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Anyone see Top Gear? What did you think? I think between Cruise and Diaz and the film about Senna, it was probably the best one so far. I really enjoyed it, though I was able to speed up all the banter about Knight And Day, as I Sky+'d it. Still enjoyable, though.

BTW, for those of you who can, The End Of The Line is on More4 on Tuesday at 10pm. If you've not seen it, do yourself a favour and do so.

Recorded TG as well but haven't watched it yet. When you say it was the best one so far, you mean this series, don't you?

Over the years I have recorded and archived every single Top Gear episode (the re-vamped TG, anyway) and am soon gonna need a hard drive by itself to store them. If people don't believe me, eat this!



They've been spending far too long on the overtly frivolous sketches recently (like that motorhome thing last week) and not enough on the, for me anyway, genuinely entertaining stuff like the used car challenges from a few years ago - The old supercars, the £1500 Porches, the home-made amphicar channel attempt etc.

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"Critics are like eunuchs in a harem; they know how the Tatty 100 is done, they've seen it done every day, but they're unable to do it themselves." - Brendan Behan

I completely agree, Tacitus. While I do mean, of this series (as it's only the third) I'd also throw in last series too. As you infered, it's on the slide and needs to get back to those Used Car challenges or more compassion stuff and not things like the Hammond challenge in this weeks.

I'll tell you how semi-interested I've been in TG recently - I still haven't watched Sunday's episode despite spending last night in front of the box and it took me until Saturday afternoon after the GP qualifying to watch last week's. The first indication was me stopping watching it live.

It's still enjoyable and one of the few TV programmes I'll regularly tune in to but there's been something sliding for a couple of years now. The dynamic is still great between the three of them so I'd suggest a shake-up in the production team. Even then it mightn't do a lot because the show is still very much Clarkson and Andy Willman's baby.

Maybe give the guys a year's break from cars and have them off doing something else - Michael Palin seems to have retired from travelogues, for instance.

EDIT - I'm not counting Total Wipeout as 'something else' but May's Open University stuff is always pretty good.

TBH, I've never been that big a fan of the little one, but he does seem to have become worse since his crash. Not really because he's changed, so much as now the money men know how much people like him, so he's started popping up on other things. Though, it's hard not to hate someone with that hair he's had for the last couple of years. Thank God he's toned that down.

Did you see the documentary Hammond did with Stirling Moss about auto-accident induced brain injury? Very revealing, especially when you consider the commentaries on a couple of the TG Adventures where the crew mention (a lot) what a bad tempered little so & so he's become off camera.

I can see the need for someone on the show who's just a petrolhead. Clarkson and, in particular, May were highly respected magazine motoring journalists before making the leap to TV and you can see a difference in the way they approach things once you get beyond JC's trademark hyperbole. That said, if one of them were to go I'd mind it least if it was Hammond...

James May has been my favourite TG presenter for a few years now.

Watched the episode yesterday and, as you say, it was the strongest one for ages. The Senna tribute was magnificent but I'm a little suspicious about just how fast Cruise and Diaz went in the Kia. It's a new car and not many of the usual suspects have driven it yet so I'm gonna give them the benefit of the doubt and, who knows, if Cruise turns out to be faster than that arch cock Jay Kay I might even like him.

A little.

No, I didn't watch the Stirling Moss documentary, mainly because it was Hammond. I only just made it through the Evel Kinevel one, though there were two arseholes on screen then, so maybe I should've taken a look at the SM one. Though, I have to say, I've never been a fan of him, either.

I'm not putting any stock in the their times, either. After all, Rupert Grint was at the top of the table before them, he's not exactly a known speed merchant, is he? It was only programme 3 and there can't be more than 8 or 10 names on the board. They do both have form, though, so it's probably a decent time. They are hampered by driving on the right side and having to find gears.

It was on BBC3 and thus I would normally avoid it like the plague but someone told me it was decent so I caught it on iPlayer. Nothing at all like the Knievel one, just two men talking about the after effects of car accidents which nearly killed them.

Some of it was quite touching, like when Hammond admitted that he had to almost force himself to fall in love with his wife all over again because it was ages before he could remember their past life. He knew her almost immediately but was adamant they weren't married.

Imagine if, this time around, he couldn't stand her?

What made me suspicious about the two biggest guests they've ever had going around fastest in the Reasonably Priced Car was that they beat that huge dragon bloke Peter Jones' time out of sight and he was one of the fastest guys in the previous car.

Then again, they might well be two of those annoying people who seem to be successful at everything they turn their hands to.

You know what's bothering me? Which fiancée was best for Charlie?

I'm afraid I had to click properties before I understood what the hell you were on about, but now that I know it was Two And A Half Men, I barely care. However, in terms of the ladies pics?



TBH, the other girl looks better, but I hate the 'wet' look.

Oh comeone on honeykid, we have to find at least one women we both agree on...I would have gone with Ms Vaugier...

Maybe we should head to the totty thread and thrash this out. BTW, who's the other chick? The one I chose.

I have to agree with HK, the other gal is 2 skinny. Women supposed to be curvaceous.

i have no idea who this gal is, but id choose her.

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"The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it." - Michelangelo.

Anyone else watched the new Sherlock Holmes on the BBC? We watched the first one and liked it a lot. It's set in the modern day.

I didn't, but I'm not adverse to it. The trailer made it look a bit like Holmes meets Dr. Who, but if the writing's better than the good Doctor, then I might give it a go.

Hon, I don't watch Dr Who, but am a fan of Sherlock Holmes so was interested in seeing what they'd do with setting in it the present. I thought it came off well, has some kooky little trickeries like showing texts as captions rather than looking at the phone like you usually see texts on screen. Worth a go

Anyone watching the athletics?

What a lovely, lovely, lovely girl Jessica Ennis is. And Denise Lewis is in a little blue dress.

With the possible exception of Stephen King, I can't think of another prolific writer whose film adaptations are overwelmingly crappy than Elmore Leonard. The three notable exceptions have been Get Shorty (the best of them all), Jackie Brown and 3:10 to Yuma.

Which brings me to the TV series Justified, which is an original series using an Elmore Leonard character US Marshall Raylan Givens. Two episodes in, and its looking good. I don't think you have to have read either Pronto or Riding the Rap, the novels in which he appeared, though it is fun as they sprinkle some of the moments, quirks and such.



if you like the Dirty Harry sensibility this may be the series for you.

Another good Top Gear tonight. It's a shame that it's only the last two episodes that felt like real Top Gear episodes. Obviously, there's still one next week, but it's a compilation.

Anyway, I loved the challenge and the approach they took to it. OK, it wore a little thin at times in the last 10 minutes, but other than that, I really liked it and it made me laugh quite a lot.

Just caught the second Holmes, and it's all becoming a very effort for me. I like the modernising idea, and the first Ep was fairly strong (aside from the 'who hunts by night' puzzle which surely everyone got immediately).

Ep 2 was all over the place tho. Lots of style over substance and inconsistency. About the only thing I really liked was the 'Indian tracking' use of the dew-covered directory outside the house (and in some way that's a rehash of the pink coat from the first Ep). Suddenly Watson doesn't have a gun, Holmes can't deduce simple things like why Watson has turned up at the same place he has, deadly mechanisms fire when turned (even though they're set off by a descending weight which would miss the trigger), nonsense is waffled about modern cryptography being no good on old cyphers (which is bollox). And on.

No amount of decent production values can save that kind of waffley writing. (All made more jumbled by this being a 3-parter, not a series, I guess). And it doesn't help that Cumberpatch isn't doing much with the role other than staring obliquely all the time. Plus he has a silly name

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