The Grand Tour

[El Guapo]

I agree with all those saying Ep12 was comfortably the best so far.
However, it still feels too much like Old Top Gear in a new hat. I'm still hoping that they'll have the confidence to step it up in the next series.

[FiF]

Bit behind the times, sorry, only just watched Ep10, the Barbados bash.

Genuine LOL at Clarkson's pot belly when he jumped in the water to go snorkeling. Crumbs he'd win prizes with that at the county show.

[Alex]

bobbo89 said:

I want a car with launch control now!

Our Golf R Estate has launch control, and it is hilarious. Particularly with an unsuspecting passenger...

[MrOrange]

Rich_W said:

The strange thing about this episode is that it was filmed in April

And then they chose to air it on National Holocaust Day, with some references to Nazi Germany and the war. Odd choice, I thought.

[djdest]

I really do think the biggest shame them not taking advantage of the tent location.
It is such a wasted opportunity for them to meet up with some local car enthusiasts, see differing styles of cars/modifications for each place and have a go round some of the better local roads etc

[Shakermaker]

Doofus said:

Of course it did. The Jaguar doesn't compete with the RR or the Bentley. They could have put the two big ones up against a Cayenne, for instance (or perhaps the new XC90, if they really wanted to be informative), or the F-Pace against a Macan and something else.

I'm not sure why they didn't, but it made the 'review' fairly pointless.

F Pace versus a Macan?

Top Gear already did that...

[Doofus]

Shakermaker said:

F Pace versus a Macan?

Top Gear already did that...

So it was even more pointless as a segment then.

[Evilex]

I've watched all of them so far.
Wife gets an Amazon Prime due to work.

It's OK, but it's hardly a car programme. More light entertainment. If you could even call it entertainment.

Oh, and the visual style/s are too extreme. The tent scenes are OK, but the outdoor stuff is dominated by weird colour filters and vignettes.

I shall be interested to see if the new Evans-less Top Gear can do something different/better.

[Smitters]

At the start I found myself excited about Friday and the launch of a new episode. Come the end, I was fast-forwarding through the guff, looking for interesting bits as they skipped by. I so wanted to be a fan, but one of us has outgrown the other. Its not like youtube doesn't supply plenty of interesting, more car oriented content, but this just makes TGT seem, IMHO, to be an even greater staggering waste of money. Ah well. All good things and all that.

[cologne2792]

I watched the Maserati Bi-Turbo episode of TGT the same day I saw the electric Maserati Bi-Turbo episode of Wheeler Dealers - I really hate to say it but the WD episode was by far the most enjoyable and interesting of the two.

[SilverSixer]

djdest said:

I really do think the biggest shame them not taking advantage of the tent location.
It is such a wasted opportunity for them to meet up with some local car enthusiasts, see differing styles of cars/modifications for each place and have a go round some of the better local roads etc

Am I imagining it or did they do that in the early episode in South Africa? Seem to remember James May going out with some local car-abuse society in the dark, doughnutting old 3-series BMWs. Wonder why they didn't follow that theme and do other local pieces in the following episodes?

[bodhi]

SilverSixer said:

Am I imagining it or did they do that in the early episode in South Africa? Seem to remember James May going out with some local car-abuse society in the dark, doughnutting old 3-series BMWs. Wonder why they didn't follow that theme and do other local pieces in the following episodes?

I suspect schedules didn't give them time to visit some of the places twice (not 2 shows in a row, but shoot the film, edit it, then return to show it at a later date), but there is a very good chance this week's will have some local flavour, given its in Dubai and they've already been in the news for driving a tank through a shopping centre there.

[Register1]

That last Grand Tour was probably the best of the lot so far..

Looks like they are getting back into their old style again.


The Bentley on that off road track was amazing, all 4 wheels up in the air !

Great to see an improvement.

r1

[Bullett]

Shows we are all different. I found that episode utterly tedious, fell asleep.

[Car mad enthusiast]

So they spent all the budget on the opening first episode and also on the last episode which were both good IMHOP.

The other episodes were a load of crap.

[Emeye]

I'm sure someone said it wasn't the last episode.

[edwheels]

I've watched all the episodes now having just watched the final 2 back to back.

I think the Maserati challenge summed up the whole thing for me. Trying to recapture some of that old magic but missing the mark and becoming cringeworthy at the end.

Looking back at TG, the best features (IMHO) where the things like the original Cheap Super Cars and the 1970s British Cars Challenge. I can still laugh at Richard's Dolomite falling to bits on the cobbles and James with the false moustache on the 1 in 3 hill/handbrake tests. Comparing these episodes with the Maserati Challenge shows how it all went a bit odd.... like a pastiche of the best of the originals.

I dunno - really wanted to like it more I suppose. The "American" and the Brain Crash didn't help...

[Buffalo]

djdest said:

I really do think the biggest shame them not taking advantage of the tent location.
It is such a wasted opportunity for them to meet up with some local car enthusiasts, see differing styles of cars/modifications for each place and have a go round some of the better local roads etc

Agreed. What I thought the show was going to entail because of rent per location and what it did = 2 very different things. What's the point of going to a location to show segments from elsewhere?

[E65Ross]

Emeye said:

I'm sure someone said it wasn't the last episode.

Correct. There's another episode this Friday.

[Adam B]

Thought this episode was much better than most of them, reaching the lofty plateau of "reasonable", mainly because most of it was the SUV test where the spent a proper amount of time comparing the cars. The place names was the usual boring schoolground level of humour but the quarry race was good.

TGT continues to suffer from the format - it is strange they repeat some of the awful bits (celebrity braincrash) every episode as each tent audience is new, rather than considering the millions that watch on TV and see every episode. Obviously they thought it would continue to be funny but it seems strange they didn't realise in the editing that it wasn't and substitute other bits