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Seven Days Buried Alive: MrBeast's Week Under 20,000 Pounds of Dirt

MrBeast ミスタービースト · ▶ 18:30 · 11 min read
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Overview

Jimmy (MrBeast) opens the video by saying he will spend seven days buried alive in a coffin under 20,000 pounds of dirt, and calls it "the scariest thing I have ever done." He also says the stunt is "100% real" and admits he "severely underestimated" how hard it would be. The video follows him from the burial to the dig-out a week later. Over that week he goes from nervous to talkative and bored, then to exhausted and depressed, while his friends on the surface try to entertain him and prank him. The channel also crosses 200 million subscribers during the week.

11 min read

The Burial and the Setup

When the dirt is dropped on the coffin, Jimmy says he feels like he needs to hold the roof up because it is shaking. He says he is "entrusting my life to this coffin" and hopes it doesn't "randomly decide to break." The burial takes so long that he already needs to pee as the challenge officially begins. He hints at how he'll handle the bathroom underground and calls it "so uncomfortable."

His supplies are a briefcase of food, mostly MREs and snacks, a five-gallon drum of water, and whatever essentials his friends packed in a second briefcase. He expects to run out of food before the seven days are up. He calls the stunt "extremely dangerous" and explains that, so he doesn't suffocate, people need to be watching him at all times. It is almost 1 a.m. on the first night, and he tells the crew he needs someone near a walkie-talkie at all times who will actually answer if he calls.

Sleep as a Strategy, and Friends Who Won't Allow It

Jimmy's plan is to sleep through as much of the challenge as he can "for my own sanity." His reasoning is that while he's asleep he isn't thinking about being trapped in a box. He adds that this "only works most of the time." He later says he forgot one thing when he made this plan: his friends would annoy him and keep him awake. The crew, including Nolan, Karl, Kris, Tareq, and Chandler, spend much of the week doing exactly that. They draw on his face while he sleeps and keep up running jokes about Nolan's mom.

To pass the time he cuts his long pants into shorts, calls it "mission one complete," and tries his first MRE. He explains that you add hot water and the meal "chemically cooks" itself, but his pasta comes out crunchy. On the surface, his friends grill steaks on top of his grave. They promise to eat MREs in solidarity, and then someone off-camera says no. He gets so bored that he punches the coffin wall until his knuckles hurt, then puts a sock on his hand so he can keep punching. He says he is "desperate for entertainment."

The Surgical Camera and the Photo

On day two a loud noise frightens Jimmy, and he asks the crew to explain what they're doing, "seeing how my life is on the line." They have pushed a pipe down to the coffin, vacuumed the dirt out of it, and fed a surgical wire camera through it so they can look at him directly. While this is happening, a fly lands on his leg and startles him.

That night, while the crew is at their RV, Jimmy opens the essentials briefcase. Inside is a card with a photo the crew says is Nolan's mom. He keeps the picture on his chest for the rest of the week. Later he tells Nolan it is "the only thing keeping me sane" and says he plans to frame it and keep it forever.

He also guesses what could make him quit. Besides losing the photo, he says it would be not wanting to poop underground, along with back pain, which he repeats several times.

Rain, Speakers, and a Loose Bolt

A heavy thunderstorm hits one night. Crew members wake up and go check that Jimmy hasn't been crushed. They wonder aloud whether the soaked dirt is now heavier, and one says the gravesite looks "way more funeral-esque."

To wake him up, the crew puts 15 speakers on top of his grave and plays loud music. The coffin shakes enough that Jimmy says the vibrations are hurting his head, and someone on the surface jokes that there's an earthquake. During the shaking he notices an unscrewed bolt on the side of the coffin that has come loose "literally from the base." He asks whether he should be worried that it was never screwed all the way in.

The speakers are also cover for a bigger prank. The crew decides to dig a tunnel from the side straight to his coffin, playing construction noises so he won't hear the excavator. Underground, Jimmy hears a loud noise and gets no answer on the walkie. He concludes that either he is about to die or his friends are about to do something dumb. One crew member compares digging toward him to a video game, "except you could accidentally kill somebody." Kris says, "I'm not certified to do this at all."

The 50-Hour Mark and the Blood Clot Worry

Jimmy passes 50 hours and says he has now been buried longer than the last time he did this challenge. He explains he promised his doctor he would move every day to avoid blood clots, "cause apparently lay down for seven days straight can kill you." He asked the crew to pack dumbbells and got 3-pound ones. He says he smells terrible. From here on, the question of whether he'll be able to stand up safely at the end keeps coming back. He says he is trying not to think about the possibility that he could die when he stands up in a couple of days.

He also describes a strain he didn't expect. Cameras record him at all times. That didn't bother him for the first few days, but now he has "this weird feeling someone's always staring at me," and it is starting to irritate him.

The Tunnel Breaks Through

The crew claims they stayed up all night digging the tunnel and "didn't pay that guy to do it," which is clearly a joke. They crawl in one after another and reach the side of the coffin. Jimmy, surprised, says he can see Nolan's forehead. They argue about the photo of Nolan's mom, and then remind him that the channel is almost at 200 million subscribers and he'll probably hit it while in the coffin. He says he wishes he could see it live. Nolan tapes a Feastables bar inside the coffin, and Jimmy jokes that it's good marketing, since now the bar will appear in every time-lapse. The crew also notes how hot it is down there.

Insomnia and Unexplained Tears

That night things get worse. Jimmy says he is very tired but can't sleep, something that has never happened to him before. Then he starts crying and says he doesn't know why.

On day five he says, "I don't think humans are meant to lay down for five days straight," and that he'll "try to act like I'm not depressed." The crew calls down that they're shooting his tombstone with paintball guns. He asks to join, then admits he doesn't know what to say to them. Asked what he's been doing for fun, he answers, "Nothing. I'm in mental agony." He says he badly needs to poop but will try to hold it for the last two days. He has no motivation to do anything and doesn't have the energy to prepare a meal, partly because going to the bathroom is so hard. After accidentally getting pee on his shorts, he cuts off the affected part, which leaves them very short.

Hitting 200 Million Subscribers Underground

The crew comes back to celebrate the approaching milestone. Jimmy says he has felt terrible all day, but the thought of hitting 200 million makes him a little happy. This section is a Verizon sponsorship. The crew says they rigged Verizon's 5G home internet to work underground, and Jimmy watches his live subscriber count from about ten feet down.

As the count gets close, the group reflects. Karl says he used to be "just a random guy in Nebraska," after Nolan joked the same thing. Someone recalls talking about goals like this at a lunch table. Chandler says that when they started there were about seven of them and Chandler was the janitor. Jimmy says he started making videos at 11, is now 25, and never imagined the channel would get this big. He thanks viewers and remembers getting zero views. The count crosses 200 million and everyone celebrates. Then the crew unplugs the connection before Jimmy can call his girlfriend. He begs for two minutes so she knows he's alive, and they leave to go eat.

Alone Again

After they leave, Jimmy is crying again without knowing exactly why. He says hitting 200 million with the boys was fun, but now he is alone and trapped again. He has no idea how he'll survive two more days and says he is "going downhill quickly." When Nolan checks in, one crew member sums up his arc: he went from terrified, to "an absolute yapster," to "a sad boy." Jimmy says he is trying to talk for the sake of the content but has "zero desire to speak" and just wants out. He reveals he has used up all his pee bottles, so now he eats a meal and pees in the empty bag. He calls the challenge disgusting.

To cheer him up, Nolan brings his parents to the gravesite. Jimmy asks them for something embarrassing about Nolan. They say Nolan once told them he was going to prom but actually just went next door to the neighbors for a while, and that they'd like to see him bring a girl home for Christmas. Jimmy says that's all he needed, because he knows the comments will go wild. Nolan responds, "I hate Jimmy."

The Final Night

Jimmy tells the crew that in exactly 12 hours they all need to start digging, whether or not they like getting up early. He asks what they'd do if he stood up, got a blood clot, and died on the spot. One answers, "I'd know where to put you." He says he doesn't think he's ever been more excited for anything and can't wait to see sunlight, and he tears up again. Lying down for the last night, he says all he can think about is whether he'll be able to stand, because "it's not normal to be laying down and not moving this long."

Digging Out and Standing Up

At the seven-day mark he asks the crew to dig him up. He calls the wait the worst part of the challenge, with the added tension of whether he'll die when he stands. An excavator digs him out, which he finds scary. When the dirt gives way to sunlight, he says it's hard to describe the sun after seven days without it, and he cries again without knowing why. He had predicted the crew's first comment would be about his smell, and they say exactly that.

He won't celebrate until he has stood up without complications. Crew members tell him to wait for a medic, who asks whether he feels nauseous or dizzy. He stands for the first time in a week. His legs feel weak and he feels a rush of blood to his head, but he's fine: "Oh, I didn't die." Above ground a large crowd is waiting, and he finally celebrates 200 million subscribers "the right way." The video ends, as he says his videos always do, with an explosion.

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