[17x07] December 28th, 2011 [India Special]

[17x07] December 28th, 2011 [India Special]

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I thought it was good. I could see the gags coming a mile away but still laughed until it hurt.

I think they need to come up with something really big and different next time, after 2 or 3 specials the beautiful mountain roads and perilous city driving conditions are becoming a bit boring.
 
i'd say this is the worst of the end of year specials. In the end the "accident" bits (read scripted) outweighed the other parts too much.

This special didnt seem as much about the cars more going from one place to the next to do their "set pieces" (for lack of a better word). Felt like there was almost too much time of them being out of the cars.

Hamster's Mini was fantastic, its a shame about the stupid winch part.

The episode did have its highlights but it did not live up to the quality of Vietnam and Bolivia, and fell behind the Middle East.

I really hope this isn't going to be Top Gear returning to more scripted "accidents" happening. The last few seasons were really good.

6.5/10
 
The ending few minutes at the caf? were easily the most genuine, most interesting and funniest moments of the entire special. Nobody's asking for Top Gear to be a documentary, but the direction of this was in favour of Dumb and Dumber, which has already been done. A beautifully-shot bore.
 
Overall, I didn't like it that much, but it did have some good moments, and I did laugh out loud several times. (I didn't like the 3 wise men one either but just watched it again recently and I really enjoyed it. Will be interesting to see if this one gets better with age.)

I would have liked it to be about 30 min longer to see more of the country. WOW. I want to go now, but I don't want to go anywhere near a car.

I can't believe it was 90 min long and most of the interesting bits lasted about 1 sec. I wanted to see the guy with the snake. 2 seconds, over.

I think that first bit with Jeremy and James was done at least several times. James was not natural in it. I find James doesn't do acting very well, so you can pretty well tell when he is "acting" something out. He is a charm when it is his natural reaction. Not so much the second time around and I think that first bit must have been the third or forth time around.

I am one who does not mind a bit of scripting, after all, it is a show to entertain me, but even for me, this was too scripted.

This is not one of their finest shows, but somehow, I was still mostly entertained. I couldn't believe an hour and a half had gone by so quickly.

I knew the water fight was going to hapen by the way Jeremy was holding the hose, but I still liked watching it. I liked Hammonds new hair cut too.

I am not giving it a number yet because I want to watch again.

I think the bottom line is, the premise just didn't work. But it gave me a thought. I would like to see the three of them just go to India or where ever and make a travel type program about the country. They are all three so different, I think it would be great. They could drive cars if they wanted to, they could even do challenges, but let it focus on the people along the way, the country, the culture, the beauty. We got a tiny taste of that here, and I would like to see more.

The filming was the worst they have ever done, but I wasn't there. Maybe they did the best they could with the logistics and time.

I honestly did not see the banner mishap before it happened, I think I was still thinking about them almost getting ripped off that train, and yes, I did rolled my eyes, but I still smiled at what they said.
 
I didn't find it to be that bad, it was just a quite boring rehash of previous specials. The worst thing about it probably is that I didn't expect any different. No score.

And shame on you for ruining that exquisite Mini!
 
I think it was a funny documentary about India. Wait... Aint this show supposed to be about cars?

One thing is that they become more comercial over the years, but this didnt give me a shit when it comes to cars. The only thing was a hill race with some elephants. Come on Top Gear! Or plz change name.
 
It wasn't that bad, not saying it was great, but it had a few good moments. I did lol at the brake-horn bit, one of the better gags they have played on each other.
 
It did have a few good laughs, the banner, 13 quid, the mower when the credits rolled, perhaps a few more. But Top Gear should be more than a laugh.

Somehow it felt mixed up to me, didn't feel like I was on an adventurous journey. There was too much emphasis on manipulating each others cars, thats getting old. Can't really explain it, but it lacked a certain something emotional in comparison to previous specials abroad, maybe it's just that it has been done before. ( Leaving the 3 cars there is cool though, it could become a pilgrimage site of sorts for TG fans :D )

Also; james and jezza need to lose some weight.
 
Aston Martin said:
I hate spoilers more than I hate spoilers on anything with less than 600bhp.

Last years Christmas special had about 45 minutes of waste.
Bets on James crashing?
Not a V12 XJS?
3 great cars... Dicky wins.
Not bangers for once, should be interesting.
Please no TG comedy.
Ugh.
Mini roofs fucked.
25 minutes of waste already.
Didn't see that happening In the queue...
35 minutes of waste.
Fucking hell Jimmy nearly died.
I swear I saw the muff coming. :blink:
Its illegal to disperse aircon gas... I think
Hmmm not that great so far.
FFS Mexico isn't funny anymore, mainly because you pussied it at the time you short arse.
Who wrote the script, the Chuckle Brothers?
Its a bad version of Top Gear Ground Force, yeah I didn't think it was possible either.
Oh fuck you its not funny.


The worst thing I've ever seen, and I've seen Transformers 3.
Waste of 90 minutes.
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Have to agree here, too much blahblah and no actual funnies or interesting stuff.
 
I had to create an account just to post this, I fucking hate message boards. Mostly because the people who inhabit them are assholes. Just know I'll never read any replies to this before you point out anything.

If any Top Gear staff reads this;

I really liked this episode and thank you for your hard work. I know that in 2012 you will test cars, play with cars, talk about cars and do many things I won't get to do... with cars. And The Boys will do it. The great thing about your show is that we get to take a vacation with the stars to somewhere exotic and have fun! No other show does that! I look forward to every episode because it's relevant to my interests and you've found such a great group of people to make and present Top Gear. It's been a long hard year for me, as it has for so many of us, and for you to take the time effort to turn my favorite show into a silly, slapstick adventure is such a treat.

I get it! And Thank You agian.
 
What a waste of time (I stopped 2/3 way through, couldn't bear any more). They went to India to trash each others cars, spill other people's lunches, have water fights and generally destroy things they come in contact with. I expected to see something about India (I bet there's a lot to see) but all I saw was utter idiocy.

Just to add: South America special was something else. Makes me want to do something similar. I can't believe same group of people produced this.
 
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Solid but not Top Gear standard
The worst special so far
Too much scripted
The cars were to expensive and in good shape. Where was a Mini with 200k on the clock or a Rolly Royce with rust and Jaguar that will not start. These cars were starting every time. Not one failure exept when the had to get to the workshop :(
Some parts where still funny so I give it a 6 out of 10 but they can do way better.
 
TaPaKaH said:
those who watch Top Gear as an entertainment show will rate this 8+/10, me still seeing it as a factual programme gives it a 5
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That's where you're wrong. I like factual programmes, but I also like to be entertained. Probably just like most people on this site. This is the excuse that the people of TG have had when an episode gets bad reviews here. Oh the people on Final Gear won't like it cause it's not about cars. Bull***. We don't like it 'cause it's just not good. I don't need cars to be interested or to be entertained. It's just that Richard taking a corner too quickly and then (over)acting all surprised when everything on his roof falls off is NOT entertaining. It's not funny. It's crap.
 
It wasn't that bad, but then it certainly wasn't the best Top Gear special. A bit too much cocking about for my liking, but there were still some lol moments in there. Didn't think the cars would make the trip though. 7/10.
 
I had a row with my g/f (she wanted to watch Great Expectations - so I had to Sky+ Top Gear).

This turned out to be a blessing in disguise - I could FFWD through the boring scenes (numerous).

Worst TG special EVER. 4/10

Next series we need 80% exciting cars and 20% cocking about.
 
I enjoyed the last 30 minutes the best. The rest had me just waiting for it to be over.

I'm really quite content with the formula: Cheap car + Long trip
 
CrazyRussian540 said:
Not gonna comment on the episode yet, but anyone else catch this gem around the 10:05 mark?

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Perhaps now I will. Can't comment on too many specifics seeing as how I fell asleep. Actually. :(
 
Let's face it. The guys are getting old and lazy. I used to LOVE Top Gear until about 3 years ago, when there was a dramatic drop in quality, originality, and enthusiasm.
Some of the old series used to have 12-14 episodes (if I remember correctly). Now you get 6 per season, and the episodes are getting way to predictible, very repetitive. British cars are all great, even if they are terrible they still love them, Hammond's a midge, May is slow and gets lost all the time, Clarkson messes everything up but always ends up winning, and collectively they always fail no matter what they do... blah blah blah, boring boring boring.
I think the only people who are still entertained by these new episodes are the ones that are relatively new to the show.
Other than that, US Top Gear is an embarrasment, Top Gear Australia started off terribly, but then I thought the 3 episodes the second time around were quite good, but I may be the only one, because it got cancelled.
I'm a huge fan of old Top Gear, but I'm so disillusioned, I'm ready to give up on it altogether. I'll give the new series a chance, but I'm afraid I already know I'll just be disappointed.
It really is a shame, as I used to get excited months before a new series would start, and now I'm dreading it.
These 3 should probably retire, and the producers should take a huge gamble on 3 new presenters to inject some life into the show. It will probably happen once the ratings drop below a certain threshold. And the 3 new presenters will probably fail, and the show will probably get cancelled, because noone can replicate the original charm of these 3. Maybe replace them one-by-one. May would probably be the first one to go, then Hammond, then Clarkson.
Either way, it's sad to see something that so many people loved go to waste.
 
Usually I find these forums too harsh and unrealistic in its criticism of Top Gear. We have to live with the fact that they have to make a show that appeals to the masses, which often leads to cringeworthy segments for petrolheads. The thing with this episode was however different: I expected a good mixture of an epic journey and a some terrible slapstick comedy to please the casual viewers, especially because it was 90 minutes long. It turned out to be nothing of it all: the challenge had no real sense of purpose whatsoever, they took cars that were actually in great shape and they ruined it themselves (a disgrace if you ask me) and nearly every part was full of this appalling and predictable slapstick "humor". This was cocking about taken to the extreme and I daresay that it wouldn't have made any difference if they had staged this cocking about in a random European nation. It would have saved the Beeb an awful lot of money. I hope this isn't an omen for the upcoming series, it would be an awful throwback after such a strong series 17.
 
Finalgear: Where everyone is not amused.

For me, I quite find it enjoyable to see them on these trips and yes, there were lots of times when you wished they didn't put in the final film and yes they should've just stuck to 60 minutes.

But they still had cars and they still had the camaraderie between the three. Was there smut in it? Yes. Were there elements of scriptedness? Yeah. Were there moments that were genuine? Yes. Was it still about cars? If you go over the trading BS, then yes. Does it make me want to go to India? Maybe.

Quote of the episode: "Gandhi made us do it" I laughed.

9/10 is maybe a bit generous, but I find that Top Gear is a way of pure escapism and that we are way too spoiled.
 
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