Comments on David Blaine Can Suck My Ass

Well, he does look good with his shirt off, so that's one redeeming quality.

Not really Andrew, that's just a trick he does with some string and mirrors.

I'd be much more accepting of David Blaine spending a week tied up in Andrew's apartment than any of the public shit he's done.

Amen, brother. Can't stand that guy. Plus, I can't stand the whole fretful girlfriend routine either. It's garbage.

However, I thought Andrew's post was really funny.

Amen: What's the "fretful GF" routine?? Do Blaine stunts actually feature such a thing?

Twaaaah.

at least he's not dane cook.

WTF is a sub bottom?

I think I would call Mr. Blaine a masochistic attention-whore. He's the spiritual brother of Steve-O and the Jackass boys. It's just that Mr Blaine tries to clothe his tendencies in more lofty circumstances and rationals.

Masochistic attention-whores can sometimes be entertaining in small doses. However, I don't think Blaine is one bit *submissive*...

Do you guys get Darren Brown over there? Maybe on BBC America or whatever. He's a British magician who's way better than Blaine and doesn't get into all that cod mysticism that Blaine does. Brown is interesting because he stresses that it is illusion and nothing magical, and goes as far as explaining how his tricks work and how he uses suggestion to get the desired result to happen. Much more interesting and refreshing than having to sit through Blaine's mumbo-jumbo.

I don't quite get the hostility. Weren't most of Houdini's "magic" tricks similarly exhibitionist (or at least highly public) stunts and spectacles?

I guess Houdini was an "escaper" rather than a "sufferer", but still ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houdini#Magic

I've heard Blaine say basically the same thing about his big publicity stunts, that he thinks they're relatively lame and not as interesting as his real tricks, but that they're essential for marketing himself and that Houdini did the same thing. But even his small-scale magic, like card tricks and the like, is not well respected among other magicians. He's apparently not very smooth to the trained eye.

Dave, I am totally with you. That guy completely sucks and is an annoying attention hog! Just thinking about him makes me aggravated.

No you don't get it! He's spotlighting common assholes (no proctologist intended). Waint no, I thought we were talking abut Borat. My bad.

I agree with Schmader's assessment that Blaine's stunts are "some perverse combination of a need for attention and a need to suffer." It's true. But the difference is that I don't judge Blaine for it. He seems like a pretty morose guy that has some dark days in his past. This is his warped way of working through it. I find it interesting.

Blaine has spoken many times about his admiration for Harry Houdini. He is basically doing the same thing as his hero. Death-defying stunts. Houdini provided some bizarre entertainment a century ago, and Blaine is doing it now. I don't get too chafed about it.

Yeah, my chafing is weird and personal and stems almost entirely from the final footage of any Blaine stunt, where our hero is shown in dire physical/mental condition—trembling, dehydrated, almost in shock—and yet he still manages to give a weary wave to all those people who are presumably being saved through his suffering. It's just gets so tortured and Jesusy, and when you realize that any and all suffering he's endured was entirely self-inflicted and self-serving, it just leaves a bad, bad taste in my mouth, one I try to get rid of by spitting at Blaine over the internet.

But I'm sure he's an otherwise fine human being. I'm just tired of ignoring the huge white elephant in the middle of the room that is Blaine's weird, driven masochism.