A Torn Tweak

Torn, by Daniel Garcia, is probably the best Torn and Restored card of all time. It’s a signed torn and restored card that looks nearly perfect and ends examinable. (A torn and restored anything that isn’t examinable at the end isn’t a “Torn and Restored” it’s a "Torn and Sort of Looks Restored.” Laymen know this.)

It’s not easy, but it’s not crazy hard either. It’s just some new movements for your hands to get used to, and there’s a lot of them because it’s a piece by piece restoration.

Here is my tip for learning tricks such as this. Don’t sit down one night and say, “I’m going to learn Torn tonight,” and try to force your way through it all and get it down in a night. It will look like shit, and you’ll be frustrated. Instead, tell yourself at the beginning of the month, “I’m going to learn Torn this month.” Then, every day or two, sit down with a cup of coffee or Ecto Cooler or whatever your relaxing drink of choice is and work your way into the routine just up until you get to something new to you. Then learn that one new movement or moment and end for the day. This way you get to build up the routine piece by piece, and you don’t get overwhelmed having to stick a dozen new “things” together as you learn a trick. You just learn it bit by bit.

I find this to be a relaxing and enjoyable way to learn more complicated tricks. It gives you a more intimate understanding of the material, too. It probably won’t take you a full month, but going into it with that in mind—and getting it done sooner—is a better approach than thinking, “I’m going to figure this out tonight,” and getting annoyed when you don’t.

[Note, supporters will be receiving my newest book soon. I also think this is a good way to go through a book. A chapter a day. Taking it slow and savoring it. Although, to be honest, I have a hard time doing that with a book I’m really enthusiastic about.]

Okay, here’s a tweak you can use for Torn that gives it some depth that goes beyond just the standard impossibility of a T&R trick.

On my coffee table sits this card…

My friend sees it and asks what it is. “Oh, just something I’ve been working on. Here, add your signature to it.”

I then perform Torn with this multi-signed card. Obviously, the gimmick used matches this card where necessary.

The idea being that I’ve been tearing and restoring this same card over and over again.

This has a practical benefit in that it gets them to sign in the area where you want them to, just because it’s the most clearly empty area of the card.

But it also has the benefit of giving this card some history. Like it’s been repeatedly destroyed and restored. And my friend is now part of the lineage of people who have witnessed this.

Usually when I perform magic for people, I want them to think it’s something I’ve never done before. But when the subject of the effect is destruction and reformation, I think there is something to be said for the idea that this happens over and over again.

You might think, “Okay… but doesn’t this suggest that maybe it’s some sort of special card? And that’s why you’re using this one card over and over?” Maybe, I don’t know. Even the concept of a “special card” would still be pretty magical. What would this “special card technology” be that allows paper to reweave itself together? I understand that issue, but for me, it isn’t a real deterrent to doing this.

Later, you can add a bunch more signatures to the card and then put it on your refrigerator. There it will serve as a Rep and a reminder of the trick for the person you performed it for (and it will look like you did it many more times). And it will also be a Hook for you to perform Torn for someone else. “Oh that? I’ll show you. But let me start with a fresh card. That one is getting pretty full.”