Facetious suggestions, maybe, but a word of caution. Remember that JC is not averse to destroying "non-cheap" cars. Sure, the brunt of the destruction may have been felt by bland white-goods shitboxes, communist junk, Yank Tanks with jelly suspension and pious eco-mobiles, but remember that a Porsche 911 and Maserati Biturbo have both been killed to death at his hands... as did the Renault Alpine A610 mentioned on another thread.
Those cars I
could stand to see given the Clarkson treatment include:
(1) Austin Montego
Yes, I know that's an easy target, but consider this; I've never forgotten what my dad told me about one of his work colleagues who was almost reduced to tears when he found out the company car he'd worked hard to get into the position to be able to have (are you still with me?) was... a Montego estate. Given this was the early eighties it was likely that it came with a horrifying beige interior.
(2) Citro?n Xsara
Never mind that it was turned into a WRC victor. Citro?n's line-up of the early seventies contained the GS, DS, CX and SM. Yes, we know the Peugeot beancounters fiddled with their ability to make interesting cars, but for Citro?n to have ended up making the epitome of boring motoring that was the first-generation Xsara is unforgivable on a fundamental level. The Xsara has to be destroyed for the same reasons as the Nissan
Sunny Drizzle was.
(3) MGB
Jezza has ranted at length many times about his hatred of the MGB, esecially the late rubber-bumpmer model, and everything that it represents. But he's never got round to destroying one yet. Don't talk the talk if you're not going to walk the walk!
(4) Fiat Stilo
For the same reasons as the Xsara... but worse. Italian styling is supposed to be the best. Generally it has been, despite some
obvious mistakes. But
never in the entire history of Italy itself should any Italian car ever have had its styling described as "a bit Eastern Europe" - which is exactly what happened to the Stilo. Considering its predecessor, Fiat had no excuses for getting the Stilo as wrong as they did. In all three body styles.
(5) 1990 Ford Escort (that's
this one)
The headline on the front of Autocar one day in 1990 said it all: "New Escort takes on rivals... and
loses." Said rivals were the six-year-old Vauxhall Astra and six-year-old VW Golf - both of which would be replaced in 1991. But, despite ferocious criticism of the Escort from just about every motoring journalist, it went straight to the top of the UK sales charts, due to the average British car buyer's slavish dedication to the brand they knew best. "I've always had a Ford, so I'll have a Ford again," so the thinking went. Ford must have known they could churn out any old crap and people who don't care about cars would buy it anyway, and that made the 1990 Escort the least deserving sales success I can think of - which justifies its intended Clarksonation. (He doesn't have to lick their balls either these days as there's no new GT on the horizon...)
Inevitably, though, the rumblings started... those reviewers had been right all along, and as Escort owner after Escort owner complained about anything and everything that was wrong with their car, Ford had to listen and
revise the Escort much sooner than they were intending... and by the time of the second revision in 1995 (the
"wide-mouthed frog" version) it was a decent car in the way its original incarnation wasn't.
