This is a bird feeder. And everything you see surrounding me in my yard is an attempt to protect it from four thieving squirrels. If they want the bird seed and the lifetime supply of walnuts in this bank vault, they'll first need to pass through my nine-part obstacle course. By design, it's extremely challenging. It's meant to test their mental limits and their physical limits. I held back no punches, but I have to admit in hindsight, I once again completely underestimated my adversary. And truthfully, I never thought I'd be that crazy guy in the neighborhood obsessing over the squirrels, but they started it first when they would constantly pillage the bird seed from any bird feeder I would put up about a year ago. That led to me defending it with an obstacle course, which they handily defeated. And so after a year of ruminating on how to avenge that L with a majorly improved version, and then two months of planning, my buddy John and I got together for a 20-second build montage. Here are the basic elements. For starters, here's their favorite bird feeder at the end of the course. And it's sitting atop Fort Knuts, the most secure walnut vault in the Western United States. Now, since birds can fly, they can come and go as they please and eat all the food they want. But the only way for the squirrels to make it right here is by surviving my nine-part grueling obstacle course, which all starts right here. Climbing up this pole to this platform is the single gateway to enter the course. Every other pole you see has some kind of countermeasure to keep the squirrel from just climbing up and then entering the course halfway through. And so the first challenge is this casino, which may seem like an odd choice until you realize that as we were building the course, we also built them some cozy little squirrel houses. So we put them up in a couple different trees, and after a few days, it looked like they'd actually made some renovations. So I went to take a closer look. And sure enough, here's the before and here's the after. Even on the inside, they'd made some questionable decor updates. So while it might look like they were just using the houses to relax, or stretch, or look out the window, or like, um, wrestle. The satellite communications gear and the tactical mission planning and the mini vault to practice cracking a safe hold a completely different story. This gang of four high-end professional birdseed thieves were secretly planning to pull off an honest-to-goodness Mission Impossible, Ocean's 11-style mega walnut heist. Which is why I was going to protect the birdseed and walnut vault with the most state-of-the-art security measures, just like the casino did in Ocean's 11. So once in the casino, you'll see the slot machine and the classic Vegas buffet, but with a warning. Take more than an ounce and you're going to have to deal with security. Now that I got the squirrels on the run, they'll naturally want to jump to this bar. But there's a twist. Like it actually twists, which I think is going to give them some problems. But if they can figure this out, they'll jump into this crate. And the good news is that it's filled to the brim with their favorite food, which is walnuts. And I know this because I tested a bunch of different options and they always went with the walnuts first. But the bad news is that once you add a little weight to the system, the helicopter starts moving just like the helicopter from Mission Impossible. Oh, and we've got a baffle here at the top to stop a squirrel from just crawling along the wire from the fence. The helicopter stops next to this wall, which seems simple enough, except that the bricks randomly move and adjust themselves in and out. And of course, at any time, if they fall off, they got to go back and start over the whole course from the beginning. After that, we come to their hideout. And this is when they'll switch from defense to offense, because it's where they hang out and plan. You can see it's sort of messy with their tools and their blueprints on the wall that show if they open the floor on the elevator, the elevator shaft leads them underground and into the sewers. Then if they crawl through the sewers, it will take them right to the control center for a second room that might look familiar. And just like in Mission Impossible, their goal is to go up through the ceiling to access the air vents. But there's no way to make it up there unless they type the password into the keyboard in the control room next door like this. And at that point, they can climb the ladder and they're in the vents. And the vents are a total maze. There's lots of different twists and turns they'll need to navigate up here. So at any moment, if they're too lost, they can always exit the whole course by using the one-way squirrel emergency exits, which also exist for any enclosed room on the whole course. And for the penultimate challenge, it's back down from the air ducts through this laser maze where they'll have to harness their inner Catherine Zeta-Jones. If they sufficiently touch any of the lasers, the metal base contacts and completes the circuit, which sends a signal from this microcontroller to a relay to a solenoid, which causes this pneumatic piston to fire, which slams this door shut for one minute. And because I'm basically certain they'll try and get to this point by climbing from the roof on top of this tube, I've placed a shield here with another enforcement squirrel to try and deter them. And so finally, if they've made it through the laser maze and everything that came before it, they've made it to Fort Knuts. And as far as I'm concerned, if they crack the safe by giving this handle a little turn, they've earned every last walnut in this bank. After the course was set up, they could definitely smell the walnuts in the vault. And then you could see them sort of working things out from the fence line. And so after two months of prep work, it was time to test our extensive security measures against this formidable set of 500-gram rodents. And right out of the gate, we got them with the buffet. And as he sticks his entire face under the sneeze guard, absent-mindedly reading the sign, you can see the exact moment he realizes he might have screwed up. The slow-mo shows Rick just really laying himself out. Oh, by the way, that's Rick. All four squirrels have names, and more importantly, like any crew looking to pull off a heist, they all have specific roles to fill. Starting with everyone's favorite, Phat Gus, who, of course, is the mastermind of this operation. On a heist, this is the role of the Frank Ocean or an Ethan Hunt. Now, I just have to say, for those who aren't familiar, last year, I named one of the squirrels Phat Gus because he loved to eat and was a little on the hefty side. But then halfway through, I noticed he had nipples, which, it turns out, means he was actually a girl, and a pregnant one at that. So, it was just a whole PR disaster, and I switched the name to Phantastic Gus and rephrased a few other things. But to be honest, Phantastic Gus just doesn't roll off the tongue like Phat Gus. So, I asked permission to use my preferred phrasing, and as you can see, I got full consent. Next up is Rick. He's the acrobat, the grease man, the gutsy one. He's the go-to for any task that is going to require some athletic abilities. And then we've got Marty. He's the hacker. Anything with computers or bank safes, and he's your guy. But while he's really smart, he also scares pretty easy. And finally, we've got Frank with logistics. A good heist starts with a good plan. He's got the whole course memorized, and he's mapped it out and provided blueprints for the team. And so back to the course, we've got Marty the Hacker here, who, again, is a bit skittish, so you can see he's coming in pretty cautious. But who can resist a buffet? Once again, the real magic is found in the slow-mo. Eventually, they realized security was just too tight at this casino, and Rick goes straight to the twist bar. Excellent. Here's try two. And with some motivation from the bird, he's like, I got this. I got this. I got this. I don't think I got this. The real-time replay on this one is great, too. At this point, Phat Gus is like, I'm gonna need that crate of walnuts. Let me show you how it's done. Which turns out somewhat predictably. Eventually, they realized, if you just scurry on real fast, the bar doesn't have time to spin on you. And you can see Rick just replicating the strategy. And so after about two days, all of them could cruise through the first part of this course about this fast, and Fort Knuts was already feeling less and less secure. Phat Gus is like, wait, is this thing moving? I'm good. Here, Rick hypothesizes if he doesn't sit in the crate, it won't move. And here, he rejects that hypothesis with a legendary leap. And now's a good time to remind ourselves that squirrels are one of the few mammals that can survive a fall from any height because, as you can see here, they make their body super flat to increase drag, effectively becoming their own parachute. But just in case, you okay, Rick? Yep. All good. And Marty the Hacker, afraidey cat is just like, yeah, I'm super not down with this. Eventually, it's the fearless leader, Phat Gus, who demonstrates the ride is definitely worth it. And soon, you've got Frank and the rest of the gang following suit. Which leads us to the wall of a thousand moving bricks. And first up, you got Phat Gus, who kicks things right off with a pull of his parachute. And Rick just barely misses. Skittish Marty gets one taste of a moving brick and absolutely yeets himself into this tree. And while there were plenty of instances where a moving brick did dump the squirrels, causing them to start over from the beginning, what was even better was Marty psyching himself out in the anticipation that a brick might move, even though the wall wasn't powered on for any of these clips. And thanks in part to the dutiful supervision of Phat Gus, eventually, like all the other challenges so far, they got it down to a science where they could cruise by the wall pretty quickly. And now's a good time to mention the squirrels weren't the only ones attempting the course. This is Splinter the rat, and here he is with one of his buddies. He liked to make the rounds to all the houses each night, which sometimes were vacant, and sometimes they weren't. There goes Frank to chase him off his lawn. And you might have noticed the stuff in the house. The squirrels would gather nesting materials from various sources, or, somewhat hilariously, just steal from each other. Here's a bonus Santa Claus impression for all the Phat Gus fans out there. So from Splinter and his buddies to not-at-all-creepy possums, there's a surprisingly constant variety of wildlife that passes through a suburban backyard, including a dumb dog who, for some reason, is much less interested in the squirrels than he is my camera gear. Which is a lovely segue back to the squirrel hideout, where the heist was really just picking up steam. And after Hacker Marty had accessed the computer and lowered the ladder, Phat Gus followed behind and joined him in the vents. But in the process, a critical tool dropped down, which led to a lovely recreation of an iconic scene. And as a side note, they figured out the exit door pretty quickly, and they functioned as a one-way door exactly as intended. And now with the vents, it was Frank's time to shine. You can see here, he's just double-checking the actual air duct layouts to make sure they match the blueprints he's memorized. And once he's satisfied, he steps up, and as you can see, he nails it first try. You can just sense his confidence here. Contrast that with Marty, who's like, all right, I think it was a right, no, it was straight. No, was it left? Crap. I gotta go check the map again. And as a result, most of his runs would end up looking something like this. So here's Frank coaching him from the outside, and you can see Marty's a little defensive about it. So Frank hops in so they can work out their differences. And with a little encouragement, he gets him going down the right way. All the while, Phat Gus continues to supervise. Focus, Marty. There you go. Which brings us to the laser maze. And here's Acrobat Rick's first approach, and he's like, yeah, that's sus. And just as expected, he climbs on top of the tube, and he's like, yeah, I totally got this. When in fact, he didn't have it. In real time, it happens so fast, it just looks like chaos. But if we slow down this second attempt, we can remind ourselves of how squirrels have mastered the laws of physics to always land on their feet. Did you catch it? The first is the locking of the head on a landing target in less than 300 milliseconds. If you go back and watch any jump from this video, that locking of their head is the first thing they always do. And the second is using conservation of angular momentum like an ice skater to pull their arms and legs in and out at the right times to rotate fast and then hold in the right orientation. Combine those two tricks with the flat-body parachute and extending their legs at the last minute to absorb the shock, and they are perfectly adapted for living high in the trees. In fact, squirrels have been around for over 30 million years, and they've had to evolve relatively little in all that time. So then Rick's like, fine, I'll use the stupid tube like a normal squirrel. What is this? See, I knew this was sus. And here's Frank, who just watched what happened and therefore is appropriately cautious. But he hops right back on the saddle, and this time he nails it. And in the end, it feels appropriate that the mastermind, Phat Gus, was the first one to make it successfully through the laser maze and then to subsequently make it to Fort Knuts. I mean, how Phat Gus is this? Falling not just for one decoy nut, but for both of them. Which paves the way for Marty the Hacker to be the one to crack the safe. And as you can see here, he's pretty stoked about it. Once the safe opened, these cargo nets unfurled, which just allowed better access to their loot. But interestingly, more often than not, after getting a walnut, instead of jumping off, they would go all the way back through the course. Here's Jumpy Marty exhibiting some real PTSD, even though I'd already turned off the whole system. So once again, the squirrels took the W, but as far as I'm concerned, they earned it. And I can't complain with how things turned out because Rick buried all his extra nuts in the yard, Marty and Frank made up and rekindled their friendship, and Phat Gus got some long-sought quality time with the bird feeder. So everyone was happy. Well, almost everyone.
Mark Rober gestures with both hands towards a large wooden structure labeled "FORT KNUTS" that looks like a bank vault.
"This is a bird feeder. And everything you see surrounding me in my yard is an attempt to protect it from four thieving squirrels."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright, natural daylight
People (1):
• standing, leaning slightly towards the vault, wearing black t-shirt, brown hair — smiling, excited expression
Camera pans across the backyard, revealing the full extent of the complex, multi-stage obstacle course set up on the lawn.
"If they want the bird seed and the lifetime supply of walnuts in this bank vault, they'll first need to pass through my nine-part obstacle course."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright, sunny daylight
A montage of quick cuts shows squirrels attempting various parts of the obstacle course: one spins on a pole, one is in a laser maze, one crawls through a tube.
"By design, it's extremely challenging. It's meant to test their mental limits and their physical limits."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
Text: "youtube/markrober"
A squirrel hangs upside down from a toy helicopter, successfully eating nuts from a netted container below it.
"but I have to admit in hindsight, I once again completely underestimated my adversary."
Setting: suburban backyard — natural daylight
Text: "youtube/markrober"
Mark Rober is inside his house, standing on a windowsill and peering through binoculars out the window shutters.
"And truthfully, I never thought I'd be that crazy guy in the neighborhood obsessing over the squirrels,"
Setting: indoors, looking out a window — indoor ambient light
People (1):
• standing on windowsill, looking out window, wearing green t-shirt and brown pants, brown hair — focused expression
A squirrel climbs down a wooden post and onto a bird feeder, shaking it and causing seeds to fall out.
"but they started it first when they would constantly pillage the bird seed from any bird feeder I would put up about a year ago."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
Text: "youtube/markrober"
A wide, fast-moving shot flies over the previous year's simpler squirrel obstacle course.
"That led to me defending it with an obstacle course, which they handily defeated."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
Mark Rober sits at a workbench, drawing and brainstorming ideas for the new obstacle course. He crumples up a piece of paper.
"And so after a year of ruminating on how to avenge that L with a majorly improved version,"
Setting: workshop/garage — bright workshop lighting
People (1):
• sitting at workbench, wearing blue jacket, brown hair — concentrated
A time-lapse shows Mark and his friend John setting up and building the new, complex obstacle course in the backyard.
"and then two months of planning, my buddy John and I got together for a 20-second build montage."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
People (2):
• moving quickly around the yard, wearing gray hoodie and jeans, brown hair — blurred due to time-lapse
• moving quickly around the yard, wearing black t-shirt and black pants, dark hair — blurred due to time-lapse
A montage of close-up shots shows various construction activities: cutting wood with a circular saw, sawing small pieces, gluing corners, drilling screws, and assembling mechanical parts.
Setting: workshop and backyard — bright, varied
People (1):
• working — not visible
A hand uses a stylus to write "FORT" on a tablet. A laser cutter then engraves "KNUTS" onto a piece of wood. The finished wooden sign is shown.
Setting: workshop/office — bright
Text: "FORT", "KNUTS"
Mark Rober pours a large box of walnuts into the completed "Fort Knuts" vault. The camera shows a low-angle shot from inside the vault as the walnuts pour in.
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
People (1):
• standing, pouring walnuts, wearing gray hoodie, brown hair — partially visible, focused
Mark Rober stands in front of the finished Fort Knuts, gesturing with his hands as he begins to explain the course.
"Here are the basic elements."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
People (1):
• standing, wearing black NASA t-shirt and green pants, brown hair — smiling, speaking
Mark Rober gestures emphatically towards the Fort Knuts vault, emphasizing its security.
"And it's sitting atop Fort Knuts, the most secure walnut vault in the Western United States."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
People (1):
• standing, wearing black NASA t-shirt and green pants, brown hair — excited, speaking
A small red and brown finch lands on the bird feeder atop Fort Knuts. Another small bird, a titmouse, lands and eats.
"Now, since birds can fly, they can come and go as they please and eat all the food they want."
Setting: suburban backyard — soft, natural daylight
Mark Rober crouches down next to the vault, explaining the squirrels' challenge with hand gestures.
"But the only way for the squirrels to make it right here is by surviving my nine-part grueling obstacle course,"
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
People (1):
• crouching, wearing black NASA t-shirt and green pants, brown hair — serious, explaining
Mark Rober stands at the beginning of the course, holding a stuffed squirrel and placing it on the starting platform.
"which all starts right here. Climbing up this pole to this platform is the single gateway to enter the course."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
People (1):
• standing, wearing black NASA t-shirt and green pants, brown hair — smiling, speaking
A montage shows squirrels attempting to climb various poles that have anti-climbing devices, like cones and cages, and failing.
"Every other pole you see has some kind of countermeasure to keep the squirrel from just climbing up and then entering the course halfway through."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
Mark Rober gestures towards the first obstacle, a wooden structure designed to look like a casino with a lit-up sign.
"And so the first challenge is this casino, which may seem like an odd choice"
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
People (1):
• standing, wearing black NASA t-shirt and green pants, brown hair — smiling, speaking
Text: "CASINO"
A man in a red hoodie places a detailed, miniature wooden house on a fence post.
"until you realize that as we were building the course, we also built them some cozy little squirrel houses."
Setting: backyard/driveway area — daylight
People (1):
• standing, wearing red 'Santa Clara University' hoodie and green pants, brown hair — partially obscured
A point-of-view shot through binoculars shows a squirrel inside one of the miniature houses up in a tree.
"and after a few days, it looked like they'd actually made some renovations."
Setting: up in a tree — daylight
A split-screen style comparison shows the squirrel house before and after the squirrels 'renovated' it, adding lights and a 'KEEP OUT' sign.
"And sure enough, here's the before and here's the after."
Setting: up in a tree — daylight
Text: "BEFORE", "AFTER", "KEEP OUT"
A squirrel is inside the miniature house, rolling around and stretching on a tiny red rug.
"So while it might look like they were just using the houses to relax, or stretch, or look out the window,"
Setting: inside squirrel house in a tree — bright daylight
Text: "youtube/markrober"
A close-up reveals the inside of the squirrel house is decorated like a heist planning room, with photos, red string, and a miniature model of the vault.
"the tactical mission planning and the mini vault to practice cracking a safe hold a completely different story."
Setting: inside squirrel house — bright daylight
Text: "BANK VAULT", "TARGET", "MARK ROBER"
A squirrel sits on a fence, looking intently towards the Fort Knuts vault in the distance, which is out of focus.
"were secretly planning to pull off an honest-to-goodness Mission Impossible, Ocean's 11-style mega walnut heist."
Setting: suburban backyard — soft afternoon light
Text: "youtube/markrober"
A montage shows the various security-themed obstacles: the laser maze, a spinning fan inside a box, and then clips from the movie Ocean's 11 showing a high-tech vault.
"with the most state-of-the-art security measures, just like the casino did in Ocean's 11."
Setting: backyard and movie clips — varied
A close-up shot pans across the 'Casino' obstacle, showing a miniature wooden slot machine and a buffet of nuts under a clear cover. A sign reads 'limit 1 oz. per customer!'.
"you'll see the slot machine and the classic Vegas buffet, but with a warning."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
Text: "limit 1 oz. per customer!"
A door on the casino obstacle swings open to reveal a stuffed squirrel dressed as a police officer.
"Take more than an ounce and you're going to have to deal with security."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
A hand spins a copper-colored bar that is part of the obstacle course, demonstrating that it rotates freely.
"they'll naturally want to jump to this bar. But there's a twist."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
People (1):
• off-screen — not visible
Mark Rober holds up a wooden crate filled with walnuts, which is covered by a black net. A toy helicopter is visible on a wire above.
"But if they can figure this out, they'll jump into this crate. And the good news is that it's filled to the brim with their favorite food which is walnuts."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
People (1):
• standing, wearing black NASA t-shirt and green pants, brown hair — speaking
Mark Rober demonstrates that when weight is added to the crate, the toy helicopter it's attached to slides along a zip line.
"But the bad news is that once you add a little weight to the system, the helicopter starts moving just like the helicopter from Mission Impossible."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
People (1):
• standing, wearing black NASA t-shirt and green pants, brown hair — speaking
A large wall made of wooden blocks is shown. Some of the blocks begin to move in and out randomly.
"The helicopter stops next to this wall, which seems simple enough, except that the bricks randomly move and adjust themselves in and out."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
Text: "youtube/markrober"
Mark Rober pushes a stuffed squirrel off a block on the moving wall. The stuffed squirrel falls to the grass below.
"And of course, at any time, if they fall off, they got to go back and start over the whole course from the beginning."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
People (1):
• standing next to the wall, wearing black NASA t-shirt and green pants, brown hair — smiling
The camera pans across a wooden structure labeled 'HIDE OUT', which has miniature tools, blueprints, and an elevator door.
"After that, we come to their hideout. And this is when they'll switch from defense to offense, because it's where they hang out and plan."
Setting: suburban backyard — overcast daylight
Text: "HIDE OUT"
A view from above looks down an elevator shaft, which connects to a white, semi-circular tube (the 'sewer') on the ground.
"the elevator shaft leads them underground and into the sewers."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
The camera shows the end of the sewer tube leading into another obstacle, which has a control room section and a large white vertical room, referencing Mission Impossible.
"it will take them right to the control center for a second room that might look familiar."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
Mark Rober stands next to the 'Mission Impossible' obstacle, pointing up to the air vent tube that comes out of the top.
"their goal is to go up through the ceiling to access the air vents."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
People (1):
• standing, wearing black NASA t-shirt and green pants, brown hair — speaking
A hand presses a button on a miniature keyboard in the control room section, and a rope ladder descends from the ceiling inside the white room.
"unless they type the password into the keyboard in the control room next door like this."
Setting: inside the 'Mission Impossible' obstacle — bright
Text: "UP"
A drone shot flies over the roof of a shed, showing a complex maze of clear ventilation tubes.
"And the vents are a total maze. There's lots of different twists and turns they'll need to navigate up here."
Setting: on a roof in the backyard — bright daylight
A close-up shot shows a clear, one-way flap door with a green 'Exit' sign on it. A hand pushes it open from the inside.
"they can always exit the whole course by using the one-way squirrel emergency exits,"
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
Text: "Exit"
Mark Rober stands next to the laser maze obstacle, a clear box filled with red strings representing lasers.
"And for the penultimate challenge, it's back down from the air ducts through this laser maze where they'll have to harness their inner Catherine Zeta-Jones."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
People (1):
• standing, wearing black NASA t-shirt and green pants, brown hair — smiling, speaking
A series of close-ups show the electronic components of the laser maze trap: a microcontroller, a circuit board with relays, a solenoid, and a pneumatic piston that slams a door shut.
"which sends a signal from this microcontroller to a relay to a solenoid, which causes this pneumatic piston to fire, which slams this door shut for one minute."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright
A stuffed squirrel holding a red 'STOP' sign is positioned on a black shield attached to the top of the ramp leading to the laser maze.
"I've placed a shield here with another enforcement squirrel to try and deter them."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright sunlight
Text: "*Anatomically correct Phat Gus coming soon to MarkRober.com"
Mark Rober stands next to the Fort Knuts vault and points to the handle on the circular vault door.
"they've made it to Fort Knuts. And as far as I'm concerned, if they crack the safe by giving this handle a little turn,"
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
People (1):
• standing, wearing black NASA t-shirt and green pants, brown hair — smiling
The vault door on Fort Knuts swings open, and a massive cascade of walnuts pours out onto the platform.
"they've earned every last walnut in this bank."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
People (1):
• partially visible behind vault, wearing black t-shirt — not visible
Text: "youtube/markrober"
A squirrel stands on its hind legs in the grass, sniffing the air and looking around at the obstacle course.
"After the course was set up, they could definitely smell the walnuts in the vault."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
A squirrel climbs the red and black striped starting pole of the obstacle course and jumps onto the first platform.
"And so after two months of prep work, it was time to test our extensive security measures against this formidable set of 500-gram rodents."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
A squirrel is on the casino obstacle, eating from the miniature buffet. The security guard door pops open, startling the squirrel, which jumps away.
"And right out of the gate, we got them with the buffet."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
Text: "youtube/markrober"
In slow motion, a squirrel (Rick) makes a dramatic, flying leap away from the security guard trap.
"And the slow-mo shows Rick just really laying himself out."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
Text: "youtube/markrober"
Clips from movies 'Twister' and 'Ocean's 11' are shown, depicting crews working together on a mission.
"Oh, by the way, that's Rick. All four squirrels have names, and more importantly, like any crew looking to pull off a heist, they all have specific roles to fill."
Setting: movie scenes — dramatic film lighting
People (1):
• varied — varied expressions
A still image of a squirrel is shown with a comic book-style graphic overlay identifying it as 'PHAT GUS, THE MASTERMIND'.
"Starting with everyone's favorite, Phat Gus, who, of course, is the mastermind of this operation."
Setting: graphic overlay — bright
Text: "PHAT GUS", "THE MASTERMIND"
A still image of a squirrel is shown with a comic book-style graphic overlay identifying it as 'RICK, THE ACROBAT'.
"Next up is Rick. He's the acrobat, the grease man, the gutsy one."
Setting: graphic overlay — bright
Text: "RICK", "THE ACROBAT"
A still image of a squirrel is shown with a comic book-style graphic overlay identifying it as 'MARTY, THE HACKER'.
"And then we've got Marty. He's the hacker."
Setting: graphic overlay — bright
Text: "MARTY", "THE HACKER"
A still image of a dark-colored squirrel is shown with a comic book-style graphic overlay identifying it as 'FRANK, LOGISTICS'.
"And finally, we've got Frank with logistics."
Setting: graphic overlay — bright
Text: "FRANK", "LOGISTICS"
A squirrel (Marty) cautiously approaches the casino obstacle, sniffing and looking around before jumping onto it.
"And so back to the course, we've got Marty the Hacker here, who, again, is a bit skittish, so you can see he's coming in pretty cautious."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
The security guard squirrel pops out again, and Marty the squirrel leaps dramatically into the air, twisting and flying off the platform.
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
A squirrel (Rick) jumps from the fence onto the twisting bar, which immediately spins, flipping the squirrel upside down.
"Eventually, they realized security was just too tight at this casino, and Rick goes straight to the twist bar."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
A squirrel (Rick) tries to cross the twisting bar again. A bird lands on the nearby crate, taunting him. The squirrel tries to adjust its balance but spins and falls off again.
"And with some motivation from the bird, he's like, I got this. I got this. I got this. I don't think I got this."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
A larger squirrel (Phat Gus) jumps from the fence directly onto the hanging crate of walnuts, bypassing the twisting bar entirely.
"At this point, Phat Gus is like, I'm gonna need that crate of walnuts. Let me show you how it's done."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
Text: "youtube/markrober"
A squirrel hangs from the twisting bar, trying to shimmy across it while upside down.
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
In slow motion, a squirrel (Rick) makes a huge leap from the roofline towards a pole, landing on it but then sliding down.
"I gave this a 9.5, but sorry, Rick, the Russian judge gave it a six. You got to stick the landing."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
A black squirrel (Frank) shimmies along a wire towards the helicopter, tries to navigate a baffle, but spins around and retreats.
"Logistics man Frank knows the wire connected to the fence leads to the helicopter crate, so he tries sneaking in the back door and is also forced to retreat."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
Text: "youtube/markrober"
A squirrel (Marty) runs very quickly across the twisting bar, successfully making it to the other side before it can spin too much.
"And finally, Marty the Hacker realizes if you just scurry on real fast, the bar doesn't have time to spin on you."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
Phat Gus is in the walnut crate as the helicopter moves. The squirrel pauses, looks around, then decides to jump out, parachuting to the ground.
"Phat Gus is like, wait, is this thing moving? I'm good."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
A composite, slow-motion shot shows a squirrel (Rick) falling from the helicopter, the crate falling, the helicopter, and other squirrels all frozen in mid-air before landing on the ground.
"Here, Rick hypothesizes if he doesn't sit in the crate, it won't move. And here, he rejects that hypothesis with a legendary leap."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright daylight
A squirrel climbs the rope ladder inside the white 'Mission Impossible' room and enters the air vent maze through a hole in the ceiling.
"And after Hacker Marty had accessed the computer and lowered the ladder, Phat Gus followed behind and joined him in the vents."
Setting: inside the 'Mission Impossible' obstacle — bright, lit from within
Phat Gus successfully navigates the moving brick wall, jumping from one stable block to another.
"Eventually, it's the fearless leader Phat Gus who demonstrates the ride is definitely worth it."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
Text: "youtube/markrober"
A squirrel (Frank) successfully navigates the moving brick wall.
"Which leads us to the wall of a thousand moving bricks."
Setting: suburban backyard — sunny
Text: "youtube/markrober"
A squirrel (Rick) attempts to jump across the moving brick wall but misses a brick and falls to the ground.
"And Rick just barely misses."
Setting: suburban backyard — sunny
A montage shows several squirrels falling from the moving brick wall as the bricks retract.
"And while there were plenty of instances where a moving brick did dump the squirrels, causing them to start over from the beginning,"
Setting: suburban backyard — sunny
A squirrel (Marty) hesitates on a stationary brick, flinching and looking around nervously before finally jumping off.
"what was even better was Marty psyching himself out in the anticipation that a brick might move, even though the wall wasn't powered on for any of these clips."
Setting: suburban backyard — sunny
A montage shows the four squirrels one by one successfully and quickly navigating the moving brick wall.
"And thanks in part to the dutiful supervision of Phat Gus, eventually, like all the other challenges so far, they got it down to a science where they could cruise by the wall pretty quickly."
Setting: suburban backyard — sunny
Night vision footage shows a rat on the moving brick wall obstacle.
"And now's a good time to mention the squirrels weren't the only ones attempting the course. This is Splinter the rat, and here he is with one of his buddies."
Setting: suburban backyard at night — infrared night vision
Night vision footage shows a squirrel (Frank) chasing a rat out of one of the miniature squirrel houses.
"There goes Frank to chase him off his lawn."
Setting: up in a tree at night — infrared night vision
A squirrel on the roof of a miniature house pulls a large wad of white stuffing out of the house, which another squirrel had just put inside.
"somewhat hilariously, just steal from each other."
Setting: up in a tree — daylight
A montage shows various animals: a rat, a possum walking on the fence, and a hummingbird at a feeder.
"So from Splinter and his buddies to not-at-all-creepy possums, there's a surprisingly constant variety of wildlife that passes through a suburban backyard,"
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight and night vision
A squirrel enters the 'hideout' obstacle and disappears into the elevator shaft.
"Which is a lovely segue back to the squirrel hideout, where the heist was really just picking up steam."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
A squirrel eats a nut inside the 'Mission Impossible' room, with a text overlay '*ADORABLE INTERMISSION*'.
Setting: inside the 'Mission Impossible' obstacle — bright
Text: "*ADORABLE INTERMISSION*"
Two squirrels are in the 'Mission Impossible' room. One is on the floor, the other is in the control room. They seem to be interacting.
Setting: suburban backyard — bright
A squirrel in the control room presses the 'UP' button, then the 'DOWN' button, then presses the keyboard, causing the rope ladder to lower.
Setting: suburban backyard — bright
Text: "UP", "DOWN"
One squirrel climbs the ladder while another watches from the control room. One of them drops something, and then a squirrel (Phat Gus) rappels down upside down on the rope, mimicking Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible.
"And after Hacker Marty had accessed the computer and lowered the ladder, Phat Gus followed behind and joined him in the vents. But in the process, a critical tool dropped down, which led to a lovely recreation of an iconic scene."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright
A squirrel easily pushes through one of the one-way exit doors from inside an obstacle and jumps out onto the grass.
"And as a side note, they figured out the exit door pretty quickly, and they functioned as a one-way door exactly as intended."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
A black squirrel (Frank) runs along the top of the clear vent tubes on the roof, seemingly inspecting the layout.
"And now with the vents, it was Frank's time to shine. You can see here, he's just double-checking the actual air duct layouts to make sure they match the blueprints he's memorized."
Setting: on a roof in the backyard — sunny
The black squirrel (Frank) confidently enters the correct tube in the maze and quickly navigates through it.
"And once he's satisfied, he steps up, and as you can see, he nails it first try."
Setting: inside the vent maze — bright daylight
Text: "youtube/markrober"
A gray squirrel (Marty) inside the vent maze looks confused, turning back and forth at an intersection before retreating back the way it came.
"I think it was a right, no, it was straight. No, was it left? Crap. I gotta go check the map again."
Setting: inside the vent maze — bright daylight
Inside a junction box in the vent maze, a black squirrel (Frank) tackles a gray squirrel (Marty). They wrestle briefly before Marty is pushed into the correct tube.
"So Frank hops in so they can work out their differences."
Setting: inside the vent maze — bright daylight
A squirrel (Rick) comes down the ramp and peers into the laser maze box, hesitating at the entrance.
"And here's Acrobat Rick's first approach, and he's like, yeah, that's sus."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
The squirrel (Rick) tries to bypass the laser maze by climbing on top of the tube, but the ramp is designed to tip, and it dumps him onto the ground.
"and he's like, yeah, I totally got this. When in fact, he didn't have it."
Setting: suburban backyard — sunny
In super slow motion, a squirrel falls, twisting its body in mid-air by adjusting its limbs and tail, and lands perfectly on its feet.
"we can remind ourselves of how squirrels have mastered the laws of physics to always land on their feet."
Setting: suburban backyard — sunny
A squirrel enters the laser maze, touches a laser (string), and a door slams shut, trapping it inside. It looks around, startled.
"So then Rick's like, fine, I'll use the stupid tube like a normal squirrel. What is this? See, I knew this was sus."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
A black squirrel (Frank) cautiously enters the laser maze. It triggers the trap, and a hamster wheel inside starts spinning rapidly.
"And here's Frank, who just watched what happened and therefore is appropriately cautious."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
Phat Gus carefully and slowly navigates through the red strings of the laser maze without touching them.
"And in the end, it feels appropriate that the mastermind, Phat Gus, was the first one to make it successfully through the laser maze"
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
Phat Gus arrives at Fort Knuts, sees two decoy walnuts on the platform, and tries to stuff both into her mouth at once.
"and then to subsequently make it to Fort Knuts. I mean, how Phat Gus is this? Falling not just for one decoy nut, but for both of them."
Setting: suburban backyard — sunny
A squirrel (Marty) successfully navigates the laser maze and stands up proudly at the exit.
"Which paves the way for Marty the Hacker to be the one to crack the safe. And as you can see here, he's pretty stoked about it."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
A squirrel (Marty) turns the handle on the Fort Knuts vault. The door swings open, and a torrent of walnuts spills out.
"And then, the big moment."
Setting: suburban backyard — sunny
Text: "youtube/markrober"
A squirrel climbs up one of the newly unfurled cargo nets to get to the platform of Fort Knuts.
"Once the safe opened, these cargo nets unfurled, which just allowed better access to their loot."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
A squirrel, holding a walnut in its mouth, jumps from the Fort Knuts platform back into the entrance of the laser maze.
"instead of jumping off, they would go all the way back through the course."
Setting: suburban backyard — sunny
A squirrel sits on a wooden fence, holding a large walnut in its mouth and eating it.
"So once again, the squirrels took the W, but as far as I'm concerned, they earned it."
Setting: suburban backyard — bright, backlit
Text: "youtube/markrober"
Two squirrels, one black and one gray, are together on the roof of a small wooden house, grooming each other.
"Marty and Frank made up and rekindled their friendship,"
Setting: up in a tree at night — night vision
A small red finch is perched on a wire, looking down at a squirrel (Phat Gus) who is now sitting on the bird feeder, eating the birdseed.
"So everyone was happy. Well, almost everyone."
Setting: suburban backyard — daylight
The screen is black with white text in the center.
Setting: graphic
Text: "please consider subscribing"