Driven to extinction: The Grand Tour

The Grand Tour is over, done, finito. Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond shook hands and called it a day in Botswana at the end of One For The Road, keying off 22 years as a presenting trio across Top Gear and The Grand Tour.

In the end, for all their extraordinary exploits, they fell victim to that most mundane of afflictions. They aged. They no longer had the energy or enthusiasm to reinvent the show and, given that Jeremy Clarkson is 64, not in great shape and has a number of other competing interests, that’s perhaps unsurprising.

At the wrap party for the final episode of The Grand Tour, Clarkson admitted his fatigue in keeping up with the new car market, confessing that he couldn’t identify 80-90 percent of today’s new cars. Yes, there’s the usual shovelful of hyperbole there, but it’s indicative of his attitude.

“I don’t know what they are. I don’t care,” he said. “They go, ‘We got a new hybrid drive system,’ I just couldn’t give a shit.”

For all the beautiful production of One For The Road, there was one fact that was evident throughout. It was recycling a woefully tired formula. Cars fell off cliffs. The soundtrack was dated dad-rock. Challenges were contrived, whether by selecting three of the most unreliable/unsuitable cars imaginable or by fabricating slapstick navigational errors. Only the undoubted charisma of the three presenters and an army of top-drawer film makers could drag the format’s careworn carcass over the finish line.

It wasn’t always that way. So well-honed were the editorial chops of Clarkson, Hammond, May and, in the background, executive producer Andy Wilman and script editor Richard Porter that, for some time, Top Gear was lightning in a bottle, a show that couldn’t come close to being replicated. Most production teams took a similar view to car manufacturers when considering a rival to the Porsche 911 or Mazda MX-5. Don’t bother trying, it’ll only emerge as an inferior concoction.

Top Gear was what the Guinness Book of Records hailed as the most-watched factual TV show on Earth, yet TV execs shied away from trying to create a rival. Yes, regional spin-off Top Gear shows were created with varying degrees of success (running the gamut from truly dismal to merely mediocre) around the globe, but they all wilted by way of comparison.

For some time, the production team had looked for a dignified way to bring the format in to land, and it’s fair to say they probably found it. Viewers found comfort in The Grand Tour’s formulaic nature, the in-jokes and the not-always-scripted friction between three very different presenting personalities.

Since 2019, when it abandoned its studio format, The Grand Tour comprised eight feature-length special shows, respectively filmed in Vietnam, Madagascar, Scotland, England/Wales, Scandinavia, Central Europe, the Sahara, and Zimbabwe/ Botswana. Each of them is something the production team can rightfully feel proud of, but you’d emerge from each wondering just how much was in the tank for this show. Well, now we know.

Clarkson admitted his contempt for electric cars in One For The Road when he felt the filter could be lifted a little. After the first of the Grand Tour specials in 2019, he considered the subject of driving EVs and asked: “What would you rather have, sex with Natalie Portman or [with] a sewing machine?”

The writing was probably on the wall then. Five years later, it’s over. It was probably time, but a heartfelt thanks to all involved for some fantastic memories.