Executive Produced by Tom Forman, Chuck Dalaklis, Jenny Daly, Jon Beyer, Wyatt Channell and Howard Swartz
Featuring Lance Reddick, Richard Kind, Amanda Seales, Flula Borg, and Harvey Guillen
New episodes airing Thursdays on discovery+

by Stacey Osbeck, Staff Writer

So many inventions have transformed our world: the automobile, penicillin, the internet. I know what you’re thinking though, “yeah, but… yawn”. Who will tell the heroic tales of the true innovations of our times? Boxed wine, corn cob holders, and Sea-Monkeys. That’s where Inventions That Changed History the new series on discovery+ finds its moment to shine.

If you were to take Drunk History, sans the booze, add animation and puppetry for reenactments, call in some celebrities and a few actual engineers who could explain how the products work for commentary, and smoosh that all together into one show - you’d know what to expect from ITCH.  

In 1960, Robert Carrier saw his son, along with some friends, hosing down the driveway and then sliding along the painted concrete. He told them, “you guys are gonna kill yourselves doing that”. But they were just kids having fun. What’s a dad, who works as an upholsterer at a boating manufacturer company, to do? In this case, Carrier began experimenting with varying materials, fostering this crazy idea he had until finally unveiling the Portable Aquatic Play Device for Body Planing. Which, lucky enough, was renamed before production to the Slip ‘N Slide. 

In 4000 BC, Mesopotamia took the first steps on a long road that eventually brought us from the primitive outhouse to the modern bathrooms we know today. This bit of history will intrigue Game of Thrones fans with its detailed lineage, highlighting how each advancement led to the next. And also because Sir John Harrington, creator of Britain’s first flush toilet, turns out to be an ancestor of actor Kit Harrington. 

You may wonder if waterbeds are still around. I can assure you every lease I signed while living in Los Angeles had a specific section stipulating ‘no waterbeds.’ So yes, at least in some parts of the country, these motion-of-the-ocean sleepers still endure as part of the current landscape. The inventor, Charlie Hall, takes the audience through his initial spark, why the prototype was filled with Jell-O, and how a little help from Hugh Hefner helped it take off.

Each episode has a theme. I’ve only seen the first two, which focus on food and water. Some rising stars are thrown in to round out the ongoing opinions and jokes (Amanda Sales from Insecure and Harvey Guillen from What We Do in the Shadows), but it’s the old familiar faces that are almost as nostalgia inducing as the products we grew up with (Greg Proops from Who’s Line Is It Anyway?, Kate Flannery from The Office, and Yeardley Smith from The Simpsons).  

Funny aside, the brief moments where a scientist explains things like the evolutionary existence of Sea-Monkeys, or a structural engineer describes the motorization behind Big Mouth Billy Bass, the most famous mounted singing fish there is, will leave you well-prepared to be a complete know-it-all at your next backyard barbecue.  

Throughout history inventions have propelled us into the future, but this show takes us back to what is collectively some of our best times.