America's Got Talent Youtube heat - Could Brett Daniels be magic's last hope?

FOR BRITISH VIEWERS, THIS ARTICLE MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS

After Landon Swank, Seth Grabel and Scott Alexander failed to get out of their first round heats, the future of magic acts on the show this year hinges on two events. One of these will be the wildcard heat next week, which could involve at least one of those three (Only Alexander failed to make the judges choice). But first of all comes the Youtube heat, which airs tonight. Hundreds of acts submitted videos on Youtube, and twelve of those will perform in the liveshows. One of these twelve is Brett Daniels, and you can see his Youtube video below

WHAT ARE BRETT'S CHANCES?

The video that Brett submitted to Youtube was not that good, and the dislikes for it outnumber the likes. It involved him making a motorbike appear, then vanishing on the motorbike and reappearing on it on a wire model on stage. The middle bit has already been exposed by the Masked Magician, and the other parts of the trick are cliche. Judging by it, Brett's chances don't look great

However, Brett has two assets. One of these should be appreciated by viewers, but only devout magicians are aware of the other one.

Brett's first strength is showmanship. The trick and presentation were dated, but with all the smoke and dancers, the staging was at the level few acts could compete with. His second strength is thus: He has a varied- and excellent- Repertoire of illusions. As a popular and respected magician who has performed all over the globe, he has a number of impressive tricks up his sleeve,  ranging from clever sleights to the sort of escapology that earned Cosentino Second place overall in this year's Australia's Got Talent, thus setting the bar very high indeed for magicians in the western world. Hopefully, Brett will aim to go one better...

WHAT IS THE COMPETITION LIKE?

As is the case with Brett, It's hard to tell how his competition (Which was revealed earlier today) will fare tonight. The change in stage is one factor, and it is also worth noting that there will only be two singing acts among the twelve contestants. This top twelve is:

1. Brett Daniels
2. Kevin Kolis- a singer with a nice voice, but how many singers can this show have?
3. Gabe Rocks- Dog act. I thought that Pup's disastrous performance last year may have put the judges off picking a dog act, but here we are. At least Gabe appears to be properly trained
4. TNC elite- Clogging act .Cloggers use their feet to create percussive music in a manner similar to tap dancing.As previous such acts like Series 4 finallists The Fab Five can attest, they tend to do well in the votes, but are never spectacular. Personally, I found this act less exciting than others
5. Aeon Fever- A group of gymnasts whose routine was influenced by parkour. Their routine may not fit onto stage (which happened to Ryan Rodriguez last year) but there were some good tricks. 
6. Beth Ann Robinson- A gymnast/Dancer. She is very talented, but may be a bit limited
7. Breena Bell - The same as Beth, only much younger
8. West Springfield Dance- Very good for a dance crew, but their video was a bit short.
9. Powerhouse Choir-An All-Singing, All-Dancing choir, they are good, but not "Wow". Choirs have never been seen in the liveshows before.
10. Gymkana- An acrobatic troupe who did a Roman Ladder routine. They were very impressive, but I'm not sure about their range.
11. Kalanai Basketball- A basketball freestyle juggler whose video was the shortest of the top 12, but included some excellent tricks. This is another act that has never been seen on Americas Got Talent before.
12. Matt Wilhelm- Unlike the other eleven acts, who were chosen by the judges, Matt was chosen by the viewers, which gives him an advantage of sorts (Jackie Evancho was chosen that way last year). However, his act is very different from Jackie's. His involves bikes, and although only one of this years three biking acts in the liveshows have made it through (Like with the magicians, this may change in the wildcard round), Matt used Fighting-Gravity style Black lights to stand out, and used the bike as a prop for some excellent acrobatics rather than a thing to ride up ramps on. His act is also more focused than, say, Yellow Design Stunt crew were last week.

These are the sort of acts without a firm voter base and who may be prone to a disaster on tonight's stage.They are also the sort of acts who look like they could be interesting viewing, just not in a distorted online video There is no-one that appears to match last years Youtube heat standout Jackie Evancho, but, overall, the group of twelve appears to be better than last year's. If I were to rate Brett's chances, they would be moderate, as are those of everyone else, even Matt Wilhelm's. It all depends on tonight's performances