With the acclaimed AMC series Breaking Bad having begun airing its last episodes before ending last night, there’s not much time left for it to have a tie-in with another show. That being the case, tonight on Discovery Channel you can see an excellent special episode of MythBusters that tests two Breaking Bad-inspired myths.
Airing tonight at 10:00pm ET/PT, the episode sees Adam and Jamie run an acid-related test, while Kari, Grant, and Tory investigate the explosive properties of Mercury Fulminate (see below). You know it’s going to be a good episode when testing one of the myths involves primary explosives.
Breaking Bad show creator Vince Gilligan and star Aaron Paul (though sadly not Bryan Cranston) are on hand for the episode as well. It’s not the best MythBusters ever, but I think it’s among the better tie-in episodes they’ve done. Check out a clip below of part of the Mercury Fulminate testing:
[KGVID poster=”https://geekdad.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/MythBusters_200MercuryFulminate_thumb30.jpg” width=”560″ height=”315″]https://geekdad.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/MythBusters_200MercuryFulminate.mp4[/KGVID]
Images and video © Discovery Channel.
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I know it’s heresy, but as much as I’ve enjoyed Mythbusters over the years, I really REALLY dislike the ones with product/movie tie-ins. They’re few and far between, but I just cringe when they’re scheduled.
And since we’re on the subject, I’m curious to know what other readers think about the current format — at some point in the past, the show changed to a more scripted format where the back-and-forth dialogue just doesn’t flow properly. It’s especially annoying when one of the crew asks *surprised* when someone offers up a new myth, like they’re really completely unaware at the time of the filming. Just a small thing, but I definitely enjoy the earlier seasons where it felt like the editing was done using so much of the off-the-cuff conversations between Jamie and Adam.
I think the last several seasons have been poor — very little real science, and what there is has been dumbed down. We still watch it — but it’s definitely not a “must see” these days.
Being critical — I think the quality of the show has decreased in proportion to Adam and Jaimi’s rise in “popularity”
Which is a shame
I will say that Adam is a very engaging person out in public… he’s not shy about lending his name to various events and activities. I’ve heard that Jamie is a very private person and I can totally understand that. These guys are probably in constant demand for all sorts of non-Mythbusters activities.
But yes, something has been missing from the show for me personally — I chalk it up to the increase in scripted conversations, but only about 1 in 5 or 6 episodes really thrills me these days. I think the last one was the duct tape episode a month or more back. I almost wish they’d take a step back and consider doing something a bit different. I’d watch these guys every week just tinkering in the workshop to build remote control devices and strange machines. They should get back to their roots. That said, I know that Mythbusters is a phenomenon that Discovery probably won’t let go of any time soon.