An essay on the U.S. version of Top Gear - by Jay Leno

nice article!!!

anyone see the one where they bought $1000 american made POS, drove thru the south and nearly got killed. :
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like a show like that would fly in the states!

 
As Leno points out in his article, the largest problem here in the States is that all of our shows are commerical-driven. How could the host of a US version of Top Gear slam some GM POS, when they are running 2 or 3 spots per show? The BBC is funded differently and has far fewer commercials. In fact, the UK versions of Top Gear are like 56 minutes long or something...we get edited versions here in the States so we can jam in more commercials.

 
I remember when I was younger there were 3-4 commercials per segment, and it occured ON THE DOT at the top of the hour, 1/4, 1/2 and 3/4. Now, we have the hour divided up into 10 minute segments, allowing for 6 commercial segments. So instead of seeing 12-16 commercials in an hour span, it's now 18-24. That's 50% more commercials, translating into more money for the stations through commercial spots.

Grrr.

 
In a perfect world I do think that a US version of Top Gear could work. The issue of "no good American cars to test" is easy to get around. First, there are plenty of fun tests that they could do with domestic cars...classics vs retro-mods, "performance versions" vs based models, etc, etc. Second, Top Gear is not exclusive to UK cars, they test everything under the sun and the US version could do the same.

Then, I think that the conversation over who to use as the US Stig would be interesting as well.

But Alas, it's the States circa 2008 and commercial TV will ruin it. I will tune in to the BBC America Monday nights for the "orginal".

 
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