HackerTubewatch
Surprise me
Frame from Ricky Jay - Amazing Card Trick/Manipulation Plays via YouTube's privacy-enhanced embed

Ricky Jay - Amazing Card Trick/Manipulation

theeloved1
Demos
YouTube
2 HN users recommended this demo2 months2015–2023 score 3
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026

HN people share it as a classic example of sleight-of-hand mastery whose ending is mind-blowing.

A three-minute clip of magician Ricky Jay performing a card manipulation routine, including table faro shuffles. The routine builds in intensity and ends with a surprising finish.

“The manipulations are pretty amazing and then at the end it's mindblowing.” (HN, 2023)

2 strong recommendations · 1 citations · Demos

3 Hacker News comments

From the HN archive; up to 20 kept per video, favoring different commenters. Recommendations first.

@duxup Nov 2018 Strongly recommends
on HN thread Ricky Jay’s Magical Secrets (1993)
I didn't know who Ricky Jay was but ages ago i ran across this youtube video and was just floored, the whole thing just builds and builds and builds. [this video]
Card routine that builds and builds
@onychomys Jul 2023 Strongly recommends
on HN thread “Cards as Weapons” by Ricky Jay (1977)
I am not 100% convinced that this isn't just actual magic. The manipulations are pretty amazing and then at the end it's mindblowing. [this video]
Card manipulation that ends mindblowingly

Citations, criticism and jokes

@greghendershott Aug 2015 Cites it
on HN thread Show HN: Learn Magic Tricks Online
52Kards on YouTube has many free tutorials at beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels: [link] Although I just dabble I think they're mostly very good. They're definitely easier to grasp than the books I remember as a kid. Recently he's moved to doing non-free material: [link] In my limited experience YouTube has almost everything. Search for, I don't know, "table faro shuffle", and you'll find a few meh results and one gem. (Table faro shuffles are arguably what Ricky Jay is doing at the start of this classic, if you don't believe it's just a camera edit: [this video] )
Classic Ricky Jay card manipulation clip

Video list and Hacker News comment labels from HackerTube (prompted by @karpathy), released under ODC-By 1.0, built on the open-index/hacker-news archive. Hacker News data is provided by Y Combinator; comments remain the work of their authors. Video titles, channel names and thumbnails belong to their creators and are shown via YouTube. HackerTube Watch is an unofficial edition. Data export of 2026-10-31.

Keyboard shortcuts

/
Search
j k
Next / previous video
r
Surprise me
l
Like (video page)
w
Watch later (video page)
?
This help
Esc
Close