TELEVISION REVIEW: The Grand Tour: Eurocrash

 (Euclid - Sleep Token)

Some several decades ago, three seemingly different people showed up on the same stage for an argument about cars, and just sort of...never stopped arguing. The rest of us have benefitted greatly from their persistence over the years in one form or another though, so it's alright.

I am, of course, speaking of Richard Hammond, James May, and Jeremy Clarkson. And if you don't know who these three are, you should probably stop reading.

Perhaps the greatest thing about the trio's antics over the years has been the fact that they've been able to have the same argument over and over again without anyone in the audience caring, so entertaining was their carrying on. Indeed, that carrying has seen them through ordeals that would have shut lesser persons down, from accidents to PR incidents to...well, sheep. Carry on they did though, stumbling from a wildly successful show on the BBC to pretty much the exact same show on Amazon TV, a number of live tours, and most recently, a string of television specials revolving around road tripping.

'All Good Things', and so on, and an exception clearly won't be made here. The last several 'Grand Tour' specials have lacked a lot of the vim and vigor of previous entries but we've put up with them because they've been at least as much good as bad. The most recent entry, 'Eurocrash', on the other hand, isn't. It's mostly unremarkable, and that's sad for a number of reasons.

First, when the three presenters are allowed to behave as old friends, the magic is still clearly there. When 'Eurocrash', a story about a roadtrip that no one would ever actually take, is working, it's like no time has passed at all since their glory days. Alas, those good times come in the form of fond smiles rather than the belly laughs of old, and those come much too rarely. The rest of the time, it's... pretty much just boring.  What's most frustrating for me is that it would be easy to write off the trio as simply 'ready to retire', except we know from their solo work that they're all clearly still capable of entertaining us. Indeed, Clarkson's nearly perfect 'Clarkson's Farm' is filming its third season right now on the heels of two absolutely bulletproof outings. James May's 'Our Man In...' shows are equally good, if for different reasons.  (We will quietly draw a veil over Richard Hammond's entirely unremarkable body of work, excepting a few stand-out moments in 'Big'.)

It sounds like there's another one or two specials in the pipeline for The Grand Tour, but I can honestly say that I'm not really excited about them. I'm not sure the hosts are either. They spend a positively damning amount of time at the beginning of 'Eurocrash' trying -- and failing -- to make an excuse for the show. There's pretty much nothing they haven't done and nowhere they haven't been.

When you bear all of this in mind, you can only come to one real conclusion: The boys are simply not having as much fun doing this anymore. As a direct result, neither are we.

It's been a stellar run, lads, and you've my gratitude for it.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go turn 'Top Gear' reruns on.