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Anyone watching them? Thoughts?

Personally I quite like Chris Paddy and Freddy’s dynamic. And that episode of TGT, Funeral For A Ford? Right in the feels. Hard.

I've kept up with the old trio in Grand Tour and enjoyed their three seasons on Amazon, though you can tell that there's a few issues here and there with them settling on a working studio format. I figure they spent so long on Top Gear with their format that it was tricky for them to break out and find new things to do, esp since much of what they had done was fairly basic. The BBC blocking them (eg first season where BBC blocked them doing interviews and its somewhat clear that they can't get "big names" any more) I think was also an issue.

Personally I always loved their touring episodes and their crazy builds so I'm quite happy with them shifting to a touring show with big adventures through other lands. Personally I'd have liked them to start introducing a fourth member of the team as well. Before they'd left the BBC I'd felt that the only way to keep it going would have been to introduce a 4th person steadily (and in an overt position not covert like the Stig) so that one of the oldies could retire/move on and the fourth simply slips in naturally to replace them. Rather than one leaving and then having to shop around.

I had hoped they could even have used the racing driver from the GT series (not the American....) but it seems its not to be and I think with the touring style they won't really get a chance to introduce someone new easily. So it could be that the mad adventures will be where the team ends - which isn't a bad spot when that time comes.




Current Top Gear I've not kept up with (lack of proper TV and stuff) though I think their earlier faults were trying to copy-cat the original trio. Though I appreciate how hard it is, in the end the best way to make top gear work is to have 3 people who naturally relax into their roles as themselves, if slightly exaggerated for the camera; and then have them work together. That said it could take seasons before a good team works together (we forget that "new" Top Gear came after years of "old" Top Gear when it was all mostly serious)

Top Gear seems to have been something that was very much "of its time" for me. I watched it pretty religiously up until maybe 2 series before the original trio got fired. It moved too far away from what I wanted to see by the end and became a little bit too obviously staged (all the goofy stuff was staged from the start, I know, but at least they were subtle about it). Not watched the Grand Tour at all, so can't comment on that.

The new Top Gear seems OK, but still seems like its trying to emulate the old format a bit too much. The chemistry from the new presenters is pretty good but I'm not sure I really trust them to do the car reviews and such - though they are an admittedly much smaller part of the show than they once were.

Even under the old team the car reviews were a weaker part - mostly because a lot of them were mostly sporty cars or cars being driven in a sporty manner.

What interested me more was when you got something where they'd go on about an older car. Where they weren't just going through the motions, but doing a proper passionate part about a historical vehicle.

Even though I've really no interest in cars those parts often held my attention because it wasn't just car tech or talking about how fast it could go or how good it could do a wheelie etc... it was a part of one of the trio's passion for cars and I think that came through very strongly.

Nah.
Hear me out here..
If you go back and check out the first season of Clarkson's Top Gear, they were trying to become an entertainment show but still had to pretend to the bbc that it was a traditional consumer car advice show - my take is they balanced it about 50/50. James May joined the next season and they collectively spent the next four seasons morphing into a purely entertainment based regular tv slot when 'ad break power demand spikes' were still a thing.

Because of this extended morphing period, despite two of them being long-term motoring journalists, the audience perception was that whatever jollies they enjoyed for the show they had 'earned' their fame and right to act their parts with self-depractation and sometmes genuine physical peril and terror while being recorded.

So then chris evans comes in with genuine enthusiasm and two motoring journalists, but they turned up, stood in front of the top gear logo and expected to be adored for 'keeping the show alive' - no audience bonding of any kind.

If the bbc actually had plucked three genuine Top Gear fans to use as presenters, the result would have been the same. If they had taken two genuine fans and Matt Leblanc, it could have worked.

My take on how it could have worked..

Ah, fanfiction.

I think the reason for success is the chemistry between the three hosts. It's why I watched Top Gear and now Grand Tour. And why I no longer watch Top Gear. It's got the format but no soul. Grand Tour has got soul, but trying to find it's format. I'm looking forward to the adventure format. The specials were always my favorite episodes anyway.