Do you believe in magic?
No? To really believe in magic would be creepy, unless you were attending Hogwarts and rooting for Gryffindor.
If you don't believe, do you at least like to watch illusionists, sleight-of-hand artists and other prestidigitators on TV? If you do, The CW has you covered. The fifth season of Masters of Illusion debuts at 7 p.m. Friday on The CW with Dean Cain returning as host. An encore episode from last season follows at 7:30.
Trivia: Prestidigitation comes from the French for nimble and the Latin for finger -- nimble fingers.
The season opener, "It's All in the Cards," includes featured magicians Rick Smith Jr., Ed Alonzo, Samantha Bell, Joel Meyers, Keelan and Keyser, Shoot Ogawa and Andy Gladwin.
I might watch just to see if Shoot does his famous Ninja Rings or Muscle Pass.
The CW promises each episode will feature "cutting-edge escape artists and performers who display skills ranging from perplexing interactive mind magic to hilarious comedy routines."
And viewers at home "will be baffled by the astounding skills of these modern illusionists." Prepare to be baffled.
• Penn & Teller: Fool Us. To make it an all-magic evening, an encore of the Season 5 opener of Penn & Teller: Fool Us follows at 8 p.m. New episodes of the series air at 8 p.m. Mondays on The CW.
As with past seasons, illusionists Penn Jillette and Teller (he's the one who never speaks) sit in the audience and watch as aspiring magicians try to impress them with a trick that P&T are unable to figure out and duplicate.
Featured magicians in this episode include Matt Marcy, The Sentimentalists, Andrew Evans, Dom Chambers and Piff the Magic Dragon.
Piff, by the way, is English magician John van der Put. He and his assistant, a chihuahua named Mr. Piffles, wear matching green and yellow dragon costumes. Hopefully only on stage.
If the aspirants can stump the masters, they win a trip to Vegas to perform as an opening act in Penn & Teller's show at the Rio Hotel & Casino.
Magic fan Alyson Hannigan (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, How I Met Your Mother) is the host.
Trivia: Years ago, the 70-year-old Teller had his birth name, Raymond Joseph Teller, legally changed to his famous mononym.
• GLOW. Season 2 downloads on Netflix Friday. All 10 episodes available. The Jenji Kohan (Weeds, Orange Is the New Black) comedy is set in 1985 Los Angeles and follows the adventures of struggling actress Ruth "Zoya the Destroya" Wilder (Alison Brie) and others in the nascent pro wrestling gimmick known as the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling. Warning: TV-MA with lots of sex talk and occasional nudity.
• Live PD: Police Patrol. My sweet, beloved Bamma spent the last decade of her life so "stove up" by the "arthur-itus" that she was mostly bed-ridden. One of her main joys was staying connected with the outside world by listening to the police scanner. Paragould wasn't really a hotbed of crime, so I can only imagine how much she would have loved A&E's Live PD.
According to producers, Live PD is only technically live. It uses a broadcast delay "for ethical and security reasons." That means you won't be blindsided by unexpected violence or offensive language.
In each episode, the show's 30 cameras shadow six or so police jurisdictions across the country as officers patrol their communities. It's a fascinating and fast-paced series of mundane traffic stops, roadside DUI tests and vehicle searches ("I'm smelling weed from inside your car."). These are punctuated by Code 3 (lights and sirens) hot pursuits, K-9 units and scary domestic disturbances. There is also unexpected occasional humor that would have made Bamma cackle with delight.
Meanwhile, Live PD: Police Patrol is a half-hour unhosted version of the series using unaired footage and highlights from previous Live PD episodes.
Enjoy a Live PD: Police Patrol total immersion experience today beginning at 6 p.m. on A&E. You can watch straight through until 3 a.m., with two new episodes airing at 8 and 8:30 p.m.
That's nine hours and 18 episodes of riding along with the men and women in blue -- and gray, khaki or black. They wear several uniforms.
New episodes of Live PD air at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, with past episodes available online at aetv.com.
• Taken drops the final curtain at 7 p.m. Saturday on NBC. Despite a radical overhaul at the end of Season 1, the crime drama starring Clive Standen and Jennifer Beals never found an audience (only 2.45 million watched earlier this month) and it was canned after two seasons.
The TV Column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. Email:
mstorey@arkansasonline.com
Weekend on 06/28/2018