[18x03] February 12th, 2012

[18x03] February 12th, 2012


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Only thing that saved this episode was the brunette behind Jeremy during the news......mmmmmmm

edit: Oh yeah and Ryan Reynolds.....humina humina might be slightly gay.
 
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Panda/Corsa + News was great.
Ryan Reynolds was ok

Sweeney was one of the worst bit of Top Gear I've seen. Like the Sirocco segment it was ok for the first half but the second was terribly scripted and boring.
 
Ryan Reynolds was one of the best overseas guests they've had [Eric Bana was best].
The Sweeney bit just went on and on and on.

How long until the complaints start from the usual whinge groups about the family used in May's film ?
You just know some group will whinge.

BTW,who or what is Plan B ?
Is he a Pommie version of Vanilla Ice [white rapper] ?
 
overall a 7 from me. the movie bits were quite funny. was laughing by meself lol
 
Um, okay... I'm going to watch this again before I make any firm decisions on exactly how I feel about this episode, but for now I am feeling not overly impressed. I feel awful for not liking it as much as I probably should. I feel almost guilty.... It's my show. My obsession. My joy.

Panda/Corsa: I really enjoyed seeing James ride with Stiggy. This was a good segment, and it was wonderful to see James take the little Panda around the track. I really love watching James drive. Interesting test with the heavier passengers in the car, too.

News: Very funny and I do like it when they pick on Hammond for his finicky eating. Although who would have thought he'd even eat vegetables :p Picking on Jeremy for using scissors was very funny. See, Richard can be funny...

Sweeney: I'll watch it again and see if I can end up liking it, but right now I didn't like this segment very much. I thought Jeremy's part helped rescue this segment a bit for me. I really got a kick out of them showing them pushing the button down for the whole ten seconds, actually, things like that amuse me. There were a few funny parts that had me laughing (Hammond fighting with the director, Jeremy's Borat impression, Richard showing the director his first edit) but I cringed a bit during most of it. Sorry guys :( And I really do feel terrible for not being overly fond of it as TG does mean so much to me... I know Jeremy and Andy said this film was not going to be a petrolhead's cup of tea, but I'm not even a petrolhead.
 
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It was...entertaining, to be safe. I mean, we did get a fair warning from that transmission blog that this episode would not be for the petrolhead, so my expectations were much lower than the others.

James' review: Really enjoyable, as much as the Corsa looks cool, he makes a valid argument for those of us back on Earth to look for a car that can provide the fun at a slower speed.

News: Rather all over the place, but still laughs when they were poking fun at each other. >.>!

Star: Alright, not really much in the way of memorable though. <.<;;;

Sweeney: Not brilliant, while Richard wanted an action film, there probably wasn't really enough to really make one. Jeremy had the right idea, and it would work nicely. But why are there XFRs when they could have just got regular XFs and more of them?

In all, yeah, probably not aimed for us at all, missed by a big margin, but still enjoyable to watch, so I won't be removing it from my library. 7/10 :3
 
Ryan was awesome! A great SIARPC!

Not a fan of scripted Top Gear but it was better and more funny than I expected it to be. I'd still rather have unscripted Top Gear though, even if it's not car related. Heck, even just setting up scenes where things can go wrong and then letting it play out is fine by me (the long trips for example).
 
The reason the Sweeney stuff was so bad and unbelievable is because it was obviously dishonest. I mean, for the past 10 years these guys have MADE CAR FILMS FOR A LIVING. There's no way they don't know better than to behave like retarded children while doing so.

And that's what's wrong with so many of the shitty segments: they're dishonest. They try too hard to capture the brilliance of the boys making a serious go at something and the audience not being entirely sure about how it will come out. This is probably why the car films are usually so good compared to the not-so-car-focused films and why SIARPC is hit or miss: it's a damned sight easier for car guys to be honest about cars than it is for them to talk honestly about cars with people who aren't car bores. Or for anyone to make decent cringe comedy, for that matter. Because that's what the shitty film-making thing was: cringe comedy. It was a vapid attempt at forcing the briliance we expect (and frequently get, or we wouldn't keep watching) from TG with the result being yet another in the growing line of "hur hur we just want to remind you we're still ambitious but rubbish" segments.
 
I actually really enjoyed this episode, but its definitely the weakest out of the 3 so far. James's Astra segment was really entertaining I've never laughed so hard at obese people lol, also the SIARPC was very strong, it was good having a Canadian such as myself and quite a surprising lap time for not driving stick in a while, The director movie segment had some pretty entertaining parts to it, i really think all of them should keep there own characters though, i think the only real idiot is Clarkson, not Hammond.
8/10 not as bad as people are saying
 
The car chase part was good for a few laughs but I came away really disappointed.

We do have to remember that this show has to try and be it's best every week. And if one were to go back to season 1 you'd realize that in the beginning things weren't always that big budgeted and funny all the time. That said this episode was disappointing because they seem to be trying so hard to make big spectacle of the car chase film. When what they really needed was more down to earth stuff. 3 blokes going on a road trip and one getting his finger stuck in a hole in the bonnet. Those were the best moments of top gear.

Maybe it's an indication of how much ground topgear has covered. It's getting hard to come up with truly amazing new films where they go to amazing locations and do things. I mean we are talking about a show that's driven trucks in the arctic, biked across vietnam, driven in Indian, America, Europe and been in the bolivian rainforest and almost passed out at high altitude in the bolivia film. And the 3 presenters are getting old so I guess there's a limit as to what they can push them to do at this point.

Anyhow even with all that I still am hoping there are some more interesting things happening in the future for topgear.
 
Too much nonsense talking in the Sweeney movie segment, plus everything was obviously staged and utterly plain.

The guest in SIARPC was amazingly intelligent and funny, one of the best on the show.

James's car review was good. Liked how he ignored the hyundai! Still have no interest in the Panda though.

News was Okay.

So overall this episode was a minor let down for me comparing to the first two excellent ones in the series. An Okay 7. Please bounce back strongly next week!
 
I quite liked the episode, James's film great as usual (They better be joking with him being sacked from power tests), news was simply amazing, the Sweeney film was quite good even after all the scripting, it was certainly a lot better than the India special and a lot better than the crap that was series 14.

Also, don't tell me you didn't laughed when the director started beating the shit out of Hammond, even if it was a pretend fight.
 
The frustrating thing about the Sweeney segment is Clarkson and crew actually are competent, and it showed. When they were doing the segment on the roadway, it actually was well staged, quite intense and Clarkson - or someone behind the scenes, though he appeared to be in charge - did a great job. You could see that just from the way it was being shot, and it came through in the competent edit. If they had a segment of them doing a car chase sequence properly it could be really entertaining. Instead they had a whole bunch of other stuff that wasn't good, including the Hammond sequences that appeared to take place in an entirely different time and place. It's like they accidentally filmed Clarkson being good at something and got nervous, and made something that sucked.
 
I have watched it twice and it has to be a 6/10.

It has to be said, What were they thinking?

It started well and I like how James makes the point you do not need a lambo to have a good time in a car. But that sweeney thing went on for a week didnt it. The only part of that I really like was Hammond getting "beat up" because I was feeling like beating someone up myself.

They messed up such a good oportunity with that segment. They could have made the best car chase segment ever seen, and they decided not to. That was so disappointing.

Richard needs to tie one of those dish dash things on his head until that unfortunate haircut can be fixed. It has to be really bad if I noticed because I really just don't give a shit about those kinds of things, but just like a huge growth on someones face, there are a few things you are just going to notice.
 
And it drops back down hill for me.
The whole last bit was terrible.
Ok, I'll give it that even way overly staged that it was there was a moment or two that was funny. But much like the Christmas special it took so long to get those bits it just wasn't worth it.
Like hearing tires squeal over the car running on grass, hilarious ....but surrounded with just boring boring boring.
Thing is though, I feel like they were onto something with this whole routine. Like demonstrating the jag with traction control on versus off. Talking about why the car choices were bad. This had some real and actually interesting potential behind it. But it was just turned into a long boring gimmick movie commercial.
 
James' bit was okay, and the SIARPC proved to be far more engaging than feared, but the whole Sweeney bit was just awful- sorry lads, but that was just total shite. To me, that was worse than anything in the India spesh.
 
This was a pretty disappointing episode and it was for a poignant reason. Just yesterday I read an interview with Hammond in C&D. Watching this episode has inspired me to quote that interview - through this quote I hope to illuminate my disappointment.

C&D: Is Top Gear still about cars?
Richard: Central to the show - always has been and always will be - are the cars. It has to be. The moment you neglect the gear-heads, two things happen: One, they turn away and never forgive you. And two, the credibility of the show, the believability of it, the thing upon which the whole thing pivots is gone. There is no magic. Because, suddenly, we'd then be three guys saying, "Hey, we're going to goof around and do silly stuff." You'll never think of anything crazier to do than people can think of themselves. So it has be to be rooted in something. It has to be in the pursuit of something.

Ugh.
 
I wasn't expecting much from this episode but the Sweeney part actually made me laugh a few times. It's actually very helpful knowing that they're going to be assing around before hand. May was good, but I especially liked the absurdity of using Top Gear Cinematography Car Porn Method on a Fiat Panda. SIARPC was actually very entertaining and some of the girls standing around today were super cute. News was also very funny. Sweeney drags the episode down but it wasn't unbearable. 5/10.
 
Hammond needs to tone down his "comedy" big time. It's the one aspect of the scripted stuff I always dislike. And he needs a new haircut, because it's even worse than mine, and that's saying something!

And, on the off chance the TG guys read this, it's not that I'm totally against the fun stuff! Just that it could have been a lot better.
 
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