Anyone doing this tonight at 10.30? Any warnings?

Im definately going to watch it but as with the Uri Gellar thing years ago, Im not going to sit there and be spooked out. Im just looking forward to the ( over-the-top ) audience reaction - 'oh, i saw my lightbulb moving!' or 'I heard my fridge tick as i watched your show'.

Just remember that the point will be that it's all cobblers and people believe what they want to believe.

Plus you will find everyone who Derren Brown has in this Seance will be stooges

Well he claims not to use stooges.

Well that was good. It's just finished and there is a room full of people about to meet the person who they think died.

Hasn't this been on before and in the end it showed how the ball and cup moved by a man dressed in black who had a pole and hook and he hooked the ball to look like it was flying....

Originally posted by Tony
Well that was good. It's just finished and there is a room full of people about to meet the person who they think died.
Yep, and it really annoyed me (although I felt a deep satisfaction about the fact that I saw it coming all the way from the start). Why were those 'students' so thick? Of course you were thinking of Jane, almost everyone in the country was. He manipulated it so that most people with an ounce of common sense would pick Jane. His last instruction on the bit where you had to be 'drawn' to a photograph was 'now move your focus LEFT or right and concentrate on the first colour picture you come across'. Now you're bound to move right, because left was said so boldly. And guess what, Jane was on the right. I (and I expect most other people had they followed Derren's instructions correctly) was on the middle row at the time, and Jane was the only colour picture on the middle row.

Funnily enough the first city that popped into my head for the city part was Sheffield. Then I thought that she didn't really look like the average Sheffielder, so I thought of London. Not really sure why, but there must have been some sort of suggestion going on.

And the stupid part is; I never believed his 'suicide pact' story from the start. He claimed that 10 out of the 12 drank 10 pints of bleach. I sincerely doubt that anyone could drink even 1 pint of bleach without vomiting.

Anyway, what annoyed me the most about the programme was the stupid people that phoned in. "Oh I was thinking of London, God knows why"; well I'll tell you love, it's because he wanted you to think of London. I just get the feeling that most people clearly missed the point of the entire experiment: to prove that mediums are frauds (whether they realise it or not).

I think everyone who watches this programme have to actually LISTEN, to what Derren says, he actually said there was no stooges or actors involved, but he made it clear that the people involved were PICKED BECAUSE THEY WERE SUGGESTABLE.....obviously all the people were hypotised before the programme started and therefore joined in with everything.

I think people are so stupid sometimes, they are duped when they really want to be

"I just get the feeling that most people clearly missed the point of the entire experiment: to prove that mediums are frauds (whether they realise it or not)."

Agree with this totally. Darren Brown has shown that the spirit world and the supernatural are all "in the mind".
I too knew that it was a fake because I was around in the 70's and would have remembered a suicide pact as a big news event. Interesting and thought provoking show though.

We watched it and really enjoyed it.

I didn't focus on Jane but chose Patty(?) and the city of Liverpool!!

I think Derren Brown is an incredibly clever man and a great entertainer.

What he proved is that the power of suggestion is far greater than we give credit for. Also, that the mind is a very powerfull organ but is also easily manipulated.

We came to the conclusion too that the students were obviously pre-hypnotised in some way so then certain words would provoke a certain response from them.

All very clever and extremely good entertainmnet.

I don't know what to make of it. I can't trust anything that Derren says, as he is a self-proclaimed illusionist, and they create illusion by telling lies.

I too picked Jane, but the city I sub-consciously wrote was "sc2r", so no dice there. It was interesting to see how the girl who wrote in the dark wrote exactly like people in the dark - the spirit influence can't have been that big ;)

The thing that scared me the most was the man in the "spirit chamber (cupboard?)", who broke his restraints and kicked at the curtain. It's a shame Derren offered no explanation for that, particularly as there was a camera overhead.

In fact, all his explanations were thrown together very quickly and not explained very fully, which was a shame.

Susie, who's cupboard started moving because of a TV show

"The thing that scared me the most was the man in the "spirit chamber (cupboard?)", who broke his restraints and kicked at the curtain"

He was restrained in the chair but he could have stood up with the chair still strapped to him and hit the curtain with his head/shoulder. He also threw the papers over but he did this after breaking the strap. How he broke a strong strap, that's another question. Could have been a weak plastic clip etc.
His scream was very good though, I do believe he was terrified by something but this was part of the hypnosis.

I've read that this programme had a large volume of complaints. Was it that bad?

I'd like to do a poll to see how many of you believe when a telly show says we dont use stooges you believe them or not? did anyone else think these so called students were actors i'd like to find out with uni's these people are at :thumbsup: Jon

Originally posted by FetishFairy

I didn't focus on Jane but chose Patty(?)

You didn't follow the instructions correctly in that case. No matter what picture was first chosen, the instructions would always lead you to Jane.

I really enjoyed the program. I think that at least a few of the students had to be actors, as some of the reactions seemed over the top. I especially liked the guy who started chanting prayers when the ball started moving. amused me no end.

I believe that the program received a record number of complaints since some other program that i can't remember right now. I think that the bulk of complaints where from believers and mediums whose income will now be somewhat diminished.

Originally posted by Andy78
I believe that the program received a record number of complaints since some other program that i can't remember right now. I think that the bulk of complaints where from believers and mediums whose income will now be somewhat diminished. That's a proper result - excellent!! :thumbsup:

I don't think he did use actors or stooges (apart from Jane at the end!). The point is Derren was doing it as an experiment because he doesn't believe in spiritulism and wanted to show that he could hold a seance using pyscholgical skills, trickery and illusions, and get the results he wanted. What would be the point of using actors? I think he proved that he could do it. He told the story at the beginning about the fox sisters who did exactly that (fraud) in the victorian days and he tried to prove he could do it. He auditioned many students and deliberately picked those ones because he knew he could control them and get them scared. I think he's a very clever man.
I remain open minded as maybe there are true spiritulists out there, but Derren certainly showed that some (and perhaps all) are fake.

I thought it was great, a few scary moments in there like the bloke screaming from inside the curtains etc . . would have loved to have seen the camera view of it though.