If I told you I set out to write a “typical” KR episode, a lot of you would immediately think this guy isn’t much interested in innovation. But fans of the original KR might see it a bit differently. As a group -- the writers, the studio, the network -- all agreed that the original KR formula – one man and one car taking on a bad guy, saving a pretty girl, and making things right was a pretty sweet template for a series. When the “re-boot” was contemplated, I immediately decided, with deliberate intent, to tell small stories. By small I mean that Mike and KITT don’t need to save the world every week. By small I mean the stories don’t always have to come to the SSC through some quasi-governmental source. By small I mean we see some kick-ass action, unravel a mystery, have a few laughs along the way, and by the end of the episode Mike and KITT make a couple of lives a little better, and straighten out their own karma a little in the process. Conceptually, it’s a lot like the original series, so you would think that after defeating KARR, the deaths of Dr. Graiman and Alex Torres, and Carrie’s near-miss and retirement, this new template would be a no-brainer.

Not so.

This story met a ton of internal resistance, but to GST’s credit, it made it to air as the penultimate episode of Season 1. It also has its own version of the original KR’s comic relief -- in the form of a pair of would-be car thieves who attempt to steal KITT with decidedly mixed results. And of course, Billy and Zoe mix it up a little bit back at the much more mellow KITT Cave.

If there is a second season, these are the kinds of stories I’d like to tell.

Thanks to a cast whose professionalism was only surpassed by their kindness and friendship, and thanks to a tireless crew who made a movie every week – and did it with pride.

Matt Pyken

Easily the most frustrating episode of the season. Originally, “Knight Fever” was conceived and shot as the 2nd episode of the season for us (to air back in early October). The idea was to have Kitt contract a tech-eating virus (think Ebola for machines) and nearly die. Well, that’s what we shot and planned to put on screen – the special effects were another matter entirely. Turns out it’s harder to make a virus look cool on screen than we ever expected. Two special effects teams and seven months later, we sort of realized that less is more. The virus you see now is the result.

Here’s another issue—we shot this episode way back in July, well before Kitt developed his current “personality.” He was supposed to be a little more robotic and so Mike’s and Sarah’s responses to him in the original script were more like that of a big brother or big sister talking to their much younger, far less experienced sibling. But now the episode airs as number ten, and Kitt’s AI is much more developed. The solution? Re-write all of Kitt’s dialogue to fit. Easy, right? Think again. Imagine you were having a conversation with your seven year-old brother, then you have exactly the same conversation six months later – except the seven year-old is now eighteen. I doubt the answers would be the same, (though I gotta admit, I’m still kinda the same dude I was when I was seven). Anyway, we’ve already shot both Mike’s and Sarah’s sides of the conversations – way back in July. But now we have to change Kitt’s entire attitude -- his point of view, his “feelings” about what’s taking place. All new dialogue. It took some doing.

In the end, I think turning episode 2 into episode 10 ended up falling under the banner of the “law of unintended consequences” -- meaning it turns out it makes more sense in the new slot than the old. We know Kitt really well by now, and we understand how much he means to Mike and Sarah and vice-versa. And despite Mike and Sarah’s relative coolness toward one another lately, it’s clear their love and friendship is still rock solid.

Plus, a tech-eating virus seems like it really could happen pretty soon, doesn’t it?

See you in '09,
Matt

What do South Africa, Nevada, Native Americans, Paul Campbell, and Kitt have in common?

“I implore you” as Kitt likes to say – read on.

Poor Billy Morgan. Always back in the Kittcave while Michael Knight gets the girl. Billy sits at his workstation and pines for Sarah, gets played over and over by Zoe, but he never seems to get anywhere -- that is, until tonight’s episode.

Yep, Mike and Billy head for Las Vegas to take down a crew of sophisticated casino thieves, and Billy works in a little extra-curricular activity along the way.

Now, here’s the back-story on the characters and the location.

First, there’s Vegas. It’s 300 miles from us here in LA, and not a great town for shooting a TV series. If that seems counter-intuitive, think about it. Shooting inside a casino is a big deal. Security is all over the crew, and if you want to simulate a casino heist, forget it. When there’s real money around, the real guys with the real guns tend to get nervous. Then there’s the disruption factor; Las Vegas casinos make more in a day than we could ever pay for a location fee, so they’re not particularly keen on 200 members of a TV crew settling in for a few days.

So how do you do Vegas when it’s too far, too expensive and you’re the red-headed step-child?

Enter the Morongo Band of Mission Indians. These nice folks just happened to build a huge Vegas-style hotel and casino 90 miles east of Los Angeles on the edge of the desert near Palm Springs. We took our entire crew of 200, put them up for three days in the hotel, ate at the buffet for breakfast and lunch and shot this episode of “Knight Rider” everywhere from the casino to the pool to one of the cabana-style suites. It was awesome and it looks exactly like Las Vegas.

And one lucky member of the crew hit a $4000 dollar slot jackpot.

Now, what about Mike and Kitt and all those driving scenes? Without getting too technical, our visual effects wizards composite Kitt in with real footage of Las Vegas – footage we were able to get form the series “Las Vegas,” a show Gary Scott Thompson created and I wrote on for five years.

So, easy-peasy, right?

Not so fast. Some of those visual effects artists who create the composite shots do their work in South Africa. Say what? We actually digitize the footage of Kitt driving (shot in front of a green screen), then we digitize the footage of the Las Vegas backgrounds, then upload both sets to the internet. The digital artists in South Africa download our uploads, marry the two sets of footage together then send it back via a very big and fast internet data pipe to us here in LA. Then we drop the shots into the show.

And that’s how you get to Vegas via South Africa and Palm Springs, baby.

Oh yeah, and Billy meets a beautiful girl, wins a hundred grand playing blackjack and saves Mike from the bad guys. But that’s another story.

Matt

ps - true fact: Courtney Flynn, Billy's love interest in this episode, was named after Courtney Flynn, who works on the show...