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Jeff.Dunhams.The.Cars.That.Drove.Us.S01E03.540p.X265.AAC [Full Movie] [Full Episodes]Full EP - Full
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00:00Hi there, folks! How y'all doing this fine afternoon?
00:02Why are you talking like that?
00:04I am fine, Jeff Dunham of Dunham Family Mortars.
00:08Well, you get a great deal or else.
00:10Or else what, Bubba J?
00:12You're really talking weird.
00:14When people see the car we're featuring in this episode,
00:16I think you can narrow it down to two responses.
00:19Some folks see this...
00:22and go, why would anyone need that much bird on a car?
00:25And then there's the rest of us,
00:27who understand that sometimes too much...
00:30is exactly right.
00:31We're not talking about subtlety.
00:33It's not about quiet refinement or European handling.
00:36It's about the last muscle car that didn't just survive the 70s,
00:40it owned them.
00:41If you know, you know.
00:42If you don't, I think you're gonna love this.
00:45Get ready, Smokey fans.
00:46This is the Bandit.
00:48Our 1977 Pontiac Trans Am just like the one Burt Reynolds drove.
00:53Does it smell like Sally Field?
00:55I don't know.
00:59Throughout time, humanity has been obsessed with getting places
01:02using anything but their own two feet.
01:05We've tried all kinds of things.
01:08Until finally, the greatest invention of all time.
01:12The automobile!
01:14Moron!
01:15These are the cars that drove us.
01:21Flex.
01:22Ripped.
01:24Buff.
01:25Jacked.
01:26This is the story of Pontiac's ultimate flex.
01:31The Pontiac Firebird Trans Am.
01:39Trans Am, what's your pleasure?
01:42But before we can tell the tale of this fiery bird of prey of the highway,
01:46we need to reverse that big old V8 powertrain out of the garage
01:50and back to the times of yore.
01:53Well, I'm gonna take you back from 1926 until 1956.
01:56Where General Motors and its multiple subsidiary companies had a big old problem.
02:02As white knuckled blue hairs puttered in Pontiacs,
02:06there was a new generation of post-war fun lovers.
02:11With blue jean pockets bulging with American dollars,
02:14and they were ready to live life in the fast lane.
02:18First time younger people who had disposable incomes
02:22that they could use on a fancier car.
02:25They wanted something exciting.
02:27Younger people really just wanted something cool.
02:30These kids just wanted to drive.
02:32Fast.
02:34I.e. not one of those old American cars.
02:38Clearly, for General Motors, there was a gap in the market.
02:41For Pontiac to find the strength to truly create the muscle car,
02:45they'd first need to deal with a competitor who set off a stampede.
02:49Since 1964, over 600,000 former GM customers bought Mustangs.
02:54GM was caught flat-footed.
02:56Unless we change our ways drastically,
02:59customers gonna do business elsewhere.
03:01And so in the early 60s, General Motors put their foot to the floor,
03:05rebranding Pontiac as its performance division.
03:07In 1964, when John DeLorean was chief engineer...
03:12Which is, incidentally...
03:14This John DeLorean.
03:16But that, of course, is in the future.
03:19John DeLorean and a bunch of guys got together
03:21and wondered how they could take an intermediate-body car
03:25and turn it into a real go-getter.
03:27So they dropped a big displacement motor, the 389,
03:31into a Pontiac Tempest...
03:33This is paid off.
03:34...and called it the GTO.
03:36A purring tiger at rest.
03:38The muscle car was born.
03:41And Pontiac's muscular realignment was complete.
03:45Basically turned the division around from an old ladies' division
03:47to a performance division.
03:49Around that same time, another GM division, Pontiac's sister company Chevrolet,
03:54was also trying to keep up.
03:55The minute that General Motors saw the Mustang, they gave us carte blanche, go.
04:01And that's when we did the 67 Camaro.
04:04A new car that's something else.
04:06An iconic car in its own right, Chevrolet's Camaro,
04:10forged in the volcanic depths of Detroit,
04:14indirectly spewed forth an opportunity for John DeLorean back at Pontiac.
04:19Pete Estes, the head vice president of General Motors,
04:22he said, tell you what, I'll give you the components of a Chevrolet Camaro,
04:26you make a Pontiac.
04:28And soon the Camaro became something else entirely.
04:32Once he got the base car, he started feeding it the bigger engines,
04:35bigger sway bars to give it the handling.
04:38Different tires, all about performance for Pontiac.
04:41Six months later came the Pontiac Firebird in 1967.
04:46And all of a sudden you had a performance pony car.
04:50The Pontiac version was always more aggressive than the Chevrolet version.
04:55And so, with the Firebird, Pontiac was racing to capture the attention
04:59of the younger, hard-charging car enthusiasts.
05:02And when I say race, I mean a race.
05:05In what was called the Trans-American Sedan Series.
05:08Trans-American Sedan Racing.
05:10A battle of the Detroit Giants for road racing supremacy.
05:13This competition, healthy competition,
05:16was a battle between modified sedans and coupes from car manufacturers.
05:20Trans-Am Championship.
05:22Trans-Am Racing.
05:23Which was an absolute dogfight.
05:31The drivers are running their cars flat out in Trans-Am Racing.
05:34And winning this was about more than just the race.
05:37Anybody who knew anything about branding and image knew the name Trans-Am.
05:42Was a bonafide winner.
05:43Now you might be wondering how the Firebird came to be known as Firebird Trans-Am.
05:48They paid for it.
05:49Yep, they cut a deal with the Sports Car Club of America
05:53to use that revered name, Trans-Am, for just $5 per car sold.
05:58The amount of money that they were going to pay the Sports Car Club of America
06:01was just a fraction of what that was really worth.
06:04The Trans-Am was the fanciest Firebird you could get.
06:07And boy, was it fancy.
06:09But hot.
06:11They took the basic Firebird body, dropped in a bigger motor,
06:15painted some stripes on them,
06:16put in a nice handling package,
06:18and Pontiac brought out the first generation Trans-Am.
06:23Man, the car was just...
06:27It was a beast.
06:31That $5 would prove to be a marketing masterstroke.
06:35Because that first Firebird Trans-Am, despite its limited run...
06:39Built a few hundred of them in 69.
06:41...is still turning heads and opening wallets today.
06:44Kinda wish I had one of those.
06:47In the early 70s, Pontiac was trying to fan the Firebird flames.
06:51But just as success was on the horizon, smoke signals appeared.
06:55Or maybe it was smog.
06:57Emissions regulations came about, safety regulations came about.
07:01That kind of watered down the muscle car.
07:03Cleaner cars, rather than faster cars.
07:07And so GM told Pontiac,
07:09Don't make any more of those engines.
07:10We'll put smaller engines in those cars.
07:13But Pontiac's Trans-Am was having none of it.
07:16Pontiac kind of went against that order.
07:18And what really made the Trans-Am take off
07:22was when they finally stuffed the 455 Super Duty into it in 1973.
07:27Beautiful engine.
07:29Has a shaker hood.
07:30When you rev the car, the shaker would move.
07:36And you got the feeling the power of the engine was right out there in front of you.
07:41Basically stuffing that 455 engine into the Trans-Am at that time
07:45was basically giving the federal regulators the bird.
07:49Now, if you're gonna give the federal regulators the bird,
07:52you'd want it to be a good one.
07:54And thus far, the Firebird badge was falling a little short of its potential.
07:58The chief designer for Pontiac, he always thought he looked like a dead bird.
08:04Well, young, novice graphic designer Norm Inouye.
08:07My first job out of school was General Motors.
08:10At the same time, they were developing the Trans-Am.
08:14The chief designer wanted something on the hood.
08:17I remember being on the drafting table trying to figure out what I was doing.
08:22Nothing was done by computer back then.
08:24But he had his vision.
08:27A soaring, majestic bird of prey for the new Trans-Am logo.
08:31And that's when somebody came up and said,
08:33you working on the screaming chicken?
08:36The screaming chicken.
08:37Ah, the screaming chicken.
08:39It was an in-house joke.
08:42It sort of got stuck.
08:43Because the bird looks like it is.
08:46Screaming because there's flame coming out of the mouth and all that.
08:49Perhaps Norman's chicken was the perfect new Firebird emblem.
08:53They were painting it on the hood of the car in the paint shop of Bill Mitchell.
08:57Bill Mitchell was the head of General Motors in 1970.
09:00The big boss.
09:01He saw it being painted and he hated it.
09:04He just hated it.
09:06Well, now it was definitely a dead bird.
09:08And I left GM in 70, late 70.
09:12By that time, I thought that whole project had been killed.
09:15Until John Schinella became...
09:17Chief designer.
09:18In 1971.
09:20Like being a doctor.
09:21Your name's on the door and Dr. Schinella almost.
09:25Dr. Schinella began probing.
09:27Discovering Norm's flaming chicken design,
09:29collecting dust in the paint shop.
09:31I said, well, you know, the bird is kind of the American eagle.
09:36We have a bird as an emblem.
09:38I said, why don't we do a big one on the hood?
09:41So he wanted to bring it back to life.
09:43And I said, let's make a decal and put it on my car.
09:47And I'll drive it up and down Woodward to test it.
09:49The reaction, I couldn't believe it.
09:50People were saying, where'd you get that?
09:53Where do I get mine?
09:55I want one for my car.
09:56And I said, okay, I think we got some.
09:59And we had a meeting with Pontiac.
10:00Now let's become more specific.
10:02The vice president at the time said, how many of you like what's going on?
10:05So they talked to sales?
10:07Hand went up.
10:08They talked to marketing?
10:10Hand went up.
10:11They talked to engineering?
10:15Down.
10:16They talked to the plant?
10:17Down.
10:18They wanted no part of it.
10:19John and the screaming chicken were plucked.
10:25Pontiac's new head of design, John Chinella, was waging a one man campaign to get a giant flaming bird plastered
10:33across the hood of an upcoming brand new Pontiac Firebird Trans Am.
10:37And I knew that they were trying to convince me they shouldn't do that bird.
10:40But if anyone needed to be convinced, it was John Chinella's boss.
10:44Because when it came to that bird, he just hated it.
10:48Bill Mitchell was in a flap.
10:49But John had a plan.
10:51Yes.
10:51He knew Bill like a black car with gold trim.
10:56John slapped a gold Firebird on the hood of his boss's dream car.
10:59A black Trans Am with gold stripes.
11:02And parked it outside of Mitchell's office.
11:06The trap was set.
11:08Mitchell, when he liked something, he licked his lips.
11:12Like that.
11:13He said, Bill, I got something to show you.
11:15He said, what do you got, kid?
11:16Something special.
11:17Hopefully some lip balm.
11:21The eagle?
11:23Screaming chicken.
11:24Had landed on the hood of second generation Trans Ams.
11:29Turned out that virtually everybody who wanted a Trans Am wanted the bird.
11:32Could it be that the first Trans Am had been out Trans Am?
11:37You know, having stripes on the car was one thing.
11:39But the screaming chicken, bold and brash, and we started taking notice.
11:43Oh, don't worry.
11:45Everyone was taking notice.
11:46Some people made fun of it, thought it was ridiculous.
11:49Even Norm had doubts.
11:51I never told anybody that I did that screaming chicken.
11:54I was half embarrassed that I did it.
11:57But the people who bought those cars thought it was wonderful.
12:01Only in the 1970s would a giant flaming chicken on the hood of your car fly.
12:05Well, fly it did.
12:07Out of the Pontiac dealerships.
12:09It seemed nothing could stop the Trans Am rise to supercardom, except for maybe this little issue.
12:15Gasoline stations ran dry.
12:17The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries imposed its boycott and raised prices more than 300%.
12:24This industry-wide issue had meant that muscle cars had been muscled out.
12:30And the pony cars weren't faring much better.
12:32But as for Pontiac, the bird was proudly raised aloft once again.
12:37The 1976 Special Edition further cements Trans Am's legacy as one of the most iconic muscle cars ever.
12:45If you drove a black and gold Trans Am, you were a badass.
12:49Consider Bill Mitchell's lips licked.
12:52But the Trans Am that actually turned the most heads in 77 was actually a 76.
12:58Yeah.
12:59Let's go back a year.
13:01Hal Needham, who was out in Hollywood, who was casting cars for his next big movie.
13:06He spots the black noises, that's it, I want that car.
13:09Now the car was already in production as a limited edition.
13:12Well, it just so happened that Hal Needham had a movie in production as well.
13:17Smokey and the Bandit.
13:19And so a 76 Special Edition, fitted with a front end from the yet-to-be-released 77 model, was
13:25ready for its close-up.
13:27When that car drove off the back of that truck, almighty, would you look at that.
13:32We got goosebumps.
13:33We said, that's us.
13:34That's our car.
13:37There.
13:38And who better to drive the coolest car in America than...
13:42The coolest man in America.
13:43Burt Reynolds, who was the number one box office hit at the time.
13:48And who wouldn't want to be like Burt Reynolds?
13:52Sorry, I don't want to get married.
13:54Does this thing move?
13:55Oh yeah.
13:57Burt said, publicly, the car was the real hero.
14:01It did performance things you can't do.
14:05Sales of the Trans Am soared.
14:07And it just took it to the top.
14:09To the top of the box office in 1977.
14:12Holy...
14:13Just behind that space opera about the bratty farm boy from Tatooine.
14:18But I was going into Tosche Station to pick up some power converters.
14:20All right, shut up.
14:22By that time, I was real proud of the fact that I decided to...
14:26Big impact culturally, big impact on sales over at Pontiac.
14:30That's a win-win.
14:31But if you can believe it, the Trans Am still wasn't done winning.
14:361979 Pontiac.
14:37In 1979, Pontiac sold over 100,000 Trans Ams, the highest total in any Firebird model year.
14:45Nothing even comes close.
14:47Having masterfully navigated the regulation-heavy 70s, largely by, well, ignoring them,
14:53as the 80s approached, the question was, would it all still be worth the hassle?
14:58Hoff.
15:00The Trans Am of the 70s was bold, gold, and...
15:04Had the loud, crazy, screaming chicken.
15:06And then as we move into the 1980s, there is a new focus on technology.
15:11People have computers in their house.
15:13They're playing video games at home.
15:15Space invaders to cause that roar.
15:17Trans Am of the 80s reflected that.
15:19In 1982, Pontiac launched its futuristic third generation.
15:24Firebird Trans Am.
15:25The strategy was to go a more sophisticated route.
15:29You can feel the anticipation in the pit of your stomach.
15:32We wanted the car to be the most aerodynamic, sleek-looking firebird ever.
15:38Create a car to conquer the world.
15:40A bullet.
15:42The older cars suddenly seemed kind of bloated in comparison.
15:46Eh, it's probably the beers.
15:48But if the muscular, handsome shape of Burt Reynolds and the iconic black-and-gold Trans Am of the 70s
15:53wasn't your style,
15:55then perhaps David Hasselhoff would take your fancy.
15:58Come on, girl.
16:00NBC wanted Pontiac's third generation Trans Am to be the model for their new series.
16:06And Knight Rider.
16:07But...
16:07They didn't know what the car looked like.
16:09This was before the car came out.
16:11They want to know what it looks like.
16:12And I said, hey, that's giving away secrets.
16:14I can't do that.
16:15You know, I can't tell that, because we didn't have any pictures then.
16:17And he said, can you kind of draw what a Knight Rider car would look like with the shapes?
16:22So I took a napkin and drew it.
16:28Knight Rider, a shadowy flight into the dangerous world of a man who does not exist.
16:35From that sketch, Chanel worked with Knight Rider producers to create the show's iconic Knight Industries 2000, Kit.
16:42A Trans Am...
16:43But you're approaching a dangerous crew.
16:45...that talked back.
16:46Kit?
16:47Yes?
16:48Shut up.
16:49Anybody from Generation X remembers watching that show when they were a kid?
16:56Good grief.
16:57People from around the world, that show had a huge impact.
17:02From 1982 to 1986, Knight Rider was a ratings winner for NBC.
17:08But what about the third generation Trans Am that inspired Kit?
17:11A lot of it sold on styling.
17:13It looked very fast.
17:15I feel like there's a butt in here somewhere.
17:17But...
17:17There it is.
17:18The image that was being portrayed by Kit did not match what the car could deliver.
17:24You've probably begun to form a psychological attachment to me.
17:27And by now, the federal regulators had finally caught up to Trans Am.
17:32That 455 Super Duty was nowhere to be seen or heard.
17:35Pontiac had dropped their own five liter engine.
17:38They had to use a small block Chevrolet, which by that time was choked with both fuel economy and emissions
17:45equipment.
17:45So you had to look fast, go slow car.
17:48But there was another problem.
17:50And it was more thanks to the design.
17:52The car had several quality problems.
17:55It squeaked.
17:56It rattled.
17:57What is this?
17:58It had electrical problems.
18:00Unfortunately, quality and performance of the Trans Am took a back seat for GM.
18:05They sort of forgot about it.
18:06Chanel didn't.
18:07Okay, he kept on trying.
18:09Me, I was disappointed in the Gen 3.
18:12But not all was lost.
18:13In 1987...
18:15What is that?
18:17The Pontiac Firebird Trans Am GTA.
18:22With its V8 engine, the Firebird Trans Am flew in the face of its fancy European competitors.
18:28And then, as the 90s rolled around, a brand new fourth generation Trans Am rolled off the assembly line.
18:35This is the new Trans Am.
18:37This is the LT1.
18:39But...
18:40Come on.
18:40You knew the but was coming.
18:42The sporty car market itself was declining.
18:45Fuel economy was everything.
18:47And everybody was going MPG.
18:49Pontiac was going the other way.
18:50Their slogan used to be, we build excitement.
18:53Well, they hadn't built a lot of excitement in a long time.
18:56And the world was no longer interested in the mighty, powerful icons of the past.
19:02All of us who grew up with muscle cars and sporty cars had unfortunately moved on to minivans by that
19:08point.
19:09The last Trans Am rolled off the assembly line in 2002.
19:13But its legacy remains.
19:16The Trans Am made an impression on those of us who grew up and came of age in the 1970s.
19:22And it was, you know, the wheels that you had that defined you.
19:25This thing is just raw power.
19:27There's nothing nanny on it.
19:28You can spin out if you want to.
19:31That's what Burittles did.
19:40I would have never believed that we were still talking about that bird.
19:44I'm pretty proud of that actually.
19:47Sometimes I get very, I'm going to get emotional now.
19:51I get emotional about that car not being around anymore.
19:59Sorry.
20:02I feel good that these people love what my team and I did together.
20:06It's a big accomplishment.
20:07It's something that won't go away in my time.
20:10Because while some cars get older, the Trans Am just becomes more legendary.
20:16Long live the screaming chicken.
20:39I'll kill you!
20:40I'll kill you!
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