What is wrong with Fifth Gear...

[AshDav]

Who cares.
Watch it if you like it. Don't watch if you don't like it. And go to bed early, and brush your teeth and no snacks before dinner. Ok?

Anything else you need me to say?

[Howie696]

I know its the worst thread ever. I don't really do much sewing. I did notice in Top Gear magazine the other day an article written by Tom Ford. A coincidence? I still find Jason Plato completely insufferable. And I thought Clarkson's comments at the end of this last series were quite poignant.

[flydiscovery]

Originally Posted by Howie696

I know its the worst thread ever. I don't really do much sewing. I did notice in Top Gear magazine the other day an article written by Tom Ford. A coincidence? I still find Jason Plato completely insufferable. And I thought Clarkson's comments at the end of this last series were quite poignant.

Wait, HUH? The comments are random enough but what does sewing have to do with anything on this board at all?

[AudiV6]

BTW, they launched 5G Europe here.... which probably contains only one extra feature, that is Tim Schrick testing a car because D-Motor demised, now many of you think Germans dont have any sense of humor.... well at least Tim is doing well, the rest is just the same from 5G...

D-Motor was fun to watch... except the bits of Sabine doing a race against anyone with a different Type of car as she was testing, she wents some sort of ...cocky... (probably emancipation) but the rest was Fun, Tim was describing the cars he Tests the same way as Richard or Jeremy... only in German, and much faster... Carsten had the Humor of James in the olden days, if you watched some Classic-Top Gear episodes, when he appeared in short hair and a tweet jacked...

5G however is nowhere near as good as the other Programs, and I dont say this because I dont like it, its a fact... Too much, too hard trying, less own stuff...

[Fiorano]

Nothing wrong with fifth gear. It's just a different show.

[Reckoning]

Originally Posted by flydiscovery

Wait, HUH? The comments are random enough but what does sewing have to do with anything on this board at all?

Thread(s).
Cotton.
Needle.
Sewing.

[edkwon]

Fifth Gear fills all the car fact needs that TG has stopped doing long ago. I like it because it still tries to be factual. I rewatch older seasons of TG because i enjoyed that mix of factual and entertainment.

[FleeceLINER]

TG=buncha fools fooling around
FG=buncha guys racing around.

[ninjacoco]

I think someone said it best when they said that Fifth Gear is "too rushed." I still enjoy the show, but it feels like I'm watching a version of Top Gear that forgot to take its ADD meds sometimes. I'd like it a lot more if they spent more time on each bit.

[Leprechaun Fart]

The only time I've actually watched a full FG segment was when they had Ecto 1 on for a test drive. I even managed to stifle my rage that that knobhead Derek Acora was within 2000 miles of such automotive pornography.

[kurthest]

The biggest problem with Fifth Gear, especially the later seasons is that they have tried to make segments like Top Gear did 5 years ago, except they do it much worse.
And Tim Shaw. What an absolutely terrible presenter. Why do they still use him?

[Tzarrim]

Tim Shaw and VBH, to me those two are the problem.

Tom Ford; great
Jonny Smith; great
Jason potato; nothing wrong with
Tiff; not my style but worth it
Jon Bentley; odd but interesting to a point

As I see it; Tim is a fake joker nono and VBH tries to hard while acting like a 5 year old.


To each their own ofcourse.

[camelfarmer]

Yeah tim is so bloody annoying that I sometimes switch channels to avoid him. Five need to open their eyes.

[Zerias]

*reads through the thread* ... I wouldn't call this the worst thread ever... not even close to bad ones I've seen before.

I do think the original poster's question is a good one. The case in point for me was the 5th Gear special where they were going to take a car and put it through a loop. A car, a standard car, going upside down, in an amusement park loop. How could this NOT be exciting? Throughout the show though... I was bored. Flat. Out. Bored. The Fifth Gear production team had managed to take one of the most exciting things I could think to do in a car (that's legal) ... and turned it into a yawn-fest. What really grated on me the most was how their expert stunt-driver kept acting like a complete and total moron... over stuff that as a stunt-driver, he should have known. It was like watching a film-production aimed at Grade-school kids.

On the opposite side of the spectrum, when James May did his anniversary of the moon landing programs, most people watching knew that James was something of aeronautical buff going into the program. When he went through the Science and maths parts of the programs, it wasn't like viewers were getting fed the information on a spoon.

Keeping on the opposite side of the spectrum, there was Richard Hammond's meeting with Evel Knievel... perhaps the most cringe-worthy and awkward production I've ever seen featuring the current Top Gear presenters. It's production was nowhere near as aweful as the 5th Gear productions I've seen.

Now, I will admit I am partway talking out my rear-end on this since the amount of 5th Gear episodic content I've seen in full can be counted on just one hand. Everytime I watched it in the past I've been struck by the sheer dryness and lack of charm and wit. Fifth Gear... isn't my cup of tea. However, there are lots of people who Top Gear isn't their cup-of-tea either. There obviously is room in the television market for a facts only, dry as it can be, boring, spoon-fed television show about cars. Fifth Gear seems to be able to handle that market segment... quite nicely.

[Jakain]

The problem with Fifth Gear is similar to Clarkson's beef with German/Japanese cars - they lack soul and personality. Fifth Gear's hosts are all much too nice and artificial, they feel like a bunch of cardboard stiffs compared to entertaining shows. Its not impossible to be both entertaining and super-nice as seen in Jay Leno and the like but you need to have at least some charisma. Don't get me wrong I do find a lot of their stuff interesting and cool to watch but they're just not entertaining.

Shame too since Tiff is a much better driver than any of the hosts on TG.

[Mr. Nice]

The problem with Fifth Gear is that too many fanboys of Top Gear who are not car enthusiasts try to watch it, and then come on the internet and out themselves as people who pretend to like cars.

[Tzarrim]

Originally Posted by Mr. Nice

The problem with Fifth Gear is that too many fanboys of Top Gear who are not car enthusiasts try to watch it, and then come on the internet and out themselves as people who pretend to like cars.

So you're saying Tim Shaw is a good presenter and doesn't at all make you want to switch channel whenever he shows his face?

[bone]

problem with fifth gear is the studio parts, tom ford and that other loser who clearly have never driven a fast car, discussing how it's understeering and how the engine is this and that.

they just should stick with how good it looks, caus for the rest they have no idea what they're talking about, it's obvious all lines are memorised and it just sounds weird comming from their mouths

[Sascha77]

What is wrong with Fifth Gear...

Not that much, in my book.

For me, one of the problems is it tries too hard to be Top Gear (and fails to be honest). The presenters aren't as funny, cool or charismatic as Clarkson & co, and somehow what they think about the cars just doesn't seem relevant.

A fair observation, I kinda felt the same during the last season. FG, for me, always has been about reviews you can use. TG hasn't done those kinda reviews since...hmm.. I'd say sometime around 2004/2005 (their Golf V GTI review was one of the last useful ones I remember).

They also seem to review cars after Top Gear has already done (a more comprehensive & better) review...

Having worked in motorjournalism, I can easily explain that one: The bigger/more popular a publication/show is, the easier they can get their hands on new cars/expensive cars quickly. I mean: You don't see the Bugatti Veyron driving around on FG, TG had it on the show at least four times IIRC. The manufacturers only have so many cars in their press-car-pool and naturally they want to make sure that the mags/shows with the most readers/viewers get those cars before everyone else.

No-one seems to have noticed that Jason Plato is a git! (In my humble opinion...) Am I missing the point, is he a god of the wheel? Has he won so many races that his opinion is not to be challenged? When he drove the Mini Convertible the other week, he described it as 'a tart's car', or words to that effect.

No offense, but it *is* a tart's car. An MX-5 may be borderline girlish, but the ragtop-Mini definetly is not a man's car.
That said: Plato does come over a bit snobbish from time to time. Not my favorite presenter on FG.

Fifth Gear needs to stop trying to be another programme and to find it's own identity. And to stop ripping off Top Gear features (anyone remember the Toyota Pick-Up/how tough is our old Mercedes Estate coincidence?)

Again: I agree completely. TG has the cocking-about-thing covered very well and has been doing so for quite some time now. Trying to emulate them will only make you look bad and unoriginal.


S.

[CD82]

Originally Posted by Sascha77

Having worked in motorjournalism, I can easily explain that one: The bigger/more popular a publication/show is, the easier they can get their hands on new cars/expensive cars quickly. I mean: You don't see the Bugatti Veyron driving around on FG, TG had it on the show at least four times IIRC. The manufacturers only have so many cars in their press-car-pool and naturally they want to make sure that the mags/shows with the most readers/viewers get those cars before everyone else.

As far as I can remember Fifth Gear actually had a Veyron on a track some time before Top Gear even did the Veyron vs Plane race from Italy to England. Granted, Top Gear has featured Veyrons more often after that... (race (jeremy), top speed (james), against a zonda (stig), against the RAF (richard), against an F1 in Dubai (Richard))