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I’m running out of clever ways to open these articles, folks. You know the drill: Friday. Videos. Smug quips. Enjoy.

The magical acts in this year’s Britain’s Got Talent were swamped by no-fun jerks in the British press who chimed in after every episode to inform us that, actually, Marc Spelmann does not posses a supernatural power over time and space. Of course, anyone with an ounce of insight to the art can tell you that knowing how a trick is done makes you a magician in the same way that knowing the lyrics to Stairway to Heaven makes you a rock star. 

Ozzie magic man, Ben Murphy, posted a cute, “interactive,” mind reading trick on YouTube. And no, the interactive element isn’t, “press the like button.” But you should. 

The final episode of the first season of Mutant Powers is now live for your viewing pleasure. Despite my distaste for “prank” videos, I’ve really enjoyed this comedy/magic format, and I can’t wait to see what Kyle Marlett does next. Hopefully another season of this. 

Magician and America’s Got Talent winner, Mat Franco, and the delicious taste of Dunkin’ Donuts, bring you a cheeky magic tutorial. Personally I found it hard to concentrate on the mechanics and useful presentation tips because I kept being distracted by the icy cool iced coffee on the desk next to him. Or at least I was until he shoved that straw up his nose. Now I’ll forever associate Dunkin’ Donuts with snot and chunks of Mat Franco’s brain matter. 

Trapeze artists Mary and Tyce, better known as Duo Transcend, made an absolutely killer appearance on America’s Got Talent. To be honest, I think I’d pay good money to watch Tyce paint a fence, so the fact he and Mary are also excellent performers is icing on the cake.

And on that shameless bit of objectification, I bid you a good weekend, gentle readers. See you next week!

  

Update (2/14/2018): Other magicians have come forward expressing their displeasure with Jibrizy’s latest video, which has exposed the method of several currently-marketed tricks as well as copied a previous viral video. Mentalist Bedros Akkelian (aka Spidey) has posted his own thoughts on the matter:

Whether a result from criticism from other magicians or the fans, it would appear that Jibrizy has since deleted the video from his Facebook page. We have removed the embedded post (which has since thrown a “video unavailable” warning”) and updated our story below to reflect this.

Original Story:

A few months back, a series of videos starring someone fans dubbed the “Pokerface Man” hit critical viral mass on the internet. In the videos, a magician pulled off a series of tricks while his jerkface friend exposed all of his methods, all while continuing to stare stonefaced into the camera. They were funny, got millions of views, and were shared across all corners of the internet, including mainstream sites like MSN.

Today, Jibrizy posted a compilation of magic tricks along with his friend Paul Vu, but the format looks very familiar…

(The original post for this story featured the Facebook video embedded here, which has since been pulled.) 

The tricks themselves are different from the ones performed in the Pokerface Man videos, but the effect is the same: Jibrizy does a trick, then Vu walks over, steals whatever item Jibrizy is using, exposes the method, they bicker, then the duo moves on to the next trick.

Other magicians don’t seem too happy with the video, like Xavier Spade, who shared the video on his Facebook page with the comment “Another sad day in magic… Can’t even steal magic in an original way…”. YouTube illusionist Chris Ramsay (who has previously been critical of Jibrizy’s work) replied to this post saying “When all else fails…”

This isn’t the first controversy Jirbizy has gotten himself embroiled in: back in August, 2017, the magician had been caught stooging his magic tricks, coaching his onlookers on how  to react in his videos. It hasn’t seemed to have effected his popularity, though, as he continues to boast over 1.1 million followers on Facebook.

Exposing method is one thing, and whether it’s ok or not is still a hotly-contested debate in the magic community. Copying someone else’s routine, though, is something else entirely. What do you think?