Watch Jeff Dunham's The Cars That Drive Us

A garage-built experiment turned a cultural icon: the Meyers Manx dune buggy, which made car building accessible to the masses. However, its success unleashed a flood of copycats that nearly wiped out the very garage that started it all.

A garage-built experiment turned a cultural icon: the Meyers Manx dune buggy, which made car building accessible to the masses. However, its success unleashed a flood of copycats that nearly wiped out the very garage that started it all.

As the American military outgrew the Jeep, it needed something stronger, tougher, more versatile -- and the Humvee was the answer. From Desert Storm to Rodeo Drive, it became America's vehicle of choice, a popularity fueled in part by Arnold Schwarzenegger, its most famous fan. But could an energy crisis mean the end of the party?

Hollywood gave audiences plenty of hero cars they could drive home -- from Knight Rider, to the DeLorean in Back to the Future, even Herbie. But one machine was always out of reach: the Batmobile. And of all its incarnations, none redefined what a movie car could be more than the 1989 Batmobile.

Before becoming "America's Sports Car," the Chevrolet Corvette was the bane of General Motors' existence. When the automaker attempted to discontinue the line in 1983, a small team of true believers went rogue, working in secret and funding the project themselves -- resulting in a groundbreaking vehicle and an all-out civil war inside GM.

The Pontiac Trans Am wasn't just part of the muscle car movement -- it was a statement. From street drags to the track, it was the complete package. A star of film (featured in Smokey and the Bandit) and television (the iconic Knight Rider), the Trans Am pushed muscle cars to the limit. But in the pursuit of greatness, did Pontiac push too far?

While the DeLorean is best known as the time machine from Back to the Future, the true story behind the futuristic DMC-12 has more twists and turns than any Hollywood movie. This is the tale of John DeLorean and his quest to create a new American car company. To do it, he would need to survive an international scandal, entrapment, and bankruptcy -- not to mention an insurgency.

The supercar explosion of the 1980s saw next-level performers like the Lamborghini Countach, the Porsche 959, and the Lotus Esprit Turbo peeling out of Europe. But could America compete? That's what Detroit auto designer Jerry Wiegert set out to discover with his jet fighter on wheels -- the Vector W8. Wiegert aimed to beat Europe at its own game, but would he go too far?