Derren Brown - The Events (Starting 09/09/09 9:00 PM) - My Thoughts - Part 2

In yesterdays article I dissected the strange new Derren Brown advert that has been airing on TV for his new show The Events. This article will look into more detail at some of the clues in the advert, with the final article "Part 3" discussing the last of the clues and summarising on what I think he has in store for us.

stucktomysofa.com

stucktomysofa.com is a fake pizza website/restaurant where they deliver your pizzas direct to your sofa (you have to give them a front door key). The background image for the website is Derren Brown's head repeated. The restaurant was founded by Dr Rene Marrone. This name is partly Italian and partly an anagram. Marrone is Italian for 'brown' whereas Dr Rene is an anagram for Derren.

The website doesn't seem to have any other clues. The name "stuck to my sofa" might be a bit tongue in cheek on Derren's part, but it could have a deeper meaning. Derren has done several tricks where he has frozen people to the spot using suggestion, and due to the live nature of the new show he could be planning some mass social experiment or "freezing" trick through the TV - there's hints to "frozen on the spot" tricks in other clues as well.

MachesterUnited.com billboard

As mentioned yesterday, on first look the billboard appears to be ManchesterUnited.com reversed. But it's also backwards, which leads to the website retsehcnaMdetinU.com. Even more confusing is that the website itself is backwards, flipped and mirrored to death. I've fixed up everything as best as I could in photoshop and you can view a readable version of the website by clicking the thumbnail below

The most noteworthy parts from the site I think is:

"Claim that reverse football website is just a front for getting people to go to the Derren Brown The Events website" - Suggesting that this, or other clues are just misdirection and meaningless. Although I'm sure some of them will turn out to be hints.

"Backwards merchandise and tickets to 09/09/09 game are available from our shop" - I think this is hinting at using a live football game as part of the climatic stunt/trick to end the first show on 09/09/09. For the non-football fans out there there's a load of World Cup Qualifying games occurring at the same time the show is airing live, including the England vs Czech Republic game. I think a live football game will definitely play a part in the first show. He might try and predict which teams will win, how many goals will be scored in all of the games or some other seemingly unguessable 'trick'. It's worth noting that although the show is being broadcast live, when the Russian Roulette special was broadcast live it had a slight delay (apparently in case he blew his head off, but we all knew deep down that was never going to happen), and I suspect Derren might try and use a slight delay to his advantage somehow...

Derren Brown also loves influencing large groups of people, and a football match would be a good way of doing this live. Also, football fans are more likely to participate in "group behaviour" (mexican waves etc) so it is arguably easier to influence a group of football supporters in a match as they would be more suseptical to his techniques. I wouldn't be surprised to see a stucktomysofa.com advert on the side of the football pitches or something.

"Ian Ducee discusses is undergoing extensive drug testing after he froze on the pitch in last night's match. Early reports state that he felt 'stuck to the spot' as though hypnotised after glancing at the big screen" - First of all, the sentence is grammatically incorrect - "discusses is undergoing". I think this is a genuine error by the person who made the website. "Ian Ducee" is an anagram for "audience" which again hints at either the crowd at a football stadium, or the audience at home being manipulated somehow. Again "being stuck" and frozen is mentioned, so it's safe to assume one of "The Events" will involve freezing people or something similar. Finally it mentions the big screen. Will some clips be shown on the big screen at half time in the England match (I think it will be half time when Derren's show starts), then towards the end the crowd will do something that Derren has apparently influenced them to do?

"Wren Ordbern talks to us about misdirection as the key to his goal scoring success. 'It's all about making them look the other way'" - Derren actually uses a lot of standard magic tricks and techniques to perform his "psychological" feats. Misdirection is talked about in the video advert, and has always been the key to a lot of Derren's tricks and a reason why he is so successful. The Russian Roulette game for example no doubt had an underlying magic trick to it, rather than him "reading" the guy who loaded the gun. If he was to pull off a "make the crowd do a mexican wave on my demand" type trick live, it wouldn't be the weird video footage that influences the crowd. It would be more likely that Derren had bought large blocks of tickets, so he could stimulate a mexican wave on demand (similar to how 'The System' was thought to be a guaranteed way to win on the horses, when in fact was a rational and outlandish pyramid type scheme).

Part 3

In part 3 of my Derren Brown blog mini series, I will talk about the Red and Black, Lottery and Secure Systems' references from the advert, and will summarise what I think he has in store for us! Stay tuned ;-)

Comments

Comments
derren, brown, stuck, to, my, sofa, stucktomysofa.com, anagram, manchesterunited.com, misdirection, magic, football, stadium, audience,
Posted by DomZ on 26/08/2009 at 15:05 pm