| Runtime: | 54 minutes |
| Director: | Keiichi Ozawa Yasuharu Hasebe Toru Murakawa |
| Starring: |
|
| Narrated: | Kiyoshi Kobayashi |
| Country: | Japan |
| Network: | TV Asahi |
| Num Seasons: | 3 TV series, 1 Special |
| Num Episodes: | 238[1] |
is a Japanese television drama series produced by and broadcast on TV Asahi.[2]
The series portrays the Western Police Headquarters Criminal Investigation Division's Sergeant Keisuke Daimon, played by Tetsuya Watari and his subordinates, dubbed the, and their superior, Section Chief Kogure, played by Yujiro Ishihara, as they fight against Tokyo's underworld.[3]
With its flashy, over-the-top explosion scenes, and car stunts, this series gained a reputation as a macho drama. It is representative of the police & detective dramas of the 1980s.
During the 5-year course of the show, a total of 236 episodes were filmed, with roughly 4,680 vehicles of all types being destroyed during the course of filming, 4.8 tons of explosives being used as well as close to 320 buildings destroyed. Surprisingly, no deaths were recorded, though there were six injured staff and crew members. The average viewer rating was at 14.5% in the Kanto Area.
Nissan provided a wide variety of vehicles for the show, most notably for use as police vehicles as well as villain vehicles. The majority of the patrol cars in the show are a mix of Nissan Laurel, Gloria, Cedric as well as Skyline sedans. For vehicle wrecking scenes the 230 and 330 model Cedrics, Glorias and Laurels were mainly used; as the filming staff had strict orders not to damage any of the 430 model Cedric marked patrol cars.
The series also had several notable cars used by the main heroes, including RS Machines 1 to 3, all of which were based on the Nissan Skyline DR30 Turbo RS; as well as Machine-X, a modified Nissan Skyline 2000 TURBO GT-E (HGC211) used primarily by Chief Daimon. There was also Super-Z: a modified Nissan 280ZX 2+2 with gull-wing doors, turbocharger, nitrous, computers, and also quad 20mm guns mounted on the hood. More noteworthy vehicles include a 1980 Nissan Safari which was also heavily modified with a radar camera, computer and also a water cannon with a water pressure so high it was shown to be able to flip a car; three modified Nissan Skylines, dubbed RS vehicles (all modified for special use by the Daimon Force) and a 1980 Nissan Gazelle convertible, which was Section Chief Kogure's personal vehicle. Being a motorcycle cop from the beginning of the series Eiji Hatomura (played by Hiroshi Tachi) used modified Suzuki motorcycles; in particular a GSX1100 Katana, which was his character's favourite bike in the series.
Almost all of the special vehicles are as of today, preserved by Ishihara Promotion.
The series' antagonists used a wide variety of vehicles, some of the most notable including:
Daitokai Series (1976–79) similar detective drama on NTV.