Really?

This is how Knight Rider Season 1 ends? “I Love The Knight Life” is a tremendous step backwards for the Knight Rider series. It’s a return to the pointless and mindless formula that plagued the beginning of the series. It’s unfortunate, really, that after “rebooting” and trying to restart the show with a new approach, a new perspective and new priorities – it’s final episode reverts back to the worst of what Knight Rider used to be.

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“Knight and the City” demonstrates the almost maddening inconsistency of the Knight Rider series. Having finally “rebooted” the reboot and trimmed the cast down to five main characters (if you count KITT), you’d think there’d be something more for the cast than simply sitting in front of computers and endlessly flirting with one another. The only one in the episode that gets to actually do anything is Michael Knight, but even his excursions are limited to the same-old-same-old that threatened to torpedo the series in the first place. The thing is, though, the episode was mildly entertaining. And there are a few nice moments tucked into the mindless din. It just isn’t enough to justify yet another season of Knight Rider cliché – and the reboot has been unable to demonstrate that the series can actually grow and evolve any further than it did three episodes ago.

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“Fly By Knight” is an example of what Knight Rider might be like with some solid writing. In fact, I’d almost go so far as to say that this was the best all-round episode of the series to date, featuring a tightly woven plot, some fun humor, and a real bit of character development from KITT. If Knight Rider truly has a future, it will be because of episodes like this one – which raise the bar and level of intelligence of the series, while keeping enough action and suspense to keep viewers glued to the screen.

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“Fight Knight” is an example of Knight Rider finding the right premise, but completely missing on the execution. The notion of Michael Knight and KITT fighting for those who are powerless against the system, and against the law, is certainly a welcome change of events. But this story was pedestrian at best and, at worst, it was a return to the kind of military-charged stories which were a hallmark of the early episodes of the series. And this, of course, begs the question: If the series is trying to make a clean break from its early episodes, why would it return, once again, to a now cliché subject matter?

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Knight Rider, you’ve got my attention.

“Exit Light, Enter Knight” is an intense, well-paced, relatively smart and engaging episode. From start to finish it is relentless with suspense and drama and only a relatively abrupt ending really diminishes the story. True, there still isn’t a whole lot of character work being done, and the episode doesn’t have a whole lot to say about anything. But for what it sets out to be, this mindless entertainment was highly entertaining. We’ll see if the rest of the retooled episodes have the immediacy and impact of this one, but for now, Knight Rider can bask in the glory of a job well done.

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“Knight To King’s Pawn” is, without question, the best episode of Knight Rider to date. Of course, all things being equal that isn’t saying a whole lot. But in this case, Knight Rider almost experiences a bona fide success. I say almost because the episode’s final, climactic moments are too perfunctory and anticlimactic to really drive home the strenghts of the story. But even so, from start to finish, this episode is (mostly) well-paced and entertaining with just enough of a deeper subtext to make it interesting.

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“Day Turns Into Knight” opens with the now-typical mindless action sequence. The whole Speed plot-ripoff is, for starters, just too blatant to be praiseworthy. Even worse, the execution is severely lacking. There is just one moment in the episode which is even worth talking about. And actually, it ends up being pretty powerful. But it’s a long, ridiculously silly and clichéd trip to get that far.

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“Don’t Stop the Knight” is a typical Knight Rider episode. There really isn’t anything new or innovative or particularly compelling about the story. That said, the episode does play out with a relatively brisk pace, taking advantage of the time constraints of a hostage crisis. And it certainly ends with a bang. With the relatively mundane plot, there isn’t a whole lot about this episode that would be worth talking about – except for the fact that this is the beginning of Knight Rider redesigning itself and a cast member seems to meet an end …

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“Knight of the Zodiac” is a return to the mostly juvenile sensibilities of the show. True, the show continues to try and build on the camaraderie of the main cast. And in that regard, the episode manages its best results. The incorporation of the zodiac itself is interesting enough, but like so much else with the series, it exists merely on a surface level, without managing to build anything meaningful or insightful.

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Overview

“I Wanna Rock and Roll All Knight” is Knight Rider’s homage to the Bonnie and Clyde stories that seem to always saturate the entertainment world. There certainly is an understandably captivating element to the recklessly passionate lives that are romanticized in these stories and, for what it’s worth, this episode manages to capture some of that (though, admittedly, only on a surface level).

What really makes the episode even close to worthwhile, however, are the parallel stories of Michael and Sarah, and Zoe and Billy. In a way, the Bonnie and Clyde homage serves as a means to highlighting the relationships of the main cast. And in that sense, the episode works. Unfortunately, the overall writing is still highly suspect, and the fromage factor is still insufferably high. I’ll give credit where it’s due: the series certainly seems to be trying. The only question is whether or not it can get out of its own way.

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According to The Hollywood Reporter, Knight Rider executive producer/showrunner Gary Scott Thompson says, “It’s a reboot … We’re moving away from the terrorist-of-the-week formula and closer to the original, making it a show about a man and his car going out and helping more regular people, everymen.”

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“Knight of the Living Dead” is a more successful episode than it has any right to be. The writing is still terrible. The campy, cheesy humor and “peril” are, well, campy and cheesy. There’s far too much technobabble and not enough actual investigative work. Plausibility is thrown completely out the window.

And yet …

I actually enjoyed the episode on a number of fairly profound levels. And it has nothing to do with the fact that this was a Halloween episode. I swear it. The fact of the matter is, this episode cut straight to the heart of the deeper implications of K.I.T.T. The Sentient Being, and almost completely ignored K.I.T.T. The Outrageously Cool Car. And it was all for the best.

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Groan.

“Knight of the Hunter” is a trainwreck. It’s an abomination. I urge you. I implore you. Do. Not. Watch. No, really. Get that morbid curiosity out of your mind. I know what you’re thinking. It’s fun to watch a trainwreck. I’m here to tell you: it’s not fun. It’s agonizing. Or maybe you’re thinking that it cannot possibly be that bad. With such low expectations, you’re bound to find something you’ll enjoy. And that’s true. I recall laughing. But I think it’s because I remembered a joke about dead monkeys.  Or remembered a line from the Daily Show.

But seriously. Don’t watch it. This is as bad as it gets. Why do I watch it?

So you don’t have to.

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“A Hard Day’s Knight” is, simply, a bad episode. What little humor there was in previous episodes is gone straight to super-uber-cheesy-camp. The pacing is horribly awkward. The melodrama is just plain silly. And there’s almost nothing redeeming to the episode whatsoever. What little there is of value only comes by way of its horribly contrived plotline. And even then, it’s not worth the bother of a full episode.

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There’s a clutch of news updates today, including which new series are getting a longer shelf life as well as the revival of a sci-fi classic.

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