Knight Rider (1982)

The car is the star, and the show knows it. KITT, a customized 1982 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am that talks in William Daniels's dry, fussy voice, turns David Hasselhoff's Michael Knight into half of a double act. Glen A. Larson's formula sets early: a town with a problem, a villain with a truck, a turbo boost over something. For the best of it, watch "Trust Doesn't Rust" from November 1982, which introduces KARR, KITT's prototype, built without the directive to protect human life. Then try the season 2 two-parter "Goliath," where Hasselhoff also plays the villain, Garthe Knight, at the wheel of a rocket-armed semi-truck.