[01x03] October 13th, 2008

[01x03] October 13th, 2008

  • Total voters
    183
cdougw said:
Haha and dont get me started on the filming of the Track.
During the chicane do they film like a kilometer away, or what?
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TGUK had the same problem. Took a couple of seasons to get it right.

What they need is some cameras very close to Clarkson Corner and the Question mark, with a Camera mounted on the walls at the chicane, just like the follow through. There needs to be a feeling of speed.

Honestly, I feel I could go out there, set it up far better than they have. That said, I'm pretty amazing! *blushes*
 
Tranquillizer said:
The best part of the show was news segment and also the BMW review by warren. He was spot on. i wonder why most of the cars for review are Victorian registered.
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BMW, Benz, Honda, Ford, Suzuki's southern region and Holden all call Melbourne home.
 
Mr Snow said:
And warren should have taken the BMW down a rough track rather than on a grassy knoll. Although he did give an opinion which was good.
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Still, it would have been nice if he'd shown how ridiculously pointless the X6 is. He failed to mention that for its bulk it's a four-seater and the back is only suited to short people, that the fastback makes luggage capacity piss-poor, the heavy low-speed steering and so on. As for turbo lag ... it's a twin-turbo. Lag is hardly noticeable, and with the sport button on and the shifter in sport mode it lifts its skirts better than Cox does.
Compare the X6 with the M-Class Benz that even with the off-road pack can only wade through 300mm of water ...
 
The X6 review was funny and very good imho.
Im still not so sure about the shorter guys voice and the main presenters hand movements.
 
am I quite right in saying that Warren >>> the other 2 guys.

I've only seen the first 2, and "Aussie James May" is to me the main attraction of the series.
CC is annoyingly loud, and Steve is overexcited at everything....

still, it beats Fifth Gear hands down!
 
I can't even remember what I voted, 3 maybe a 4.

The start was ok and promising, the first bit of the cheap car challenge was quite interesting and it built up some "suspence" as to what was to come. When it came it was more "look we can hoon about making fun of Warren". TG Uk would have got all three cars going then had some challenges but no, yawn factor 1.000.000.

Warrens X6 was ok, silly BMW should have called it "the bling" as it's just neither this nor that. Nice looking but rubbish in whatever environment. And why doesn't TG pick that up? It's just a play thing for the investor who doesn't know what to do with his spare cash, even the many beepers show it's built for the US market.

The "black" being driven on aussie roads doesn't do it justice, in OZ you get more potholes and bumps per foot than a European road has per mile.
Jeremy drove one and the passion he throws in to presenting the car is 100x better then Steve the whiner who obviously hasn't got the faintest about driving a decent bit of kit.
It's not built for Australia, it's not even a track day car, just a nice cruiser for the same cashed up guy who'd buy an X6.

The SIARPC bit was the worst bit of TV I've seen in a long time, the star isn't funny, should be shot for calling herself a comedian as she's not got the faintest about humor but tries to make up for it by being all attention deficit disorder with the crowd, and on top of it she can't drive so wtf get her on TG? What did she pay or who is paying you to promote this kind of crap "celeb"?
I for one don't blame Cox not knowing what to do, she's trying to flirt with the crowd to at least get someone to like her. so WHY so looong..

All the uk TG's are much more believable and much more rounded off, more decent conclusions, better finish to things and a LOT more realistic enthusiasm.

It's like the challenge, it almost feels like Warren sat down and wrote the first bit and then Cox and Steve come along "you still writing? lets just hop in and crash about and call it a day" which is exactly how most of it is filmed, lets just grab loads of time with the star to fill it up, who cares what she says.

Summing up: yeah the start was promising but the only reason i'll switch it on next week is to see how they screw up the whole TG concept next time, give me more Warren and less ford holden mates in the bush cringe factor.
 
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SO much better!

SO much better!

I've been watching the series since the start (haven't we all? :D ) and I'm just seeing continuous improvement.

First, Charlie. He's shouting less, coming across as more natural to me. I feel like he is beginning to take on his own persona rather than "Australia's Jezza." His weakest area remains his interviewing style in my eyes, doesn't seem to have Clarkson's ability to improvise on the spot for comedic effect.

Steve is definitely growing more and more on me. Just as with Charlie, I'm seeing more and more of *him* rather than "Australia's Hamster." I was especially impressed with his opinions on the CLK Black, considering that many of them ran counter to Jezza's review in TGUK. That kind of gutsiness shows me that the show won't just become a TGUK clone.

Warren, as always, rocks. He is very good at presentation, I love his integration of his cartooning into the show. I did indeed burst out laughing when he started desperately thumbing through the owner's manual in the challenge segment. The X6 segment was interesting, but I felt it was missing something.

My current biggest gripe with the series is the lack of exposition on the track layout. I did appreciate Steve and Charlie explaining during the CLK Black's lap a few of the track's features and subsequent significance towards achieving faster lap times, but they will need to do more than that. I think an inset map (like on S1 of TGUK) would be wise for the first season or so. And I agree 120% on the camera angles, they definitely need higher mounted cameras at the named corners (Question Mark, Clarkson's Corner, Bus Stop, etc.)

Altogether, I am pleased at the development present throughout the studio segments of the show. Does anyone else have an impression that SBS or TGAu staff are implementing changes based on posts like this on our humble forums? Maybe Viper or SL know ;)
 
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Ok, still only gets a 2 from me, but it's obvious they are responding to feedback...

Cox 'is' shouting less, Charlie has taken a chill pill, and Warren is acting more normal, and acting less.

But, even with them acting more like themselves, Cox is ok, Warren could become passable, but Charlie even possibly being more normal, is not a TV grade host.

They also are being really vague on all car tests, they won't draw any conclusion, or go so far as to say they hate something, even just to perhaps bag a part of it we know is rubbish.

To be fair, as the industry stands here, you can't bag cars here, and no one has ever pushed it far enough to expose how full of crud it really is.
If you bag cars in this country, you end up with lifetime bans on ever getting a test car from that company again, many well known and respected people here are banned from getting any test cars from many companies, sad but true.

The result is if Top Gear Australia spoke their true mind about all cars tested, they would run out of cars to test real fast, I was hoping they could change that, maybe with more time, but we will have to see, so far it's weak sauce...
 
Havent watched this one just yet but i like where the series is going. Obviously not as good as the UK version and i like DMotor from germany and fifth gear a bit more but it is still far far better that i thought it was going to be and i think they are still sort of feeling around and seeing how they want the show to work. Yoiu have to remember the UK programmes are into their like 13th and 15th series now so they know the drill. I think it is going to keep getting better.

Also i found this torrent for PiXs internal rip. I like the best quality i can get for car shows. Thought i would whack it up as if we get this torrent with loads of seeds like the usual finalgear torrents then it will save viper a bit of time and bandwidth. He seems to do so much around here already. It is in rar. format but all you have to do is click any of the .rar files and drag the file onto your desktop. Let it do its thing and then it will be a normal Xvid file on your desktop. You can delete all the old .rar and store the .avi as usual. If you really want me to i will upload an unrar'd version but i can assure you its not difficult.

NO TORRENT TALK

Although the link is to "Mybittorrent" the actual tracker for the torrent is piratebay.

Enjoy!
 
Better than last week, but still not that great IMO.

The black review was pretty good but it still lacked tech #'s. Why is the black heavier even though it has lighter stuff everywhere? Not everybody watches TGUK so for that part of the public (the ones they need) they are left in the dark. Power #'s, acceleration times, top speed and so on. Without that it doesn't seem like a "full review" for me.

Both reviews still feel sugar coated as to not make anybody mad. My biggest worry with the knock offs seems to be true in Aus. If a car sucks on the street and sucks off road rip it apart. Don't try to make BMW happy, "I don't really like it but it's not too bad"


The concept of the challenge was good. I like the idea of getting something from a junk yard. But a quick drag race and a 4 lap short track race for challenges? C'mon guys that's the best you had?

7/10 I guess.
 
For me, the episodes have been 7, 7, 6

Having said that, the episode actually WAS improved over the last one. It was good to see Steve and Warren do their reviews, but, once again, it felt as if I was reading one of the middle paragraphs of a 4 page essay (at least in the X6 review). Steve's was better, and felt like a proper (ish) car review, something that we've not seen in Top Gear in a very long time.

Charlie, on the other hand, was a tad forgettable, and I felt their Junker clip spent too much time on the "picking and fixing" part, with not enough emphasis on the cars themselves. They just felt like props in the segment. I also didn't like the blatant scripting of the race, where Warrens passenger side door magically opened so that Charlie could hit it.

I know all I've been giving here is a bunch of complaints, but the reason I say that the show is still improved, is because the hosts are relaxing up more and more, and that will be the biggest thing to drive this show!
 
They should of dropped the Black review and had more things in the Challenge.
 
The second part of the challenge ended way too soon I think. I still think they should have spent more time on that segment, as the first part was quite convincing.

6/10 from me.
 
Well last week I gave the show and 8, but this week I give it a 7, but only for minor little quirks.

First off the AMG Black test. Now there was nothing wrong with the test itself, it was the video. It looked as though I were squinting at it, the way they presented it. I thought I was getting astigmatism (no pun intended).

The X6 review was....boring.... I found myself skipping to the end about halfway through, after he started speaking German in the mountains. I dunno, there just wasn't any 'spark' to it.

The star this week, while cute as a bug's ear, was near annoying with her energy. When she hugged Charlie at the end, he had the look on his face as if 'Oh god, she's touching me!' lol. But overall, I think a pretty good segment.

The challenge this week, I have to admit while it was fun to watch, didn't really serve any useful purpose aside from three guys putting together junkers, racing, and beating the hell out of them. Good fun, but no rhyme nor reason to it.

So while I enjoyed myself watching this episode, I'm afraid it's not the 8/10 worthy that it was last week. So a 7/10 it gets.
 
Watched it again, like you do.

And I've decided the Paddock Basher Challenge was possibly the worst thing I've ever seen on TG, EVER!

Steve's car wasn't really a taxi. It was a white S-Pack.
Why was Wazza tailgate up?
Why was Steve's car mis-firing?
Why was Charlie's roll cage not mentioned?
Why couldn't they get Wazza's wagon going? (absolute Cardinal Sin!)
And really, what was the challenge?

NOTHING!!!

How hard would have it been to make a simple motorkana circuit with a few cones? A couple of cut-out plywood kangaroos to dodge? A taxi rank for Steve? A circle-work pad? A drive-through bottleshop? Anything!!!

What a bloody disgrace! What a total waste of three cars to set up one gag with Warren's door open.

/rant
 
My internets at home decided to go poop itself, so I?m having to post this from work.

I give 1x03 a 6.

The cheap car challenge was far too short and the SIABSC was far too long. It felt like filler, and Julia Zemiro was absolutely painful. I can cope with her in controlled doses, but for that length of time she is hard work to watch.

The CLK63 Black Edition & X6 pieces were very good. I felt that Warren may have been somewhat hamstrung by the script writer acting as a firewall between his brain and BMW?s PR people, as I get the impression that Warren had a ?what were they thinking?? moment when reflecting on the X6. Kudos to Wazza for acknowledging the precedent of totally pointless off-road ?sports cars? in the Suzuki X-90, it shows that someone there knows something about cars. That said, both of these films were excellent.

The improvements in Steve and Charlie?s ?live? stuff are obvious, and Warren also keeps on getting better. In Warren?s case, it?s not as noticeable as the other two were coming off an obviously lower base, therefore their improvement appears to be more dramatic. But I'm liking Steve more and more.

I guess I?m marking this a bit harshly because I was expecting so much more from the cheap car challenge. Well, a bit more than a drag race and some paddock bashing. That, and Julia Zemiro is irritating. Now, if the SIABSC was Myf Warhurst :wub:, then I?d happily give the episode a solid 9/10 ? :D
 
NooDle said:
...and Steve is overexcited at everything....
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He still was this week, but nowhere near as much as in first two.
And he was (surprisingly) tame in the CLK Black review.

Then again I suppose it's all a matter of interpretation.
 
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