Clarkson Being Fired Is Good News

I’m going to go off on a tangent here and cover something happening in TV land as I sometimes do.  The once manly television series Top Gear as at a cross roads as its leading presenter has been fired.  This is good news.  The main reason for that is because Top Gear was once extremely good.  And recently, even for years now, it has not been.

What happened?  Jeremy Clarkson filmed one of the latest episodes, went to a bar and got drunk on wine.  Then returned to a hotel and demanded a steak dinner, when he was told the chef had gone, he launched a prolonged physical assault on one of the producers.  According to the BBC the guy did not fight back through fear of losing his job, then checked himself into ER.  Demanding steak and not getting it?  Then beating up some underling?  The actions of a diva,  not a manly man.

After Clarkson had realized his mistake, days later he started crying in front of an audience, saddened that his actions had probably ended his career at the BBC.  When I read that, I lost even more respect for him.  The fact is, you punch someone in the workplace, or as it was revealed today, give the guy a prolonged beating, you’re going to be shown the door.  The rest of us could expect an 8×8 cell.  Man up and take responsibility, don’t go shedding tears in front of an audience.  He was a fun politically incorrect character, but beating up someone who won’t fight back, then crying tears of victim hood afterwards, bitch moves.  Plain and simple.

Top Gear had it coming

I used to like Top Gear a lot.  It ways a guy’s show, written for guys with three gearheads presenting it.  We’re talking about 2002-2009 here.  It had the correct mixture of humour, ‘adventures’ and car journalism.  The humour and jokes were real, the ‘adventures’ were original and the car journalism was second to none.  Then, somewhere along the line, huge success wasn’t enough.  Clarkson was a senior producer and he and other bigwigs wanted more.  They wanted to chase the X-Factor and Pop Idol audiences by upping the comedy and toning down the original style.  Other people blasted Top Gear for being offensive.  I eventually disliked it because it had become a farce.

It lead to week after week of fake shit, written by Clarkson.  There was staged crap here, publicity hoaxes there.  F-league actors would boast on their blogs about how Top Gear would hire them to act as aggrieved bystanders in the latest publicity stunt.  Only the most retarded enjoyed it.  For years now all I’ve been hearing is ‘I have no interest in cars, but I love Top Gear!’.  That’s how low it had sunk.  It tried to appeal to the lowest common denominator and that comes at a price – a bigger audience wants less car action or they’ll boycott.

The problem is Top Gear has strayed from its roots, a criticism that is usually met with the response – ‘If it’s all about cars it’ll be boring’.  This usually comes from casual viewers who really aren’t aware that the shit they were doing recently, and it was shit, was a re-hash of something that was done better ten years ago.  And it wasn’t all about cars then. All of it is fake, old and tired.

I was clamouring for a reboot.  I didn’t care if it had the three main presenters or not.

Clarkson’s new show

So what’s next for Clarkson and the other two?  Obviously, they’ll go to another network.  Clarkson no longer owns the majority rights to Top Gear, stupid move by him for selling them to the BBC.  And James May at least has hinted that the trio are a ‘package’ and that he will follow Clarkson.  Hammond probably will too.  Sky and Channel 4 have turned down the idea.  However, Netflix is rumoured to be interested.

The new show will be downgraded.  The reason for that is because, even with the recent scandals it has suffered, the BBC is a monster which has in no small part been a part of Top Gear’s success.  Ferraris don’t come cheap.  Neither does Tom Cruise appearing on your show.  While Clarkson is popular, people seem to be forgetting that the BBC coughs up extraordinary money to make things happen with that show.  One possible comparison is TV host Jonathan Ross.  He had a hit chat show with the BBC with A-list guests.  He was fired, moved to ITV and now his show is being pummelled by the Graham Norton show, which replaced his slot on the BBC, simply because the BBC could bring in A-listers every week, while Ross relied on T-list British ‘celebs’.

Nevertheless Clarkson will get a new show.  Probably on Netflix as rumoured.  I expect May and Hammond to follow him.  What format could it take?  Basically a rebooted Top Gear, in some capacity.  I expect a series of guy-orientated road trips, perhaps some guest hosts like Jay Leno.  But this is good news if you’re a fan of Top Gear when it was good, because it means we get not one but two reboots essentially.

Top Gear on the BBC

Clarkson fanboys and other naysayers say that without the three previous presenters that Top Gear is finished.  Well, that’s not true.  The BBC have already admitted, today, that a reboot is scheduled for 2016.  You know why they’re confident in saying that?  Because they’ve most likely been planning it for a while.

The fact of the matter is that the three presenters were getting old, along with the format, and the BBC were quite aware of it.  Often, they were out of touch with the electronic interfaces with the cars they were piloting.  Nowadays, real younger gearheads are known to have laptops hooked up to their cars quite often.  If you want power from your 21st century performance car, it’s imperative that you and the car both understand each other electronically.  On Top Gear though, jokes are made of the fact that the presenters, headed for 60, are alien to this, so instead they script some comedy scenes about caravans catching fire.

Nothing lasts forever, especially when your presenters are becoming a legal liability.  I guarantee the ball has been kicked around at BBC HQ with regards to a reboot for quite a while now.  I don’t think the BBC will be deterred by the reaction of Clarkson’s departure.

From here the BBC will probably reboot the whole thing, probably with younger presenters.  Steve Coogan is a popular rumour at the minute, he’s a funny guy who knows his way around an en engine.  Truth be told younger presenters were needed anyway – it was just a question of when.  They’ll also keep the comedy and increase the level of social media interaction.  One possible way to do this is to go live, something which always increases the energy of a show.  It would be the perfect antithesis to the horrid staged nonsense that has plagued the show for years now.

There’ll be a ratings war.  It could even get dirty.  And this is good for us, the viewers, unless you’re a manchild Clarkson disciple.

Top Gear is certainly not dead as some are saying today.  Again, the BBC have foreseen this, probably prepared for it and has all but confirmed this with their damned near immediate confirmation that they’ll have something new next year.  And again, they have cargo ships of money to throw at it.  They can bring in guests from the latest comic book movies and call upon their relation with Ferrari, Jaguar and Lamborghini.  They won’t take it lying down.

So the bottom line?  Clarkson acted like a diva and the result is the best possible outcome.