#19: Spencer Horsman (Season 7)
Unlike the Kinetic King, there weren't really any questions about whether or not America would accept Spencer Horsman's act as appropriate for America's Got Talent, though there were genuine concerns about whether or not they would vote for it.
In seven seasons, Spencer Horsman was the first contestant on AGT to ever compete exclusively as an escape artist. What few acts had done anything remotely like this in the past were either magic acts with an escape theme like that of Seth Grabel, or completely useless time-wasters like that of George the Giant.
Needless to say, as the first genuine representative of the talent, a lot of viewers were curious, not only to see how Horsman would do as an act, but how America would respond to him with their votes.
Truthfully, Horsman's expectations were not as high as the anticipation. Second only to magic acts, danger acts have the worst record on America's Got Talent when it comes to disappointing; Mark Faje, Ben Blaque and Frank Miles have already been named (as well as Rudi Macaggi, albeit for different reasons), and even more are still to be named.
So it honestly wasn't that surprising when Horsman, after two very impressive escapes building up to the live shows, suddenly performed a routine that was more akin to a magic trick.
More than that, the trick, by Horsman's own admission, suffered a prop malfunction that caused the trap door to open thirteen seconds premature, effectively ruined the illusion behind it.
Much like the Kinetic King, Horsman was later brought back as a wild card, where he redeemed himself with a highly impressive, proper escape trick.
Unfortunately, this time America did not reward the redemption with votes.
In fact, given that Horsman lost in votes even to Todd Oliver of all people, it might be fair to say that America voted no to escape tricks as a whole on Horsman.
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