I’ve had Mopars on the brain lately, but to know me, it’s not all that surprising. Being powerTV’s resident “Mopar guy,” I take plenty of guff for being so. Its with great personal pride that Street Legal TV is significantly more “diverse” than its ever been, due to a larger presence of Oldsmobile, Plymouth, Pontiac, Buick, Dodge, or Mercury content. As a self-christened Mopar guy, I’ve got a soft spot for “underdog” or “off-brand” muscle; and as you might’ve deduced, our on-going 1969 Dodge Charger R/T “Killer Kong” is all my doing.

The venerable third member of Detroit’s “Big Three” has been a hot topic in the news this past month or so, giving me much more than usual to think about. Recently, Dodge’s modern muscle sedan has been the talk of the town, so to speak. The ’12 Charger was listed as an “All-Star” from Automobile Magazine, while Consumers Digest included three Mopars in its “2012 Best Buy” list; and the announcement of the slightly stripped-down ’12 Charger Super Bee SRT8 introduced a new price point for the high horsepower four-door.

It’s no secret that I’m a bit of a Charger geek. For reasons that would fill an entirely different editorial alone, that specific model holds a place in my heart.

That is why I’ve been so vociferous about the recent aesthetic changes to the four-door, what I feel is still left on the table for Dodge, and how the Charger is more than worthy of a modern version that not only captures the spirit, style and performance of its heydays.

Exploring this thought, I began thinking of Chargers in TV and movies. One car, far more than any other, has been captured on film. One car has been featured as a co-star to the story’s main character more than any other. One car has been – and continues to be – the go-to machine to embody core characteristics that any clever script can convey with a snarky off-hand comment, mood or swagger. That car has been and continues to be the Second Generation Dodge Charger.

The vehicle of choice for Hollywood’s anti-heros, the Charger’s menacing furrowed unibrow, gaping maw, broad, angular shoulders and long, wide lines are far more masculine than a feminine, curvaceous and lithe Jaguar E-Type. If a movie producer wanted a way to communicate key attributes without spitting out the words outright, they try to say them through the character’s clothes, home and most notably to us car guys, his choice of transportation.

Of course, this works for the bad guys too, as much of the attributes of an anti-hero transfer over to a villain. Remember Bill Hickman and John Aprea as the two Chicago hitmen hunting down Detective Frank Bullitt and his Highland Green ’68 Mustang GT 390? The long, sleek triple-black ’68 Charger R/T made its film debut in 1968’s “Bullitt” and left an indelible mark on all of our minds as the unstoppable murder machine all bad guys need to pilot.

This motif was repeated almost verbatim in Quentin Tarantino’s “Death Proof.” Piloted by Kurt Russell as the serial killer “Stuntman Mike,” his flat black ’69 Charger was caged, stripped of all niceties and designed for one thing, homicide. When asked about the car selections for his movie, Tarantino shrugged, “What else could I use?”

Although nowhere near as subtle as the black or primered Chargers, the Citron Yella ’69 Dodger that devoured the highways and country roads in the Peter Fonda anti-establishment film, “Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry” was a psychedelic lemon-lime getaway car that blended into nothing and stood out like a stray nail waiting to be hammered down by the authorities.

The very same could be said for the uniquely-blended orange ’69 Charger wheeled by those nefarious, although good-natured Duke cousins. Originally moonshiners, the Duke boys’ exploits later devolved into a veritable games of never-ending cat-and-mouse, the wily mice never being in any real danger, even when in the clutches of the bumbling Hazzard County Sheriff, Roscoe P. Coltrane and his dopey-eyed sidekick Flash.

As light as the “Dukes of Hazzard” might have been, its inverted doppelganger could be a pair of dark and brooding supernatural action flicks, the “Blade” Trilogy and Nick Cage’s box office dud, “Drive Angry.” Both films featured tortured leads, draped in long black trench coats and spouting off about the end of the world at any given moment. Their vehicles of choice? You guessed it: ’69 Dodge Chargers.

The final entry on this list would have to be the most hotly argued and reviled-among-classic-car-lovers, “The Fast And The Furious” series. Nowhere before is the car so overtly recognized as being “more than the main character can handle,” literally attributing characteristics to the muscle car that are specifically designed to incite a sense of awe when in action.

Dom Torreto’s father’s black ’70 Charger is exactly that, a character; particularly in the first of the quintet. Stupidly, the Charger – when finally called to serve – does so limply, leaving smokey trails of rubber across much of Long Beach, California’s asphalt to little avail.

The Charger is matched – although not bested – by a turbo-charged inline-six cylinder Toyota Supra and is totaled in spectacular Hollywood fashion for no reason more than “Dodge Chargers look great roiling through the air before meeting an unnecessary demise.”

Until we get to “Fast Five,” the series went on to wad up Charger after Charger, always giving the audience the payoff of “This car is really a bad guy, so it needs to be punished for being so unruly” in the same way that Vin Diesel always walks away in some level of a bloody mess. It’s Hollywood karma.

With this long – and ever growing – list of film and television accolades, it’s not surprising that Dodge has Michael C. Hall, known for playing the ultimate anti-hero, a serial killer-with-a-conscience, Dexter Morgan in Showtime’s “Dexter” series, is the voice of so many modern Dodge Charger advertisements. Why do you think Dodge is pushing the “Dodge: Man’s Last Stand” advertising campaign. Despite its extra two doors, the brand is trying to maintain its rough-around-the-edges, burly persona while exclaiming, “But wait, it’s refined! It’s got everything a BMW’s got, but cooler! It’s still a muscle car!”

The need for, or even the complete existence of this argument is because of two things: first, the hiatus of the Charger nameplate for so long; and the reaction of the Charger loyalists to the 2006 model. Had today’s ’12 Dodge Charger been introduced in 2006, I believe a lot more people would have forgiven the infraction of making Dodge’s most iconic muscle car a sedan, as today’s Dodge Charger is – in my opinion – worthy of its name and the spirit that accompanys it.

Light ‘em up,
Kevin