Top gear returns 8:00pm (BBC2)

[Allen]

My Dad thought Clarkson just drove off, hehehe! And I meant Exige, not Elise.

What was that comment about the Focus RS though? They said it never came? Err, YES IT DID, it was just limited though! I've seen plenty around here though, too many rude boys about! Fiesta ST looks a bit tasty, shame about the name!

[dkmech]

It never came as a 4wd road legal rally car (ie evo or scooby like). Of course they know it came out, as they tested it. But it just wasn't the full on cosworth experience they wanted even though it was jolly fast.

[Allen]

Hmm, I thought the Cosworth was different to the RS. They spoke about the RS right? Isn't a Cosworth in production somewhere?

[Rave]

Right, well I'm going to be the lone dissenting voice by the look of it. I reckon the studio format of the show is a total waste of time, really it adds nothing to the show. Clarkson is a great entertainer when he's just making a program, but his chat show was crap and he's no more entertaining talking to randoms in the audience on Top Gear. The features are cool still, but overall the show tries way too hard to be 'laddish' and fails.

So the Scaglietti is disqualified from coolness because it's designer was named Ken is it? Right, well by that reasoning the DB9 is disqualified, because 95% of the cars they sell will be bought and driven by w***ers.

TBH Fifth Gear might not have the visual flash and gimmicks of Top Gear, but it fits more interesting stuff into half an hour than Top Gear manages in an hour. Next week I'm going to video Top Gear and fast forward past all the crap.

Rich :¬)

[Skii]

Right, well I'm going to be the lone dissenting voice by the look of it. I reckon the studio format of the show is a total waste of time, really it adds nothing to the show. Clarkson is a great entertainer when he's just making a program, but his chat show was crap and he's no more entertaining talking to randoms in the audience on Top Gear. The features are cool still, but overall the show tries way too hard to be 'laddish' and fails.

So the Scaglietti is disqualified from coolness because it's designer was named Ken is it? Right, well by that reasoning the DB9 is disqualified, because 95% of the cars they sell will be bought and driven by w***ers.

TBH Fifth Gear might not have the visual flash and gimmicks of Top Gear, but it fits more interesting stuff into half an hour than Top Gear manages in an hour. Next week I'm going to video Top Gear and fast forward past all the crap.

Rich :¬)

You raise a fair point there Rich, the Cool wall I just don't understand at all, there is no logic to it whatsoever, I have to say I looked very puzzled when they talked about Ken the designer - like that would have any effect on how cool the car was.

The Apache bit was thoroughly entertaining but 100% pointless, A tank busting helicopter trying to get lock on a glorified go-cart seems an utterly pointless endevour that doesn't really show off how well the car handles as there reallty isn't anything to compare it to. For all we know a Citroen Saxo or a VW Lupo could have fared the same !

It isn't the consumer program it once was, after all drag racing Harrier Jump Jets and sticking N02 in a stripped-out Jag is hardly of any value or interest to the Car buying public, or a supercar that costs the equivalent of a respecteable starter home, but its entertaining, and it does admittedly grasp me for the full 1 hour duration.

The cars they seem to spend the vast majority of the shows reviewing tend to be the fastest/most expensive marques money can buy, doubtless if I was
a merchant banker or premiership footballer I'd find the programme not just entertaining but also useful.

To be honest Clarkson could do a show on Foot cream and I'd watch it, and no doubt it would be thoroughly entertained, but this isn't top gear anymore - 'Jeremy Clarksons Mad Mad Motor world' but not Top Gear.

[Butuz]

At the end of the day - the program is just catering for its market. The vast majority of people see citroen saxo's, rover 25's, ford focus's day in day out. they do not then want to see them reviewed in every detail for an hour.

What they want to see for an hour on a sunday night at 8pm is rediculous fast expensive cars being thrown around a race track with an apache chasing them. The sort of stuff you don't do or see everyday. I havent yet had the chance to hop in a DB9 and race a TGV to monaco - so i watch it on top gear instead. That is exiting TV.

If you wish to see reviews of mundane family cars i suggest you pop to the nearest garage and take them for a test drive, coz frankly no one else gives a stuff, i do not care how well a megane drives, nor do i care about the new city rover.

But thats just me

Butuz

[plaz]

Fiesta ST looks a bit tasty, shame about the name!

Whats wrong with the name?

[Howard]

Absolutely. If I wanted to see boring family cars being driven I'll go and sit on the wall outside my house for half an hour

It's very entertaining, and I find Jeremy Clarkson, and the whole chat show part, very funny. I was laughing yesterday anyway

[Butuz]

Whats wrong with the name?

They should have boasted about its fuel injection!

Fiesta STi

I hope they make a deisl one too!

Fiesta STd

Lol

(they should have called it the ST150)

Butuz

[Skii]

Hey guys i'm not saying turn it into a family-car fest, I'm saying there doesn't seem to be the same amount of balance as it did when the new series first took off, nothing about 2nd hand cars, bargains, etc, just supercar after supercar after supercar now.

They seem to be losing their way and turning it into justy a show about caning fast expensive cars around deserted runways, don't get me wrong, its still hugely entertaining still, but it isn't Top Gear.

Its hardly like they can't do more stuff about averagely priced cars and still keep the show entertaining and funny now is it ?!

[dkmech]

ST=sanitary towel

As for the focus RS - when it was anounced many expected a replacement for escort cosworth - something outrageous, rally-bred and 4wd. It turned out to be something fast and great, but more of a hot hatch, than a rally car, even if it was very fast.

As for the program itself. I love it. I watch 5th gear too, but i do like top gear very much and i will watch almost everything with clarkson in it as its so much fun.

I once saw a bmw something or other review in some Channel 5 proggy (couple years ago now) and that almost killed me. It was the most boring thing i ever see about cars. While it probably was very informative it was absolutely dire. I would take an Apache vs Exige item any day of the week.

As to how pointless that item was - there is no point in racing an f1 car against a jet either. You just measure acceleration characteristics and find a point where the plane overtakes the car and you are sorted. But its entertaining, its fun, so why the hell not do it.

[dkmech]

Its hardly like they can't do more stuff about averagely priced cars and still keep the show entertaining and funny now is it ?!

The cityrover bit was both entertaining and informative. And its one of the cheapest cars. Plus its the first show back, they need to enter with a bang!

[Allen]

Whats wrong with the name?

I was totally confused when they asked the girls in the audience. But hey, who cares, what girls are gonna drive one anyway?

[ken]

fully agree with Rave. i used to be a fan of Top Gear but it was never Jeremy Clarkson who made it. he was just a part of the overall appeal. i prefered the profesional opinion of Tiff or even VBH. Jeremy Clarkson might have a few funny comments but the majority of the time his comments are 'agree with me' or 'i will bully you' type humour. How any programme can waste half its time on a train race to france with the car stuck at motorway speeds is pitiful, and what was the point of the helicopter ??

The only useful part to Top Gear is the fastest lap, provided by a pro driver (or stig)

other car progamme's have much more enthusiasm, better biased comments and more detail than this, without this budget. another example of more tax payers money wasted to the man with a funny handshake..

[ken]

oh, and its not the name ken... this is a 'tag', for thinternet ....

[Angus]

I'm not surprised that Rover wouldn't let Clarkson have a CityRover. Would you give a budget reconditioned PII computer to a reviewer normally used to Alienware new releases?? No. That's why you'll see the likes of the ZT and the SV on TG, and not the CityRover (well with permission anyway ).

Personally, I haven't sat in a CityRover, or any of the competitors so I don't know how fair the road test was. I'm just glad it wasn't Clarkson tearing it apart.