What is the show about?
The Grand Tour is a series on Amazon Prime. It’s about cars but I don’t think a lot of people watch for cars. They watch it for the humor that the presenters bring to the show. The presenters are Jeremy Clarkson, James May, And Richard Hammond.
Before we explain this Amazon Prime show, let’s rewind the clock to 2002 when there was another show on BBC called Top Gear. This is where originally it started. Jeremy Clarkson was a car magazine journalist. He was approached by BBC to present the show. He approached James May as he was also a car journalist, whose work Jeremy admired. At that time, Richard was a PR Resp for Renault. Jeremey noticed how quick-witted he was and asked him to join the show from the second season.
The show started with reviewing exotic cars but eventually gained popularity for the silly humor of their presenters. And that’s where specials started. 1 hour plus special episode where the cars would be taken out of their comfort zone and driven in a different environment. It was a perfect mixture of a travel show and a car show. Some of the memorable top gear specials were – Vietnam special, Bolivia special, Middle East special, India special, Africa special, Burma special, Patagonia special, and Polar special.
The chemistry between them created a cult following for the then Top Gear show.
The Most Unlikely Presenters
These are unlikely presenters because they are very different. James May is a technical person. He can explain to you the engineering side of almost everything and anything. Richard Hammond is a prankster, silly, and the one who makes you laugh the most. Whereas Jeremy Clarkson is you. The person who connects the dots. He is often flamboyant, loud and mainly acting like most of the audience would in those situations. For example, if their car breaks down, May and Hammond would explain what is wrong and how to mend it but Jeremy would simply use a hammer to hit the engine with it. He loves power and brute force, like most men. He connects with audiences and brings them into the story. In another example, when James would be explaining in detail about some engineering aspects of a car, Jeremy would be the one who would cut him short because that’s exactly what we would do if one of our friends started to ramble on.
Hammond usually will say something quick that would burst even the presenters laughing. In one of the specials, Hammond was saying that how forgetful he was about taking his malaria pills. He finished it by saying, “thank god, I am not a girl, else I would be pregnant most of the time.” I burst out laughing even thinking about it.
How did I discover the show?
It was the Middle East special that caught my attention. They are given a challenge to re-enact the journey of the three wise men, by traveling from northern Iraq to a stable in Bethlehem where it is said to be the birthplace of baby Jesus. I loved the idea of men driving in cars through a war-torn country, without care in the world, laughing. I loved their banter. It connected with me as if I was on a road trip with my friends. The leg-pulling and the pranks made the specials more interesting to watch than the entire season. Each year, I used to wait for them to put together a special for us to enjoy. Since then I devoured all of their previous seasons, specials, and everything they had done together. I was officially part of their fan club.
The Era Of The Grand Tour
From 2002 to 2015, Top Gear ruled the charts. It was one of the most-watched shows in the world. Around the end of 2015, the 22nd season of the show, there was a controversy where Jeremy Clarkson was involved in verbal and physical abuse with one of the producers. He was immediately taken off the air and the rest of the series was finished by James May and Richard Hammond. After the series, the entire team quit. Jeremy Clarkson did apologize and settled the matter. The production team as well as the presenters were lured by Amazon’s big dollars for their show called The Grand Tour. If you are an astute viewer, you would notice that the top gear had the initials TG and the grand tour had the initials GT.
Honestly, The Grand Tour was not at par with top gear in the beginning. The show segments were not at all interesting. Even though they tried to create a similar mystery as the Stig in their new show called “The American”, it never picked up. The sections were boring. Their banter in the tent studio wasn’t appealing. However, the informative clips on cars had world-class production and storytelling. I still remember the story they told about Senna. It was amazing. Then followed The Grand Tour specials. Again, the first few episodes lacked the spontaneity. They looked too crafted for the usual format of 3 friends on a long trip. Obviously, there would be some script involved in these specials but earlier it never felt like that. It felt natural but the grand tour specials felt too mechanical.
Until, their latest episode. In the latest episode, I felt the same magic was visible. Maybe because it was their last outing together. I felt sad at the end of the episode knowing that they won’t be back in this sort of format again. They have done almost everything there is to be done with cars so I get their decision as well.
Plot Of The Sand Job
This time they start at the western Sahara region in a trio of second-hand exotic GT convertibles, starting in Mauritania, they travel towards the west coast of Senegal in an attempt to replicate the final leg of the legendary Paris-Dakar rally. It was an episode of 2 hours filled with fun and friends bantering about everything. Even though the disclaimer notice before the show begins, says the film is unscripted, there are a few incidents that you know for sure must have been scripted. But if you ignore these minor details, you’ll laugh out loud as I did when I watched the show. I will give 4.5/5 ratings and highly recommend watching this show.