When Magicians Collide

Are any ZONErs watching the magic reality show Phenomenon? If so, and you were watching last night, you saw Criss Angel throw down a million dollar challenge to one of the contestants as well as his co-host Uri Geller. More on that in a second…

I watched the first episode of Phenomenon and found it to be boring. I like good magic. Unfortunately the show didn't deliver. Further I didn't care for the co-hosts Uri Geller and Criss Angel. I guess it's because they're too hokey... not hokey like a guy who does magic as a hobby, but hokey in that they take themselves so seriously. Give me magicians like Penn and Teller or even David Blaine. I felt that the show was headed for early cancellation and I stopped watching.

If I had have tuned in last night I would have seen Criss Angel and Jim Callahan almost come to blows. After spiritualist Jim Callahan performed his act, both Geller and Angel were supposed to critique it. Angel called the performance "comical." Angel then pulled out two small sealed envelopes and offered Geller and Callahan each one million dollars of his own money if either of them could say what was in the envelopes.

Callahan became visibly upset and began to repeatedly call Angel an "ideological bigot" as he walked toward him. Angel got out of his seat and walked toward Callahan taunting him to tell what was in the envelope. The two were separated and the show went to commercial. You can see it HERE.

Sure, Callahan doesn't really communicate with the dead to find out that the item in the box is a toy car and the only way he can present the message is through a painful psychic experience where the answer comes to him written so it must be read in a mirror. Then again, Angel doesn't really walk on water, split women in half, or levitate.

For Angel to call out Callahan on national tv to prove he's a fake is stupid. Pot meet kettle.

Then again, maybe it was a set-up between Callahan and Angel to help hype the show. If that's the case the show is in worse shape than I thought and I know neither Angel or Callahan have enough magical powers to save it.