After an illustrious run spanning more than two decades, the iconic trio of Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May are about to sign off from presenting a car show together. The last ever episode of “The Grand Tour” drops on Sept. 13, and the trailer was released today.
The final episode, entitled “One For The Road,” sees the presenters set out across Zimbabwe in a Lancia Beta Montecarlo (known as the Scorpion in America), a Ford Capri, and a Triumph Stag. Admittedly, those aren’t exactly the cars best suited for such an environment, but it wouldn’t be an episode of The Grand Tour if everything was meant to go perfectly.
Unusually, the trailer’s sparse in dialog, with a montage of shots scored by a version of “He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother.” There’s plenty of laughter and a handful of shenanigans, but it feels like the producer’s leaving it vague, almost like we already know what to expect. The truth is, after so many years, we almost do.
I doubt that when Clarkson and Andy Wilman set out to relaunch “Top Gear,” they expected to create one of the biggest shows in the world, much less do it again on Amazon Prime. The fact is, millions of people laughed along as three men, or perhaps three man-sized boys, drove cars on television. From magnetic north to Australia to America to Botswana, the fantastic travels of three people who, from the outside looking in, had the best job in the world, captivated us and sparked joy, whether they were driving six-figure supercars or three-figure shitboxes.
Sure, the trio is not without controversy. There’s the time they pissed off everyone in Spain and everyone in America and everyone in Mexico and everyone in Wales and everyone in India and everyone who drove a truck and everyone in Germany and everyone in Scotland and everyone in the North, and a few people in a village in Somerset, and the Mountaineering Council, and caravan enthusiasts, and the Morris Marina Owners Club, and anti-smoking campaigners, and Elon Musk, and many other people, but let’s not get too bogged down in details. It also says something that the most frequent targets of their brand of banter were each other, as that’s a huge part of what often made both shows brilliant fun to watch.
I’ll never forget the first time I saw an episode of “Top Gear” broadcast on television. Series five, episode one, the one with the Vauxhall Monaro, Chrysler 300C, and Jaguar S-Type R on the Pendine Sands. I was but a small boy, but seeing cars slithering about on camera made me think “Man, I want to do something like this when I grow up.” I might be lucky to have a platform, but I’m not the only one who felt that sort of way. Clarkson, Hammond, and May did so much for automotive enthusiasm, and it’s worth recognizing them for that.
All good things must come to an end, and while we can always wish for more, the fact is, it feels about time for “The Grand Tour” to wrap. With a three-week wait for the final ride off into the sunset, it feels about right to start marathoning the old stuff, don’t you think?
(Photo credits: The Grand Tour)
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When I was 22, I was newly engaged and knew I was marrying into a car family, so I figured I could be bored for the rest of my life or sit down, shut up and learn about cars. I started watching Top Gear to learn a bit and the first episode I picked happened to have a track test of the 500 Abarth. This was before Fiat came back to the US so I thought nothing of it, but it was cute. A year later, Fiat came back and I ended up with the first of my (so far) 4 Fiats, which rendered that episode massively pivotal in my life. My heart and soul has since become dedicated to questionable Italian cars.
Over a decade later, I am now also a Lancia Scorpion owner. The fact that my “introduction” to cars was Clarkson driving a Fiat and now he exits that whole era of car TV in a car I own is absolutely mind boggling to me.
May St. Gianni Agnelli, patron saint of Italian car lunacy, bless his journey.
I think what set the hook for me was the cheap car challenge with Clarkson’s -100 pound Volvo. After that while the “new car” episodes are dated, I still watch the cheap Italian cars. Almost all the long form Grand Tour specials are gold, I especially liked Mongolia.
Watched the Mongolia special a couple month back, and it was true-to-form bonkers. Tough terrain, beautiful scenery, and The Boys definitely being boys.
Legends.
Most car people have a favorite Top Gear/GT moment, and the beauty is that there are some many to pick from. I can’t think of another car program that is so nearly universally revered. Let’s be honest… we all wish we could be them from time to time. Congrats to the trio (plus crew) for so many years of incredibly entertaining television.
There are always going to be contrarian opinions that they’re overrated but I don’t agree at all. These guys did more for enthusiast culture over the last 25 years than just about anyone because they made car content that was for everyone. As much as we like nerding out on sites like this, the average person just wants to be entertained, and the boys were always entertaining.
The dynamics between them and their collective sense of humor are what really what made The Grand Tour and Top Gear. The cars are all cool, the challenges are great, the running bits (the variety of Stigs, guests always “dying” on their way to get interviewed on The Grand Tour, etc.) are great, but at the end of the day you watch for Clarkson, May, and Hammond.
And I’d be willing to bet that countless people found their way to liking cars because of their shows. Like I said, you don’t need to be an enthusiast to enjoy them. Hell, my mom loves Top Gear and used to watch it with me when I was home for summers in college and grad school. My wife also watches the Grand Tour with me and her dream car is a hybrid Highlander.
I’ll always love the trio and respect their huge contributions to car culture. They’re the best to ever do it and IMHO they walked so a lot of the automotive media we enjoy today (particularly some of the better YouTube channels like Throttle House) could run. They’ll be missed, but they’ve earned the right to go out on top and call it a career.
I’ll add innumerable YouTube stars owe them a debt as well..Sorry, you nailed it at the end, missed it!
I remember watching the show in high school and getting several friends into it, many of whom didn’t know one single thing about cars.
My senior year of college me, my roommates, and our friends would get blasted and see who could set the best lap time in the reasonably priced car on the Top Gear test track in Forza. I remember there was one Friday night when we had a few people over for a pregame that wound up turning into our entire night because we’d watch an episode of Top Gear, pass the bong around, grab another beer, and see who could lap quickest.
What’s wild is we aren’t even talking about a sausage fest either! We had a bunch of a girls over and even they were into it. That’s the type of universal appeal Top Gear had, and one of the many reasons I respect Clarkson, May, and Hammond so much. Women dressed to go to the clubs wound up spending a Friday playing Forza and watching TG with us lol.
We used to do this in our college years as well, except using the Gran Turismo version. GT did not include any of the reasonably priced cars used on the show, which was disappointing, but it was still one of my favorite tracks ever. Trading fastest laps back and forth with my buddies while getting gradually more and more intoxicated was a hoot.
While there’s nothing wrong with a good old time with the boys, occasionally females were around too. I’ve just never seen a girl show any interest in actually playing a racing game, with the exception of Mario Kart. I have had at least one lady hand my ass to me at an autocross event, so I know they’re out there.
I was getting more and more worried each time they crashed a car at this point, so it’s nice to see them go out intentionally rather than forced by one of them dying.
hammond def gave that the old college try.
So did may when he slammed the Evo into the wall in the tunnel. Maybe he wasn’t close to death, but paralysis or serious head trauma?
So I am guessing that the Hamster is a lot like your average cat.
He has 9 lives.
God speed you twats…
oh that’s right, I forgot, and that one special where he didn’t give space for the tow rope, got flung back and hit his head on a rock.
and let’s not forget when he lost control of a Rimac concept car and rolled over several times. He was pulled off the car seconds before it went in flames…
and let’s not forget when he lost control of a Rimac concept car and rolled over several times. He was pulled off the car seconds before it went up in flames.
The time James May got blind sided by a tow strap, resulting in his head leaving a puddle of blood on the rocky ground really had me cringing. I could see that one coming at least 5 seconds before impact.
Very happy to see these guys retiring all in one piece.
While it’s hard to see them go, it’s better that they leave with grace than have the show forcibly canceled due to them being so old they can no longer do what they want.
Better to die with dignity than to live without it.
> it’s better that they leave with grace than have the show forcibly canceled due to them being so old they can no longer do what they want.
“Joe Biden’d”, as it were.
(He said, as a light-hearted joke, steering perilously close to the sun)
I would really love if Amazon could “borrow” from The BBC the rights to do one final appearance of Ben Collins’ Stig. That would be epic
But when he takes his helmet off in the final scene, he’s been digitally replaced with Michael Schumacher.
They did that gag already, back when they didn’t need a CGI Schumy.
Yeah, but doing it one more time for a champ who can’t do it anymore might be nice.
Or he pulls off his helmet and he’s digitally replaced with Sabine Schmitz…
RIP Sabine…
He knows three facts about ducks, and they’re all wrong.
While this is a bit of sadness, the song really does not help, I really can’t say I’m going to be sad to see it go.
The Presenters have found success and happiness with their own projects outside of the TG world, and I think that helps alot. We’re not getting less content, we’re just getting different content individually. I find Clarkson’s Farm and May’s “A Man In” series just as entertaining as an episode of Top Gear, and Hammond is keeping up well with Youtube content.
I wonder if their Roku channel will go away?
I would have never know who Sabine Schmitz was if it weren’t for this show
Also this
Andy Wilman:
“Not much happens, I would say. Anyone who thinks they’re going to get Avengers: Endgame is going to be disappointed because it is deliberately gentle. But their camaraderie is next level,” he said. “They say goodbye better than any presenters could ever say goodbye, because they’re so close. They can take the piss out of one another and then be emotional as well. It’s quite weepy.”
Since 24-year old me stumbled across Series 6 Episode 11 in 2005 (Jezza reviewed an F-150 Lightning and I thought, “who is this pompous idiot?”) to now, with rewinds to watch, and re-watch, all the TG/GT episodes. Thanks boys, it’s been a fun ride.
I started watching around the same time. My sister (married to an Englishman) raved about the show. I was definitely aware of it from Autoblog etc., but I had never seen it. So I watched one episode, and then reported back to my sister: “Why am I watching this?! They hate everything!” And my sister said, “They don’t hate everything, they’re just British.”
I actually knew what she meant, and after that I enjoyed the show in the spirit in which it was intended.
“All good things must come to an end” has never been more applicable. I was in college when top gear started. I have literally grown up with these guys. We all got a little older and a little fatter. They have definitely earned a break. Pour one out for the boys.
Top Gear was probably the most influential show of my youth. I started watching it in 2006 when I was 13, and I’ve been hooked ever since. I could say a whole lot more, but that’s basically it, in a nutshell. I knew it had to end eventually, and I’m glad they did it on their terms. I saw that they referenced a “familiar island” in the info about that episode. Wonder if it’s going to be one of the islands on the salt pans, that they visited in their 2007(?) Africa special. Seeing that picture of their cars sans doors, I might be on the right track.
2 and a half man-sized boys, to be accurate
That’s a low blow. Also true.
It would have to be a low blow to include Hammond.
Two men and a hamster.
Richard Gere has entered the chat….too soon?
Gents, thank you for the amazing programming over the years and I look forward to continue watching your future programming. I hope you’ll still do some crossover appearances within your various shows at some point.
Love the show. I’ll also give a plug to James May’s solo work – such as “Our Man in Japan” (and others in that series).
The Reassembler!
“Hey Bim! Guess what?”
Hey_Bim is now my ID on a few social media platforms. I laughed harder at that episode than at any comedy show or film in the last 10 years.
The Man Lab!
I’ll be sad they’re gone, but also relieved. TGT started off great, but I feel like it’s steadily gone downhill, especially after the 1st season. Fewer and fewer episodes were produced until it became just specials released… whenever.
It’s time. Thanks for all the entertainment, everybody take a well deserved bow, and turn out the lights.
I think it got _better_ as it went along. I like the “specials.”
I think the first few episodes were a disaster. It took them almost half of the the first season to get things figured out.
The specials are all amazing though.
The specials are amazing, but I also just dug the guys sitting around doing “Conversation Street”. The show never needed to spend $5 million to impress me.
I like the callback to the opening of the first ever Grand Tour episode, where Clarkson was driving on the desert, and the other two pulled up to join him.
A lot of people love cars because of these louts, and hats off to them for that. What they did was unique, as evidenced by the numerous failed attempts to make Top Gear variants around the world (I wish they would have tried Top Gear: Canada. The unintentional comedy would have been sublime). And let’s not forget, they often risked their lives (well, mostly Hammond’s) to entertain us.
I hope after they finished the show, they sat down, had a quiet drink and said “well done, lads.”
The only car show my wife enjoys watching, and that says an awful lot.
My wife watched TG with me and she was actually very enthusiastic when we drove several hours to that first ep shooting of TGT in California.
I was at that first episode shoot too. The filming was a pretty interesting experience and there were some neat vehicles to look at. I enjoyed.
Came here to say the exact same thing.
I just rewatched the other Africa special over the weekend. You know, the one where the find the source of the Nile, not the one with Oliver.
The Oliver one is better, but neither holds a candle to the first South America special or the North Pole special.
It depends on the mood I’m in, I like them all.
My favorite is Mongolia, while obviously the “losing all the food” bit wasn’t real, I think it has the highest real to contrived ratio.
Yeah, to me the conditions looked absolutely miserable in Mongolia at times, and it seemed like it was physically punishing for all the guys.
IDK, I think the Vietnam special is my favorite even though it was without cars. Actually made me want to get a scooter just to ride around my hometown!
The Vietnam special is my favorite as well, followed closely by the Oliver African special.
I still think the North Pole special was the most dangerous one with very real and deadly stakes. Yes, there were support trucks, but those also had issues and if a truck fell through there was no real chance of rescue.
It will be sad, but mostly because I miss the content they used to produce. I loved the actual reviews, and the crowd bits they had in the old format. Some of the Grand Tour has been fun, but the latest one in the sand was more of a slog to watch, with the same old stuff happening. It didn’t feel any bit genuine to me.
These three are the automotive equivalent of the Harry Potter series. Almost everyone had a phase where you were into it, but you really should have moved on by the time you were like 13.
Perfect comment. But one of the nice things about really being into something is that when you look back on it, sometimes you can say “you know, I was right about X when I was 13…”
Favorite Top Gear moment, was on the Mid Engine Exotics episode, where May’s car shows up on the back of a tow truck, and he casually says “Oh, I’ve run out of electricity…”
For whatever reason, that just tickled me.
In the sport coupe challenge, where Clarkson got a Starion, Hammond a 6 series CSi and James “bought a grandfather clock” (XJS). I don’t know why, but that line still makes me laugh
No matter how you look at it or Jeremy’s questionable behavior, the trio produced outstanding content that captivated an audience beyond just car nerds for literal decades. There is nothing else like Top Gear or Grand Tour, and when you add in the chemistry they had on set and the absolutely beautiful cinematography, it was profoundly entertaining. There are a million cooking shows, there are a million cop shows, there are a million fantasy shows. How many truly good car shows have there been, and how many appealed to people that didn’t even care about cars?
The show was always well-produced, but I would argue that, as it went on, it did more to damage the car hobby than to help it. TG had an absolutely massive audience and they could’ve used that platform to actually educate people about lesser-known cars, the inner workings of cars, automotive history, etc. Early episodes did that honestly fairly well, but once the show got globally popular it turned into little more than a bunch of overly-produced Whistlin’ Diesel episodes, replete with an anti-science and anti-intellectual message that championed high-end exotic cars over anything else. I get that it’s a business venture at the end of the day and you have to entertain people, but they leaned way too much into that aspect and turned the show into a shell of its former self.
And don’t forget America doesn’t know how to build cars LOL
In fairness, a broken clock is right twice a day.
The James May side-project The People’s Car was so damned informative. I learned a ton, and I loved every minute of it. More shows like that, please.
Pour one for the trio. None of the various Top Gear spinoffs and new hosts are as entertaining.
i might be the minority here, but I like the Harris, McGuiness and Flintoff series a bit better than the original cast.
Chris Harris should be on TV more, he’s a fantastic presenter.
Richard with daughter Izzy on Drivetribe is pretty entertaining, imo. If her reactions aren’t genuine, she’s a damn good actor.
Their relationship is so charming. They are clearly very close, but then she will take the piss out of him like Clarkson.
I am just realizing as I am typing this that I have a similar relationship with my own daughter, lol.
I’ll miss Captain Slow the most. He was always my favorite. They’re all getting old, they’ve been doing this forever, and I’d rather them send it off on a high note than see them produce garbage until we have to beg them to stop.
I’ve been watching Clarkson’s Farm, and it’s much better than I anticipated. Jeremy is Jeremy whether he’s driving a car or trying to farm, but Kaleb is the real star of that show IMO.
Yep, it’s actually pretty good. He’s less Jeremy than I was expecting though.
I think him letting go of the schtick is what makes it tolerable. Make no mistake he’s still Clarkson, but Clarkson Lite. More human, less TV personality.
Clarksons farm is fantastic. The impact its had on real world discussions about Farmers and how govts are treating them is pretty interesting too.
Beyond that, if May is your favorite, I hope you have gone and watched his solo stuff, like “Our man in…” where he travels around the world.
It’s on my list but haven’t gotten around to it yet. Maybe when Snowpiercer wraps up.
I’m sad, because I really enjoyed these, even if they were pretty formulaic, but I agree it’s time.
I’m just glad that I got to attend the taping of the opening segment of the first episode of The Grand Tour in Johnson Valley, CA. That was a very cool day, and I spotted myself in the crowd when it aired.
This makes me sad