Magic in the Media Friday, June 21, 2002 Alex Shvartsman About a month ago, Spider-Man came out in theaters. Like so many others who had waited for the movie, I anxiously went to see it. One of the pleasant surprises about the film was discovering that the director's version of Peter Parker plays Magic! There was a large Invasion poster on the wall of Parker's room. Only a week or two prior, I read an amazing novel by Neal Stephenson called Cryptonomicon. Although Magic is not mentioned in it by name, there are allusions to it in the book. This got me wondering just how many different books and movies our favorite game sneaked into. A month ago, I asked the Sideboard readers to email me with any instances of Magic appearing in media. I've also asked a number of Magic trivia buffs to recall any such. This compilation was made possible by their efforts. Magic in Movies Spider-Man The latest and the greatest, Spider-Man is certainly the most notable film I know of to mention Magic. Early in the movie, when Parker was just bit by the radioactive spider and is falling ill because of it, there is a scene where he climbs up to his room and falls on the bed. Right on top of him, is the Invasion poster!. Scott Rouse, Magic marketing director offered the following explanation of how it got there on Magicthegathering.com: "Movie production designers will often place props into a scene to create a more realistic environment. The producers of the Spider-Man movie thought Peter Parker would be the type of person who would play Magic. In December 2000 the Spider-Man movie production team contacted us looking for Magic and D&D items to place in Peter Parker's bedroom. I jumped at the chance to get Magic products in a sure-to-be blockbuster movie about one of the best superheroes ever. That same day I sent a package of cards, novels, binders, and posters off to Columbia Pictures. We would have to wait over a year to find out if they used any of the items we sent. In the September 2001 issue of Wizard Magazine, a sneak peak look at Peter's movie set bedroom confirmed the use of a D&D poster but there was no mention of anything from Magic. When the movie was released we were very excited to see they had used an Invasion poster in Peter's bedroom. We did not pay a fee for the placement of the posters in the movie, although that is a very common practice in the entertainment industry." Chasing Amy Many of you have surely seen this Kevin Smith classic and are probably wondering right now just how you managed to miss a Magic reference. In fact, the scene in question is only available on Chasing Amy DVD. It is one of the deleted scenes, and if you own the DVD you can find it under "Tell 'Em Steve-Dave" chapter. In this scene, the characters of Steve-Dave and Walt the Fanboy are in their comic book store playing Magic over the counter. They call it "Crimson Mystical Mages, an Overpower card game," and make up card names and game play as they go along, but the physical cards they are using are actually MTG. Dein Mann Wird Mir Gehören Blastoderm What do you think Blastoderm's daughter looks like? This German made-for-TV movie debuted on April 4 of this year. It's name translates "Your Husband Will Be Mine" and it was billed as a psychological thriller. According to a couple of players from Germany who saw the film, it is nothing to write home about - but the teenagers who played the leading roles in this movie played a lot of Magic throughout the it. You could see them play several times, saying things like "tapped out", "damage on the stack", etc. One of the boys gave Blazing Specter as a gift to one of the girls in the movie. Later that same girl said something along the lines of "I look like Blastoderm's daughter" which makes me wonder why he bothered. Magic is a strong sub-theme of this film, similar to how EverQuest is a sub-theme of "The New Guy" - a comedy that was released in US about a month ago. If you speak German, you can learn more about the movie at the following URL: http://www.tvspielfilm.de/programm/filmdetail/0,8484,355575,00.html Magic on TV Home Improvement When I asked for Magic sightings in Week in Review, over half of all the replies I got were people mentioning Tim Allen's sitcom, Home Improvement. On the show, Tim plays himself as the host of cable TV show "Tool Time" who is juggling his job and his family life. One of his sons is named Brad, and Brad is apparently a Magic player. There are always Magic cards lying around, or attached to the front of his desk. From all the submissions I got regarding the show, it seems like he has the entire Revised set in there. Over the last two seasons he "upgraded" from Revised cards to oversized Arena prize cards such as Shatter and Shivan Dragon. Not surprisingly, Brad is the smart one in the family. MST3K Mystery Science Theater 3000 is a TV show currently on the Sci-Fi channel that makes fun of B-rated science fiction and horror movies. In each episode, the cast of characters (and the viewers) watches one such film. The gimmick is that the cast poke merciless fun at the movies in question. In "The Pod People" episode of MST3K, the cast briefly discuss trading Magic cards. Magic in Books The Black House This was a best-selling novel by Stephen King and Peter Straub. Let's face it: any novel by Stephen King is a bestseller these days anyway. While I have not read the book myself, I was told by at least two people that Magic was mentioned (though not in a favorable light). In fact, a character was killed while on his way to buy Magic cards. The Empty Chair A suspense novel by Jeffery Deaver, this is the third book about Lincoln Rhyme. You may remember Rhyme from "The Bone Collector" - the first novel about him which was made into a movie, starring Denzel Washington. Peter Kasel found this Magic reference, and was even able to provide the exact location of it. On page 69 of the Coronet paperback edition, Deaver writes: "That's it exactly. Garret doesn't have a single pinup, a single Playboy or Penthouse poster. No Magic cards, no Pokemon, no toys." Cryptonomicon This mammoth novel by Neal Stephenson may be one of the best books I've read. It has two story lines. One is about modern day hackers and computer entrepreneurs trying to set up a "data haven" in Asia Pacific. The other is about their grandparents lives during World War 2. The themes of the book are ciphers and code breaking - but even someone like me who is not at all mathematically inclined will find it a great read. Bigger than Microsoft? In one of the scenes, two of the main characters visit their contact in Northwestern United States. They find him in the process of trading "collectible role playing cards" or some such. Although Magic is never mentioned by name, it is pretty clear those are the cards Stephenson is writing about. Only a few pages later, he also happens to mention "a game company in Seattle that became bigger than Microsoft." I will give you two guesses as to whom they are referring to. Magicthegathering.com editor Aaron Forsythe wrote the next two entries. I am quoting him directly, as he did as good a job or better than I would describing the books: A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius This is a biographical work of a Gen-X'er that my wife told me to read. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, by Dave Eggers, was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 2001 in the General Non-Fiction category, so it is clearly a good book. I wholeheartedly concur - the author has a hilarious, rambling style, not unlike Magic's John Rizzo, and I'd recommend it to anyone. The main thread of the story is how the author copes with raising his nine-year-old brother (their parents both died) while trying to remain cool and connected. It is the nine-year-old - not the author - that is into Magic. A quote (p. 83-84): "When something doesn't get done, we both shrug, because technically, neither of us is responsible, being just these two guys, brothers maybe, but we hardly even look alike, making duty even more questionable. But when someone has to be blamed, he allows me to finger him, and when he resists, I only need to look at him that certain way, that way that says 'We are partners, here, little jerk, and yesterday, when I was exhausted, and sick with pinkeye, you wanted to get some of those Magic cards, absolutely had to have them for the next day, because everyone was bringing new cards in to show during lunch, and because I was afraid that you'd be unpopular and would be cast out for being a near-orphan and having funny ears and living in a rental and would grow up with an interest in guns and uniforms, or worse, I'll find you under the covers reading Chicken Soup for the Prepubescent Soul and lamenting your poor lot, I got dressed and went to that comics store that's open 'til eight, and we got two packs of cards and one of them had a hologram in it, and you were the envy of all, and your life continued on its recent course of ease, of convenience, of relative stardom, of charmed bliss'--and he relents." Obviously "hologram" means "foil." The second quote comes from pages 110-111, where the author is explaining how difficult it is to find a girlfriend that Toph [his brother] likes: "Sure, it helps if you're interested in iguanas and can make words while belching, but even without such features, he actually recognizes the difficult spot a given date-person is in, and makes things easy, showing them his Magic cards when they say they'd like to see them, getting them beverages, with ice, sitting next to them, almost on top of them, so happy he is for the new company, someone who might, if he goes and gets it before his bedtime and maybe while his brother is in the bathroom and so can't protest, play Trivial Pursuit, as long as it's the fast way--one pie piece per answer correctly provided." So what if the book paints Magic as a hobby of nine-year-olds? It was still cool to randomly come across it in a national bestseller. Word Freak I almost expected to this book to allude to Magic. Word Freak, by Stefan Fatsis, is another work of non-fiction, this one about a year in the lives of professional Scrabble players. I loved loved loved the book, as have all the other people I know that have read it, both here at Wizards and outside. The parallels between the Scrabble culture and the Magic culture are eerie: questionable hygiene, the tendency to blame lack of success on bad luck, the insatiable gamer appetite, all of it. Go buy and read this book. Rounders and Searching for Bobby Fischer might give gaming a splash of Hollywood cool, but this book completes that trinity with a more real, grittier look at the lives gamers lead. The relevant quote is lost to me; I forgot to mark it and I can't seem to locate it. It is a brief mention; the author is lamenting why Scrabble gets no big monetary support, whereas Magic has a monstrous Pro Tour (Which is true. Once you read the book, you'll truly appreciate all the time and money WotC spends on Magic OP). But there is a second quote I'd like to share, from page 79. The author is at the 1998 U.S. National Scrabble Championships in Chicago: "From a podium, John Williams [the tournament organizer] thanks us for making this tournament the biggest Scrabble event ever. He then announces the deaths of two prominent Scrabblers: Joel Skolnick, 'one of the founding fathers if not the founding father of the tournament scene' -- Skolnick organized the first big New York tournaments in the early 1970s -- and Mike Wise, 'the founding father of Scrabble in Canada.' John's voice cracks. It's a touching scene, a reminder of how important this game is in people's lives." Mike Wise is, you guessed it, Gary Wise's father. Gaming is in Gary's genes. Surely, there are more books, movies and TV shows that mention Magic. A number of celebrities have been rumored to play the game also. If you spot a Magic reference that was not already covered here, please drop me an email. If I collect enough interesting occurrences, part 2 of this article will certainly be forthcoming. Mail me at NOSPAMashv@kingsgames.com Remove the NOSPAM part before you send out the e-mail. It has been added to combat spam programs and email viruses.