POP GEAR

So 4.4 million people tuned in to watch Top Gear. What does that tell us about how good the show was? Absolutely nothing. They didn’t tune in because they liked it, they tuned in because deep down they knew they wouldn't, but wanted to be proved wrong. Unfortunately, and inevitably, they were not.

Imagine if James Bond walked off the set of the next Bond movie and vowed never to come back. Not Daniel Craig mind you, James Bond. What would the producers do for the next movie? Make a Bond film without Bond in the hope nobody notices? Fooling themselves into thinking that international espionage and the inner working of the British Intelligence Service are what people actually watch Bond movies for? No, they’d probably call it a day.

Which would have been a very good idea when Clarkson went last year. May and Hammond knew the show couldn’t work without the three of them so they left too. The BBC probably knew that as well, but had no choice but to give it a go. So they pretended people watch Top Gear to see people - any people - dicking about in cars, and re-booted the show. 

But here’s the thing. The old Top Gear hated super-slick presenters, lavish production values and self-indulgent stunts. Which is why we loved watching it. The whole point of the show was to have a go at the TV establishment, placing a bunch of largely disinterested misfits at the centre of one of the most ludicrously over-produced shows on the telly. It was sending itself up constantly, and we were all in on the joke, whether we knew it or not.

These guys really didn’t have a place on mainstream TV, what with May the cringeful super-nerd and Clarkson the embarrassing relative you’d disown given half the chance. Baby-faced Hammond, on the other hand, was more like what we’re used to. But he was the whipping boy, the token young trendy, and consequently the butt of the others' constant put downs and ridicule. Because he represented lad culture, and Top Gear hated that too.

The old Top Gear also hated its studio audience, who were presumably told to stand quietly and look pretty in the background. Always in the background note, there was rarely any interaction. And it hated its viewers. It gave up trying to provide any useful consumer information with the reboot 10 years ago. There was way too much fun to be had hating - and breaking - things. The whole tone of the show gave you the feeling that these three were going to arse about anyway. You can come along for the ride if you want to, but don’t feel obliged.  

And of course, it hated its producers. Who hated the presenters for acting like dicks all over their beautiful, globally revered TV show. So, understandably, gave them ridiculous, sometimes sadistic, things to do. And that was the big joke at the centre of the show. It made Top Gear work, making sense of otherwise totally pointless challenges like driving two open topped three-wheelers to Blackpool in the pouring rain. Given this implicit animosity, it was perfectly natural that Clarkson punched someone in the nose. Some found it hateful. Most applauded it as a physical manifestation of the Top Gear guys hating pretty much everything. Except each other. And having a laugh (on a full stomach).

Top Gear was the nation's PC safety valve, a conduit for a suppressed cynicism which we could all tap into. It poked a finger in the eye of celebrity, took a pop at the populist, and peed on the opulent meritocracy that has driven such a formidable wedge between the Daimler and the Dacia drivers amongst us. Had Gordon Ramsey flashed his new La Ferrari Spider key at Jeremy Clarkson I think it may have found its way into the nearest lavatory. Not because Jezza wouldn’t have wanted one (he’s probably got one on order) but because Gordon’s ‘a cock’ for bragging about it. 

All that hate created a lot of tension, and that tension kept us hooked. The only tension on Sunday night came from the sad realisation that Chris Evans isn’t as clever as we all thought he was. Because he thought Top Gear was about cars, and that the current format could run without the old team. If there was ever a place for him at the centre of Top Gear it was as the bulls eye, because he and his uber-cool friends - and all they represented - were the target. 

There was hate alright - why else would someone at the Beeb have released Chris and his pal Matt into that studio. Like two woodland animals bouncing around in the gun room at the shooting lodge. If only they knew what the guns were really for.

@jesoverthinksit