An attempt at a Knight Rider reboot has already been attempted. Back in 2008, NBC tried their hardest to bring back the crime fighting television show with a brand new series updated for the 21st century, starring Justin Bruening as the estranged son of David Hasselhoff's character from the original and Val Kilmer as the voice of KITT, the super-advanced talking car. While the show was initially given a full season order of 22 episodes, after just two months that number was cut down to 17, and by mid-2009 the network announced that they would not be bringing the reboot back for a second season. It was a failed experiment, but apparently Hollywood is taking the "never say die" approach and believes that there's still some life in Knight Rider yet. And apparently they think that the biggest problem holding the franchise back is the small screen medium, which is why we now may be only a couple years away from seeing a new film based on the property.
The Los Angeles Times has learned that The Weinstein Company, which owns the feature rights to the Knight Rider brand, is now in the midst of developing a film based on the '80s television series, and have hired a screenwriter to pen the script. Brad Copeland, who recently helped develop the MTV version of the hit British comedy series The Inbetweeners, has been tasked with bringing the adventures of a man and his witty car to the silver screen. According to the newspaper's sources, they plan for the film to be "a somewhat higher-budget, more action-oriented" entry for the Weinstein label, which is best known for its annual attempts to score Oscar gold late in the year. Some think that the recent success of movies like Fast & Furious 6 may be what opened the door for the idea.
In the original series, Hasselhoff starred as Michael Long, a police officer who is shot and left for dead while working on a case. Discovered by a mysterious millionaire named Wilton Knight, who wishes to take action against the criminal element, Long is nursed back to health and reborn as Michael Knight. The benefactor supplies Michael with all sorts of tech to fight crime, the most valuable piece being the Knight Industries Two Thousand, a.k.a. KITT.
As the LA Times notes, this isn't the first time that Copeland has been hired to bring back a classic television series, as he was previously hired to develop a new version of Gilligan's Island. He also wrote six episodes of Arrested Development back during its original run. Unfortunately, his big screen credits include the 2007 "comedy" Wild Hogs and 2010's Yogi Bear. He also recently made his directorial debut with the upcoming College Humor movie Coffee Town. You can watch the first trailer for that film below.
