– Melina Major, staff

Ted and Marion Outerbridge are a magic duo who perform a Time Capsule tour, in which they attempted to turn back time.

On Saturday, the show came to Brantford, but was underwhelming, and only made me want to turn back time to before I got there.

The show began with creepy voices coming from the intercom saying things like “Do you ever wish you could turn back time?” No one was on stage yet and lights were flashing, leaving the fully packed audience feeling confused as to what was going on. This was just the beginning; the show slowly became more and more bizarre as the night went on.

Then Marion Outerbridge came on stage, very scantily clad for a woman of her age, in a black leotard. She started to leap around the stage and wave a somewhat ridiculously bright light in the audience’s eyes. The leaps she was doing were somewhat resembling of a contemporary style of dancing. She was either doing this to set the mood for the next magic trick or trying to distract the audience. If the latter is true, it certainly did the trick.

Her husband and magic partner, Ted, came on stage and announced that he could smell someone’s perfume. He proceeded to walk out into the crowd and sniff around, closely resembling a dog.

He then picked a lady from the audience and drew the perfume she was wearing on a piece paper. He did guess the right perfume which was impressive, but, drawing was not supposed to be the point of the show.

Ted then introduced us all to Greta the Goose, a puppet or stuffed animal of some sort that moved its head whenever he did and could “read minds.” Unfortunately, it was really just him and, rather obviously, not the goose at all.

The goose had no voice to it, which was good because in order to not go overboard with the cheese factor of the show. They inserted a lame joke about the goose peeing on stage, which only enhanced the fact that this was one of the weirdest things I’ve ever experienced.

Perhaps the worst was that the Outerbridges liked to repeat a lot of their tricks, which began to bore the audience. One in particular was repeated three times.

What they deemed worthy of a three-peat was a trick in which he was able to magically make three separate pieces of string become one piece, and then separate them into three again. This trick seemed a bit amateur for the type of magic show that they were holding.

Fortunately, this was the last act. Unfortunately, upon its completion, Ted gave a little spiel about how thread was a metaphor for life. Cheesy.

They claimed that they use acting, comedy and dancing to enhance their magic. This only made parts of the show unbearable. Perhaps the show would have been mind blowing without it. Instead, the dancing and showiness just seemed to distract from the whole point of the show, which was supposed to be magic and illusions.

However, not everything about the show was negative. It did have some high points.

The chemistry between the Outerbridges was amazing. You can tell by watching them for two hours that they are in love with each other and wholly dedicated to the work that they do together. The magic may not have been the greatest, but, it was impressive with how well the Outerbridges communicated with one another on stage.

Ted also did perform some tricks that were impressive. He made his wife levitate just by waving a scarf over her and did the same to bring her back down.

Production helped as well, with bright lighting which enhanced the eerie effect. The trick was believable, making it the best one of the night.

Likely the greatest part of the whole show was the set designs used. One set was that of an alleyway, giving the show an edgy feel. Another resembled a living room. These sets were brightly coloured and cartoon-like and made sense in relation to each magic trick. Throughout the show the set changed at least a dozen times, which really caught the viewers’ attention and kept them glued to the show.

Unfortunately, The Time Capsule Tour is not as impressive as it could have been. The Outerbridges really should have used their magic to go back in time and work out a few kinks in their show.