Dead man's hand in popular culture Dead man's hand in popular culture The dead man's hand, a legendary "cursed" poker hand usually depicted as consisting of the ace of spades, ace of clubs, eight of spades and eight of clubs with an undefined fifth card, has appeared or been referenced in numerous works of popular culture. In the novel "Along Came a Spider" by James Patterson, Jezzie Flannigan tells the story of how her father won his gun with a hand of aces and eights – she also uses "Aces&Eights" as her computer password. "Dead Man's Hand" is the name of the seventh book of the
Pai gow poker a player acting in tandem with the dealer as co-bankers). The object of pai gow poker is for a player to create two poker hands out of the seven-card hand he/she is dealt (a five-card hand and a two-card poker hand) that beats both the dealer's corresponding hands. The five-card hand's rank must exceed that of the two-card hand, and it is for this reason that the two-card hand is often called the hand "in front", "on top", "hair", or the "small", "minor", or "low" hand. The five-card hand is called the hand "behind", or the "bottom", "high", or "big",