Print KNIGHT RIDER: A Knight in Shining Armor

Could a single episode of any television series be worse than the Stride Gum episode of Smallville? The answer is a resounding YES. Is this series a slightly more adult remake of the old animated television series MASK? This car transforms into a couple of versions of the car plus a pickup truck and who knows what else. The film that was supposed to kick this series off last year was pretty bad but it looks like an Academy Award winner compared to the series that followed with this premiere. The series feels like one of those really cheaply made series like Time Trax that plays on basic cable at 2 am. The transformation effects are horrible with the only worse effect being the blue flames shot from inside the car to the tailpipe. It’s just impossible to believe this is a real network show.

The budget for the writing of the episode seems to be similar to that of the special effects because there really isn’t much of a story. The episode feels like it was shot from an outline of a script not from an actual developed and fully realized script. There’s a series of dramatic bullet points that have to be met to establish the characters and they are met in the most stilted and amateurish way possible. This is not meant as an insult – it’s just the way it is. Background information is delivered in the same way a chef cooking spaghetti might check the noodles; by throwing them against the wall. There’s no chemistry between the characters delivering the bulleted list making the proceedings all the more excruciating. To put a fine point on it, this “script” has all the finesse of a solid installment of Power Rangers with directing to match.

The question is who is this series meant for? If I were a young man of 8 years old I’d probably have loved this show because it would be all about the transforming car and the explosions. The creators of this series give that up a plenty. In fact there’s at least one instance in the episode where the car transforms twice for virtually no reason at all. If that’s who this series is for are references to porn really appropriate? There’s really not one redeeming thing about this episode unless you consider that this episode is so bad the series can only go up from here. Knight Rider could have gone two different directions and been potentially successful. The first would be to take a very serious even dark approach to the story similar to Battlestar Galactica. This would of course be the most difficult direction to choose. The writers would have to write deep character driven stories and taken careful care with the science straying from going to far and making it all feel ridiculous. The other direction would be to give in to the potential for being ridiculous and created a series similar to Get Smart or the old Matt Helm films (James Bond spoofs). The choice here was to go the Fast and the Furious direction hoping that special effects would bolster weaknesses in characters and story. The problem is, the effects are pathetic, so even if that trick would’nt have worked to begin with.

KNIGHT RIDER: A Knight in Shining Armor (Mania.com)