7/10, because it had some real highs and lows.
Highs:
- Hot hatch comparison. Very much "old" Top Gear - straightforward, to the point. Nicely done.
- The news. Take away the prolonged handbrake turn bit (come on, you already did this in Season 13), and it too, was surprisingly straightforward, to the point, and about cars.
- Kia Cee'd part 1. The ol' "Mr. Needham" sensible reviews bit, eh? Well, unlike the others in that style, this one wasn't dragged out, and it actually showed Jeremy giving (gasp) factual information about the car. The Eric Clapton bit was just a nice cherry.
- The Mastretta. Don't look now, but not only did Top Gear just do a sensible review of a sports car away from the track, but Hammond actually was reviewing as though he was back in Season 4 or 5. Do you see, Andy? Let them just get back to doing reviews!
Lows:
- SIARPC. I don't mind Lewis. The interview itself was ok. But this gets a low from me because I do not believe for one second that time is legit. Either the car is now drastically dissimilar to the one driven in all the other F1 laps, or this was just fudged. You mean to tell me that Lewis is somehow more than one second faster than every other F1 driver -previous and current- who tried their hand at this car on this lap? I call complete and utter bull unless somehow the producers or JC can provide an otherwise legitimate explanation.
- Kia rugby. My god, it was long, boring, and just slow (until the very end, when it actually had some pace).
Of course this means I need to amend my scores from previous episodes in this series.
Ep1 was 7/10, now is 6/10 (because they weren't into it).
Ep2 was 7/10, now is 5/10 (because they had all the ingredients for a great episode, but because they weren't into it at all it really showed in the end result)
Ep3 was 9/10 and still is, because epic race, dammit!