Derren Brown: 5 Best TV Specials and Secrets Of How They Were Done

2. Russian Roulette

The Premise 6 chambers, 1 bullet- how sure is Derren that he can read someone€™s mind?? How It Was Done Derren Brown€™s first big Event show, Russian Roulette, remains his most dangerous (and the only one totally fixed). After following the usual procedure (choosing from 12,000 that applied), Derren€™s accomplice places a bullet into a gun, which is passed to Derren to shoot himself. The whole show details the psychological techniques that Derren would use to determine the chamber in which the bullet was placed, and therefore play safely. This show attracted the most attention by far, with criticisms ranging from the impact it would have on children, to the fact he blatantly used a blank. Ok well he argued a blank would still have killed him, but it misses the point he covered up during the show. The Russian Roulette stunt was a magic trick, there€™s no doubt. No matter how well you read people, you can never be 100% sure, not when your life is in the balance. Penn and Teller could probably tell you 15 different ways it could have been done, no magician truly risks their lives (particularly on live TV) no matter how dangerous it may seem. In this show, the €˜reveal€™ of psychological techniques is, in fact, what a magician would call €˜mis-direction€™, distracting you from seeing the truth behind the trick.