The more I watch this show the more I start to notice how often they flip over cars for practically no logical reason.
A car spins out on the road and predictably enough some car will come flying through the air when it's so clear they had room to stop.
A car going airborne or flipping over was more visually dramatic than simply smashing into each other in a fender bender. Personally, I enjoy it more than the CGI stuff we have today. Back then when you wanted to have a car crash, you were really crashing the cars, which was always risky since the drivers didn't have a lot of protection other than a seatbelt, crash helmet, and maybe a rollbar.
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And for me, a 53 year old woman is to see Ponch and the romantic moments!
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No! I really didn't watch CHIPS till it came on last year in reruns on METV! Just for something new to watch! First run, I wasn't interested in it. I thought it was a boys show! I didn't really pay much attention to Erik Estrada than! It is just lately thanks to METV that I developed my crush on him! Kind of a belated crush huh?! LOL!!
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It was pure entertainment, however the show did not start out that way- look at some of the season 1 crashes and you won't see this take place.
It's fun to see how they did this- I know from firsthand experience when cars rear-end other cars, they do not fly through the air. If you look closely, you can usually see the "ramp car" which is often an old Mercury. It had a ramp built onto the rear of the car so as to launch the other car(s).
As the other member noted, you can also on occasion see a roll bar and also that the fuel tank has been removed and in some instances a pillow in the car for the stuntman. I agree this is more entertaining than modern CGI.
Joe "We're authorized" Fontana: I can do this all day, Mitch. How about you?
I think the target audience for this show was boys and young men. In order to make the show appealing to said audience, the producers had to feature spectacular car crashes, automobile acrobatics, and a few wild stunts. Remember this was the era of Wide World of Sports and Evel Knievel.
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One thing I got to thinking about the other night was that the big crashes probably worked better back when the show aired. Back then, we didn't have VCRs, DVRs, DVDs, etc. where we could repeatedly go back and watch a scene over and over and notice some things like a stunt ramp here, rollbar there, etc. The show would air, and you'd have to wait for it to be re-aired during the off season to see it again.
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That's probably true but it's quite obvious when a car was going to flip it's usually an older early or mid 70s car being chased.
A carefully hidden ramp is the reason.
shareI can understand the need for visual appeal but the audience will pick up on an illogical scene.
What makes it funny is that some cars had room to stop or swerve.
Other times someone would get pulled out of s burning car, run a few feet, duck just in time before it explodes.
GCI is okay if it's done right like Band of Brothers.