I was left stunned after former Top Gear presenters, Clarkson Hammond and May’s new car show came out today. The first episode of their new show, called ‘The Grand Tour’ (I saw what you did with the title, Jeremy Clarkson), made its debut on Amazon Prime today. We took out a free trial of Prime (get yours here) to see how good it was.

Here’s the (spoiler free) as-it-happened review and commentary of my unfiltered but occasionally sarcastic thoughts on how this first episode of The Grand Tour went (and because I don’t work for a nameless TV show, I even mention the words ‘top’ and ‘gear’):

• Couldn’t get Amazon Prime to work. Switched to Netflix and watched Luke Cage instead. Luke Cage is phenomenal. I think more people should be talking about Luke Cage, which I’m going to do in a future article once I’ve watched the whole season.
• [An hour later] After dinner, my Dearest got Amazon Prime to work and put on The Grand Tour.
• [Some minutes later] Intro was pretty low-key. Thought it could have done with some hot air balloons and kangaroos.
• [Some minutes later] Not one iota of copyright infringement and still got more Top Gear than Top Gear.
• [Some minutes later] Capitalizing on the online-only platform big time. Nice that they don’t have the same constraints that some other car show had on a TV network.
• [Some minutes later] The lighting is fabulous.
• [Some minutes later] The cars are at incredibly reasonable price-points. I don’t think you can get a higher-spec McLaren for that sort of money.
• [Some minutes later] “This is a missionary position car…”
• [Some minutes later] Captain Slow is driving a fast car.
• [Some minutes later] …That was the weirdest drag race ever.
• [Some minutes later] Loving the sheep by the racetrack. Good incentive not to veer off-course.
• [Some minutes later] NotTheStig drove the car around a racetrack.
• [Some minutes later] Maybe it wasn’t wise for three British blokes in a room full of Americans to say what they just said.
• [Some minutes later] The star is not in a reasonably priced vehicle. This is highly irregular and further goes to show that this show is definitely not Top Gear.
• [Maybe 30 seconds later] I think someone just died.
• [Another minute at most] They seem to be having a spot of bother with their segment…
• [Not long after] Oh good commentary on 2016! Nicely done.
• [Some minutes later] The landscape shots…. oh wow they are to die for. The camerapeople have amazing camera skills. Visually everything about this show is stunning.
• [Some minutes later] OhmyGod they just compared shoes…
• [Some minutes later] Different NotTheStig drove cars. That was interesting.
• [Some minutes later] “That was a sensible bet,” said nobody ever.
• [After end credits] …That was bloody brilliant. Well worth spending the time on when I should have been writing two essays.
• The time in question… Episode 1 was over an hour long. I believe it was 1 hour 11 minutes in total. That’s a lot of bang for your buck.

Final comments: I really liked The Grand Tour. I think this will be my new favourite car show. I particularly liked the presenters, the cars, the settings, the lighting, the humour, the international focus, the races and all the stunning visuals and incidental music. It’s better than any car show I have previously watched, and I have watched a lot of car shows because as you know, I am passionate about cars (I even owned one once or twice!!!!!).

What did you think? Have you seen The Grand Tour yet? Are you going to? I am so excited to see more of this show, I can’t wait!