T.V Musclecar Mayhem......

With the talk of movie chases people have also asked about some TV shows. I gave it some thought, and here's the one's I came up with. Feel free to write in with any good ones I might have missed. # 1. This is a no-brainer-silly or not-you gotta go with the "Dukes of Hazzard". I think they wrecked 50 1968-70 Chargers during it's run as well as numerous cop cars, Daisy's Road Runner, and Deputy Enos' '69 Chevelle. The action was pretty well done considering the limited time constraints and budget of a TV series as compared to a feature film. For sheer speed and carnage per episode-no one delivers like "Dukes". # 2. "Nash Bridges." Any show in which the hero supposedly drives-Quoting the ad in TV Guide "A 425 hp  1970 Barracuda Convertible" "And he doesn't brake for criminals".  Has a place in my heart. We all know they were mistakenly done up with '71 style grilles, and were mostly 360 automatics, except for Don Johnson's favorite which was a 340-4 speed model. No matter, lots of tire smoke, and pursuing the bad guys around San Francisco, and they even crashed them a couple times. # 3. "Miami Vice". Long before he was "Nash Bridges", Don Johnson was famous as "Sonny Crockett". The Ferrari Daytona Spider he drove was actually a kit car built on a 1981 Corvette chassis by Tom McBurnie and had, of course Small-block Chevy motivation. Johnson and partner Phillip-Micheal Thomas chased a lot of baddies, in Camaros, Mustangs, and Porsches, and in one episode the baddies actually drove a 1969 GTX convertible. #4. Who could forget "Starsky and Hutch" and the famous red and white Gran Torino? Paul Micheal Glaser and David Soul chased their share of bad guys, and usually caught them. # 5. "Vegas" Robert Urich was a cool private eye, but I don't know how many bad guys you'd ACTUALLY catch in a '57 T-Bird. They look cool, but the 292 and 312 Y-blocks are underpowered, and their ill-handling, and have 4-wheel drum brakes. But it did have some action, and ultra-sexy Phyllis Davis as his secretary. # 6. "Hunter" Ex-LA Rams defensive lineman Fred Dryer found stardom for 7 seasons as "Dirty Harry" style detective Rick Hunter. Not a lot of musclecars, but they wrecked a lot of Mopar and Chevy cop cars chasing the baddies, and a young Stepfanie Kramer was smokin' hot as his partner. # 7 "Stingray". This show only lasted a couple of seasons but when the hero drives a black 396 1965 Corvette and kicks a lot of butt, you've got to love it. Nick Mancuso was understated cool as the Caine-like "Stingray" who wandered around and helped strangers and stomped on the bad guys. # 8. "The Fall Guy".  Six million dollar man Lee Majors had another hit as Colt Seavers-hollywood stuntman / bounty hunter. This set up allowed more fights and automotive mayhem than usual. The producers adeptly saved money by sometimes using clips from movies and other shows-The train wreck from "Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry" is in the opening credits-and implying that Majors' character and crew performed the stunt.  I know a bunch of geeks are going to gripe about two omissions-but I feel I'm justified. Omission # 1. "Knight Rider" .  I just can't wrap my head around a talking car, that actually has a bitchy british butler type personality, and can drive itself.  David Hasselhoff's acting was at it's wooden worst, ( I'm guessing because he didn't have Pam Anderson, Nicole Eggert, and Alexandra Paul all constantly in swimsuits to motivate him like he did on "Baywatch" ) and the action was terrible-the camera is so obviously speeded up that a nine-year old would get bored.  Omission # 2. "Hardcastle&McCormick".  This show had a lot of car chases in it, but the hero drove a VW-powered Manta kit car. That alone kicks it from the list. If you think of any that I missed, please let me know. Mastermind