The New Top Gear is Just Fine

With apologies for the extended period of radio silence, I made a point to carve out the time in my seemingly ever-busier schedule to watch Episode one of Top Gear, Season 23, and have some strong feelings to share. If the title seems to belie the strength of those feelings, that’s because they essentially cancel each other out. So let’s look at the pros and cons and I’ll explain why it’s premature to give up on a new experiment after one trial.

Cons

Evans and LeBlanc share a rare laugh. Image courtesy of The Sun.

Evans and LeBlanc share a rare laugh. Image courtesy of The Sun.

In the run-up to the first episode, various media reported severe tensions between Matt LeBlanc and Chris Evans, so I think many viewers were looking for evidence of this throughout the episode and, absent a cold reception when LeBlanc gave Evans a “love tap” in his Reliant, I didn’t think there was much animosity there. Unfortunately though, there wasn’t much chemistry either, and even less comedy. Most of the jokes fell flat and the studio audience seemed too prompted for inauthentic applause or laughter. I assume it was not genuine because I was definitely not laughing at home.

Another disappointment was the format. Sure, they’re trying new things with the Star in a Rallycross Car, but the majority of the segments were taken wholesale from the previous incarnation of the series. Chases, challenges and competitions are all fun ideas, but they’ve all been done before (the segments in the first episode were almost facsimiles of previous episodes) and I was hoping for more of a change, as the old format had grown long in the tooth. That’s not to say the old format was not entertaining – indeed it was, but that was due to the characters, rather than the segments, and the new show clearly does not have personality to fall back on yet.

Unlike some viewers, I don’t immediately skip through the guest star segments (though I will in second and third viewings), but I really wish I had with the new Top Gear’s first episode. As a Gordon Ramsay fan, his participation felt pretty neutered, and Jesse Eisenberg was a really struggle to put up with. I understand not being a car person – I’m friends with many of them – but if you’re asked to go on a car show, and you’re an actor, you could at least try to act like you give a shit at all about cars. Maybe this was to identify with the non-petrolhead members of the audience, but he just felt too disinterested to carry the segment. Evans’ narration of the laps did the feature no favors, which leads to my final point.

The writing for this first show was the worst I’ve seen in any Top Gear episode I’ve ever watched. Matt LeBlanc is a funny guy, and Evans’ previous appearances on the show were entertaining as well, but the script they were so clearly reciting was bland, the delivery painfully unenthusiastic and the pacing quite plodding. Despite being competitions, the races and shootouts had no sense of urgency and I was not once convinced that either presenter was trying very hard to win. The two presenters may have been trying too hard to act like they got along to pretend like they cared about winning the competitions, which is a shame, and leads to a lack of emotional investment from viewers.

Pros

Admittedly, that’s a lot of cons for these pros to balance out, and they may not tip the scales a whole lot in the show’s favour, but bear with me.

Foremost among things I really liked was that the show retained its trademark beautiful, rich visual style. Sure, you can get automotive comedy with the likes of Regular Car Reviews on YouTube, but what you miss out on is the multi-million-pound budget of the BBC and the sheer amount of effort they put into creating a visually compelling product. Each scene was beautifully coloured, well framed and well-choreographed, apart from maybe the dreary scenes in rainy old England. Every moment of film outside the studio feels like a sizzle reel trailer, and that alone is worth watching.

Add to the beautiful visuals the fact that not every joke missed the mark (a sad qualification, granted), the writing wasn’t a complete flop. Some of LeBlanc’s schtick during the Ariel Nomad segment were pretty amusing and Sabine Schmitz’s brutal evaluation of the Corvette’s handling evoked a pretty broad smile on my face. They’re showing signs that, when you throw the script out or improvise a bit and show some personality, the show can really entertain.

Speaking of LeBlanc and Schmitz, they were the best part of the show. Though I honestly expected Evans to be worse than I found him, based on the news coming out before the show, he was still the shouty buzzkill that made me cringe when he opened his mouth. Meanwhile, the criminally underused Schmitz was funny, genuine and actually evoked a sense that she was trying in her segment. On his own, LeBlanc too was enjoyable, with some coy glances at the camera to show he wasn’t taking himself too seriously. He seemed like he was having fun when he wasn’t with Evans, which isn’t a great sign for the two of them working together.

Why it’s just fine

LeBlanc pictured in front of the Ariel Nomad he drove through the desert. Image courtesy of USA Today.

LeBlanc pictured in front of the Ariel Nomad he drove through the desert. Image courtesy of USA Today.

Just like Manchester United coming off the reign of Sir Alex Ferguson, the prior Top Gear crew established a legacy that was going to be impossible for anyone to live up to. I’m not suggesting here that Evans & Co. will experience David Moyes-level failure, but perhaps like Louis van Gaal stated, expectations are too great, and must be lowered. That’s a tough pill to swallow for long-time fans of the famous show, especially when The Grand Tour will be out this fall with our three favourite old grouches driving entirely too fast and getting on each other’s nerves.

And if this disappointment sounds familiar, it’s because we just went through it about six years ago when Top Gear USA kicked off (yes, it’s hard to believe it was that long ago). While many complained at the time that it wasn’t a REAL Top Gear and that those hosts could never be James, Jeremy and Richard, they were right, and after the format was changed three years in, we got a show that was less of the same Top Gear and more of a unique, special car show that is really quite fun to watch. Seriously, give it another chance.

In the internet age, feedback for this first episode has been pretty instant, and while it may be too late to fix every aspect of the rest of the season, nobody is probably busier right now than the Top Gear crew, trying to rejig the script, editing and pacing of future episodes to iron out some of the wrinkles. The guests will get better (they almost have to), the interactions will get better as the hosts become more comfortable with one another, and the show will improve.

So the new Top Gear may not be the old Top Gear, but it’s also not the old old Top Gear, and we’re still getting Capt. Slow, Jezza and Hamster back in a few months. So instead of being disappointed in the first example of a show for which the expectations were way too high, let’s be happy that we, as gearheads, are getting more choice in our automotive programming and let the new Top Gear grow into a better show. Because, as it is, it’s fine. Not great, but just fine, and it may get there eventually.

Authored by
Devlin Riggs