I think we can all agree that Jon Bois and the team over on our sister site Secret Base do incredible work. Their documentaries are deeply researched, visually unique, and incredibly human, telling stories about sports but also the history of slipping on banana peels and that time some very dumb people got into an argument about how many days are in a week. Which brings me to Kevan MacKay, aka BobbyBroccoli. His YouTube channel definitely riffs on the same 3D docu-space animation style: He even made a tutorial for how to animate like Jon! But I must be very clear: BobbyBroccoli is no knockoff.
Instead of data-driven documentaries on the television series 24 or SCORIGAMI!, BobbyBroccoli’s bread and butter is scientific controversies. However, this isn’t a look at the “controversy” surrounding, say, vaccines or climate change, but rather, the scandals that revealed legitimate scientific fraud. These include the Korean human cloning scandal, the cold fusion fraud, and the fake discovery of new periodic elements.
While BobbyBroccoli originally used Bois’ Google Earth style of animating, his last few docuseries have moved fully into Blender, even as they keep the concept of slowly assembling a virtual tableau to create powerful visual connections between characters and concepts in the story. This is part of what keeps these videos from simply looking like a Bois knockoff, because each of BobbyBroccoli’s series takes on a distinct visual style. For example, the series on human cloning ties everything together with a casino card table to help enhance a story about bluffing on an international scale.
BobbyBroccoli also has a Bois-like knack for breaking down topics that you may not fully understand into compelling content. But while an episode of Pretty Good might need to explain just how hard it is to miss a field goal, BobbyBroccoli needs to explain high-level science. Which means not only explaining how the periodic table works, but also how ultra-heavy particles are “discovered,” and how a fraudulent research paper slipped by some experts while others were able to spot the fake.
As much as the visual connections seem like the most obvious tribute to Bois’ work, BobbyBroccoli actually understands that what really makes a video about guys named Bob or one particularly notable pitcher isn’t all the fancy graphics: It’s that these are ultimately stories about people. Extraordinary people, but still just people. Even science, for all its noble pursuits, is also made by people. Flawed, idealistic, selfish, fame-chasing human beings. Whatever the challenging, elite pursuit may be, if there are humans involved, there’s going to be an interesting story to tell.
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