Wizard Wars

When the focus is on the magic, Wars can be spellbinding--when it's not, irksome questions arise.

This collaborative atmosphere and casual framework may keep Wizard Wars from being the battle royal of Adventure Time's Wizard Battle, but it's still fun, as its performers manage to mutate the mundane into magic.

The format doesn’t work, but the illusions do. It’s 58 minutes of pretty amusing magic, building to a two-minute letdown.

It's possible Wizard Wars will get old quickly if too many of the tricks contestants come up with look the same, but in this first episode anyway it's a fairly entertaining hour of TV.

Wizard Wars never comes across as a straight magic show, but more about how to assemble the pieces that add up to a magic show.