I would like to introduce you to the concept of paintball.
I can’t imagine making any judgments or drawing any conclusions until full evidence and information comes out. Why would anyone?
This is the internet, but it is also the Straight Dope. “Fighting Ignorance since 1973” is our motto.
It’s devastating what happened and I think we should just wait for the police and investigators to figure out what happened and who is to blame.
That would be a good TV episode. I do feel very sorry for the young lady who was killed. What a tragedy.
Generally speaking, an actor messing with a prop gun after it had been checked and cleared by the armorer - even to “check it” himself - would increase the risk of mishap in this instance, not decrease it. And would make the actor liable. The armorer would literally be required to take and check the prop again afterward to make sure the actor hadn’t accidentally rendered it unsafe.
The armorer’s job is to check and doublecheck to make sure the prop weapon is safe to use, and then to hand it to the actor whose job it is to point it and make it go bang while emoting appropriately.
Or a Super Soaker.
Plus it’s harder to shoot your eye out with a Red Ryder Official BB Gun if you don’t point it at yourself. It can be done, it’s just more difficult.
I know, right? Some here are getting nuts and have no clue what happened.
Back when Brandon Lee died, we learned that the actor was entirely innocent.
I don’t even know what to say to the “no one should point a gun at anyone even in a movie” concept. Of course they do. Like, constantly. In the same shot, with both actors in the shot. All the time.
Like, I can’t believe we’re pretending that hasn’t been happening for decades.
How is this even relevant to this situation where the two casualties weren’t actors but part of the crew behind the camera?
To “own the libs” of course. This is about Alec Baldwin, more than anything else that happened.
Yeah I’d assume this is true for any actor, in pretty much any situation, they are never meant to be given a weapon that even has been used to fire real bullets (or even squibs given what happened to Brandon Lee). There is no situation I can imagine where any actor (let alone a big name like Alec Baldwin) would been given a real gun with real bullets (except maybe in some pre-production gun training), so no matter how much of a dick you think he is I don’t think he can bear any blame. All the usual rules about gun safety (the big one being don’t point it anything you don’t want killed) don’t apply when you are making a film about gunfighter.
The armorer however better be lawyering up like nobodies business right now.
I don’t think anyone is unaware Alec Baldwin is an ass, or at least was as recently as a few years ago, but that is no reason to assume he is culpable for this at all. There have been a number of incidents like this in which the actor was not remotely at fault, and considering the vast majority of the onus is on the technical staff to make guns on set safe it seems at least decently likely Baldwin isn’t at fault here. If he was pointing the gun at someone when he wasn’t supposed to or fucking around with it, sure, but nothing close to that has been reported, kinda crazy to see people crucifying him.
Well, with Brian Laundrie’s skeletonized body now discovered, some people turn their attention to the next death about which they can spin out fantasies.
Not a gun person by any means, so I don’t know anything. So it was wadding that killed the person? How far away from the gun would wadding sill be going fast enough to be lethal? I’m guessing that it isn’t particularly aerodynamic and after 50’ or so it isn’t deadly but if someone has a better figure I’d like to know.
I haven’t seen any specifics reported yet.
We don’t yet know anything about the nature of the projectile.
Blanks don’t have wadding, just a crimped end. Even if they did, wadding won’t retain any lethal force at 50’.
https://cdn3.volusion.com/jodua.csmpx/v/vspfiles/photos/SA13B-2.jpg?v-cache=1547484779
Thanks for the clarification. Not that I’m not still confused.
Not arguing the moderation, just wanted to say that this made me laugh. Rather like the snarky style of a certain C. Adams. (Might have gone better if asahi had just left it at that.)
I’m also still confused. I always thought a blank was simply a bubble of gunpowder that was hammered down on to make noise and smoke - kind of like a kid’s toy gun, without the strip of paper coming out the end.
I am in full agreement that Alec Baldwin is a scumbag.
But people should only be sent to prison because they’re guilty of committing a serious crime. We should not imprison people just because we don’t like them.
With the exception of the Dutch.