History YMMV / MythBusters

* HarsherInHindsight: In the first season episode about cell phones causing explosions in gas stations, the fire chief noted that the worst-case scenario for the test would be an excessively large explosion blowing out all the nearby windows. Six years later when testing Knock your Socks Off, an excessively large explosion blew out many of the windows in Esparto, California.

* InternetBackdraft: A common problem when the [=MythBusters=] test a particularly controversial myth. While there are legitimate criticisms in their testing methods which led to retests, such as using the wrong type of scope for Carlos Hathcock's famous Scope Snipe[[note]]Little known fact is that due to a miscommunication, their expert brought the wrong scopes, and they filmed the original test to attempt to salvage a day's shooting, then retested it with correct scopes exactly one day before the original test aired and before anyone could complain about it.[[/note]], there are just as many complaints due to viewers just being plain unhappy that the results of the myth didn't conform to their expectations. However, the Mythbusters are all familiar with the trope, joking about how they'll be deluged with angry e-mails and forum posts.
** With the 2014 announcement that the Build Team was leaving, the show has been subjected to a torrent of fan hate on social media.
** Good grief, the reboot. Pick any post about the reboot from the official Facebook page, and you'll find people roasting how the show isn't starring the build team, Jamie or Adam. It's either that or rants regarding how the first season is a reality TV show.

* MostAnnoyingSound: Any show where the subject under testing encourages Adam to do a [[WhatTheHellIsThatAccent horrible accent]] for the entire show, especially anything with pirates.

** Creator/JamesCameron took a different tack; he basically admitted that StupidSacrifice was in play in ''Film/{{Titanic 1997}}''... in order for the story to work, Jack ''had'' to die, one way or the other, and if he'd thought of a better way, he'd have used it.

* MostWonderfulSound: The sound that Jamie's [[ICallItVera little pop gun]] makes when firing paint-filled grenades during the "shoot a grenade out of the air" myth qualifies as a Most Hilarious Sound. It makes the [=MythBusters=] lose it.

* InternetBackdraft: A common problem when the [=MythBusters=] test a particularly controversial myth. While there are legitimate criticisms in their testing methods which led to retests, such as using the wrong type of scope for Carlos Hathcock's famous Scope Snipe[[note]]Little known fact is that due to a miscommunication, their expert brought the wrong scopes, and they filmed the original test to attempt to salvage a day's shooting, then retested it with correct scopes exactly one day before the original test aired and before anyone could complain about it.[[/note]], there are just a many complaints due to viewers just being plain unhappy that the results of the myth didn't conform to their expectations. However, the Mythbusters are all familiar with the trope, joking about how they'll be deluged with angry e-mails and forum posts.

** Among [[GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff Japanese]] fans: '''''BEUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU....'''''[[note]]The sound Adam used to describe the Confederate Rocket prototype firing during a test in the workshop.[[/note]]
* {{Misblamed}}: While the [=MythBusters=] do make mistakes from time to time, complaints that they are "highly unscientific" is quite a glorification of how science works. Science is all about having a hypothesis and coming to a conclusion through testing and experimentation. As ''Webcomic/{{XKCD}}'' said, "[[http://xkcd.com/397/ Everything else is just bookkeeping]]." They are also under a time constraint to complete the testing or are given incentive to twist the results in some way (which will happen with scientists just the same, they get money from somewhere). Also, a big aspect of scientific research is verification and replicability, since they are the only ones doing what they are doing it means it is unlikely to be backed by any other research teams, which is not their fault.

-->'''Dan Tapster, executive producer (Discovery):''' We were very keen for [Imahara, Byron and Belleci] to be a part of the show, we are massive fans of theirs, and what they did over 10 years was phenomenal. There were negotiations, and based on those negotiations, they opted out. It's a shame for them. It's a shame for us. But it gave us the opportunity to reinvent the show, which it kind of needed.
-->'''Adam Savage:''' Kari, Grant, and Tory are good friends of ours and we love those guys. We didn't want to see them go. The actual reasons for them going -- while we have certain understandings of what went on, that's a contract discussion between Discovery and those guys. We don't know much about how that actually went.

** Contextually the Needle Vs. Glass myth turned out to be a big one, with the MythBusters failing to take a lot of their usual research and investigative techniques into account. Firstly they decide to use ordinary sewing needles when even a quick glance at the video (let alone their usual frame-by-frame analysis) shows the monk is using a heavier, sturdier type of needle that would be less likely to bend or break like many of the test needles did and would have more force behind it when thrown, letting it pierce the glass easier. Secondly it appears they didn't get the input of the Shaolin monk who actually did it (something they usually try very hard to do) and the monk would later appear on several other programs to demonstrate his feat. These two simple oversights led to them busting a myth that was later confirmed by several other sources.

* HilariousInHindsight: During the Bug Special episode, Jamie likens the toy helicopters on a sheet to a man trying to move a sailboat he's on by blowing on the sail: You don't get anywhere, and can't. [[spoiler:A few episodes later, the Build Team enacted that thought experiment. If you have a strong enough fan, and a large enough sail, this can work. Not very well, but the boat does move.]]

* BrokenBase: The reboot not having either Jamie, Adam or the build team in it, and the first season is a reality TV series focusing on assembling a new team of Mythbusters. Some are just glad that the series is back, others are shouting TheyChangedItNowItSucks at the various changes and the OutOfGenreExperience from changing one season to Reality TV.

* CriticalResearchFailure: While testing myths related to the MoonLandingHoax, Adam holds up an Apollo astronaut figurine and says that it's Neil Armstrong because of the figure's red commander markings. Neil Armstrong's suit never had any red markings, and looking at any picture of him would reveal its absence - Something space-buff Adam especially should have known. They were an embellishment added to commanders' suits from Apollo 13 onwards because people had trouble distinguishing the Apollo 11 and 12 astronauts on TV.

* GrowingTheBeard: The first season had a significantly slower pace than later seasons, one point being that the show would stop to have Heather Joseph-Witham give elaborate and unnecessary information regarding the myth. As well, a higher percentage of the show focused on Jamie and Adam's efforts to acquire the parts needed and their interactions with the bemused sellers (e.g. Jamie trying to get the JATO rocket). Even the narrator, [[NamedAfterSomebodyFamous Robert Lee]], spoke in a rather slow, awkward cadence that gave off a real lack of confidence as if he was reading the script for the first time. Evidently the charm of the show was still there, but the second season started featuring the Build Team and had a greater focus on the actual experimentation and their efforts to recreate the myth.

* CrazyAwesome: The entire idea of the show is this! Five {{Mad Scientist}}s blow up, shoot, break, and damage tons of stuff all in the name of finding out if a myth is true or not.

* GrowingTheBeard: The first season had a significantly slower pace than later seasons, one point being that the show would stop to have Heather Joseph-Witham give elaborate and unnecessary information regarding the myth. As well, a higher percentage of the show focused on Jamie and Adam's efforts to acquire the parts needed and their interactions with the bemused sellers (e.g. Jamie trying to get the JATO rocket). Evidently the charm of the show was still there, but the second season started featuring the Build Team and had a greater focus on the actual experimentation and their efforts to recreate the myth.

*** Kari provided more detail on the situation in her 2018 memoir ''Crash Test Girl'', which illustrates it as less of a negotiation and more the producers making a lowball offer that was clearly designed to be rejected so they could claim that the Build Team hadn't been fired. (The offer not only would have cut the Build Team's appearances down to almost nothing, requiring only a few weeks of shooting per year, but also included an exclusivity clause that would have barred them from appearing on other shows.) [[TearJerker Profoundly disappointing]] when viewed against the Build Team's contributions over the years.
--> '''Dan Tapster, executive producer (Discovery):''' We were very keen for [Imahara, Byron and Belleci] to be a part of the show, we are massive fans of theirs, and what they did over 10 years was phenomenal. There were negotiations, and based on those negotiations, they opted out. It's a shame for them. It's a shame for us. But it gave us the opportunity to reinvent the show, which it kind of needed.
--> '''Adam Savage:''' Kari, Grant, and Tory are good friends of ours and we love those guys. We didn't want to see them go. The actual reasons for them going -- while we have certain understandings of what went on, that's a contract discussion between Discovery and those guys. We don't know much about how that actually went.

*** Kari provided more detail on the situation in her 2018 memoir ''Crash Test Girl'', which illustrates it as less of a negotiation and more the producers making a severely reduced (and restricted) offer that was clearly designed to be rejected so they could claim that the Build Team hadn't been fired. [[TearJerker Profoundly disappointing]] when viewed against the Build Team's contributions over the years.

** The various farewell messages from people such as Chris Hadfield, Creator/JamesCameron, Creator/NeilDeGrasseTyson, [[UsefulNotes/BarackObama Pres. Obama]], and Creator/StephenColbert.

** The beautiful sound of a [[StuffBlowingUp cement truck]] [[UpToEleven ''vaporizing.'']]

** [[http://hackedirl.com/2010/08/30/jamie-knows-best/ "When in doubt... C4! Heh heh heh!"]]

** As the show goes on, they started testing stories that are clearly set up for marketing purposes (the scaled-up Newton's Cradle video they were examining was a commercial made using blatant CGI) and attempting to recreate something that was known to have occurred in a controlled environment (like a movie stunt) or are pure fantasy (like the episode testing gags from ''Series/TheSimpsons''). Also, in early Season 10, Adam stopped referring to what a lot of what they're testing as myths and started calling them ''tropes'' instead since a huge chunk of the experiments were made up of examining stunts performed in films and television.

* AdoredByTheNetwork: Mythbusters is Discovery Communications' CashCowFranchise, and the execs know that. When someone at The Science Channel put forth an idea to revive the series just days after the show ended production, the higher ups at Discovery approved of the plan almost immediately.

* AwesomeMusic: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztEkd1tdBmM The Mythbusters theme music]].

** The opening stinger to the "Blow It Out of the Water" episode (which featured the test of the machine gun booby trap from the series finale of ''Series/BreakingBad'') uses a song that sounds a ''lot'' what the theme music for ''Breaking Bad'' might be if it had lyrics.