase their skills. It's not judgmental. It's not confrontational. And some of the highest praise from P&T is reserved for acts that haven't fooled them, but who have such great technique and execution it seems to have genuinely moved them.

I saw this show for the first time a few nights ago, and was highly entertained in seeing the experts dissect various magic tricks by performers on stage, and then admitting when they had been fooled.

The format is simple; Penn and Teller sit at the front of a stage and watch various prestidigitators perform their tricks on stage to see if the legendary duo of Penn and Teller can reverse engineer or deduce how they did their trick.

The only down-shot is that they will, for the sake of keeping the essence of the trick, a secret, sometimes use magicians jargon or stage lingo to get their point across to the performer on stage, and in this way communicate to both us and the audience that they either know how the trick was done, or are sufficiently impressed that they have been fooled.

But even then, they do reveal and otherwise convey to us the basics of some of the tools the performers use to create their illusions.

I had fun watching this show as I watched and tried to figure out how each trick might have been done. And I found myself being right a significant part of the time. It was very interesting and entertaining.

For anyone who's been to a magic show, wants to see magic, but is curious how any of the tricks were done, then you must see this very basic yet very remarkable show.

Enjoy!

I generally quite like this show as it's just fun to watch. But there are a few things that are starting to really bother me. Yes, it's reality TV and so there is going to be some things left out, but at some point if you know it's all fake it isn't as much fun.

Specifically: they are editing some performances to make them seem impossible; performances that SURELY did not fool them get some made up story about how it really DID fool them so they can get the performer in their Vegas act; they are re-using audience reactions to tricks for multiple episodes/performances; Penn & Teller are hamming up their fake reactions to tricks that don't deserve such a reaction.

Vegas and Hollywood together...I shouldn't be surprised?

This a truly outstanding TV show that brings highly talented magicians to the screen. Jonathan Ross does his job really well and Penn&Teller do a wonderful job of honoring true talents who come to the show to fool them. Nothing is controversial, Penn is courteous when dealing with fellow magicians, and the magicians accept defeat with humility, also Penn&Teller do a good job of keeping the methods secret when describing how the tricks are done, which helps keep the mystifying aspect of the tricks: the 'magic' is never totally gone even after Penn explains the methods used. Almost all of the acts are exciting and have a wow factor, which provide non-stop entertainment with very little filler to artificially boost the length of the show.