cpfc is right. Why go for exactly the same format, even the same studio? The only way a new Top Gear was going to work was to completely reinvent the show. This was a shouty, poor imitation of the originial.

"Save some money" You must be joking as Top Gear is a huge cash cow for BBC as it's watched by an estimated 350 million people worldwide and is the most popular factual program in the world.

Nothing to do with his or my age.

I don't like him full stop.

I like people younger, older and the same age as him... but not him.

The reason Top Gear became so popular is that it was the antithesis of everything else on the BBC. It couldn't give a toss for political correctness and diversity and it didn't care who it offended. That appeals to a helluva lot of people (and switches off a lot, too).

To keep the same name and format but to change the presenters to someone who is so BBC it comes out of his ears (and yet tried and failed to be Jeremy Clarkson) was foolish in the extreme. There's no chance it will be a success here and even less chance of it being as successful to sell abroad, either.

The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.

The sad thing is, its barely about cars anymore

Clinton is Clinton. I have known him for a long time, I know his mother... Simon Jordan

Which is ironic, given that was what Top Gear essentially was for the last 14 or so years. I don't think you can look at what happened to Top Gear without looking exactly at the kind of affect TFI Friday and the Big Breakfast did in their respective genres (and to a lesser extent, Evans was building on Jonathon Ross and that the Tube had done with Music shows).

If they'd done it with Chris Evans, when they rebooted it in 2001, it probably would have worked. Problem is, you can't really replace something 'original' by simply repeating the influences - because its had 14 years or so, to grow from that original influence into something very different.

The reboot of top gear worked, because people wanted something different - and they slowly delivered that - something with cars, that wasn't just about cars, but our relationship with cars and driving (the road) and generally do things they couldn't do.

Anyone can test drive a new insert brand name car. What you want to see, is a Jet fighter racing a 1.5m sports car, someone antagonising rednecks in a 'gay' pickup or ski jumping a mini with a jet engine.

Problem is, when you then change the team, who have become synonomus with that format, you've got to change the format.

No one likes 'more of the same' unless its the same. You could probably switch people out one at a time, and get away with it.

Arguably, like its previous reboot, the fate of the show will rest with people who didn't previously watch it. Oddly a lot of top gear fans pre-2001 were turned off by the new top gear.

"One Nation Under God, has turned into One Nation Under the Influence of One Drug"
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