Top Gear Runs it's course.

[Jenksie]

It is as if there has been a deliberate decision taken to scale down this series to get back it's boring motorist centred roots.
Last nights treatment of Guest John Prescott was appalling.

Clarkson at his smug boorish best seemingly unable to hide is absolute disgust at having to converse with a democratically elected Politician who had the audacity to not share his views.
Every question pitched to humiliate and belittle - no answer listened to and expanded upon. There was one Jag (the other was a govt car) It was wrong to punch the electorate (but for one second you think you might have been stabbed or shot) flowing traffic is better than fast or stopped traffic. etc etc

Alistair Cambell was more adept at fielding the provocative answers a few weeks back - Prescott is a bit of an anachronism after all but when repeatedly challenged about his diving Holidays (remember he was a nautical man) he refrained from pointing out that Clarkson has spent years titting about at the tax payers expense destroying things and having a good time.

In the process making himself fantastically wealthy with Cotswold Mansions and a lighthouse for a second home on the Isle of Man etc

Last weeks interview with a vapid actress from a film most people will pay half their wages to not see was as dull as a Veyron.

Hammond is these days content to be the court jester - god how boring was that Porche/Ferrari piece?.

Only May's piece on the second MoonBuggy managed to educate, inform and entertain.

 

[db]

so why watch it if you hate it so? and clearly, from this and other posts, clarkson is the antithesis of everything you moan about.. er, i mean stand for, so why waste an hour of your life on it?

you sound like my mum, who reads the daily mail just so she can tut at it lol..

 

[db]

completely by co-incidence, just read this opposing viewpoint on twitter:

"Great performance by @johnprescott on Top Gear! Great lap in the wet and excellent banter as usual!!!"

horses for courses, obv's

 

[Jenksie]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/tvandradioblog/2011/feb/28/top-gear-richard-hammond

Not just me then?

 

[shoes]

It is as if there has been a deliberate decision taken to scale down this series to get back it's boring motorist centred roots.
Last nights treatment of Guest John Prescott was appalling.

Clarkson at his smug boorish best seemingly unable to hide is absolute disgust at having to converse with a democratically elected Politician who had the audacity to not share his views.
Every question pitched to humiliate and belittle - no answer listened to and expanded upon. There was one Jag (the other was a govt car) It was wrong to punch the electorate (but for one second you think you might have been stabbed or shot) flowing traffic is better than fast or stopped traffic. etc etc

Alistair Cambell was more adept at fielding the provocative answers a few weeks back - Prescott is a bit of an anachronism after all but when repeatedly challenged about his diving Holidays (remember he was a nautical man) he refrained from pointing out that Clarkson has spent years titting about at the tax payers expense destroying things and having a good time.

In the process making himself fantastically wealthy with Cotswold Mansions and a lighthouse for a second home on the Isle of Man etc

Last weeks interview with a vapid actress from a film most people will pay half their wages to not see was as dull as a Veyron.

Hammond is these days content to be the court jester - god how boring was that Porche/Ferrari piece?.

Only May's piece on the second MoonBuggy managed to educate, inform and entertain.

Can't say I particularly enjoyed Prescott's segment, although I firmly believe the interviews are quite heavily scripted and as such this would have all been cleared by Prescott beforehand.

in fact the star in a reasonably priced car is dull, always has been, always will be. I'm not sure what interests me less - crap from celebrities' mouths or (on the whole) watching them driving a painfully shit car, painfully badly around a racetrack.

The rest of the show I have no problem with though, the news has gone downhill in the last couple of series, but generally speaking i quite enjoy it. All the other segments, whilst being somewhat formulaic, I do enjoy.

As an avid car enthusiast I found the porsche/ferrari piece very entertaining and interesting - I'm guessing you're not really a car man, which would explain why it doesn't appeal to you - each to their own.

I have to agree with you about the moon buggy piece, most interesting and more in line with that May is really good at, in my opinion.

As for the veyron being dull? I thought I was the only one. I don't see what all the fuss is about - JUN Auto were pushing road going, road legal cars to 230 mph in 1990 for approximately 1/50th the cost of VW's monstrosity.

 

[Clarkey]

The Prescott interview was always going to be a total ripping, anyone expecting anything different must be pretty naive. It lived up to all expectations, pretty darn funny.

Maybe you should get your facts straight though, the reason Clarkson didn't get ripped for wasting taxpayers dosh is because he doesn't. The Top Gear brand is extremely successful worldwide and makes healthy profits for the BBC, I believe it's the only profit-making show on the BBC.

If you don't find a piece on an F40 (lets forget the 959, nobody cares about that) interesting then you must be an anti-car eco warrior and thereby should probably turn off TG and never tune in again.

FWIW though, if you find a Veyron dull then you are missing the point by about a million miles. The JUN-blitz Bonneville Z32 actually cracked 260mph but that doesn't make it even half the car a Veyron is. For the JUN car, and any other similarly modified machine, it is great at going top speed on a salt flat but absolutely sucks at everything else.
With a Veyron you can drive it around all day in total comfort and luxury with no worries, and at the same time you have unsurpassed power that will leave other supercars wondering where you went, with the kind of stability that allows you to use it all. No other car comes close, to find it dull would be to drastically underestimate it.

 

[Tinkerbell]

I for one think Top Gear is a laugh ... and im a girl lol!

I agree that the John Prescott interview was well scripted ... but was still funny. I tend to like the Top Gear race's that they do between all three lads. I still think that the caravan holiday they did was the best thing they ever did, finally setting fire to it. Well scripted - definitely ... funny as hell - oh yes

 

[Glam]

I love Top Gear,in fact I love it so much I want to drive as fast as I can round the Top Gear track,and beat Sabine Schmidt round the Nurburg Ring! Yes the John Prescott interview were scripted,the whole programme is to some extent. Who really cares who new Stig is either? From what we've seen so far he's a damn sight better than Ben Collins ever was,some of you may disagree with me,it's just my opinion. The whole programme comes across to me as three school boys being let loose on cars and having the time of thier lives. If you don't like the programme then don't bother watching again,after all,it's only bbc 2s top show. James Mays bit of the moon buggy was brilliant,and I loved the look of that red Jag they showed. Well worth the license fee.

 

[Withnail]

I am in no way interested, and that's why i don't watch it, and that's why i don't really know anything about it, and that's why i don't have much of an opinion of it.

One thing i do know is

The Top Gear brand is extremely successful worldwide and makes healthy profits for the BBC

which is undeniably true - i very much doubt it is

the only profit-making show on the BBC

for which i suspect Clarkey may have to have words with Mr. Attenborough and BBC Bristol in general.

With our beloved Beeb under attack i fear we must take some rough with our smooth.

 

[Tinkerbell]

I love Top Gear,in fact I love it so much I want to drive as fast as I can round the Top Gear track,and beat Sabine Schmidt round the Nurburg Ring! Yes the John Prescott interview were scripted,the whole programme is to some extent. Who really cares who new Stig is either? From what we've seen so far he's a damn sight better than Ben Collins ever was,some of you may disagree with me,it's just my opinion. The whole programme comes across to me as three school boys being let loose on cars and having the time of thier lives. If you don't like the programme then don't bother watching again,after all,it's only bbc 2s top show. James Mays bit of the moon buggy was brilliant,and I loved the look of that red Jag they showed. Well worth the license fee.

 

[John Marwood]

The BBC is legally obliged to commission a certain percentage of its output from so called independent production companies

There is a new Patten emerging in this process

 

[MISS T]

I asked these very words Sunday morning, it's been a poor series overall with no new segments to the show and less about the tech/spec side of cars and more of the silliness of three increasingly irritating man (and I'm a Clarkson fan). To say 'some of the show is scripted' is mahoosively wrong, it's all scripted, in fact Clarkson was mightly peed off a few years back when the show won International Emmy in the Non-Scripted Entertainment category and cursed the man hours he puts into script writing every week, for it to go unnoticed, in America at least.
Seems a tad easy to say 'well just turn over, don't watch it then', think it's fair to say we've all been fans of the show for many yrs, when it goes off the boil I think 'we' have a right to complain...and as BBC 2s top show, we should be seeing better standards...we bloody pay for it after all.

 

[Jenksie]

To 'DB' I say - When does a critical opinion become a moan?

You have done exactly what I accused Clarkson of i.e. had a go at me from a predjudicial stance and not addressed any of the issues I raised (Unlike Shoes). Can't say I care much for Clarkson because I think he does a bad act of pretending to be a laddish boorish right wing oaf which I suspect part of him is.

I wouldn't have a copy of the DM in the House either.

Just because I critisise now does not mean I haven't enjoyed it previously. Cars are boring - compared to Cycles and Motorcyles but it's not about cars. It's not even about Motoring in General or even about AutoSport - certain bits of which I love.

It's about three increasingly tiresome middleaged bores and how they interact. As for the guests they are either pushing a product (book or film usually) or just dull or both. Boris Becker!!Alistair Cambell?? - I'd watch an interview with Hamilton or Button or Frank Williams or Rossi but come on tennis players from 30 years ago?

The continual denial that Motorcycles exist is also getting tiresome now.

To Clarky I say the Veyron is a concept. It doesn't exist except in the minds of marketing teams and petrolheads. You will never own one. Never drive one, couldn't afford one, couldn't insure it, couldn't service or maintain it. Not now and not in 50 years time even if you really wanted to. You could buy a German motorcycle tomorrow for 100 times less money and it would give it a good run for it's money.It doesn't exist.

The Atom however is worthy of a story. The BBC - funded by taxpayers - commission TG. How long would it have lasted on Men and Motors?

The Christmas special was the worst of all of them. The staged pranks are becoming more obvious. It's a Mexican stand off!

 

[Alan B'Stard]

so why watch it if you hate it so?

Agree, which is why I never watch it at all, can't stand it and actually feel that I have wasted 15 seconds of my life typing about it.

 

[Jenksie]

so why watch it if you hate it so?

Agree, which is why I never watch it at all, can't stand it and actually feel that I have wasted 15 seconds of my life typing about it.

Because it has been good in the past.

The Photography, production values are second to none.

Some of the guests have been interesting. I particularly liked the the MoonBuggy piece in last weeks show - the most expensive car ever built.

The challenges have been interesting: Racing a Steam train against a vintage Jag and a Vincient Black Shadow was particularly entertaining with some superb ariel shots of the UK. The Cycle, Boat, Drive accross London was good. The endurance race at Brands was great.

The Arctic and Vietnam specials were great TV.

I maintain however that the content has dived - the persistance with the laddish boorishness - the strain of trying to be edgy and dangerous and the staged pranks and in jokes and boring guests are killing it. Combine Harvester snow ploughs? Come on.

 

[toooldtorock]

Jeremy Clarkson - The Times (2003)?
I was explaining all of this to the man who edits my column. There was lots of puffed-up indignation and tutting. So we agreed that I wouldn’t write, as planned, about that Swiss yacht winning the America’s Cup and that I would write in defence of Staffordshire.
Sadly, though, I can’t. The problem is the towns. Stafford. Lichfield. Stoke. They’re all ghastly. And it’s all very well having the Can- nock Chase, but it’s named after Cannock, which would be the worst town in the world were it not for Burton upon Trent. Rugeley is a power station. Tamworth is a pig, Newcastle under Lyme is just confusing and Uttoxeter is hard to spell. All you can buy on the high street in any of these places is a house or a hamburger, and at night all any of them offer is a polyurethane tray of monosodium glutamate and the promise of coming home with a beer bottle sticking out of your left eye.

Tamworth is a pig!