Fingers of Fury Vol.1 (Weapons Of Choice) by Alan Rorrison

The seemingly mild-mannered Alan Rossison proves to be a creative magic talent. His “Fingers of Fury Volume 1 offers some fresh effects, one of which involves the video capabilities of a cell phone. While there are hits and definite misses, I found his effects to be different as well as commercial.

Deep Impression is a shocking knife-thru-arm style effect that uses a playing card. A spectator selects a card and you use the card to slice through your arm. This one is great, although it’s probably more of an in-between, throw-away effect than a full routine. By the way, to perform this effect as Rorrison does, you’ll have to take some time to fine tune the gimmick.

The second great effect is Relentless. Here, a spectator’ marked coin visibly penetrates into the LCD screen of a cell phone. At the end, the coin is “slid” out and vanishes from the screen.

I love all these fresh new ideas that have physical objects somehow immersing themselves into electronic screens, which blurs the line between virtual worlds and reality. Marco Tempest has been doing innovative work in this area, and here, Rorrison adds an entertaining rendition of his own.

3 Shot Slammer offers a three phase coin through glass shot glass routine. Here you repeatedly push a coin through a shot glass, which is real and ungimmicked. Here, Rorrison combines some well known moves and integrates a nice vanish into the routine’s final phase. The vanish will also lend nicely to your coin work.

In Broken Home, you borrow some keys and appear to break and restore one of the keys. In the performance video, the secret was clearly visible. I don’t know if this is because of my magician’s eye, but it looked obvious to me and something that I think a spectator will catch. However, during the explanation, the positioning looked more convincing.

An offbeat effect, in Evolution, the head of a stick man that’s drawn on a business card moves across the paper to another location. Effects where a drawing changes are always crowd pleasers. This one requires a flame from a cigarette lighter.

In Hells Bend, you bend a coin by simply blowing on it. This trick features a cool switch. While I anticipated the switch given the layout of the trick, Rorrison’s method is a clean one that should baffle lay spectators. The best part is that your hands are completely empty at the end.

The oddball Lightless Lights has you showing your hands empty and then causing a light to flicker from within your cupped hands. I don’t think spectators will be fooled as to what can cause such a light, even through the hands look empty. I think this one is something of a miss.

On this DVD, Alan Rorrison presents some fresh ideas. Not all are winners, but there are a few gems.

-Wayne N. Kawamoto

MSRP: (US) $25

Dealers can purchase from Murphy's Magic Supplies, Inc.