How Jackass changed television and no one seemed to notice

The first strings of Jackass' frenetic theme song only hint at the chaos and comedic destruction that's to come. Johnny Knoxville's sober warning that these stunts are performed by trained professionals and that you shouldn't try them at home is in direct contrast to the cackling glee with which Knoxville and his merry band of (sado)masochists throw themselves and each other directly into harm's way.

Airing on MTV from 2000 to 2002 in three hilarious, shocking, and disgusting seasons, Jackass was the love child of '90s skater culture, sketch comedy, and stuntman risk-taking, brought together through the combined efforts of co-creators Knoxville, Jeff Tremaine, and Spike Jonze. It all started when Tremaine, as editor of skater mag Big Brother, hired Knoxville for a piece on self-defense methods. Knoxville's spin was to try each method personally... on himself. The result was so bizarre and inadvertently funny that Tremaine and Knoxville decided to film it.

At the same time, Bam Margera was doing something similar with his Camp Kill Yourself crew, attempting wild stunts and filming them. Along with Bam, Dave England and Jason "Wee Man" Acuña also had ties to Big Brother on the editorial and publishing sides. Then there was Steve-O, who'd been mailing tapes to the magazine's offices trying to get a feature. It was a perfect storm of fearlessness and foolishness, and when they joined forces, the cult phenomenon Jackass was finally born. After a bidding war between several interested parties (including a very thirsty Comedy Central), MTV won. Jackass premiered on October 1, 2000, and television was never the same. Here's why.