mister why
Happy new year! Did everyone see how empty Time Square was? Anyways, I asked a friend on the west coast how the crossover works since I didn’t really celebrate New Year’s Eve before moving to New York. Turns out it’s broadcasted twice. Once on east coast time, then once local. Which makes sense. So, if you’re not on east coast time, you get to celebrate the ball drop twice. That sounded weird. Well, so I’ve got another trick from my notes. It’s a mystery card plot + sandwich-ish card trick.
Also, I’m still trying to figure out things with the website. So, you’ll probably notice small changes here and there. Like for instance, I’m thinking about moving the blog to the front page. For now, the blog will have a new page for each month. So, swipe right or click on the dots at the top of the page to navigate. Here’s a photo I saw on reddit of Time Square this year vs last year. Strange times. But let’s make the best out of this one! Ta.
You take our a card and place that to the side, then ask your friend to take out a card too. Their card is returned at a chosen location. You spread through and remove the two cards next to the selection and place the mystery card in between them like a sandwich. The mystery card is revealed to be the selection. Can be signed.
METHOD:
You will need a dupe. Both can be wherever in the deck. In the process of looking for and removing one as the mystery card, cut the other to the top. Place the mystery card off to the side then give the deck a quick overhand shuffle faced down, and shuffle the top card to the bottom. Then have them take out a second card without looking at its face and place it on the table away from the mystery card.
Next, deal the cards one at a time into a pile on the table and have them say stop. When they do, place the selection out-jogged on top of the tabled pile, and then the remaining cards goes on top and squared with the bottom half of the deck, which leaves their card sticking out.
Remember: the dupe was at the bottom of the deck. So it is now above their selection in the face down deck.
Pick up the deck and flip them over to be face up in your hand, note their card, and spread through to that spot. I mention something about how this is where their decisions ended up and call out the two cards on either side of theirs.
Then it’s basically two monte moves back to back. First a switch out, then a switch in. For clarity, I used pseudo dupes 6D and 6H in the videos but those should be dupes.
Now, take a break from reading and watch these crisp vids. First at speed...
Then slowed down:
Now you push the out-jogged card into the deck and reveal that it's in between the two sandwich cards.
So, this will need some presentation context. Essentially the card belongs in between those two cards. By removing them from the deck, leaving their selection behind in the deck, and sandwiching the mystery card on the table, you’re reestablishing the location of their card after it was selected. Thus the mystery card is revealed to be their selection because it’s suppose to be in between those two cards. "Can a card be in two places at once?" you might ask.
If this is part of a larger performance, it could be cool to use an already signed card or have the signed card reused for something after.
Name drop: I believe the on the table switch is Gordon Bean's. I think I learned it a while ago from one of Allan Ackerman’s mystery card tricks. Also, I showed the original to Alex Hansford, and he had some ideas to extend it by allowing them to also choose where to return the card to. So, this is what came out of that. Oh, and Tatanka convinced me using a dupe is better than pseudo dupe. Thanks dudes!
*Edit 5/19/23: This was updated to a new handling, and will probably continue to improve. :)