Knight Rider premiered on NBC on September 26, 1982, and ran four seasons and 84 episodes before signing off on April 4, 1986. Glen A. Larson created it. David Hasselhoff starred as Michael Knight, a cop rebuilt from a bullet wound and paired with a talking car. It was a hit. It was not good.
Trailer, via NBC Classics.
A Cop Named Michael Long
The premise is pure Larson. Detective Lieutenant Michael Arthur Long takes a gunshot to the face in Las Vegas while working a case. Wilton Knight, a dying billionaire, pays to save him, gives him a new face and a new name, and hands him a car.
That car is the Knight Industries Two Thousand, a modified Pontiac Firebird Trans Am with an artificially intelligent computer, a nearly indestructible shell, and a voice supplied by William Daniels.
KITT and the Man Who Wouldn’t Take Credit
Daniels asked not to be credited for voicing KITT. He was starring on St. Elsewhere at the same time.
Hasselhoff plays Michael straight, which is the only way to play a man who talks to his Pontiac. Edward Mulhare’s Devon Miles delivers the mission briefings as head of the Foundation for Law and Government. He appeared in every episode.
Bonnie Barstow Gets Fired, Then Hired Back
Patricia McPherson played Dr. Bonnie Barstow, KITT’s chief technician, with a romantic tension opposite Michael. The character was dropped after season one. Rebecca Holden replaced her as April Curtis in season two.
Then fan reaction, plus lobbying by Hasselhoff and Mulhare, brought McPherson back for seasons three and four. Holden was written out. The show never explained what happened to April Curtis, or established any connection between the two women.
Peter Parros joined in season four as Reginald Cornelius III, or RC3, a former street vigilante who becomes the driver of the FLAG operation.
The Truck, the Son, and the Shell
Hasselhoff also played Garthe Knight, Wilton’s estranged son, a criminal mastermind who drives Goliath — a Peterbilt 352 Pacemaker semi-truck armed with rockets and protected by the same Molecular Bonded Shell that makes KITT so hard to kill.
It is a soap opera twist bolted onto a car show, and it fits the show’s appetite for spectacle.
direct action might provide the only feasible solution
That is the stated operating principle for Michael and KITT.
Four Seasons of the Same Episode
Eighty-four episodes is a long time to watch a man and a car outrun the law’s limits. The cases blur. The villains are forgettable. KITT’s features expand as needed and vanish when they would end the story early.
What holds up is the design. The black Trans Am with the red scanner is one of the great television objects, and Daniels gives it a dry, fussy personality that Hasselhoff plays against well. That is craft. It is not drama.
A Cult Following Built on Nostalgia
Knight Rider drew negative reviews during its original run. Retrospective reviews have been kinder, from audiences and critics alike, and the series has a cult following. That reversal says more about childhood than about quality. People who were eight in 1983 are now writing the retrospectives.
The show was Larson’s last series at Universal Television before he moved to 20th Century Fox Television. He left behind a franchise template, not a good show.
What Knight Rider Actually Is
Knight Rider is a toy commercial with a good car and a bad case-of-the-week engine. The premise — a dead cop given a second identity and a machine that cannot be killed — is genuinely strong. The execution never got there. Michael Knight has no arc. Devon Miles has no arc. KITT has no arc. The show resets every week, and the reset is the whole point.
The Goliath episodes are the closest it comes to stakes.
3.3/10.
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