MythBusters

Who you gonna call?

MythBusters is a popular science program that airs on the Discovery Channel. The show follows five people who get paid to blow things up, surf, skydive, waterski, get drunk, fire guns, wreck cars, set things on fire, drop things from massive heights, travel the world, launch frozen chickens and blow more things up, "all in the name of science".

Who Are The MythBusters?

• Two guys with more than thirty years of special effects experience between them.
  • Adam Savage is a middle-aged infant who spends most of his time dressing up as a pirate, ninja, caveman, cowboy, astronaut, superhero, indian, clown, mime or ballet dancer and putting on silly voices.
  • Jamie Hyneman 2.0 is an advanced multi-functional robot built to look like a French walrus. As well as being a visual effects expert, he is also a scuba diver, a licensed boat captain, a linguist and a bear wrestler.
• Tory Belleci is expendable, i.e. if he dies he gets replaced, and conducts the most dangerous tests.
• Grant Imahara created a punching robot, a sword-swinging robot, a chainsaw-juggling robot, and Jamie Hyneman 2.0.
• Kari Byron is a red-headed genius whose "behind" is something else.
• Buster the crash-test dummy, according to Kari, is something else too.

Format

Each episode begins with the MythBusters receiving a phone call from a scared person whose house is being haunted by a myth. The narrator then shows the audience a piece of stock footage related to the myth. Afterwards, the team get in their "MythMobile" and drive off, then there's an advert break. After the adverts, more stock footage is shown and there's an unnecessary recap of the previous part. The MythBusters then arrive at the client's house and begin using a variety of scientific techniques to disprove (bust) the myth. If the myth is successfully busted, they lock it up and the client is now myth-free. If they fail, the myth is confirmed and will continue to haunt the client's house unless the MythBusters destroy the house with a spectacular explosion.

Often viewers complain on the fansite that a busted myth was treated unfairly. This occasionally results in a lawsuit demanding the myth be released. The released myths continue to haunt people until they are revisited in special episodes and the MythBusters attempt to shut the fans up and bust them once and for all.

Early history

Discovery Channel was in trouble, its ratings the lowest around. Apparently back then people weren't interested in learning about exciting, adrenaline-fueled subjects such as moss, igneous rocks and the mating rituals of elephants. They wanted to see dull, yawn-inducing puffs and learn a bunch of useless trivia, such as how to escape a sinking car or how to save someone who's about to be run over by a train.

Discovery devised a show in which special effects wizards would do just that. Given the working title "The Best Job in the World", the half-hour pilot was entirely clips of car crashes, helicopters spinning out of control, three pairs of girls making out, a moonwalking bird, and a brief epilog with Kari's butt undergoing vacuum-induced flatulence. "Yakety Sax" and "1812 Overture" alternated as background music.

The show received viewing figures of 42, a record high for the Discovery Channel. However, parents complained that the show had no educational value at all. All it did was make children want to attempt some of the dangerous stunts at home. One mother was shocked to find her eight-year-old son stuffing his baby sister into a microwave, while her older daughter actually kissed a girl (and liked it)! So Discovery had to think of a way to pass the show off as an educational program, while including lots of warnings against trying any of the experiments at home. Thus MythBusters was born.

Myths tested

“We should start out small scale. Where’s Grant?”

~ Kari on the masturbation myth

“Where's my pirate costume?”

~ Adam on something completely different

“If it’s good enough to do, it’s good enough to overdo.”

~ Grant

“When in doubt, C4.”

~ Jamie

Safety first

Myth Statement	Method	Status
A 33hz sound wave can give a woman an orgasm.	Kari sat on a beasty amp while it played a 33hz sound wave at 160db.	Busted. She did not climax, much to the disappointment of the nerdy fan boys.
You can be killed by a flying champagne cork.	Grant built a champagne cork launching robot and fired several shots at Tory's head.	Busted. Tory didn't die, although he was rendered completely blind in his left eye. He now has AIDS. Poor guy. Justin Beiber is like aids, once you catch it there is no cure and you will die. Your penis will fall off too.
You can make an anti-gravity device using a cat and buttered toast.	They taped slices of toast, butter side up, to a number of cats and used a cat-throwing robot to launch them into the air.	Confirmed. The forces exerted by the butter and the cat's feet were in perfect equilibrium causing the cat and toast to defy gravity.
It's possible to make a fire extinguisher look sexy.	See picture.	Confirmed.
Frantic masturbation can make you go blind.	The less said about it, the better.	Busted. Like their balls.
If you flip a penny ten thousand times, because the heads side is heavier, it will land on tails significantly more times.	They built a mass coin flipping robot to flip a hundred pennies a hundred times each and recorded the results.	Plausible. They got bored about half way through and just decided to put ten thousand pennies in a pile and blow them up with C4.
Chuck Norris's tears can cure cancer.	Jamie's MythTerns tried a variety of methods to get Chuck Norris to cry.	Inconclusive. All efforts failed and the MythTerns died of roundhouse kick related injuries.
The World Trade Center was actually brought down using Diet Coke and Mentos.	A 100th scale model of the World Trade Center was built and filled with powdered Mentos and Diet Coke.	Plausible. The scale models were successfully destroyed, however the MythBusters were arrested by the FBI when they attempted to go full scale.
Crossing the streams is bad.	Using plans submitted on the fansite, Adam and Jamie built their own proton packs and crossed the streams.	Confirmed. A total protonic reversal occurred, causing all the molecules in their bodies to explode at the speed of light. Luckily, Grant was able to build another Jamie.
Burning your tongue with a lighter gives you a craving for fruitcake.	Adam and Jamie burn their tongues with a lighter.	Busted. Or rather, impossible to find out, because Adam always has a craving for fruitcake. That poor guy. Jamie and Adam got their taste buds burned off, and they wasted money buying expensive lighters, so this episode was a total waste to them.
The moon is made out of cheese.	Adam and Jamie blast into space with a bag of Cheese Doodles. They extract a moon rock and eat it. Then they eat a Cheese Doodle and compare flavors.	Confirmed. But mostly because they have no tastebuds.
Toxic waste will give you superpowers.	Adam and Jamie throw toxic waste at a passerby.	Busted. The person in question died a horribly painful death and Adam was sent to jail for 25 days on manslaughter charges. Jamie 1.0 exploded.
A bomb is significantly less powerful if swallowed.	The newly built Jamie 1.1 ate a twenty-pound bomb with his meat-and-apple-cucumber pie.	Uncertain. Unkown to Adam, Jamie 1.1 already had a two-ton nuclear device in his beret which exploded simultaneously with the other bomb. The blast destroyed the MythBusters headquarters, rendering the test unrepeatable.

See also

• Ghostbusters
• Urban legend
• Myth