Clarkson sacked - and now?

[cramorra]

The poll says it - I am personally sad as I really loved the show and the interaction of the three blokes was top notch.
I also agree whith their stance on a lot of the b...ks going on at the mo- political correctness, environMENTALISM, etc
On the other hand I think we all would not have gotten away with that type of behaviour at work and whilst I am sure we all felt at some stage "I....punch the Basterd" we didn't and we know it is not acceptable
I do not think the show will work without Clarkson or the others so not sure hat the beeb will do but wonder if the show up elswhere soon (just hope it's not sky...)

Edited by cramorra on Wednesday 25th March 22:10

[Stig]

Poll or no - surely there are already enough threads to discuss??

[cramorra]

Stig said:

Poll or no - surely there are already enough threads to discuss??

Given your profile your answer is 3????

[TUS 2 CON]

My guess is that they (Clarkson, Hammond and May) will move to another channel. Hopefully it won't be Sky meaning people have to pay to watch.

BBC will own the rights to the Top Gear 'brand'. So any new show will need a different name and changes to the format to not infringe the BBC's copyright. If it was ITV, they could call it "VTi" perhaps? Can't have another Stig, so how about getting Mark Webber in - "some say he's an Aussie G(r)it, all we know...."

[RicharDC5]

I'd vote the first two if I could, but there is no way he should keep his job after that.

[rohrl]

RicharDC5 said:

I'd vote the first two if I could, but there is no way he should keep his job after that.

Ditto.

I'd vote for both the first and second options.

[P-Jay]

If we want this thread to be even slightly different to the handful of others perhaps we should focus on what comes next?

James May has said they're a team other things that lead me to think TopGear won't appear next spring with him, Richard Hammond and A.N. Other following the same sort of format - which I think is for the best - in years gone by it's become a bit stale IMO, and for me personally it's not been 'must see TV' for a while.

I suspect Topgear fans will be the winner here, once the dust settles anyway - JCs agent's phone will be white hot at the moment with every broadcaster in the western world salivating at the idea of getting the sort of figures TG got globally - offering huge buckets of cash for him Andy Wilman and the other two (not sure where they are contractually with the BBC) to make GearTop, or TopFlix or whatever else - either way, the new broadcaster will no doubt not want to mess about to much and will pinch as much of the format as they can.

On the other side the BBC are keen to carry on with TopGear, I know everyone says Chris Evans, but he doesn't seem keen, but he's not the only option - despite no doubt owning the rights to things like Coolwalls, SIARPC and whatever else I suspect they'll go for a clean sheet

So instead of the TG we had until now, which IMO was getting stale we'll have two new ones!

The real winners though, will be the people who just love to go out of their way to try to highjack every thread on the internet about Topgear, just say how crap/scripted/fake/notenoughcars it is and how they never watch it - not because it's dead, but because they'll no doubt love high-jacking every thread about the two new series to say how they're not as good as the old ones.

[Truckosaurus]

What will be the short/medium/long term future of the TopGear magazine?

I believe it is currently the best selling of all the car magazines, and from my experience of it that's mostly due to the link to the television show and its (former) presenters rather than any sort of editorial superiority.

Will Clarkson/May/Hammond continue to contribute (ghost written?) articles and/or will their fanboys stop buying it?

Edit: Spelling.

[P-Jay]

Truckosaurus said:

What will be the short/medium/long term future of the TopGear magazine?

I believe it is currently the best selling of all the car magazines, and from my experience of it that's mostly due to the link to the television show and its (former) presenters rather than any sort of editorial superiority.

Will Clarkson/May/Hammond continue to contribute (ghost written?) articles and/or will their fanboys stop buying it?

Edit: Spelling.

I've not read it for a long time, but their columns aside they're not really involved in it - I believe it's run by Tom Ford of Fifth Gear fame?

It's far more 'car-y' than the TV show and has a different audience (with lots of cross-over) I suspect it'll carry on as-is and the columns will be replaced by whoever takes over the TV series.

[irocfan]

Call it:


Overdrive
Not for grown-ups
Adventures of Mr Toad

as long as it's well scripted it'll work thanks to the chemistry between the 3

[cardigankid]

P-Jay said:

Truckosaurus said:

What will be the short/medium/long term future of the TopGear magazine?

I believe it is currently the best selling of all the car magazines, and from my experience of it that's mostly due to the link to the television show and its (former) presenters rather than any sort of editorial superiority.

Will Clarkson/May/Hammond continue to contribute (ghost written?) articles and/or will their fanboys stop buying it?

Edit: Spelling.

I've not read it for a long time, but their columns aside they're not really involved in it - I believe it's run by Tom Ford of Fifth Gear fame?

It's far more 'car-y' than the TV show and has a different audience (with lots of cross-over) I suspect it'll carry on as-is and the columns will be replaced by whoever takes over the TV series.

I'm a subscriber, because it is intermittently well produced and the involvement of C, M and H lead me to think that it will offer interesting and different perspectives. They contribute articles and features as well as their regular columns. It does however have some basic problems:-
There is far too much advertising
The new car reviews at the back are lazy and repetitive.
They review far too many boring cars - I sometimes think they are competing with What Car
There are too many 'experience' articles which tell you little about the cars or the location. Poorly written travel journalism
They all try to write in the Clarkson idiom which only demonstrates how closely the whole franchise is tied up with the three presenters

If C, M and H are no longer to be involved it will probably be the tipping point for me and I will switch to Car or Motor Sport.

I do think that on balance the whole thing may be a cynical put up job as I believe that C sold his share some time back. I wonder what the purchasers thought they were buying?

[Smollet]

cardigankid said:

If C, M and H are no longer to be involved it will probably be the tipping point for me and I will switch to Car or Motor Sport.

I do think that on balance the whole thing may be a cynical put up job as I believe that C sold his share some time back. I wonder what the purchasers thought they were buying?

Well Motorsport is nothing like TG magazine as it's primarily about motorsport with a few car articles in it. The last copy of TG I read had virtually no Motorsport content whatsoever so I think Car magazine might be more up your street or perhaps Evo if it's still going.

[sparks_E39]

Smollet said:

Well Motorsport is nothing like TG magazine as it's primarily about motorsport with a few car articles in it. The last copy of TG I read had virtually no Motorsport content whatsoever so I think Car magazine might be more up your street or perhaps Evo if it's still going.

The last TG magazine I read was mostly adverts.

[cardigankid]

Smollet said:

Well Motorsport is nothing like TG magazine as it's primarily about motorsport with a few car articles in it. The last copy of TG I read had virtually no Motorsport content whatsoever so I think Car magazine might be more up your street or perhaps Evo if it's still going.

Motor Sport is a much more balanced magazine than you might imagine. It has a lot of good general interest articles. It often interviews interesting characters from the world of motoring, The motor sport content is not intensive (like Autosport for example) and a lot of it is about historic motor racing, which does interest me. there is quite a bit of classic content. Most of all it is more content and less bumf than TG. Classic and Sports Car has become repetitive and a vehicle for advertising. Evo and Octane can be good but again repetitive. Car is quite interesting. That's my thinking anyway.

[Hub]

Clarkson is now free to start his political career. Stand as MP in the coming election, with support from mate David Cameron, who has said he will not do a third term - Clarkson for PM in 2020!

[Smollet]

cardigankid said:

Motor Sport is a much more balanced magazine than you might imagine. It has a lot of good general interest articles. It often interviews interesting characters from the world of motoring, The motor sport content is not intensive (like Autosport for example) and a lot of it is about historic motor racing, which does interest me. there is quite a bit of classic content. Most of all it is more content and less bumf than TG. Classic and Sports Car has become repetitive and a vehicle for advertising. Evo and Octane can be good but again repetitive. Car is quite interesting. That's my thinking anyway.

I get Motorsport every month so I know what's in it and as I said it's primarily about motorsport articles with Andrew Frankel writing car reviews. Octane used to be a good magazine but that started to go off a bit so I cancelled it a couple of years back.

[/footnote]

Edited by Smollet on Saturday 28th March 08:42

[craig2003]

Clarkson was on the flight today to St Lucia with his missus, not in the best of moods either according to my back to back who was sitting in the row in front of him

[bridgdav]

Have Hammond and May been released from their contracts too..?

[dilbert]

I wonder if William Woollard is waiting in the wings?

[hidetheelephants]

irocfan said:

Adventures of Mr Toad

Surely this title is reserved for a documentary of Farage's progress toward world domination?

dilbert said:

I wonder if William Woollard is waiting in the wings?

He's no doubt getting a bit tired of doing endless stey corporate videos.