1980's Saturday Morning Historical Preservation Society

1984 seemed to have a theme of some sort... can you spot it? 10:30am on CBS was one of the several new Video Game cartoons that had been rushed in to production in the wake of Pac-Man's success and departure from Saturday Morning Television. The (unconfirmed, not from a confirmed source) story of this show and it's creation are kind of neat...

Former Hannah-Barbera writer and story-editor Andy Heyward had this idea floating around in his head for several years, a story about a traveling stock car stunt show circus that was a front for some secret agents and their high-tech computerized James Bond cars. When Andy finally left Hannah-Barbera to help form DIC, he pushed the idea through to get fully developed. When the writers were polishing and refining the idea (adding a little sister to the mix along the way), they were pitching ideas for an actual NAME to the show, which had been stuck under the title "Secret Agent Cars" for far too long. Various names were shouted out, stuff like "C.A.R.Z.", "Fast Track", "Pit Stop"... and then when somebody stated listing automotive/racing terms ("Checkered Flag", "NASCAR", "Race Track", etc) and hit "Pole Position", somebody said "What... like the Video Game?"

The room went quiet as everyone looked at everyone else.

"Yes" it was agreed. "Just like the video game!" And so that's how they sold it.

Mind you, the cartoon has literally NOTHING to do with the video game AT ALL beyond the title but who would have tuned in after the Saturday Supercade to watch a single car driving around a track for 22 minutes?

The theme song for this show was *perfect*, reminiscent of both "Airwolf" and "Knight Rider", hooked me from the get-go: