The Rust shooting case—where Alec Baldwin negligently fired a .45 Long Colt round that killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and wounded director Joel Souza on October 21, 2021—keeps coming up in the news despite the case being nearly 4 years old.
My latest dive into this mess comes courtesy of James Reeves’ new YouTube series interviewing Hollywood armorer Bryan Carpenter to get answers from the expert witness in the Alec Baldwin case. Their Part 2 discussion covers Carpenter’s insider perspective in this sensitive case, and Reeves also goes on to question how this incident might color future productions and what kind of mistakes actually need to happen in order to lead to this type of accident on a Hollywood set.
Right off the bat, Carpenter doesn’t mince words. According to him, the set was a circus of incompetence. Negligent discharges were routine—stunt performers mishandling loaded lever-actions, crew pointing guns at kids, even the prop master popping off a round. The young armorer, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, was in over her head, leaving live rounds intermingled with dummies.
Even basic safety checks like shaking the rounds to listen for the sound of loose bbs in the cases (indicating that they are blanks) were not performed on set by anyone. Then there’s Baldwin, who called for his “really”—a real Colt Single Action Army revolver—during a rehearsal. Why a live firearm for a dry run? Carpenter’s blunt: “Unnecessary. A good armorer says no. Use a Nerf gun.”
The fatal moment came after lunch. Gutierrez-Reed loaded the Colt with what she thought were dummies. The gun passed through first AD Dave Hall, who had no business touching it, to Baldwin. He holstered it, drew it, cocked it, and pulled the trigger. A 255-grain lead slug punched through Hutchins’ chest and lodged in Souza’s shoulder. Baldwin’s defense? “I didn’t pull the trigger,” Carpenter calls BS, citing FBI and independent analyses proving the gun couldn’t fire without a trigger pull. Case closed.
But Baldwin’s liability isn’t just about that shot. As the top producer—number one on the call sheet—he was “the man,” per Carpenter. The camera crew had walked off over safety concerns, leaving Hutchins to run the camera herself. Baldwin saw the chaos—negligent discharges, an inexperienced armorer, a crew stretched thin—and did nothing. “Time is money,” Carpenter speculates, suggesting Baldwin pushed forward to save a buck rather than halt production – in the first video, he mentioned that armorers are looked at in different “tiers.” A producer’s job includes safety. Baldwin failed miserably.
Gutierrez-Reed faced justice—convicted and maxed out with an 18-month sentence. Baldwin? His trial imploded two days in, dismissed with prejudice over a box of ammo from PDQ Props that the prosecution didn’t disclose. Carpenter was set to testify when the call came: “Case over.” He’s pissed—not because he hates Baldwin, but because a woman’s life was snuffed out, and justice stalled on a technicality.
This wasn’t just an armorer’s screw-up. Baldwin’s own words haunt him. In interviews with George Stephanopoulos, he bragged, “I’m an expert. I know what I’m doing.” Decades of gun movies under his belt, yet he pointed a loaded revolver at a human—violating Cooper’s Rule #2: Never point a firearm at anything you’re not willing to destroy. Expert? Hardly. Carpenter’s ritual is telling: he hands a gun to actors with one word—“Control”—and makes them repeat it. Baldwin took control and blew it.
What’s the fallout for guns in Hollywood? Carpenter sees a shift. Dwayne Johnson swore off real firearms post-Rust, and VFX is closing the gap—Unreal Engine muzzle flashes now fool even trained eyes. But he’s pragmatic: “Stunts kill more people annually than guns on set. Ban those, too?” Risk is inherent in filmmaking. The fix isn’t banning guns; it’s hiring competent armorers and holding producers accountable. Hollywood might lean harder on CGI, but Carpenter doubts it’ll kill the real thing entirely—producers still crave authenticity when it fits the budget.
The Rust tragedy is a warning to the Hollywood industry. Baldwin’s negligence—personal and professional—cost a life. Gutierrez-Reed paid the price; he didn’t. As gun owners, we know the stakes: one lapse, one unchecked round, and it’s over. Hollywood’s anti-gun elite love preaching, but when Baldwin held that Colt, he wasn’t above the law of the land or the basic rules of firearm safety. If you’re interested in hearing the first two episodes in this series, you can check out James Reeves’ YouTube channel videos below. Be sure to let him, and the rest of the readers here, know what you think of this incident and how things have turned out.
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