Attack Mode KITT - The Live Unveiling

[PHOENIXZERO]

That was more inspired by Chris Rock's line in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, when the Blunt Sabers come out.

Yeah I guess their lawyers will have looked into it, but look how they handled the Glen Larson issue when it came to the TV movie. Legal departments aren't immune to stupidity as they've shown many times over the years. The transformation looks a lot like it did in the TF movie from what I can remember. Though yeah, it's not a concept exclusive to Transformers but I'm sure there's going to be a lot of "Transformers rip off" comments. Not to be expected since Silvermen's wanting to bring back KR had to do with that movie.

I dunno if Power Rangers would count there since their "Zord" transformation was putting the pieces together, like Voltron. Yes, I know the Japanese PR, Super Sentai came out well before Voltron. I don't really remember M.A.S.K, I've heard of it but I'm not sure if I ever even watched it.

[Lameth1]

I am not sure how they managed to make the exaust come out farther than the back tires either. I can just imagine someone tripping over it to get in...

[tamatt27]

Im sorry but im just gonna say what everybody is thinking, that thing absolutely sucks! Words cant describe how cheesy that thing looks! They had it right the first time with the one from the pilot! You guys have to admit in a comparison the first attack mode was far better than this monstrosity we got. It might just ruin the whole show for me because it will make me sick every time it appears! I really enjoyed the pilot & was very excited about the series but now im just disappointed & whoever decided to green light that junked up attack mode version should be fired!

I agree. Absolutely disgusting! Some small things could make a huge difference, but as is...it is disgusting! I want old Attack Mode back!

[Niggle Snoosh]

Yeah I guess their lawyers will have looked into it, but look how they handled the Glen Larson issue when it came to the TV movie. Legal departments aren't immune to stupidity as they've shown many times over the years. The transformation looks a lot like it did in the TF movie from what I can remember. Though yeah, it's not a concept exclusive to Transformers but I'm sure there's going to be a lot of "Transformers rip off" comments. Not to be expected since Silvermen's wanting to bring back KR had to do with that movie.

True, comparisons with transformers are gonna happen, hell even KI3T says 'Transformation complete' in the trailer, it wouldn't surprise if stupidly they could get away with saying that but not transform itself becasue i'm no memory of any phrase other than transform being used in the movie or series
Legal loopholes are ridiculous these days anyhow.

The transforming effect does seem familiar from what i remember too but the agin they had a shocking amount of animating parts in the Transformer movie when the would transform. It could argued that effect is what inspired the Knight Rider into productiion. You could just as easily make a case that it's the success of an old franchise that worked well on screen that made them see that a new Knight Rider series could be profitable. These days as long as an audience has like something once (generally with recent success) something similar will follow in its place. Obvious as it is that why so many old titles are returning in some form and why we have so my comic based movies.

[zero]

It would look about 100 times better if they didn't use those horrible looking rims, and without the silver. I don't like the lights on the mirrors either, that seems ridiculous.

[Garthe Knight]

I'm speechless. I really don't know what to say...
what have they done???

After yesterdays interviews I was happy of the direction this series was going, I think storywise they have some good ideas from what I can tell.
I even arranged with Ford Shelby Mustang being KITT, the normal car even feels like it is KITT now.

But what the heck is that? Why does it have to be an overtuned, neon drag monster???
Remove those silly tubes, this ugly blue neon light, give the car a sleek spoiler, normal street-ready tires and for gods sake a custom interior.
My Astra has more modern buttons and switches than this.

I like the attempt Kaine presented earlier, it looks fast but sleek.

Come on, it can't be so hard.

Any chance we can make a petition so they change some of those ugly details? Minor changes, big effects.

I still can't believe it. I waited all the time for... this. Ugh.

Normally I am a very positive guy, but in this rare occasion I really don't know anything good to say. I'm in shock.

EDIT: ok, I know something positive. Except those tubes I like the custom hood, and I like the silver rimed air intakes on the side. Makes KITT look fast.

[Skav]

Looks bloody horrible!

I had a feeling as soon as they had a writer from fast and the furious on board this was what was going to happen. This is not for the fans, people, it's for the teeny bop, rap generation who like chav movies.

That's not KITT even if it is just a mode he converts to occasionally. And I'm a man who loved SPM. So that's saying something.

I wasn't impressed with the 1 minute sneak preview of the show either, the effects looked extraordinarily bad.

I was looking forward to this show but now there are two major things that have spoiled that.

[TurbomanKnight]

*facepalm*

Honestly, I dont have a anything positive to say about this.

[kitt34]

Here's another picture from Neil showing off a lot of the more intricate details, such as the triangular turn signals.

Matt

The Only thing that I Liked is the lambo doors, everything else about this one is atrociously bad, this tv series is gonna defintely fail on us.


The Pilot was much better than this mess.

[KITTRINA]

I think that the car looks good. I'd like to see black rims, but its not all bad. this is just one version of Kitt. They have to update it for 2008. I love the ki2t more then anything, I like the new kitt, and i'm just happy we're getting the show back

[PHOENIXZERO]

I'd like to show them a magic trick......

[neps]

hey, I'm sorry to hear this but the car looked great in person. We have this amazing video with GST that michael will post tonight. I am confident once you hear him explain things you'll have a more open mind.

Off to the airport!

[Sky_Blue_Civic]

And thanks a lot for sharing all of this with us Neil!I appriciate it a lot! I already knew that was going to be the attack KI3T the moment I saw it in a different forum topic!viewtopic.php?f=1041&t=11738
KI3T looks great though.Besides,KI3T's supposed to be a tough muscle car,not a ricer!Remember( I'm not trying to offend anyone):This is 2008 and not 1982.
But I still feel that an 8th. GEN Civic would give that more futuristic feel.It seems more convincing that it's a futuristic car,especially when I imagine they're KI3T.


Er...yeah,I know I'm going too far with this...but I think you get my point.By the way,none of these are mine!But I do have an 8th. gen american civic sedan model .

[weeezl]

hey, I'm sorry to hear this but the car looked great in person. We have this amazing video with GST that michael will post tonight. I am confident once you hear him explain things you'll have a more open mind.

Off to the airport!

Hey Neil, Thanks for the great pics and the videos, hope you had some fun while you were at the Con and not all work for us fans!

Matt. (weeezl)

[Victor Kros]

I would just like to point out that the first question (I believe it was the first one?) asked from people in the crowd was how this new Attack KITT would handle speed bumps with it's low clearence bumper in the front. I believe that the show's great copout answer will be "we can transform it" any time there is a question of clearance or functional conflict. Another thing to point out is the doors are not lambo doors, they swing out and up.

Consider how you're going to handle trying to get inside KITT when bullets are flying at you. With the older KITT Michael could sprint behind an open door and be ok but here what can you hide behind when the doors are primarily ABOVE you?

It just seems like it's stylish for the sake of being "cool" but not very practical at all. Obviously we also know that the interior of any KITT can be damaged right? So if those doors swing up and someone is shooting at Mike who is trying to get into the car, what is going to happen when he does? Will the door be able to swing down fast enough or will the ol nanotech just magically form a new door and shift the other one's position?

These kind of things should be considered when you decide to declare that Knight Rider is being taken into a more realistic direction. Form should follow function, not flash following cash.

I don't hate the attack KITT, I really can't draw a concrete conclusion until we actually see it in action but I can tell you those frying pan rims that weezel pointed out have to go big time. The older Pontiac had such a great look with just the silver rims. People might have said the bowling ball hubcaps were weird too but at least they blended in with the rest of the car instead of being an eyesore.

I think having seen the car from pretty up close, design wise they've taken steps backward instead of forward. Interior wise, don't really know till the show actually airs. From what Justin has said in some of his interviews, he has to handle doing several things at once while driving from reading stats to having conversations to dragging things around on a HUD screen on the windshield...man and I thought driving while talking on a cellphone was distracting! I mean really, hand eye coordination is knocked seriously off balance when you have to multitask on the the fly. I guess when Michael has to operate things of this nature, KITT will take over in some sort of "auto cruise" mode.

Aside from speed, I wonder what makes this car an "attack" car. My guess is they'll CG weaponry too. Here's another destined answer to be given whenever there is a design flaw, "We'll fix it in post."

I didn't like the three scoops in the front, still don't like them now. I think the scanner looks much better then the backdoor pilot and no longer looks like "nostrils". The newer hood looks much better and sleeker. I also noticed there was no shelby lettering across the hood either. I definately feel the whole "dragster" look with the front wheels being smaller and thinner then the thicker, wider racing wheels in the back. It's a good point that dragsters are designed for the most part to go in straight lines and don't handle curves well. Perhaps those silver vents along the side act as some sort of thrusters to give more control, not really sure.

I don't see anything on the Attack KITT that even remotely resembles the 82 Trans Am other then the fact it's black.

Again this is why we really have to wait until we see it in action before we can really judge it from a functional standpoint. Visually, it's obvious there are some obvious issues to work out. At least the paint looked nice. I like the tailights from the back and I agree that visually the spoiler looks pretty rediculous but if it serves as both a braking device and stabalizer, I would prefer to see one piece move and adjust then multiple pop out flaps on the original SPM car. Since this thing is claimed to go around 377 mph, you do need some sort of high tech braking system in place, even Barris knew that back in season four.

As far as the Transformers issue is concerned, we know from the start it was their intention to do something "like" what they did in Transformers but they can't seem to keep their distinctions straight between "transforming" and "morphing".

See keep this in mind, transformering by TF movie's defination implies that all the parts needed to form a robot are already prebuilt. They just arrange in different ways in order to conceal the robot into a vehicle mode. I would agree that this show's approach is also like M.A.S.K. however in MASK vehicles turned into other vehicles but again all said parts were originally prebuilt and concealed until they needed to be used.

In this case "nanotech" is supposed to rearrange itself into various forms. This means that it does not have things prebuilt into the car itself and concealed because it's a "nanotech skin armor", which I would have to assume rests on top of the general structure of the car itself, not unlike MBS but with nano-tech it's not a rigid shell.

In order to change, it can reshape itself...reshape and "morph", not actually "transform". There's really a great deal of difference when you say you are going to "transform" something and when you're going to "morph/reshape" something.

Legally NBCU is walking a fine line with what Paramount did with Transformers but you have to keep in mind you can't trademark a visual effect. This is why you see countless reprisals of the "bullet time" effects from Matrix, bullet trails etc. What you can do is trademark the technology to produce an effect if you need specialized equipment to do it. So there is nothing Paramount can really do about NBCU using something that's oddly simular enough to their idea but on a lower budgetary scale. When you borrow visual effect ideas from someone who originally came up with it first, you have to accept that people will say you're just borrowing a concept from someone else.

I think unfortunatly a lot of story gets lost in this race to come up with the next big visual effect that no one has done before or is done in a different enough approach it's like something else but expanded on. For example, Episode I with the use of CG army "sprites" and mutliple droids and then The Lord of the Rings Trilogy with the same type of techniques but on a larger more improved scale.

The SPM KITT from the original series in season four "transformed". All the parts needed were prebuilt into the car itself which even then didn't work because all the panel lines magically disappeared when it wasn't in use. Still at least back then they were considering form and function. There's only so much you can do with prebuilt things.

With this new show and the whole exploration of nano-tech, what is missing here is what specifically are it's limits. It's still experimental technology that they've taken creative liberties with and that is perfectly fine but at what point do you move from believability into pure fantasy. That's a balance they're going to have to establish besides a computer virus shutting KITT down to turn it back into a typical vulnerable mustang.

Just some things to think about beyond just the "look" of it.

Long post I know, just wanted to give people another honest perspective from someone who was there.

=VK=

[KnightLady]

This is the first time I actually seen pictures of this car. As well as seen the preview, and I'm sure not impressed with it at all. It sucks!!!! What are these people thinking? In my opinion, they would've only needed to do minor adjustments with the car to improve it. But, what they have done in this time around just makes it look fake. It don't need to look a dragster. It don't need to look like a Mustang on steroids. The more I see these turkeys out in Hollyweird messing with this legend, the more I realize what an awesome vehicle the original KItt was.

[Sue]

Hi everyone. I just got back from Comic con and I am doing everything in my power to speed the process of getting my videos up to you. You will soon see that I am the luckiest KRO member on the planet!!! Sporting my KRO T shirt and sticking close to Mike and Neil I was allowed into the press pit at the reveal. I was up close and personal with KITT, Deanna, Justin and GST.
(I must say, Deanna and Justin are very attractive people on camera, but are even more so in person. ...And attack KITT was rather impressive in person too.)

As you’ll see soon in the video they didn’t want to open KITTs doors. But when they asked if there were any questions I raised my hand and asked. “So are those Lamborghini Doors?” GST kindly rewarded me by opening them to show us. He then explained that they are not exactly Lambo doors but a custom design. Perhaps they want to avoid using the word Lamborghini.































They were in a rush to get Justin and Deanna to their helicopter, (they opted to fly after the disastrous drive down.) But I pulled aside someone from NBC and asked if I could just get one more photo. After telling them what I had in mind they couldn’t refuse.



Sue

and SHADO

[KFCreator]

To be honest, I wasn't thrilled when I saw the first pictures posted a few days back of the new Attack KITT spotted while filming in California. I thought 'Oh God, that better just be a temporary vehicle for that one episode!,' however the more that I look at this new car and the more footage that I see trickling out from NBCU of the new series and the new car in action, the more I think 'You know, this just may work and it might not be so bad after all.'

What is bothering me the most about all of this (and the one thing I find incredibly ironic) is that when the vast majority of us saw the Attack KITT in the pilot movie, there was a collective cry of bloody murder and thus began the countless threads that basically boiled down to 'I hate the new Attack KITT' and 'Anything would be better than that thing!' posts. Now that we have a newly unveiled Attack KITT, those same people still are not happy even though (I think) this new Attack KITT looks hugely improved over the previous version and even resembles the SPM mode in several not-so-subtle ways.

Before we go shooting down GST and the new crew for giving what some of us perceive as a "dreadful" Attack KITT, let's all remember that we asked for them to redesign this thing. Had it not been for all of the fans out there who clamored for a redesign, the unveiling today very well wouldn't have happened. For that matter, most of the changes being made so that the series will (hopefully) prove successful and give us all a new, modern era of Knight Rider that will draw in new fans as well as please the old ones wouldn't be coming about either and this new series would likely bite the dust after a few episodes had David Andron and Steve Shill stayed in the primary seats as writer and director/producer.

This new series is being made with, what seems to be, very close attention to what the fans and critics are asking to see changed from the pilot movie. They can't go changing everything so we need to understand that compromises have to be made on both sides but let's all give this series the chance it deserves before we go on a crusade to villify the new showrunners for not living up to the immense and widely differing standards that some of us have. Let's face it, I think some of us here wouldn't be content with any decision that is made regarding this new series unless they were the ones calling the shots. I, for one, am excited and eager to see what this new series holds and I am willing to have an open mind all the way and to reserve judgement until the show is well under way.

[djshag69]

its not often everyone on a forum agrees, but it sure does seem like no one is impressed with the new attack mode.

After watching the panel interviews again they did ask all of us to give him a chance and see what happens.

so maybe this new attack version is a little too much, like anything else it needs to grow on all of us. i just hope once we actually see the first show, and see the attack mode in motion we get past all the minor imperfections we all sit back and realize that none of the other classic 80's shows are getting a remake like this.

change is good, if we want the 80's knight rider we can all watch it on dvd (which im sure just like me everyone does as often as they can) but lets see how creative this team is with the story before we say something like "we arent gonna watch it cause the attack mode looks horrible"

[neps]

just a reminder on the leaked image.

I'm about to board the plane, but I think we seriously need to all remember that this thing is going to look alot better in motion, and trust GST et al a little bit until we see the show. I hope we can share some more video of it tonight. I think we all need some time to rest on this - remember, everyone hated the Batman Batmobile Tumblr, and now it's loved.

[epc1122]

To be honest, I wasn't thrilled when I saw the first pictures posted a few days back of the new Attack KITT spotted while filming in California. I thought 'Oh God, that better just be a temporary vehicle for that one episode!,' however the more that I look at this new car and the more footage that I see trickling out from NBCU of the new series and the new car in action, the more I think 'You know, this just may work and it might not be so bad after all.'

What is bothering me the most about all of this (and the one thing I find incredibly ironic) is that when the vast majority of us saw the Attack KITT in the pilot movie, there was a collective cry of bloody murder and thus began the countless threads that basically boiled down to 'I hate the new Attack KITT' and 'Anything would be better than that thing!' posts. Now that we have a newly unveiled Attack KITT, those same people still are not happy even though (I think) this new Attack KITT looks hugely improved over the previous version and even resembles the SPM mode in several not-so-subtle ways.

Before we go shooting down GST and the new crew for giving what some of us perceive as a "dreadful" Attack KITT, let's all remember that we asked for them to redesign this thing. Had it not been for all of the fans out there who clamored for a redesign, the unveiling today very well wouldn't have happened. For that matter, most of the changes being made so that the series will (hopefully) prove successful and give us all a new, modern era of Knight Rider that will draw in new fans as well as please the old ones wouldn't be coming about either and this new series would likely bite the dust after a few episodes had David Andron and Steve Shill stayed in the primary seats as writer and director/producer.

This new series is being made with, what seems to be, very close attention to what the fans and critics are asking to see changed from the pilot movie. They can't go changing everything so we need to understand that compromises have to be made on both sides but let's all give this series the chance it deserves before we go on a crusade to villify the new showrunners for not living up to the immense and widely differing standards that some of us have. Let's face it, I think some of us here wouldn't be content with any decision that is made regarding this new series unless they were the ones calling the shots. I, for one, am excited and eager to see what this new series holds and I am willing to have an open mind all the way and to reserve judgement until the show is well under way.

i can definitely understand where you're coming from. as a superman fan, i know this all too well. some fans just are never happy with anything, and we all have our own interpretation of what "should" be done with a particular franchise. personally, when i first saw the new attack mode in the spy pictures, my mouth dropped in utter disappointment. now that i have had some time to digest the new attack kitt, it would be a lot better with some revisions. not making the spoiler so big for one and losing the pipes. the interior also doesnt seem too high tech as i would have liked, but they may add the interior later with post production shots, i don't know. but something as simple as this car




nothing big, but a modification of what the regular shelby looks. to me this car looks sleek without going too over the top. but this show is also trying to attract the general audience and attempting to make it a little bit more fast and the furious. it's knight rider, so i'm going to give it a shot. i do like the direction the show seems to be taking, but i would lose the three pipes on the front. to me, that looks pretty bad. dont know if i can get past that. but the car doesnt look as bad as i originally though. i actually do like the blue neon that surrounds it. ok, maybe the bottom of the front bothers me too, but its just minor. eh, i think it'll be better than people think.

[weeezl]

Id be smiling like that too!, Im so jealous, She`s Hot!

[Sue]

I can’t tell you how many times I have heard GST mention that he read such and such online in a forum, and at the panel discussion he specifically referred to KRO.

The Moderator asked of Thompson if he had been to Knight Rider Online to listen to what the fans had to say. Thompson admitted that he went online to the forums, the press to learn what they liked and didn't like or what they missed. "Turbo Boost was the big one, you should know, and I think you do." But they argue that everyone has a vision of what Knight Rider was to them, and also take into consideration that they want to get the new fans involved as well, and it's very difficult, and they will try to get it right. We just need to give them the time they deserve.

You probably hear him once or twice referring to some threads in some of the interviews, or even at the reveal he was discussing what was being said online about the spoiler. He apparently has some surprised for us on what it does.
Here’s a little treat. KITT gave me an autograph.

[PHOENIXZERO]

If they're gonna stay I think it'd help if those rims and the pipes were black and shiny... Keep the silver or whatever around intake and exhaust openings, but everywhere else, black. Did they even toy with the notion of making them black to give an idea what it'd look like? If I had any talent with Photoshop I'd do it... I do think it's an improvement over the last one but things still could be improved, obviously they're restricted by the limitations of what they can do with a Mustang body but it's just not there yet... Oh and lose the Shelby emblem on the back, nice the other ones aren't there but that one on the back gives me the feeling that we'll be getting a lot of shots of its rear...

VK also raised a good point about the doors and sacrificing a logical practicality of things for the "cool factor".

I dislike the "we'll fix it in post" attitude, so many shows/movies are getting too reliant on CGI that at least IMO opens things up to be sloppy and lazy. I really would like to know why they did next to nothing with the interior, especially in the attack version. Adding neon lights doesn't cut it...

i can definitely understand where you're coming from. as a superman fan, i know this all too well. some fans just are never happy with anything, and we all have our own interpretation of what "should" be done with a particular franchise.

Are you referring to Superman Returns? The backlash of that film has nothing to do with "never being happy with anything" and more with Singer and his writers not having a clue about how to write Superman and taking things from the old Donner movies in some weird pseudo sequel to those films or a "tribute" or homage or whatever to the first movie. Superman isn't a complex character, the basics of his personality are extremely easy to access and writing a Superman story for film shouldn't be a hard thing to do. Bryan Singer and his writers just doesn't get Superman and tried to make him something he's not in a poor attempt of "Marvelizing" him and latching on to ideas that hadn't been relevant in 20 years.. it probably didn't help that he took the Burton approach in completely disregarding the source material. That in of itself is a huge difference between the approaches of Singer or Burton and Chris Nolan, who took much of the inspiration from the source material and adapted many ideas from it to film.

I'm sure that if Singer would have got off the whole excessively absurd tribute to the Donner films and didn't think it below him to look through some of actual Superman comics and a much needed reboot it might have been a better film, hell even with much of the story elements. I think the final domestic box office results with it barely making 200M domestically (even with the competition it faced) after people waiting nearly 20 years for a new Superman film reflect some huge disappointment, even with whatever positive reviews or ratings it's had. I know that the 270M figure listed for its budget likely includes all the other failed attempts at bringing it back, but that also just goes to show that the wrong people are in control, that goes double for John Peters. If that didn't include all the failed attempts from before one would have to wonder where the hell all that money went to. Before it gets brought up, the lack of action (or good action) is the least of the films problems. It wasn't all bad, the plane scene as well as the scene where he was shot in the eye was kind of cool.

Wow, I wrote way too much about this...

[PHOENIXZERO]

I'll certainly give them a chance because I and I'm sure everyone else here wants the new show to succeed. We don't want another Knight Rider 2000 or Team Knight Rider.

When it comes to Turbo Boost, I've been seeing the car speed up to where it goes up on it's hind wheels just before it "jumps" with there being a big boost from like, rocket fire or something lifting/launching it off the ground. Or something like that, the drag racing tires kind of enforced that idea for me. Though I hope that won't be the case.