The Cars of "Chuck"

Chuck is a North-American TV show about Chuck Bartowski, a young man whose mediocre life changed when he opened an e-mail containing encrypted content composed of a huge number of highly classified information called the Intersect. Once read and in the subconscious of brain, the person with this information becomes a supercomputer of sorts, able to do things like ID an international criminal, or identify a weapon or document of upmost importance, though involuntarily. And that’s just the first season! Due to his skills behind a computer and overall unorthodox ways in handling situations in relation to governmental bureaus, Chuck reluctantly becomes part of a secret anti-terrorist team effort until a way is found to remove the Intersect from his head. His cover? His mundane life. In the meantime, serious questions appear: What makes a spy: the equipment or the individual? Can one be a spy and have a normal, happy life? Can one be a spy without sacrificing one’s values and integrity?

The show was a much-needed breath of fresh air for me. Chuck came along an interesting time for me: I was continuing my quest to soak up all automotive-related programming from SpikeTV, TLC, etc. I realized that watching MTV and Vh1 was starting to give me cancer. MTV2 was slightly more tolerable. Comedy Central was also frequented. Cartoon Network was undergoing changes that weren’t widely received by long-time viewers like me; Nickelodeon was becoming a crappy Disney Channel clone, which was sad because by then Disney Channel flat out sucked. Pretty much all other cartoon blocks from other channels were eradicated by then. I watched TV Land and Univision for just one program each (Hogan’s Heroes and Los Simpsons, respectively). Then I caught wind of this show that was about to premiere on NBC, a TV network that I never bothered watching before.

This geek-tastic espionage trope-destroying series lasted 91 episodes in five seasons, 2007-2012. It wasn’t a heavy-hitter show like, say Lost or NBC’S then-darling Heroes. Every time something with the word ‘Olympics’ in the title came around, Chuck would always end up being shelved. Its fans helped keep it alive all the way to a decent series ending, instead of a humiliating cancelation. Because it’s rather recent, one would think that their cars would be boring. Much like People of Interest and The X-Files, there’s a lot of everyday iron but with interesting machines thrown in, so there’s a little bit of something for everyone.

 

Let’s get this out of the way: Toyota was one of the show’s main sponsors (though not as infamously represented as a certain sandwich restaurant, which turned out to be a blessing in disguise), as shown by the following, so bear with me for a bit:

At the time, I hated the Toyota Yaris. So I was torn as I saw it being featured on what became my favorite then-new live-action TV series, including the intro, promo pics and even the DVD sub-menus. They’re fleet cars for the Nerd Herd, the tech help division from Buy More electronics store franchise (both names parody the North American companies Geek Squad and Best Buy, respectively), and got used as such: car chases, accidents, explosions, you know, what typical fleet vehicles get subjected to. Chuck-nbc.wikia.com says that all of the “Nerd Herd-mobile or “Nerd Herders” -as they’re known- that Chuck used have been modified by the CIA, ranging from remote control to ejector seats to self-destruct mechanisms!

The Nerd Herd fleet later got replaced by 2^nd-gen Toyota Matrixes, so Chuck received one as well, modified by the CIA, of course. Here’s a picture of them in case one’s forgotten how they looked like. They too suffered in the line of duty as shown below, a Chuck-style action/chase sequence, though it’s not complete:

-Chuck: What are you doing? What are you doing? You promised that you’d help me save Morgan.

-Casey: I didn’t promise I’d let you drive.

-Chuck: What? HUH?! There’s a remote control for this thing?! That’s crazy! This is crazy!! […] Watch the Rolls. The Rolls! Oh, oh, oh! Casey!

You’re going to have to see the episode to see all of it. More on the the Rolls later on.

Big Mike (left) is the manager/assistant manager of the Buy More and a comedic relief character. As you can see, he drives a 2009 Toyota Corolla. Later in the series he’s shown driving the buttlifted version. Emmett Milbarge (right), also drives an ’09. I think Toyota accidentally nailed it with the product placement here. Could you picture a lagging-in-sales electronics store management representative driving anything else?

Emmett eventually traded up to a chassis-code XV40 Toyota Camry. Only a nose-shot appeared of this car; if there was a better shot I would’ve used it, only to protest how the exit of this character was handled in the series. I know he was very annoying, but come on…

Another Toyota product placement, uh, product is the Toyota Sienna. Devon “Captain Awesome” Woodcomb (he is pretty awesome) touted the new set of wheels he purchased to his wife and Chuck’s sister Ellie. It’s shown briefly, with its swan song being the final season, when Ellie crashes it on purpose to save Chuck, Sarah and her life. That’s reason enough for me to mention it, even though they kept switching it with an older model in some shots and sequences.

Ellie was also shown driving this Toyota Highlander Hybrid. For some strange reason, that’s my favorite grille for these. It’s a vehicle that witnessed some serious emotional extremes from her: happiness at her wedding day, sorrow after witnessing the death of a loved one, stress and worry at what would become of Chuck, Sarah and Casey, relief at knowing that they were alright.

Enough practical appliances. The show has a spy-genre bend to it, so of course there’s gonna be vehicles befitting such line of work, fictitious or otherwise. Let’s start with resident blonde bombshell and overall badass Sarah Walker. She always had a penchant for sports coupes:

Sarah’s favorite sports coupes are probably Porsches. Here she is with her 997 Porsche 911 Carrera 4S Cabriolet. I’m guessing that the show used a couple of ‘em with subtle variations between ‘em. She used a ‘07 Turbo model in the first episode.

Also, in a flashback, Sarah’s shown driving a 996 Porsche 911 Cabriolet. Dig the chrome.

Even in a Hart to Hart classic TV series-inspired dream sequence Sarah’s driving a 911, a Targa in this case. Chuck’s just happy to have her company, but a Ferrari 308 GTS isn’t bad, either.

This is the Lotus Evora that she drove for the last couple of seasons. Sarah had a nasty scare in it, being that it was once rigged to blow up with her inside it.

Chuck was indeed able to drive a Ferrari, a 430 Spyder, out of the aforementioned dream sequence for a mission, courtesy of Uncle Sam… until he stalled it just a few meters from the valet. They came with 6-speed manual. I checked.

-Sarah: Chuck, we’re AWOL. It’s why we ditched the car.

While Chuck and Sarah were indeed forced to go AWOL, that didn’t stop ‘em from picking up something with some sporting flair, a 1970 Dodge Challenger R/T. I’d change the wheels, though. It was part of a sweet action sequence. Contrary to the typical Mopar Hollywood treatment, the Challenger came away with only a couple of gun shots.

-Chuck: Nice car.

-Casey: Not just any car. It’s a 1985 Crown Victoria. But, like a lady, she doesn't like it when I talk about her age.

-Chuck: I'm not really a car guy, so I don't really... Pretty, pretty shiny, though.

-Casey: Yeah, she's shiny. 4.6 V8 engine. Hydra-glide transmission. Reupholstered the prisoner containment area. Even installed a state-of-the-art GPS tracking system in the license plate. Can locate this baby anywhere in the world in less than a minute.

-Chuck: That’s great. That-that’s really great, Casey.

Take any James Bond car and mix it with the inconspicuous nature of the black Ford LTD Crown Victoria in Men In Black and you’ll have John Casey’s personal ride, a Ford LTD Crown Victoria. It’s bulletproof; its trunk has a small armament and it even has a missile located behind the front headlight, with its guidance system projected in a heads-up display. If it’s any consolation, they named the episode Chuck Versus the Crown Vic.

He had two. The first one had to be used to draw a missile, with predictable results. It’s as close to sadness as we see Casey experience. For a car that Casey gladly talked about to the point of saying it’s his dream car, there are a couple of interesting discrepancies: the one used in the show is a 1991, Casey says it’s an ’85. The grille is from the ’88-onwards facelift, unless he added those parts. Casey also says that the engine is a 4.6, which came out for the following generation in ’92, unless he made a swap. The transmission is perhaps the biggest snafu,as “Hydra-glide” is not a name of a car transmission unless he’s referring to GM’s Powerglide/Hydramatic/ Turboglide transmissions or the Turbo-Hydramatic 400-based Hydra racing transmissions, none of them available in a Ford from factory!

Remember the early days of the Tesla car company? Imagine my surprise when a Tesla Roadster showed up, albeit briefly. Used by another spy, Daniel Shaw.

-Casey: You’re not even supposed to know about the Nighthawk.

-Chuck: Come on, you thought you could keep a superbike secret from me? She’ll do 250 (mph) on the highway.

The superbike in question is a second-gen Suzuki GSX-R1300R Hayabusa, which is better labeled as a hyperbike. The base motorcycle is one of the fastest naturally-aspirated production motorcycles on the planet, with a rabid fanbase devoted to not only enjoy them, but modifying them in both appearance and performance. I’m convinced that 250mph is achievable with the right mods. This experimental model has been equipped with a small arsenal consisting of machine guns and a missile in the headlamp. The CIA could’ve at least nicknamed it “Night Falcon”, as that’s what “Hayabusa” means: Falcon. Nighthawk sounds cool, but it’s also a Honda motorcycle name, and those aren’t hyperbikes.

 

Let’s see other vehicles outside the espionage world… or are they?

-Chuck: Look if this has anything to do with my mom or Albania or Tangiers or that café in Budapest

Morgan: Oh, that was not even his fault.

-Chuck: Anyways, we have explanations for all of them.

-Repo Man: What are you talking about? I’m here for the car. I’m a repo man.

-Chuck: R-repo ma-- Morgan?

-Morgan: Right. We haven’t made a payment in four months.

-Chuck: The car costs $900!

-Morgan: Yeah, but we’re $43,000 in debt.

By the turn of the decade, Disney/Pixar re-introduced the notion that the AMC Pacer, among others, as a symbol of loser-dom to a new generation with their Cars 2 movie. Seriously, this trope is like beating on a dead horse, it needs to stop. Chuck briefly did the same, but with the rarer 1977 AMC Pacer Wagon, their $900 spy company car. We get it, they’re a cash-strapped start-up, they used a 1980s Toyota van with center cap-less AE-series Corolla rims for spy work; we get the picture. The upside of the scene was the cameo appearance of Harry Dean Stanton reprising his 1984 Repo Man role as a repo man, though I do question the method of using guns for a repo job other than self-defense. Throughout the series there are other memorable guest stars, including Christopher Lloyd, Scott Bakula, Chevy Chase, Bo Derek, Mark Hamill, Stan Lee and many more.

Let us bask in the glory of one of Sarah’s first cars, a 1982 Volkswagen Rabbit Convertible that she drove around her high-school senior year (1998). It’s considered by many to be the ultimate chick car, with Sarah not doing it any favors while blasting Tubthumping by Chumbawamba. While she’s definitely come a long way, both in life and car-wise, the picture above is a clear indication that her taste for foreign machines runs deep.

Chuck’s best bud and co-worker Morgan Grimes went through a douche-phase, with his company car being this attention-getter: a Peraves Monotracer “feet-first” motorcycle. Yes, those are outriggers. Yes, he drove it right into the store. This is the gasoline powered version, though the Swiss company has all-electric versions as well. Peraves have been building machines of this ilk in low numbers for over 25+ years. While Morgan returns to being his former self, the Monotracer ends up destroyed due to his previous actions.

This Mustang belonged to Chuck and Ellie’s dad, Stephen Bartowski (that’s Ellie and Awesome driving). Stephen’s choice in transportation contrasted with the bohemian lifestyle that the Bartowskis had early on in life. It reappears in Ellie’s and Chuck’s life because there’s a very important package left inside: a powerful scratch-built laptop.

This first-gen Mazda Miata belongs to recurring character Anna. That’s about all there is to it. I’ve only included it because of the racing stripes, which does suit the car’s owner. It’s still a better mention that a 2005 Volkswagen Jetta used by a recurring love interest.

-Chuck: Whoa. What is this place?

-Lester: Whatever our friend Jeff here doesn’t guzzle down his throat, he spends on spy gear. Incredible, right?

-Chuck: Incredibly creepy.

Duo Jeff Barnes and Lester Patel’s antics –like their music career as Jeffster!- are always a welcome distraction, though it’s not unusual for them to unknowingly cross paths with Chuck’s spy work. Jeff’s Mitsubishi Wagon has been in a number of stakeouts itself and has the equipment for the job. It’s also where Jeff resides. By the end of the series, it’s revealed that because Jeff leaves the van running while he sleeps, he’s gotten more than his fair share of noxious fumes –it’s a miracle he isn’t dead; this, along with numerous substance abuse, had made Jeff the quintessential ‘burnout’ poster child. It took almost the entire series, but Lester and a recuperated Jeff finally figured out what Chuck and co. were up to. The “partied-so-hard-that-we-can’t-remember-what-happened-in-Vegas” scene above with the Ford Mustang convertible was a setup hilariously repeated a number of times in that one episode, to try and convince Jeff and Lester that what they saw wasn’t real.

Nothing says Christmas shopping like having at least that one guy drive right into the store. Actually, the guy in the Volkswagen Jetta had an ulterior motive to wrap up his 20 mile-long police chase and crash into that particular Buy More. There's nothing special about the car, but hey, the shot is funny, right?

Is this an evil criminal organization gathering, or a Chrysler Sebring convertible enthusiast gathering? Is there a difference?

-Morgan: How can you have any trouble selling this treasure?

-Seller: The passenger door doesn’t work, gas mileage is horrible, and if it actually goes over 22mph, it stalls.

-Morgan: Really? I’ll take it.

-Seller: Deal.

Being that this series is geek-stacular, the appearance of a 1981 DeLorean DMC-12 should come as no surprise. Heck, they even named the episode Chuck Versus the DeLorean! If I had the space I’d write all the quotes involving the DeLorean. It was in this episode that I first heard about the incorrect trivia of how the Back To The Future DeLorean Time Machine had its original engine swapped for a Porsche V8 for stunt film duty. Not counting the BTTF3 dune-buggy conversions, all rolling DeLorean Time Machines kept their original engines, much to the chagrin of the stunt team. Only the Porsche V8 sounds were added.

Morgan completely blew a chance to prove he was responsible by buying this rough-runner and adding the ‘DEMORGAN’ vanity plates. Luckily, he was able to sell it……

and then have temptation drive right into the stereo workshop area of where he works in the form of yet another childhood favorite: a 1969 Dodge Charger General Lee replica.

If you were able to watch the video earlier in the write-up, the Toyota Matrix was chasing after a 1954 Rolls-Royce Silver Dawn, one of the rides belonging to a foreign car importer/smuggler, who he sold to a foreign ambassador. The business of this episode’s antagonist gave way to the use of far more exotic metal than usual.

-Chuck: So, uh, Anna, what’s the occasion for all this?

-Anna: It’s a car preview for an auction Jason’s having tomorrow. Sort of an open house for cars.

-Chuck: Oh.

There are contemporary exotica like an Audi R8 and Lotus Elise, mid-century superstars like the 1957 Ford Thunderbird and 1962 Chevrolet Corvette and even a Speedster Classic Boattail, a replica of the Auburn Boattails.

There’s also this Shelby Cobra replica that Sarah borrowed.

 

There are two characters that are deeply intertwined with the Bartowski clan and the spy world. For the sake of secrecy, I’m not saying their names, but I will say this much: both used to be very close, but judging by their vehicles, have very different lives:

One is deeply immersed in the spy world, shown driving a 2011 Cadillac CTS-V Coupe.

The other lives off the grid, choosing a rather appropriate 1^st-gen Ford Bronco.

Let me share with you a broader picture of where Chuck had to go every day to work since 2003:

-Harry Tang: Wow. Leave the Buy More. I never thought this day would come. Don't know what it is about this place, but it gets under your skin.

-Casey: Yeah.

Mundane, isn’t it? Part of me hopes that this image would come to represent North-American consumerism -circa 2007- but I’m getting ahead of myself. Look at that parking lot. The most modern-looking vehicle here has got to be that Mercedes-Benz R-class and maybe that Honda Fit. The rest of the vehicles are refreshingly devoid of LED DRLs and high belt-lines. The Mazda Protegé sedan with the breast cancer ribbon symbol calls to me, and it’s been awhile since I’ve seen a Kia Rio of that vintage in that color, and I’ve seen plenty of the earlier Kias. And what’s a mid-‘00s North-American parking lot without crossovers and SUVs? From a second-gen Toyota RAV4, to a luxurious Acura MDX, to the North-American staple that is the Chevrolet Suburban.

Just like the banality of the daily grind at the Buy More gets broken every so often, so does the what’s available in the parking lot. How about this Subaru SVX background car? While browsing the show’s IMCDb, I was surprised that I didn’t catch this one back then. Well, it’s something!

I just had to include this one. I dig Cadillac STSs and who doesn’t love the ’62 Dodge Dart one way or another? It’s just that I find it so odd to find these two very different cars just parked there.

There’s a reason why this background car is mentioned: This is a USDM Ford Focus, not the one that can be found in Europe, or Italy, where the scene takes place. While it received less than 5 seconds of screentime, I quickly spotted that it was wrong.

About background vehicles, the show does try to convince you that the cast is in a foreign country when the story calls for it, though eagle-eyed car nuts will be quick to point out the details (like if that Renault 10 is actually US-spec), and globe-trotters will be quick to rip the show for using imagery from other countries –including trains- to represent others. It’s interesting that Chuck had older Chevy Suburbans dressed up with a newer front clip for stunt duty, but didn’t bother with using a specific generation of Toyota Sienna for its crash scene. Then again, they did recycle car explosion footage from another source.

The show does strive to convince you that you’re in a flashback as far as cars are concerned, though. A small TV show like this did a better job at not screwing up an early ‘00s flashback than a major, star-studded motion picture (The Big Short), who should’ve had no problem finding vehicles from 11 years ago. In the flashback sequence above, they really did make it feel like it was 1988. Out of all the vehicles used, I chose to represent this one, since it’s the ride of choice of a recurring character. Besides, could you picture a better vehicle for a professional con-man than a 1982 Lincoln Continental Mark VI? Back to the present, the same con-man was later driving a Chrysler Sebring convertible.

This 2010 Honda Accord Crosstour -featuring Morgan, Awesome and Ellie- wasn’t part of the series, but part of a series of advertisement tie-ins with the show and the Winter Olympics that would temporarily eat up the show’s time slot. I found its promotion interesting, given the prominence of rival Toyota in the show.

Chuck, in a nutshell.

 

--Tigerstrypes

 

References:

Corollas, Jetta: http://chuckaholics.com

Nerd-Herd mobiles, Sienna, Tesla, 997 Porsche Cabrio, Ferrari-Porsche dream sequence, ’67 Mustang, Sebring enthusiast club/evil organization, Mitsubishi Wagon, wrecked Mustang vert, “DeMorgan”, General Lee, Rolls, Cobra, CTS-V Coupe, “Italian taxi”, SVX, Dart and STS: IMCDb

Opening title card: http://www.imfdb.org

Highlander, 996 Porsche 911 cabrio, Evora, 430, Crown Vic, Hayabusa, Rabbit vert, Miata, auto show, Bronco, Buy More parking lot, Crosstour: printscreen

Chuck artwork: collider.com

http://www.imcdb.org/movie_934814-Chuck.html

http://chuck-nbc.wikia.com/wiki/Home

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