I remember an episode of the Better Call Saul podcast where Vince Gilligan was talking about safety on the set. This was WAY before this incident.

It was something about how they worked with guns and how they use squibs, etc. The way that actors are told about the guns they are using is that the armorer hands them the gun opened, fully emptied. The actor and the person being shot watches as the armorer handles the gun and it is in full view of everyone involved. The gun doesn't leave the sight of the actor or the armorer as everyone gets in place.

Once everyone is ready, the gun is handed to the actor and then the scene is shot.

The amount of checking and double checking that is done is way over the top. And that's just for a non-functioning gun For guns with squibs, even more oversight and more checking.

"We're making a TV show for Christ sake. No one should get hurt, let alone die, because we're shooting a scene." (horrible paraphrase of Vince).

The actor shouldn't "assume" the gun is safe when it's handed to them. The actor KNOWS it's safe because they saw it. The armor KNOWS it's safe because it's their job. There are no "should"s.

Nah, one of the very first things you are taught about gun safety is to always assume a gun is loaded until you have checked it for yourself. If someone hands you a gun, you should always check it no matter what. I've been in to firearms since I was 8 years old, and I've never had a negligent discharge.

They were filming in a state that has a law specifying the exact opposite. “I thought the gun wasn’t loaded” is codified as not being an excuse for a negligent shooting and there isn’t a “it was a movie set” carve out to the law. Hollywood also seems to be extremely split on this with some actors saying you always check and take personal responsibility and others saying to just trust what you are told. If anything hopefully this will lead to actual best practices being adopted industry wide because the current hodgepodge isn’t cutting it.

As someone that has been working around weapons for the better part of 20 years, I disagree with your statement of not being blamed.

It's unfortunate yes, but whoever had that weapon in their hands and pulled the trigger should hold some blame.

If anyone ever hands you a weapon, movie set or not, it should be checked.

I do understand that it doesn't quite work that way but that's how it should be. Anyone handling a real weapon, especially during the course of ones job, should be required to go through training.

Proper gun safety is to always check yourself.l, especially since they had live ammo on the set. These are tools that kill people, you can never be too safe and he should have checked the mag before they shot.