Viper

Metro City is besieged by the Outfit, a crime syndicate that the city police, MetroPol, cannot stop.

In response the federal government creates the Viper Project, a secret task force whose weapon is a red Dodge Viper that, at the flip of a secret switch, transforms into the Defender, an armored assault vehicle.

The Defender was invented by technology specialist Julian Wilkes, who was left paralyzed after a shootout between police and criminals.

The project stalls because no ordinary driver can handle the car. The answer turns out to be Michael Payton, the Outfit's top getaway driver, who is injured and captured after a heist.

His memory is erased and he is "reborn" as a police officer named Joe Astor, the only man who can drive the Defender.

With Wilkes and mechanic Frankie Waters he goes to war on crime, even as the Outfit tries to pull him back and politicians try to shut the project down.

In the first season the team fights the Outfit, led in the pilot by Mr. Townsend and later by Lane Cassidy.

The Outfit kidnaps Astor and demands that he steal the Defender.

He agrees but changes his mind, and in retaliation they murder his girlfriend.

Councilman Strand, who approved the project and the erasure of Payton's memory, takes a bribe from the Outfit and gets the project cancelled.

Astor, Wilkes and Frankie steal the Viper and carry on fighting crime on their own, funded by Payton's bank account.

At the end of the season Astor is sent on a deep-cover mission in Europe.

This season the team works without official backing.

With Payton's money Astor buys an abandoned power station on the edge of town, empty for 50 years and missing even from the city survey maps, and turns it into the Viper's hideout.

Anyone he brings there arrives blindfolded.

A new crime wave hits the city, this time a team of renegade ex-commandos led by Col. Hanson Dekker.

CIA agent Thomas Cole is chosen to drive the new Viper, and on his way into the city he is pulled over for speeding by officer Cameron Westlake and her partner Carpenter.

At that very moment Dekker hits the city bank, and Carpenter is killed.

The project is reborn with a MetroPol liaison, and Westlake is promoted to detective, only to find that her new partner is the driver she pulled over.

Systems specialist Allie Farrow joins the team, and Frankie returns as mechanic.

The rebuilt Defender now carries machine guns, something Julian Wilkes, himself a shooting victim, had refused to install in season 1.

Over these seasons the team also has to deal with FBI Special Agent Sherman Catlett, a by-the-book bureaucrat who keeps getting in the way, and with a fake Defender that criminals use to discredit them.

In season 3 Allie Farrow leaves, and Frankie is left to look after the car alone.

At the end of season 3, criminal Giles Seaton sends in Terry Hawkes, who has had plastic surgery to look exactly like Cole (Jeff Kaake played both roles). The double gets into headquarters and steals the Viper, and the team has to blow up the car to keep its secrets out of enemy hands.

After the car is destroyed, Cole is reassigned to undercover work, and when another crime wave strikes the city the project is restarted for a third time.

This time the car is a Cobalt Blue Metallic Dodge Viper GTS coupe with all of the original Defender's systems plus new ones, most notably a hovercraft mode.

The new car is designed by Julian Wilkes, who returns as a "special guest star" in three episodes.

This time he walks, thanks to a spinal implant of his own invention based on the Viper's morphing technology, and at the end of the first episode he leaves for a job at NASA.

Joe Astor, the original driver, is called back, but his old identity as Michael Payton keeps haunting him. In the two-part finale, "Split Decision", his memories return and threaten the project's future.

The series was born out of a partnership between Chrysler and Danny Bilson and Paul De Meo, the writing team behind The Rocketeer.

Filming began in the Los Angeles area in early 1993, and the show was meant to debut on CBS that fall.

It was held up twice: first by a dispute over the title, and then when CBS decided it was too violent and shelved it. Thanks to Chrysler's backing production went ahead, and NBC picked the show up.

It premiered on 2 January 1994 with a two-hour pilot, as a mid-season replacement in NBC's Friday 8 PM slot.

Ratings fell, and the series was cancelled in April 1994 after 13 episodes.

After the cancellation, Paramount reworked the show for first-run syndication, and it returned on weekends in September 1996. Of the original cast only Joe Nipote (Frankie) came back, and he stayed until the end. Season 2 was shot mostly in Calgary, Canada, and seasons 3 and 4 in Vancouver.

The series ended in May 1999.

Unlike most Hollywood cars, which are customized by production designers, the Defender was designed at Chrysler, with an exterior by company stylist Steve Ferrerio.

According to the fan wiki, in early 1993 Chrysler had Aero North in Detroit build two V10 "beauty cars" in 12 weeks, partly to shoot the presentation reel used to sell the show to a network.

Unique Movie Cars, under Mike Sciortino, then built 14 stunt cars on Viper RT/10 chassis, fitted with a 360 cubic-inch Chrysler V8 and an automatic transmission, because the original V10 ran hot and could not keep up with the filming schedule.

In the first three seasons, the Vipers seen on screen were not production cars but leftover prototypes and engineering mules supplied by Chrysler.

Many other cars in season 1 were prototypes too: for example, the Eagle Premier sedans with yellow stripes in the pilot were drivetrain test mules for the Dodge Intrepid and Chrysler Concorde.

The "hex snakeskin" transformation effect for the pilot and first season was made by Metrolight Studios using Pixar's RenderMan, and each transformation scene reportedly cost about $50,000. Because of the cost, the creators often hid transformations in dark alleys or showed only their shadow on a wall, and in all of season 1 the car changes back from Defender to Viper only once.

From season 2 the effect was replaced by a new "flip-panel" transformation, in which panels rotate around the car to reveal the armor, handled by Tim Claycomb and Tim Eilers.

According to the fan wiki, in 2005 a lawyer sold 72 production vehicles that were supposed to be scrapped and was convicted on seven counts of fraud.

One car went to auction in 2010 but bidding stalled at $270,000, short of the reserve, and another sold on Bring a Trailer in April 2023 for $141,777.

Every season gave the Defender new systems.

Season 1 - four-wheel-drive mode, a hologram projector that rises from the roof, a probe with a laser and camera deployed from the rear hatch, retractable battering rams, and twin weapons pods under the doors with a "static pulse" (EMP) emitter, missiles and a harpoon with tow cable.

At Wilkes's insistence, it carried no guns.

Season 2 - a turbine booster, a voice amplifier, machine guns, Stinger missile launchers, high-powered lasers and an infrared lens for the probe.

Season 3 - a net launcher and a flamethrower.

Season 4 - hovercraft mode, torpedo launchers that work only in hovercraft mode, a rear bomb launcher and a cloaking device.

Each era of the show had its own opening.

In season 1, over Eddie Jobson's music, the narrator set up the story: "The day after tomorrow: a time when criminals rule the city.

The only weapon that can stop them needs a driver.

The most wanted man on wheels is about to change sides.

Now, against a corrupt system... a lone fight for justice.

Viper is taking back the streets."

Seasons 2 and 3 kept the tune, remixed by Jay Ferguson, with new narration: "It prowls the streets in the pursuit of justice.

Its origins are secret, its technology 21st century, its existence officially disavowed, but its presence undeniable.

The perfect weapon for an imperfect future - Viper!"

Season 4 dropped the narration entirely, and Ferguson wrote a brand-new theme.

Chrysler and Paramount backed the show with a range of merchandise.

From August to November 1994 DC Comics published a four-issue miniseries in which Joe Astor and Julian Wilkes take on an assassin who sees the Defender as a "work of art". It was written by Ben Schwartz, with covers by Howard Chaykin, who was also one of the show's regular writers.

Tyco made a 1:14 radio-controlled Defender and an electric racing set with the Viper, the Defender and a Dodge Stealth.

Matchbox released a 1:64 red Viper and planned a whole show-themed line: a red Viper, the Defender ("Viper Morphed") and a black Dodge Stealth.

The models reached pre-production and were then cancelled.

AMT sold a 1:25 Viper model kit, and Telemania sold a Viper-shaped telephone whose headlights flash when it rings.

Cyberflix also developed a CD-ROM game for Paramount Interactive, Viper: Assault on the Outfit, in which the player helps Joe Astor fight crime and can trigger the Defender transformation at will.

It was due out for DOS and Mac in December 1994 at $69.95, but was shelved.

For years the series was not available in English on home video.

In Germany, where it aired on ProSieben, the seasons came out on DVD between 2011 and 2013, and an English set with all four seasons and the pilot followed only in December 2017.

Creator Paul De Meo died on 26 February 2018, aged 64. James McCaffrey, the show's Joe Astor, died of multiple myeloma on 17 December 2023, aged 65.