Friday Night Brakelights

White walls and all

A latecomer to Friday Night Lights, ABC's Texas high school football as religion drama (Peyton Manning Place?), I am now gobbling up the episodes two or three at a time on Netflix. In an episode in Season 2, QB1 and all-around good guy Matt Saracen buys a used car. His new girlfriend Lauren, who claims to know a lot about cars, helps him get a good deal on a blue-and-rust Dodge Dart Custom. So far so good. "It's not a Slant 6, is it?" she asks. The seller assures her it is not. Like that's a bad thing! Of course it's a Slant 6! (He also tells her it's got 275 h.p., instead of the 225 the Custom packed.)

The photo above comes from the great IMCDb website (Internet Movie Cars Database) where the actual car's story gets told in this quote from the series producers:

"We just nabbed a blue 1974 Dodge Dart sedan for the Matt Saracen character as his 1st car for the Friday Night Lights TV show on NBC. It was in a farm field for 12 years. It started right up after it was pulled out. We've had to replace the master cylinder, gas tank, exhaust/muffler, tune up, oil/filter, idler arm, and charge the AC unit. The automatic transmission shifts fine. Otherwise it's a great car for $1,000.00. The interior is near perfect. The paint has lots of desirable patina wear giving it the '1st car I ever bought' look. It will see plenty of action. Watch for it starting episode # 7, second season. It's a hoot and a great picture car."

Of course it started right up. It's a Slant 6. "Can't kill 'em" was the word. If you are a fan of early 70's Dodges and Plymouths, you will want to stream Season 2 Episode 8 when Matt goes to pick up Smash, the star running back, after a college recruiting trip goes off the rails. Great shots of the car's interior.