Top Gear

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  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 12,190
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    trevgo wrote: »
    I'll say one thing for TG - they certainly know how to tickle the prejudices of the types who love the show.

    The final farcical line-up inn The Mall of the disparate bits of automotive stuff assembled in the UK must have had the Germans spitting out their currywurst in laughter. "Das Auto" - written and presented by a grown up person - gave the lie to the tripe peddled by the pitiful Clarkson and his motley crew.

    This series has at least demonstrated there are no depths to which this tedious, patronising, ego trip cannot plunge. How anyone with an IQ higher than a plant can suffer it without feeling their intelligence is being insulted, I know not.

    I drive one of the cars lined up on The Mall. It cost £43,000, the profits of which will have been exported to India. It's 15 months old, has been back to the dealer 11 times, and is falling to bits. It will be back to the Germans next time for me.

    Wow... did the Top Gear boys steal your rattle or something?
  • paulschapmanpaulschapman Posts: 35,536
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    allafix wrote: »
    UK jobs do help of course, better to have them than not, but the wages paid to the workforce is a small part of the economic cake that is a car company. It's not the most important thing. Control is also out of the hands of UK shareholders, so the owners can choose to take their investment and production elsewhere if they wish.

    When we had a large UK owned car industry there was also a thriving parts supply industry that went with it. Most of that's gone now, the car industry is smaller and parts tend to be imported.

    Even the parts industry is coming back now - the problem of managing the supply of parts when it takes 6 weeks for them to be transported from around the world in conjunction with just in time manufacturing mean it is now cheaper to make them here in the UK.

    Last year we exported more cars than we imported for the first time.
  • trevgotrevgo Posts: 28,241
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    HHGTTG wrote: »
    Even Ta Ta Jaguar and many others.:rolleyes:

    Damn, damn and triple damn! How did I miss that one? :D
    mikw wrote: »
    Thanks for your thoughts - i enjoyed it, as did lots of others, and i'm not thick....
    Justabloke wrote: »
    Wow... did the Top Gear boys steal your rattle or something?

    The TG crowd are always protective of the show, and I accept it's hugely popular - just like The Sun, McDonalds and taking screaming children on planes.

    I hate it because I'm a petrolhead and love cars, and would dearly love the BBC to make a programme about them.
  • Rip the TV EyeRip the TV Eye Posts: 1,687
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    I noticed at the end that hardly any mention of the bus industry was mentioned. A large majority of service buses in use today are made in Britain.

    Alexander Dennis, Plaxton, Optare and Wrightbus all manufacture buses and coaches made in the United Kingdom, the latter supplies the New Bus for London as featured in the programme.

    Was thinking this today. I did notice a couple of Plaxton coaches in the lineup at the Mall.
  • HHGTTGHHGTTG Posts: 5,941
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    trevgo wrote: »
    Damn, damn and triple damn! How did I miss that one? :D





    The TG crowd are always protective of the show, and I accept it's hugely popular - just like The Sun, McDonalds and taking screaming children on planes.

    I hate it because I'm a petrolhead and love cars, and would dearly love the BBC to make a programme about them.

    Exactly my sentiments. You would have thought in this day and age, one of the TV channels could make a proper, informative and yet light-hearted programme about the cars we love so much and I don't mean that to include those ridiculous supercars they keep on showing on TG, doing useless Doughnuts all the time.
    I could say a lot more but will only get shouted down or told to not watch the programme.
    In a way, I am the forever optimist, hoping that TG will improve but it never does even though it, momentarily, has some redeeming snippets of common sense (but few and far between).
  • Yorkshire.KingYorkshire.King Posts: 1,467
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    HHGTTG wrote: »
    Exactly my sentiments. You would have thought in this day and age, one of the TV channels could make a proper, informative and yet light-hearted programme about the cars we love so much and I don't mean that to include those ridiculous supercars they keep on showing on TG, .



    There have been loads of attempts at an alternative car show....

    The Original 5th Gear was lighthearted, informative & different from TG, and had serious reviews too, and decent presenters who know their onions, but the powers that be, went and chased the Top Gear audience

    Channel 5 scrapped it, because no-one watched it
    & now, its buried.........


    Channel Four tried with a programme called Driven, in the late 1990's, with Mike Brewer, James May, Jason Plato and Penny Mallory (again, all people who know their onions when it comes to Auto's)

    and then Deals on Wheels as well


    Pulling Power was a programme in the mid 90's that returned in the mid 2000's


    Used Car Roadshow on ITV4




    There have been others, on various channels...
  • mikwmikw Posts: 48,715
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    trevgo wrote: »

    I hate it because I'm a petrolhead and love cars, and would dearly love the BBC to make a programme about them.

    There's been lots of BBC documentaries about cars recently, not just TG!

    They're usually shown on the same night, before or after TG. Just like on Sunday.
  • jonbwfcjonbwfc Posts: 18,050
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    The bare fact is when people say 'why don't the BBC make a programme about....' what they actually mean is 'why don't the BBC make a programme that I think is better, regardless of what any other person in the UK might want.' Amazingly enough, the BBC makes programmes that lots of people might want, not just a couple of forum warriors who think they know better than a multi-billion pound corporation.

    Tell you what guys, if you think so many people want that show, do some market research, come up with a pitch and head off the TV company. There's loads of them. Literally crying out for new show ideas that that will make them even a small fraction of what Top Gear makes every year. If your idea has legs, it'll get made and in a year or so's time you can come back here with a photo of your bank account and laugh at me.

    Or, alternatively, you can accept the notion that the popularity Top Gear enjoys is in fact in some slight way causally related to the fact it's a programme lots of people want to watch because it's actually quite good.

    Armchair TV producers. world's full of 'em.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 6,126
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    jonbwfc wrote: »
    The bare fact is when people say 'why don't the BBC make a programme about....' what they actually mean is 'why don't the BBC make a programme that I think is better, regardless of what any other person in the UK might want.' Amazingly enough, the BBC makes programmes that lots of people might want, not just a couple of forum warriors who think they know better than a multi-billion pound corporation.

    Tell you what guys, if you think so many people want that show, do some market research, come up with a pitch and head off the TV company. There's loads of them. Literally crying out for new show ideas that that will make them even a small fraction of what Top Gear makes every year. If your idea has legs, it'll get made and in a year or so's time you can come back here with a photo of your bank account and laugh at me.

    Or, alternatively, you can accept the notion that the popularity Top Gear enjoys is in fact in some slight way causally related to the fact it's a programme lots of people want to watch because it's actually quite good.

    Armchair TV producers. world's full of 'em.


    Top post...I said something similar about the Olympic opening ceremony...although it could have been any show on TV....and was cyber bashed by the arm chair producers...so don't forget to put your tin hat on because the DS doom and gloom brigade will be on the march when they see this!!
  • trevgotrevgo Posts: 28,241
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    jonbwfc wrote: »
    The bare fact is when people say 'why don't the BBC make a programme about....' what they actually mean is 'why don't the BBC make a programme that I think is better, regardless of what any other person in the UK might want.'.

    No, that would be being subjective.

    I want a programme about cars, and TG is absolutely not about cars. It is about the ego of three rather inadequate men, and their appeal to quite a few million wannabes. Which is fine, so long as it is regarded as light entertainment for the undiscerning.

    The fact remains that the BBC does not make a motoring programme.
  • trevgotrevgo Posts: 28,241
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    Top post...I said something similar about the Olympic opening ceremony.

    Eh?

    The OIympic Opening Ceremony had more intellect in the opening video than in every series of TG put together.
  • Hassaan13Hassaan13 Posts: 41,961
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    You couldn't really compare TG to the Olympic opening ceremony.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 6,126
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    Hassaan13 wrote: »
    You couldn't really compare TG to the Olympic opening ceremony.

    I was't...anyway it was 12months ago and I'v forgotten the details...other than I was cyber bashed for asking the arm chair cynics what they would have done because they'd spent the preceding 3+hrs slating Danny Boyles effort
  • The WulfrunianThe Wulfrunian Posts: 1,312
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    trevgo wrote: »
    No, that would be being subjective.

    I want a programme about cars, and TG is absolutely not about cars. It is about the ego of three rather inadequate men, and their appeal to quite a few million wannabes. Which is fine, so long as it is regarded as light entertainment for the undiscerning.

    The fact remains that the BBC does not make a motoring programme.

    The BBC used to make a motoring programme. It was called Top Gear and it got cancelled due to plummeting audience figures. Mondeo and Vectra reviews and articles on NCAP ratings may have done it for you, but they seemingly got pretty dull and out of touch for the rest of us.

    Meanwhile the new version of Top Gear went on to claim a global audience of over 300 million "wannabes".
  • andy1231andy1231 Posts: 5,100
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    jonbwfc wrote: »
    The bare fact is when people say 'why don't the BBC make a programme about....' what they actually mean is 'why don't the BBC make a programme that I think is better, regardless of what any other person in the UK might want.' Amazingly enough, the BBC makes programmes that lots of people might want, not just a couple of forum warriors who think they know better than a multi-billion pound corporation.

    Tell you what guys, if you think so many people want that show, do some market research, come up with a pitch and head off the TV company. There's loads of them. Literally crying out for new show ideas that that will make them even a small fraction of what Top Gear makes every year. If your idea has legs, it'll get made and in a year or so's time you can come back here with a photo of your bank account and laugh at me.

    Or, alternatively, you can accept the notion that the popularity Top Gear enjoys is in fact in some slight way causally related to the fact it's a programme lots of people want to watch because it's actually quite good.

    Armchair TV producers. world's full of 'em.

    Excellent - well said. Why do people post and moan about a programme they hate. if you don't like it don't watch it ! Simples.
  • CaltonfanCaltonfan Posts: 6,311
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    The BBC used to make a motoring programme. It was called Top Gear and it got cancelled due to plummeting audience figures. Mondeo and Vectra reviews and articles on NCAP ratings may have done it for you, but they seemingly got pretty dull and out of touch for the rest of us.

    Meanwhile the new version of Top Gear went on to claim a global audience of over 300 million "wannabes".

    exactly, i like to see them do the occasional road test but prefer to see the challenges and super cars, if that makes me a "wannabe" then so be it

    its an entertainment show first and foremost then a car show
  • HHGTTGHHGTTG Posts: 5,941
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    The BBC used to make a motoring programme. It was called Top Gear and it got cancelled due to plummeting audience figures. Mondeo and Vectra reviews and articles on NCAP ratings may have done it for you, but they seemingly got pretty dull and out of touch for the rest of us.

    Meanwhile the new version of Top Gear went on to claim a global audience of over 300 million "wannabes".

    This doesn't prove anything really except perhaps the good old British public doesn't want to see programmes about their cars which might inform and not just titilate.
    I'd much prefer a motoring programme about the more serious aspects of our cars without which we couldn't exist, it seems.
    TG as it is today is just a load of old nonsense really although there's doubting its popularity with the 'masses'.
  • roger_50roger_50 Posts: 6,894
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    The problem is, I'm not sure where a factual car program sits on the BBC. General product reviews and comparisons is a tricky subject in general, and it's touch & go whether they should really even be telling the public to buy from one car manufacturer and not another (it's only ever done in a very minor/jokey way on the current Top Gear).

    Clarkson & Co often only hint at what's the best car in a certain field, very rarely pummeling the worst cars.

    I don't know what scope there is. Certain times of the year, some car manufacturers release a new model of car. Occasionally something might happen, like a car recall. Perhaps there might be the odd car enthusiast event.

    I think factual car discussion is a deceptively niche area.
  • HHGTTGHHGTTG Posts: 5,941
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    roger_50 wrote: »
    The problem is, I'm not sure where a factual car program sits on the BBC. General product reviews and comparisons is a tricky subject in general, and it's touch & go whether they should really even be telling the public to buy from one car manufacturer and not another (it's only ever done in a very minor/jokey way on the current Top Gear).

    Clarkson & Co often only hint at what's the best car in a certain field, very rarely pummeling the worst cars.

    I don't know what scope there is. Certain times of the year, some car manufacturers release a new model of car. Occasionally something might happen, like a car recall. Perhaps there might be the odd car enthusiast event.

    I think factual car discussion is a deceptively niche area.

    That's fair comment but the fact remains that TG as it now is has run out of original ideas and is embarrassingly silly and I cringe sometimes and wonder what my anti-car partner is thinking.
    They could at least have a slot devoted to the sort of cars we mere mortal aspire to. And I don't like the arty farty photography all the time - it's very clever but it is overdone.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 12,190
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    HHGTTG wrote: »
    This doesn't prove anything really except perhaps the good old British public doesn't want to see programmes about their cars which might inform and not just titilate.
    I'd much prefer a motoring programme about the more serious aspects of our cars without which we couldn't exist, it seems.
    TG as it is today is just a load of old nonsense really although there's doubting its popularity with the 'masses'.

    I believe the problem here is that on the whole people want to be "entertained by TV" and not "educated by TV".
    For some a car will always be a considered choice and as such those people will do their own research, for others a car is an appliance and they'll simply go to the nearest dealer and buy whatever is on offer.
    For example if I took notice of JC / JM / RH I'd never buy an Alfa (even though I happen to know they love Alfas) and my motoring life would be much the poorer for that.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 12,190
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    HHGTTG wrote: »
    That's fair comment but the fact remains that TG as it now is has run out of original ideas and is embarrassingly silly and I cringe sometimes and wonder what my anti-car partner is thinking.
    They could at least have a slot devoted to the sort of cars we mere mortal aspire to. And I don't like the arty farty photography all the time - it's very clever but it is overdone.

    Reading this, I really would question why you watch it? I used to watch new Dr Who.. always in the hope that I would enjoy it the way I used to enjoy it, about two series ago I realised it would never be the show I wanted it to be and so I stopped watching it, dipping in occassionally to ascertain the state of play. It does sound to me like you've reached that point with TG
  • mikwmikw Posts: 48,715
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    trevgo wrote: »
    No, that would be being subjective.

    I want a programme about cars, and TG is absolutely not about cars. It is about the ego of three rather inadequate men, and their appeal to quite a few million wannabes. Which is fine, so long as it is regarded as light entertainment for the undiscerning.

    The fact remains that the BBC does not make a motoring programme.

    It makes LOTS of motoring programmes actually, including the one that was shown straight the way after this week's TG - so it's not a "fact" at all.

    And, i'm not a "wannabie" thanks, i enjoy the programme for what it is - it's unique, which is why it appeals the world over.
  • HHGTTGHHGTTG Posts: 5,941
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    Justabloke wrote: »
    Reading this, I really would question why you watch it? I used to watch new Dr Who.. always in the hope that I would enjoy it the way I used to enjoy it, about two series ago I realised it would never be the show I wanted it to be and so I stopped watching it, dipping in occassionally to ascertain the state of play. It does sound to me like you've reached that point with TG

    Oh dear, we always get people on these forum who tell someone else 'to turn off' or 'why watch it?'. Please that is not very helpful or original. These forums are for commenting on the various threads, whether positive or negative, aren't they.

    Incidentally I grew up with Dr Who but when the new iterations started with Chris Ecclestone etc. I found them boring but perhaps that was because I was much older and found the simpler, somewhat amateurish, earler productions had been swept aside by clever computer graphics, thus detracting from my enjoyment. Again the new ones were just too silly.
    I do not watch Dr Who anymore, as a result and so I do retain some discerning abilities in my dotage.;)
  • lundavralundavra Posts: 31,790
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    trevgo wrote: »
    No, that would be being subjective.

    I want a programme about cars, and TG is absolutely not about cars. It is about the ego of three rather inadequate men, and their appeal to quite a few million wannabes. Which is fine, so long as it is regarded as light entertainment for the undiscerning.

    The fact remains that the BBC does not make a motoring programme.

    I mentioned in another thread (or was it this one), the much missed Radio 4 programme Going Places. They managed to fit a lot into a half hour every week (more than Top Gear do in a full hour), covering the full range of 'travel' from cars, trucks, boats, aircraft etc. They were very open-minded on topics - road testing large items of earthmoving plant, a RN minesweeper (one of the officers was going to water ski behind it but the RN decided it might not be good PR). It managed to be to very informative and also funny at times.

    I am sure there is room for an intelligent motoring programme, it would not get as large an audience as Top Gear but could still attract modest figures.
  • lundavralundavra Posts: 31,790
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    andy1231 wrote: »
    Excellent - well said. Why do people post and moan about a programme they hate. if you don't like it don't watch it ! Simples.

    I am sure that many, like myself, do not 'hate' the programme or the presenters but just think they have got lazy and repetitive and could do a lot better.

    The audience size is irrelevant, The Sun is the best selling daily newspaper but few people would say that it is the best newspaper. They could quite possibly sell even more by getting lazy and repetitive and putting a page 3 picture on every page.
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