One of the most exciting things about watching the filmed version of Showman, Derren Brown’s latest construction, is that I finally get to see a routine I missed when I went to see it live for the best possible reason - I was returning to my seat having been an integral part of the previous routine. That humblebrag aside, this is one of my favourite shows of his I’ve seen, both because I got to be a part of it, but also, for one of the few times, something actually worked on me. Like much of the audience, I lost 10 seconds or so of my memory. I still think about that nearly a year later. Seeing the whole show back, it’s fascinating to see the foreshadowing that had been weaved through. It’s quite easily Brown’s most personal show, and all the better for it - it brims with the need to use “magic” to tell a larger story, to impart some meaning to the audience. It’s hard to say much more without spoiling it, which is not really in the spirit of the magic, but yes. This is a remarkable work, and I’m glad that a canonical version of it exists.