More than two decades ago a trio of car dorks appeared on “Top Gear” together for the first time, and on September 13th they’ll end that run with one last back-to-basics Amazon Prime travel-across-a-desert special film. The Clarkson/Hammond/May throuple has been through the wringer and come back out again, making the journey from middle-aged entertainers to elderly curmudgeons along the way, and we’ve been there to see the whole thing unfold. They’ve been a long, long way together, through the hard times and the good.
This whole experiment probably should have ended when Clarkson physically and verbally assaulted a BBC co-worker in 2016, but here we are. The final nail will finally be driven into the long-overdue coffin of this show, which the presenters have clearly not enjoyed doing for at least five years, next month. Belligerent millionaire potato man Jeremy Clarkson is 64 years old, for goodness sake, just let him rest. Maybe his anger will subside in retirement.
Top Gear was extremely important to me as a young car enthusiast, and I regularly downloaded torrents from Final Gear to my college computer. This trio instilled an enthusiasm for cars and travel that inspired millions, but the immaturity and vigor of their early days has been replaced with the deep seated ire. There’s no more impressive hatred in a heart than that reserved for colleagues of 22 years. It has been easy to see that they’ve been mentally done with this show for years, but the Amazon money was too good to walk away from.
At any rate, here is the trailer for the final episode. I’m sure that there will be enough nostalgia to push this one up to heights of their earlier travelogue installments on The Beeb. It looks like it could be a return to form, and I truly hope it is. To end the tenure of this trio on a high point would be as much as we could wish for. I’m certainly wishing for it.
