Typically, I don’t like to blog about other blogs. But one of my favorite technology/information/gun sites (besides TFB, of course), War Is Boring, posted a great write-up of the MAC-10 and its high-speed rise and fall as a viable submachine gun. Entitled The MAC-10 Was an Over-Hyped Hunk of Junk, writer Darien Cavanaugh chronicles the basic history and development of the Military Arms Corporation Model 10 (MAC-10) as well as its prominence in Hollywood action films despite being a poor choice for almost any special operations mission.

The MAC-10 was so prominent in American culture during its heyday that its manufacturer advertised it—or, more accurately, the follow-on MAC-11—as “the gun that made the ’80s roar.” But by the time the ’80s actually rolled around, the MAC-10 family of guns had already fallen from grace on the commercial market.

Today the MAC-10 still has a loyal following on message boards and in Internet chat rooms for gun enthusiasts. The faded movie-star is, if nothing else, a fun gun to shoot.

Cavanaugh could have also mentioned that today the MAC-10 is typically purchased as an initial entry into the heavily controlled world of National Firearms Act (NFA) machine guns. Because of their low (by comparison) price, first time buyers can experience fully automatic weaponry at a fraction of the cost of other machine guns.

Also worth noting is that a company called Lage Manufacturing produces upper receivers, barrels and collapsable butt stocks that transform the MAC-10 into a modular gun with more options. So there is a solid argument that the MAC-10 and its variants is more popular among enthusiasts than it was at its debut nearly 50 years ago

Check out War Is Boring and the story on the MAC-10. And give them a follow while you are there.