[12x03] November 16th, 2008

[Mineworksfine]

WAIT A SECOND!

Right now I've got your attention, bearing in mind some of the less than positive comments so far about this episode and before you post your own I have a theory. Goes something like this.

1. The host of the biggest UK chat show gets himself suspended from the BBC for a stupid and childish prank.
2. Big Hollywood star is already booked to do an interview of a specific length on the BBC in order to plug his new movie.
3. BBC looking at embarassment and possibly private jet full of Hollywood lawyers bringing huge, expensive lawsuit for breach of contract.
4. Bright spark at BBC says "Hang on a sec, we can stick him on Top Gear and not get sued.
5. "But," says Wilman, "SIARPC is only about 9 minutes and Wahlberg's people are insisting on 12?"
6. "Tough," says Director-General of BBC.

So the Veritas piece gets dropped to be replaced by the Toyota i-Real and a hastily dreamed up studio piece to fill the gap.

Therefore if you are less than happy with tonight's show go and kick the shit out of Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand because it's all their fault.

That's my theory anyway.

As for my opinions some of the more subtle nuances really worked for me.

Hammond in the Paisley dressing gown - as soon as I saw it I was waiting for the "bet" gag and the anticipation and the build up was really well done. Agree the Dacia Sandero gag fell a bit flat 'though.

May chatting to Hakkinen and in asking him about air vents discovering where being Finnish ends and having OCD begins was priceless, and I love the way they are slowly building him up. Certainly makes up for how little we saw of him last series. He's turning into quite a driver - he'll be playing the bagpipes next!!

The V8 Blender - I know some people hated it but I have to admit it had me in tucks. Top Gear hasn't made me laugh so hard since Jeremy arrived at the campsite with a cow on the roof of his car. Reminded me of some of the things they used to do in the embryonic days of series 1 and 2.

Wahlberg - I was expecting to be totally unimpressed and hated the obligatory movie clip but was surprised at how much I enjoyed it especially the "different church" line. Would have liked to see the outtakes of him breaking the Lacetti(s) though.

Avantime - was a tad anticlimactic but still had its moments, my favourite being where Jezza and Hammond are persuading James to stay up all night to do the engine mods and are appealling to his OCD nature. "Can I have chips?"

All in all a solid 8, but I'll sleep on it and might even give it a 9 in the morning.

PS Massive rep for life to anyone who can get me the address and phone number of the cute girl who confessed to having a Brazilian!. WANT!

PPS Obviously I'm kidding, but boy is she going to get some stick at work on Monday morning!

[pimpinero]

The part with James and Mika was terrific. It didn't have the scripted feel like many of the other stuff on Top Gear these days. All the rest was only average. (that's average on a Top Gear scale, would be 10 points for every other car show though)
Definitely missed a proper review, they should have brought the Veritas instead of the Japanese wheelchair thing.
I gave it only a 7/10.

[kekekeke]

It's weird. I hated last weeks episode while everyone else seemed to love it. I enjoyed this weeks episode and there are quite a few here slating it. Weird...

[RSTurbo]

Saw the toyota thingy at the Goodwood Festival of Speed earlier this year, they are very strange indeed.

James in Finland was great I thought, anything with old Volvos is allways going to keep me entertained! Loved that Merc rally car as well.

V8 blender was ok but just went on for abit too long.

SIARPC was rubbish as allways.

Avantime was great, have allways liked them for the strangness. Would of been better split over the whole series as a small segment each episode though IMO. The BBK wasn't realy nessacery either, would of been better speding that money supercharging it or somthing similar. I now want a track prep'd one.

Overall a good enjoyable episode. I'll give it a 8/10, just for the old school volvo sideways action

[matt2000]

Originally Posted by Mineworksfine

Hammond in the Paisley dressing gown - as soon as I saw it I was waiting for the "bet" gag and the anticipation and the build up was really well done. Agree the Dacia Sandero gag fell a bit flat 'though.

May chatting to Hakkinen and in asking him about air vents discovering where being Finnish ends and having OCD begins was priceless

I thought those two bits were brilliant. Enjoyed the show as a whole, the guest was a bit rubbish and he can't drive for shit but so what. Enjoyed the challenge, nice to get technical again without too much arsing about.

I missed Hammond's part about the chair thing, just caught the end, but I'll be watching it as soon as I can.

I'd give it a 7/10 purely because of the guest. The rest was stop-notch!

[Bartg.pl]

Gave it a 10 just for James polishing his skills again ( which shows already this season, his sisu during Lorrying or Cadillac going through mountains ), cant wait for his powertest ( will it be Zonda F roadster ? ), Avantime bit was also very good without cocking about to much, and people claiming "where is biturbo-nitro-v12 in avantime" - they got 2 days, and putting 300-400bhp wouldnt get they close to posted time imho in bouncy suspension, standard brakes and all interior trim.

[idk]

For the first time since really really long i knew the guest... and he was really boring. Obviously he was forced to come and didn't really care...

Gave it a 6... Was an really middle range episode imo. Not bad, but not spectacular. A poll is useless when u don't use the whole range

Although i dont remember a episode that i would rate less then 5..... But the worst Episode ever should be defined as 1.. and the best as 10.

What does the system how it is at the moment tell me?

[WillDAQ]

Was I the only one thinking "gee, who is this douche with the pretentious surname who should have been on Ross, please can he crash the Lacetti and die"

There is nothing more un-Top Gear than Hollywood, I was significantly disappointed that Clarkson didn't start the interview with "You defaced the institution that is The Italian Job, get out now and don't come back".

[/rant]

Other than that, good episode 8/10.

[scabu]

isnt that avantime-engine basically the same engine as in the nissan 350Z only with 3L ? but... more power isnt good... because the car is fwd

[Crash Biker]

But they didn't "get 2 days" - they write the scripts. I would really have enjoyed seeing them buy a (for example) second hand Vauxhall Corsa and spending £5k tweaking it to see how close they could get to the performance of a Golf GTI, and if it took a week in the Top Gear Technology centre to fit a turbo then why not, it's pre-filmed and not in real-time. Would have shown the youngsters of the "neon underlights & giant stereos" customisation crowd how much similar sorts of money could do for their driving enjoyment as an alternative.

As it happens I love the Avantime as a car and was really sorry to see it fail, but why an Avantime for this particular task, why compare to such an unrealistic goal as an Evo? If the tweaks had brought it closer and closer to target then it could have built some tension but this was so far off they could have tried painting a racing stripe and had as much of a chance.

It's always fun to see the guys having fun and messing around so I don't pretend I didn't enjoy watching, but it did seem (like much of this programme) still good but slightly off-key/out of tune/mismatched.

Crash

[jack_christie]

Gave it 7.

Finland bit was good and the Stig's last lap in the Avantime was wild. The rest was a bit of a damp squib.

Why did they not put a turbo on the Avantime. Even if it blew up, the segement would have been alot better.

[Wyvern]

Originally Posted by Mineworksfine

WAIT A SECOND!

Right now I've got your attention, bearing in mind some of the less than positive comments so far about this episode and before you post your own I have a theory. Goes something like this.

1. The host of the biggest UK chat show gets himself suspended from the BBC for a stupid and childish prank.
2. Big Hollywood star is already booked to do an interview of a specific length on the BBC in order to plug his new movie.
3. BBC looking at embarassment and possibly private jet full of Hollywood lawyers bringing huge, expensive lawsuit for breach of contract.
4. Bright spark at BBC says "Hang on a sec, we can stick him on Top Gear and not get sued.
5. "But," says Wilman, "SIARPC is only about 9 minutes and Wahlberg's people are insisting on 12?"
6. "Tough," says Director-General of BBC.

So the Veritas piece gets dropped to be replaced by the Toyota i-Real and a hastily dreamed up studio piece to fill the gap.

Therefore if you are less than happy with tonight's show go and kick the shit out of Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand because it's all their fault.

That's my theory anyway.

You know, that might well just be it. As I said before, I didn't think any part of the show was bad, but it just didn't quite fit together and I couldn't quite figure out why. As theories go, it's a good 'un

[corradoboy]

Someone gave me negative rep and called me 'ricer scum' because I used to have an Impreza Even though in the same post I confided that I now drive a poor mans VW (Skoda)

Thanks for the '+' from the guy who agreed this weeks show was dire

[Heathrow]

Car Review: none as such this week. Toyota iChair or whatever, was only mildly interesting.

Challenge:
a) Renault Aventine – was OK though not a classic. It had some good bits of TG-ness in it but wasn’t the spectacular challenge fail that we like. (e.g. sinking Toybota)

b) Finland, Mika Hakkinen teaches James to drive. This was by far the best part of the show. The Folk Race was really good to watch and funny as well.

SIARPC: Mark Wahlberg interview was a bit mixed and I wasn’t sure if he knew what was going on. Maybe it wasn’t edited very well or something. He didn’t seem bothered really and when the clip was show I thought ..

“this better be a car based sequence”

.. but it wasn’t.
So only a fair grade on this.

News: This was pretty good I think, but I need to watch it again then edit this.

Miscellaneous segment: V8 Food mixer was quite funny, I loved that they fired it up in the studio. No Cool Wall, booo!

In summary, not as good as last week’s classic, but a good if slightly odd episode and still easily the best thing on TV all week.

7/10

[Cobol74]

corradoboy
I was a bit suspicious of you (I did not give the -ve rep btw) that you had not actually watched the show but were just trolling - apologies.

But such a low score - been taking lessons in scoring from Steve Leven by any chance?

[corradoboy]

I scored it as I saw it. I just didn't enjoy it as I should expect to enjoy TG. If the scoring is from 1-10, then there should be some low scores if they are deserved. The Polar Challenge, Veyron race and a few other specials may well be in the 9's and 10's, and good regular shows may get there, or settle in the very good 7-8-9's. Last weeks US trip was a strong 8 for me, bordering a 9, but it simply wasn't as good as other stuff I'd give a 9 or 10 to, so I voted fairly. The week before with the trucks I found too scripted, silly and irrelevant and so dropped to a 6. Those whom give every show a 10 are just not being honest about what they are seeing IMHO. Last series I would have given only S11E2 an 8 or 9, because it had several very good and interesting cars in well made articles. The other 5 were average at best, and even not that at times. You have to wonder if they're actively trying to move away from the original concept of the current format and try to recreate Last of the Summer Wine these days with their hair-brained cocking about. Sorry, I aren't trolling, I'm being honest about being regularly disappointed by a show I have loved and enjoyed for many years, and am sad about that.

[Mineworksfine]

Sorry to add more to this thread after the earlier essay but a couple of comments from http://transmission.blogs.topgear.co...as-it-for-you/

It would appear at least one vegetablist is also a Top Gear fan, but he/she was seriously offended by the V8 Blender.

Big fan of Top Gear! said...

That was very EVIL!!! when JC reved the v8 food blender with the poor inicent bucherd cow’s were blended in that way.I BLOODY HOPE YOU GO TO HELLLLLLLLLLLLL MISTER CLARKSON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Big fan of Top Gear! said...

Oh whydid i just put that in’ look i’m 8 years old and could’t help it i’m very sory Jeremy Clarkson**.But dont do enything ever ever so horible again to animals even if it is dead just give it some respect please.

An 8 year old vegetarian? WTF?????

[Kirsten]

I sincerely missed a proper review this week. However, the "steven hawking facebook" thing actually did cause me to cease breathing through laughter...

Absolutley loved James' segment in Finland - that was actually just awesome (for some reason Mika Hakkinen just makes me laugh).

I did enjoy the challenge this week, but must admit I thought the best bit was toward the end with the "now back to the studio". It just felt like proper, unscripted Top Gear.

And the SIARPC was alright - though as many, I am getting a bit sick of it now.
I just wish Mr Wilman would take note.

[LoadStar]

Easily the worst episode of the season... possibly the worst episode in a long time.

The Toyota chair was interesting... but as a lead story, no. It's the kind of story that they would normally have somewhere in the middle of an episode. For instance, they could have it to break up a longer multi-segment piece, like the muscle car one.

Moving right into the news was a bit weird. It felt totally out of place. In addition, the pacing felt a bit off as well, and more to the point, there really wasn't anything particularly interesting, amusing, or anything in the news this week.

The V8 blender was utterly stupid and a total waste of time. It had next to nothing to do with cars, and was only mildly amusing in the same way that a fraternity hazing prank is amusing.

Finally, the Renault modification story was rather dull. It wasn't one of their "how hard can it be?" segments where the totally screw the whole thing up, because they really didn't. Aside from the splitter made out of MDF, it was a fairly competent job. Since they spent all that time and money, did a competent job, and didn't accomplish anything, I was rather bored by the whole thing. It was like a DIY bit explaining how to get the most performance out of your car... except they forgot the part where they explained to the DIY'ers how to do the same thing, and they also forgot the part about getting the most performance out of the car.

5 out of 10, and I think I might be a bit generous.

[Almaster]

Finally they came here to Finland, country full of petrolheads!! Best part in Top Gear ever! More of this, please! I'm still waiting Top Gear to invite Häkkinen, Räikkönen or Kovalainen to their track!