[peaceful music]

[things explode]

[whoops]

I'm Dr. Kate Biberdorf, but you may know me

as Kate the Chemist.

[Narrator] Kate is a scientist, author,

and science entertainer.

Today, I'm going to break down clips

from movies and TV about chemistry.

So let's experiment.

Dissolving a body, Breaking Bad.

[gags]

It's possible that HF could dissolve a body,

but I would not pick that one because HF is a weak acid.

And so that means that it doesn't fully dissociate

into the hydronium ion and that's the active species

that's actually going to start eating away at the tissue.

So if it was me, to dissolve a body,

even though I shouldn't be saying this,

I would probably go with something closer to aqua regia,

which is a royal acid.

[machine whirs]

[bottle spritzes]

That last scene makes me cringe.

He's standing next to a huge container of HF,

so hydrofluoric acid, that is being suspended

in the air and he doesn't have

any safety equipment on his face.

So that thing could break and splash in his face

and just, pfft, he'd be done-zo.

No, thank you.

[acid bubbles]

When you add acid to something,

it is going to start to react immediately.

We have a saying in lab that you add acid to water,

do what you oughta, because if you add it

in the opposite direction, it starts to rip things apart

in a really treacherous way.

So we usually would take a body.

Help me out, Professor!

[laughs] Not, no we wouldn't.

We would usually take a substance and then add acid to it.

We're ready to go to work.

Sniffing chemicals, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

I'm stuck to your glue!

What about gasoline?

Pour a little bit of gasoline on there,

dissolve some of the glue.

In theory, in theory, maybe gasoline

could actually dissolve glue.

That's basic chemistry.

They have similar properties

and so it's possible that you could actually use

this non-polar substance, gasoline,

to dissolve something that's also relatively non-polar,

which is glue.

So in theory, maybe, but there are so many things

that would be better to use and gasoline

would be the bottom of my list.

Are I sure it's gasoline though?

Gas, that's really good gas. I should just try it again.

Whew! Jesus!

Please don't huff gasoline at home.

It's not a good high though, honestly,

because the gas can get into your brain.

It's one of those things that's very dense,

the molecule's very dense. It also could fill up your lungs

and then you can asphyxiate.

Chemical brownies, Rick and Morty.

Okay, if we add a little more titanium nitrate

and just a tad of chlorified tartrate.

[brownies sizzle]

Ovenless brownies!

Not even close on this one.

Titanium nitrate is a colorless solid

and chlorified tartrate, I think he said?

Chlorified tartrate!

I am not familiar with that molecule.

I'm pretty sure that does not exist.

But let's just give him the benefit of the doubt

and say they were using tartrate,

which is essentially the salt of cream of tartar,

tartrate acid.

Yeah, it's gotta be that way.

So we do eat cream of tartar,

that's used in a lot of baking recipes.

So that piece we could actually eat.

But if you took titanium nitrate

and mixed it with cream of tartar,

you are definitely not making brownies.

It's incredible what a gifted mind can accomplish.

Sticky substances, Spider-Man: Homecoming.

[Teacher] Today we're gonna be talking

about Danish physicist Niehls Bohr.

But trust me, there's nothing boring about his discovery.

My big issue is, on the right side, the left part,

that ring I'm okay with that.

That's okay.

But it's when we get to the right side of it

and you see just a line attached to this rogue carbon,

and then you have another one attached to a carbon

and another carbon, it's just garbage.

So that is just a disaster of a drawing.

It's something I've would expect from a high school student

and it's not good.

[Teacher] Boring about his discovery

regarding quantum physics.

This would not make a sticky substance at all.

It would make a clear, colorless solution

that kinda looks like salt water.

In this experiment, we are going to make nylon,

which is what I would make if I was Spider-Man.

So I have four different things in front of me.

To start with, I have a crystallization dish.

And so this is a really round glass dish

that is appropriate to make nylon in.

I also have a spatula and that's just gonna be

to actually pull my nylon out.

So I'm gonna start off by pouring this liquid,

just to have a little bit at the bottom.

So I just wanna cover my crystallization dish completely.

Then I'm gonna take my other reagent, my chloride,

and I'm gonna add that.

And right away, we can already see the nylon forming.

It's happening, it's absolutely working!

Oh my God, I'm so excited.

Oh!

And I made nylon. Look at this!

And it just doesn't stop.

It just keeps going and I can keep pulling it in here.

And I've made this awesome polymer, look at this!

See, this is what Spider-Man should have done!

This is exactly what it looks like.

Oh my God, it's just nonstop!

[imitates web]

Fictional elements, vibranium, Black Panther.

[T'Challa] A meteorite made of a vibranium,

the strongest substance in the universe,

struck the continent of Africa.

The theory here is actually quite spot on.

I mean, that's how elements are brought to earth.

There are explosions that happen in space,

maybe it's with a meteorite, maybe it's a supernova,

who knows what it is.

But eventually these pieces, these elements,

actually just fling themselves onto earth.

It's not just the metal. They sew it into their clothes.

It powers their city, their tech.

Unfortunately, there is no atom or no element

on the periodic table right now

that resembles vibranium in any way whatsoever.

What are you talking about?

Cooking meth, Breaking Bad.

[upbeat music]

In terms of safety, I'm pretty good with this.

They have the gas mask on, then they have a piece over that

that protects their face.

So that's gonna protect their eyes and nose as well.

And they also are completely covered

in some kind of hazmat suit.

I really like how they have their gloves all the way up,

but then over the suit so, in theory,

nothing's gonna be dropping down into them.

♪ Under the sun ♪

♪ With the corn up into the sky ♪

A lot of the equipment and the processes used here

are very standard.

So any standard chemistry lab, any industry place,

any pharmaceutical place,

those are probably gonna have all that equipment,

all that safety equipment and, in theory,

you could potentially make meth there

with that glassware and with the gas mask

that you would need.

[upbeat music continues]

♪ Summon everything you-- ♪

That's a very common method.

We used stills in our lab when I was in graduate school

to purify our solvents.

It's a really old school way of doing it.

♪ Under the sun ♪

2.35 pounds.

To make something that's two or three pounds

is a lot of material.

And you would need to put a lot of reagents into that.

Is it possible? Absolutely for their setup.

[both exclaim]

Gasoline fight, Zoolander.

♪ Come on baby, let's not fight ♪

♪ We'll go dancing, ♪

♪ Everything'll be all right ♪ So bad. [laughs]

I would not douse myself with gasoline,

that's typically frowned upon.

It would smell terrible,

but you're also extremely flammable.

It's just not a good idea. ♪ Wake me up before you go-go ♪

No!

[gas station explodes]

I do not believe that small of a flame would be able

to have that big of an explosion.

I don't think the spark from the lighter would ignite it.

The actual flame from the lighter

definitely could light octane vapors on fire

or gasoline vapors on fire, but it wouldn't have

those big explosion points of boom, boom, boom

that we see in that clip.

[explosion bursts]

Cigar explosion, National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation.

Sewer gas.

Don't drop that!

[ground explodes]

Even though the chemistry is not perfect here,

I do like it.

Sewer gas typically contains a mixture of hydrogen sulfide,

some ammonia, some carbon dioxide, maybe some methane.

The hydrogen sulfide is really

what I'd be worried about there.

That is toxic and it is extraordinarily flammable.

Yeah, thanks for telling us.

And anytime you have gases that are trapped

in an area, that's when you can essentially make a bomb.

And so if it's trapped in a small pipe or a small area,

it's gonna explode, it's gonna push out,

so you definitely will see an explosion,

but not nearly like that.

Cigarette explosion, Con Air.

Si--

Anara.

[man screams]

This is a big miss.

Cigarettes rarely cause an explosion like this.

You would need that cigarette to land perfectly,

have that light, that actual fire,

directly connect with any of that liquid that's flammable.

But unless it lands perfectly,

this is just not gonna happen.

Looks like you missed your connection.

Chloroform, Community.

Excuse me, who are you guys? This is not your office.

No, no, no!

So when you take chloroform and you put it on a rag

and you try to smother someone,

it actually takes quite a long time.

I've never done it personally, but from what I've read,

it sounds like it takes about five minutes.

So you don't just immediately pass out.

What's happening?

Oh, we all got chloroformed.

With a small amount of it, you essentially get

that euphoric feeling, that temporary euphoric feeling

like you do with any other drug or alcohol.

But then you pass out, like with alcohol.

Would you stop?

Testing for purity, Blow.

What I'm doing here is measuring the purity.

Pure Coke, it melts away at about 185, 190 degrees.

So, by definition, when we use the word pure

in the chemistry world, that means we have 100%

of just those molecules.

So pure cocaine would be a vial of pure cocaine.

There's no meth in there, there's no corn starch in there.

It is just cocaine.

187.

Where did you get this stuff?

So he's using a very interesting version

of a melting point apparatus.

We use this a lot anytime you're actually trying

to characterize a molecule.

So the first time a molecule is made and you're trying

to publish that, you wanna know the melting point.

And so this is a really easy way for you

to quickly test your material and see if it's good.

Chemical burn, Fight Club.

This is a chemical burn.

[man screams]

I don't like it.

He's intentionally throwing sodium hydroxide, which is lye,

a base, a very strong base onto your hand.

It'll hurt more than you've ever been burned

and it'll never scar.

What are you doing?

The movie's wrong here, because it doesn't burn like that.

That's not really what a chemical burn

with a base feels like.

That's more what it would feel like with an acid.

When you put a base on your hand like that,

your hand actually feels really slippery

'cause it sucks the fats out, I know it's gross,

of your hand, but it sucks the fats out of your hand

and you start to feel really slippery.

And you're kinda making soap literally on your hand.

This is the best soap.

Creating foam, Big Bang Theory.

We're going to combine these chemicals

with ordinary dish soap,

creating a little exothermic release of oxygen.

[all laugh]

This science is good, yeah. I'm all about this one.

For elephant's toothpaste,

which is the reaction he's making,

what you do is you take concentrated hydrogen peroxide,

so that's why he is wearing gloves,

usually about 35% hydrogen peroxide.

You add it to a mixture of dish soap,

so some really bubbly dish soap,

and I usually add food coloring to make it colorful.

And then you add your catalyst, your potassium iodide,

and that's what decomposes hydrogen peroxide

to release oxygen gas.

So yeah, Sheldon was right.

Sheldon, you remind me of a young Lex Luthor.

He uses the phrase exothermic release of oxygen.

Exothermic release of oxygen.

That means you're releasing oxygen

and also releasing heat energy.

So you probably can see at the very top

or right on the outside of the reaction,

you can actually see those heat waves

and it's just heat energy being pushed off

as the decomposition of hydrogen peroxide occurs.

So let's do exactly what Sheldon just did.

We're gonna make elephant's toothpaste.

So in order to do this, you need an Erlenmeyer flask,

so something that's wide at the bottom

and then narrow at the top.

You're also going to need hydrogen peroxide

and you want concentrated hydrogen peroxide.

You'll also need some dish soap.

I highly recommend non-natural dish soaps.

And then I have my potassium iodide, which is a catalyst,

and that's going to actually activate this reaction.

Let's get started.

So the first thing I'm going to do

is add my hydrogen peroxide to my Erlenmeyer flask.

We'll just add this whole thing in here.

We want a nice big reaction.

Then what I'm going to do is add my dish soap in here.

And so the dish soap is actually gonna trap the oxygen gas

that's released, once I add my catalyst.

Gotta give it a little swoosh.

Then we're gonna add our food coloring.

So this is the yellow.

You could add any color you want,

but I want it to match Sheldon's.

I'm gonna give it a little shake to prep my catalyst.

This is the best part.

And then, on the count of three,

I'm just gonna add this directly into my flask.

One, two, and three.

Let's see what we get here

Whoa! [laughs]

Yes!

Look at this go! Isn't this amazing?

So you have hydrogen peroxide.

As it decomposed, it released oxygen gas,

which was trapped in the dish soap.

We also see liquid water is actually condensing

on the outside of the container.

And then hopefully you can see all of this steam,

these heatwaves, 'cause this is an exothermic release

of oxygen gas, just like Shelton said.

Gene-altering chemicals, Spider-Man.

[glass breaks]

[Norman screams]

Stay away from green gas,

you never ever wanna breathe in green gas.

What I love about this is that he essentially

is doing a really fun chemical reaction inside of his body.

So the first thing he does is he drinks something,

which is essentially a primer, some kind of molecule

that will react with the gas.

So he needs to have that in his body

'cause we don't naturally have that.

The green gas comes in and then, supposedly, magically,

he has a chemical reaction between the two

and it's just garbage.

I'm something of a scientist myself.

Explaining a nuclear reactor, Chernobyl.

There are essentially two things

that happen inside a nuclear reactor.

The reactivity, which generates power,

either goes up or it goes down.

His explanation of a nuclear reactor is beautiful.

I love the way he describes it.

Fuel increases reactivity.

Control rods and water reduce it.

Essentially what you do is you take a fuel source

and you release energy from that source of fuel

and then you funnel that energy through the power plant.

He does a great job of this because he really expresses

how the nuclear fuel is dangerous,

but it can be kept under control

if you have all the other parameters locked into place.

It is beautiful.

Explaining a nuclear disaster, Chernobyl.

When the core is running at full power,

it burns the xenon away before it can cause a problem.

But Chernobyl Reactor 4 has been held

at half power for 10 hours.

I love how he talks about xenon

and how cute is he how he says it?

Xenon.

Xenon's an inert gas and so it really limits reactivity.

It's not something that's very explosive,

it doesn't really wanna react with things.

But at high enough temperatures, we can burn it off.

And so when we have too much xenon present,

but it's not at high enough temperatures,

we essentially start poisoning the reactor.

At long last, we have arrived 1:23:45, explosion.

[metal explodes]

What happened is they dunked these graphite rods directly

into the water and it essentially had enough energy

to boil the water up, first of all,

so the water is gonna go from the liquid state

to the gas phase, but it also had enough energy

to split water into hydrogen and oxygen.

And when hydrogen is around oxygen, with enough pressure,

and with enough energy, it was so hot,

it immediately becomes combustible.

So we build up the pressure, we set hydrogen on fire,

we blow the roof off, and then that's gonna grab

every single radioactive material in those nuclear rods

and they're just gonna shoot them everywhere.

And it was a huge problem.

They believe the radiation was airborne for about nine days.

Just terrifying.

Safety first, always.

Chemistry equipment, Mr. Bean: The Whole Bean.

[liquid bubbles]

[audience laughs]

Don't do that. [laughs]

I hate that.

He's not wearing goggles, he's not wearing gloves,

he doesn't have a lab coat on.

He put two liquids to his face that he doesn't know

what they are and then mixed them together.

That's just like a big no.

[glass shudders]

This setup is a disaster.

It would never happen in real life.

What drives me the most crazy is that all the tubes

are basically wired backwards.

You always shoot liquid, cold liquid, into the bottom,

pump up to the top, and then you filter it out the top.

Every single one in this clip is set up backwards

and so the water's flowing in the wrong direction.

Liquid nitrogen, Terminator 2: Judgment Day.

Hasta la vista, baby.

[person shatters]

It's possible that you could cover something

in liquid nitrogen and then shoot it

and have an explosion like that.

It's possible.

Is it gonna happen exactly like that? Hmm, unlikely.

Liquid nitrogen is one of my favorite things

on planet earth.

So in the Terminator 2 clip,

we saw that there was this liquid-y thing

that was frozen with liquid nitrogen

and then it was shattered with a bullet

and so we're gonna try to replicate that.

So the first thing I'm gonna do is put my safety goggles on

and then I'm going to put my cryogenic gloves on.

Liquid nitrogen is cryogenic, it's very, very cold.

I've got hot dogs.

Hot dogs are gonna kind of replicate what happens

if human flesh went in there.

Now this is disgusting. I'm just gonna put that out there.

I have to stick my hand in there and get it.

I'm gonna try to grab it. It is rock hard.

Oh my gosh.

So that's like we're gonna pretend human flesh

that we froze with liquid nitrogen.

One, two, three!

[hammer bangs]

So let's use this experiment to conclude

that if you dunked a human or a robot

in liquid nitrogen and then tried to hit it

with a bullet or a hammer, you absolutely would be able

to destroy the villain.

Case closed.

Ingesting toxic chemicals, Radium Girls.

Watch me.

Don't do it. [laughs]

This actually used to happen, 100%.

They would dip the paintbrush in there

and then put it into their mouth to get it

into this nice, pinpoint tip.

And then they would be able to very precisely paint

these different dials on the top of clocks.

And essentially what they're doing is using a paint

that contains radium to give that nice,

glow in the dark effect.

Everyone put down your brushes.

Radium is in the same group as calcium

in the periodic table.

So that means it's in the same column.

Radium actually is going to get into these little gaps

where calcium usually sits in your jaw

and so it kind of sinks into these holes

and then it starts just pulsing out radiation.

So right away, when you're licking the paint,

it's just gonna taste bad,

but you're not gonna notice the fact

that you're absolutely killing yourself while doing this.

But a year or two later, when you've had enough

radium deposit in these bones, then it starts shooting out

these alpha, beta, and gamma rays

and that is what's actually causing cancer.

And the dentists were the first people to figure it out,

'cause they were seeing all these girls come in

with these huge issues in their jaw.

And the only thing they had in common

is that they all worked at the same spot.

Invisible ink, National Treasure.

[breathes heavily]

There are two common ways of using lemon juice

for secret messages.

One of 'em is if you have baking soda

and you kind of paint the baking soda

onto your surface, your canvas, whatever.

And then you can actually use lemon juice

and kind of code it over there and then it will bubble

and kind of elevate the secret message well.

And the second way would be to actually use lemon juice

to write the message, to actually code the message,

and then you can expose it to heat

and the message will appear.

But neither of those things happened here,

so this is pretty much just bad science.

No. Nuh-uh.

Sorry.

Toxic chemicals, Casino Royale.

Fold. Thank you.

100% you could poison someone this way.

Sodium cyanide is very, very water soluble,

so it looks like they dissolved the salt in water

and then dumped it into the martini glass.

So depending on how much cyanide was there,

you absolutely could kill a person if there's enough.

Yeah, this would work.

It's very possible that he would start feeling nauseous,

getting dizzy, the sweating, the really quick.

And so all three of those factors together

would probably clue someone like James Bond

into knowing that he's been poisoned.

There is one antidote that we know of

and it works extraordinarily well.

I'm aware.

So the first thing you need to do

is you need to inhale an amyl nitrate.

That's followed by an IV that's filled of sodium nitrate,

which is then followed by a second IV

that has sodium thiosesulfate.

That last hand nearly killed me.

Handling dangerous chemicals, The Rock.

[canister hisses]

[gasps]

Really elegant string of pearls configuration.

The VX nerve agent is absolutely real.

It is a neurotoxin, which means it goes into your body

and effects either your central

or peripheral nervous system.

You know how this shit works?

This one specifically makes it

so that your muscles can't relax.

So your muscles can still contract,

like your heart can still beat, but then it can't relax.

Oh my God.

The only reason you would use VX nerve gas

is to hurt somebody or kill someone.

There's no functional or practical reason to use it.

Twinge at the small of your back

as the poison seizes your nervous system.

Do not move that!

One of the biggest thing that drives me nuts about this

is that we're seeing the VX in the gas phase

and it only exists in the gas phase

at really, really high temperatures.

And so these little green bubbles,

or those little balls, are filled with green gas,

which must be at high temps,

yet somehow they're just carrying it around

without being around something.

None of the science really matches for that,

so it should really be in the liquid phase right now,

which is an amber color.

Right, just back away.

Making water, The Martian.

I have hundreds of liters of unused hydrazine at the MDV.

I run the hydrazine over an iridium catalyst.

It'll separate into N2 and H2.

Well, he's starting off with hydrazine,

so N2H4, and so that's something that's used

as, essentially, rocket fuel.

And so he has a lot of that leftover.

And what he's going to do is then take an iridium catalyst,

which again, found on his equipment,

combine the two, and that breaks apart the hydrazine

into nitrogen and hydrogen.

It also makes ammonia, which he didn't mention,

but I understand why he left that part out.

So this chemistry is really clean here.

Hydrazine is extremely flammable.

Whoo! [experiment explode]

It would be able to propel a rocket through space,

which is extremely important.

But in the context of this movie,

there's a big piece that we've overlooked.

Because I'm stupid.

It's very, very toxic.

And so if he's using hydrazine at all,

he needs to be in some kind of hazmat suit,

his space suit, at the very least.

So yeah, I blew myself up.

I do not think he would've survived

that explosion, not at all.

He would've had at least second degree burns,

but more likely third degree burns.

And those are painful.

Let's not talk about that ever again.

Conclusion. [bell dings]

So, overall, movies typically portray chemistry

in a explosive light.

You see over and over again that a small spark

causes a huge explosion or a little huff of a molecule

all of a sudden makes you pass out and die.

What I love about that, though,

is that people love including chemistry in their movies

and in their TV shows

and so I will always be happy about that.