BritInParis

Top Gear return: James May and Richard Hammond expected to turn down multi-million BBC offer and join Jeremy Clarkson on Netflix - News - TV & Radio - The Independent

Steve_

Assuming people in the UK want to sign up for Netflix in large enough numbers. Not convinced myself.

They have major problems in Canada because they don't have as much content available, so people use proxies to get around it and use the US version. A lot of content providers now (we know about Sony because of the hack) are trying to get Netflix to use more effective geofencing.

If that happens (pretty sure it will) the UK version of Netflix is going to have to be pretty good to get a lot of people to sign up.

The difference in the UK is that OTA TV has a lot of channels and most people simply don't bother with things like Sky or cable or internet stuff, it's a higher barrier for Netflix to get over I think. The BBC is more of an obstacle than the US OTA networks.

And I would be amazed if the BBC didn't send in the lawyers over any format copying infringements of Top Gear.

According to this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Televi...United_Kingdom less than half of UK households have pay TV and Netflix is estimated to have 1.5 million subscribers.

Steve_

Oh and just as an aside, Simon Cowell obviously underestimated the ability of people to come up with better talent shows than his ideas, i.e. The Voice on NBC. What's he doing in the US nowadays? Nothing.

Pulaski

I wasn't initially convinced either, until I noted, per above, that the viewership of Top Gear is relatively high compared to the number of Netflix subscribers in the UK, and you'd only need some of the Top Gear viewers to sign up for Netflix to cover the cost of making a fairly extravagant Top Gear substitute. And there are Top Gear viewers in every country that NetFlix has a presence.
Would you care to explain what you mean by "a lot"? ..... There were four OTA channels when I left the UK, and I think a fifth has been added subsequently.

Otherwise I don't see the BBC's lawyers getting far - not least because the BBC doesn't have a significant budget for fighting legal battles, and the format of Top Gear is quite frankly extremely woolly - three guys taking about cars, new and old, test driving some of them, and otherwise horsing around and being politically incorrect. I don't see much there that can be copyrighted. So far as the list of "elements" of Top Gear that are at risk from any sort of copyright infringement suit, I suspect that it begins and ends with "The Stig".

Nutek

Maybe they can bring back Sacked Stig.

Weeze

Chris Evans is filming a one off top gear thing if that helps. He said so on tv today and they the three of them tweeted pretty good responses.

markonline1

America's Got Talent?

There's loads since the UK swapped from analogue to digital. Probably 30 plus.

sir_eccles

Lots more than there were when I left

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...n_channels_(UK)

sir_eccles

Sounds like the Beeb is getting ready to air the last episode:

The New Teaser For Top Gear's 'Lost Episode' Is Here

Steve_

Maybe. Maybe not, TV to me appears to be a very fickle business.

When did Channel 5 start? Can't even remember. But anyway OTA you typically get 25+ channels now according to this: All of the free TV channels in the UK

All I can say is Conan sucks without all the stuff he was able to do on NBC. The format will have to be different.

SultanOfSwing

1997.

But it was probably well into the 2000s before it could be picked up with any half decent quality. I rarely watched it myself, except for the occasional new movie and the softcore porn at 10:30 on weekends

Steve_

Yeah, what I meant was he hasn't done anything new lately, America's Got Talent and American Idol are clearly on a downward slope and I heard American Idol had been cancelled.

I'm just not convinced that Top Gear is dependent on those three presenters. To me, they had moved beyond the amusing stage and had become quite irritating. I know I for certain wouldn't sign up for Netflix to be further irritated by them.

Like I said, Top Gear USA sucks because of the budget, not the presenters.

Pulaski

There is no point in arguing with you, but those are your opinions and it is my belief that you are not a typical TG viewer/fan.

I find Clarkson, Hammond, and May to be entertaining, and I don't think the US presenters would be particularly entertaining no matter how big a budget you threw at the show.

A colleague of mine found the History Channel version, but when I realized he was raving about the US version I introduced him to the UK version on BBC America, and within a few days he had found the BBC version on Netflix and he has never looked back - he found it waaay better than the US version.

Steve_

It is way better than the US version, but not because of the presenters. The US version has had a handful of really good episodes but generally it's low budget rubbish.

I think to say the UK presenters are uniquely entertaining isn't the case.

Do you even watch Top Gear USA?

SultanOfSwing

The appeal of UK Top Gear was partly content (and what was allowed due to the budget) but mostly due to the chemistry between the three presenters. Sure, anyone can stand there and talk about cars, they had a million people do that on Top Gear UK between 1977 and 2001, but for what made the second incarnation of the show enjoyable for me and most people I know who like it, was Clarkson, May and Hammond. The fact that it was about cars became incidental for me, I'd watch the three of them present a show about stamp collecting, if they made it funny enough.

FWIW, I think US Top Gear is OK, if you consider it a completely different show to what the UK one tried to be.