BBC’s motorhead enthusiast series, Top Gear, continues in top form for a thirteenth season, but anyone who’s kept in touch with the series for the last four seasons will notice a slight shift in tone for this latest season: comedy is slightly more important than cars. The show has always managed to be a car show that balanced the lead trio’s staged wit with lots of beautiful looking cars, road trips, guest stars, and lap runs. The thirteenth season doesn’t deviate from the pattern; it just offers a slight albeit noticeable shift in how it handles itself. At the end of it all, it’s still very much the show you’ve been watching for the last few years only this season lacked a very important entry in the episodic canon: there’s no epic road trip or motor event like in past seasons. They do a few small trips, but compared to some of the past features on rallies or cross-desert travel in Africa, the thirteenth season’s endeavors fall short.
As per the show’s usual shenanigans, the three hosts launch into a given episode’s challenge with the premise that they’ve no idea what’s ahead, and this tends to carry through the entire outing. Where the idea stretches thin is when they lay voiceovers of witty things they wish they’d said at the time. It’s not a new convention for the show, but when the tasks assigned in episodes feel like repeats of those in recent seasons, you’re taken out of the excitement and the narration’s comedic quality becomes paramount. It’s a summit Top Gear’s 13th season never reaches.
Some of the season’s highlights involve a race between the trio as they test the speed and efficiency of three classic vehicles, one of which is a coal burning locomotive – which is just fun to watch. A few of the episodes go the very typical Top Gear route of the guys taking a set (usually low) amount of money and buying a cheap car and putting it through various trials arbitrarily based on what’s funny. Some supercars get tested by the guys, and of course by the Stig. Also, depending on whether or not you trust the show’s desire to throw out red herrings, there’s even a reveal (maybe) of the Stig’s identity.
What does set the season apart from past sets, in a good way, is the collection of guest stars that pop up in the Top Gear studio for the talk show portions. It’s always cool when Stephen Fry pops up anywhere, and with his awesome show Q.I. going strong and having established himself firmly as a comedic voice in the U.S. after enjoying years of the same in England, but Jeremy makes a solid interview of the occasion. Fry may be the best guest of the season, but with the likes of racing pro Michael Schumacher, Michael McIntyre, Olympic Champion Usain Bolt, Brian Johnson, and Sienna Miller taking a seat as the “Star in a Reasonably Priced Car” for season thirteen, the interviews are usually quite solid (especially Bolt and Miller). The season’s final episode brings in car enthusiast and large-chinned television personality Jay Leno and the man has a few decent stories to tell about his various automobile-centric adventures. Truth be told, Leno works better as a guest than he does the host.
Longtime fans of Top Gear will find the season satisfactory, since it manages to cram in a few really great moments (like a Bugatti Veyron vs. a Mclaren F1 drag race in Abu Dhabi). The thirteenth season is enough to barely please the hardcore car enthusiasts whereas before seasons went out of their way to throw in as many really cool car moments as possible. The tone of the show has shifted, almost imperceptibly until the season’s final episode, towards one of comicality over technicality, the latter of which was the backbone and foundation of the show. With the final episode, the idea of being technically inclined goes out the window in favor of just being a comedy show that also happens to involve cars. It’s not a good change for the show, and you can’t help but hope it returns to its car roots, replete with a big road trip special, in following seasons.
DVD Bonus Features
Where the show itself dialed back the more motorhead-pleasing moments in the show, they live on in the extras with a segment on the spitfire, a slo-mo look at a Ken Block performance, more train race footage with Jeremy Clarkson, and, the crown jewel of the extras, more footage of the Lamborghini Murcielago LP670-4 SV. There is also additional interview footage with Brian Johnson and Jenson Button, and a fun but otherwise pointless Stig POV piece.
"Top Gear 13" is on sale September 28, 2010 and is not rated. Comedy, Documentary, Sports. Directed by Brian Klein, Nigel Simpkiss, Phil Churchward. Starring James May, Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond.
