A new era of the world’s biggest car TV show is almost here. Amazon’s “The Grand Tour” is officially relaunching next month with new challenges, new features, and yes, new hosts. From what we’ve seen so far, it looks absolutely epic, and here’s your chance to ask two of them anything.
In some ways, succeeding the trio of Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May seems like a challenging proposition. The BBC didn’t quite land it with the 2016 reboot of “Top Gear” but Amazon certainly seems to have hired the right people for the “Grand Tour” job. We’ve got Trainspotter, mechanical engineer, and Civic Type R-swapped Honda Jazz (that’s the Honda Fit in America) owner Francis Bourgeois; car reviewer, E46 3 Series endurance racing driver, and Alfa Romeo aficionado Thomas Holland; and car reviewer, Toyota Century owner, and MX-5 enthusiast James Engelsman on deck.
You likely know Thomas and James from the immensely successful car YouTube channel Throttle House, where they’ve been road-testing, track-testing and road-tripping cars together since 2018. From breaking down in heavily depreciated V12 luxobarges to showing why wearing a helmet’s a good idea when getting into a BMW i8 to demonstrating just why the Lexus IS 500 gets under your skin, they’ve already done a cinematic job of showing what it means to love—and occasionally loathe—cars. A rather good CV, then. Likewise, you probably know Francis Bourgeois from TikTok, but there’s so much more to him than viral train videos. He’s in the midst of an OM606 turbodiesel-swapped R129 Mercedes-Benz SL project, his work with Chris Harris has been seriously entertaining, and he’s tailwhipped a scooter on stage at a Sam Fender concert.
From what we can see in the latest trailer, it looks like the reboot of “The Grand Tour” is going to be an epic season. Ford Mustang GTD vs. Chevrolet Corvette ZR1 vs. Hennessy Venom F5 Revolution Evo vs. a jet. A Jaguar XKR, Nissan 350Z, and Mercedes-Benz CLK doing skids. A Tesla Model 3 being launched off one of those giant inflatable blobs. Volvo 240 vs. Lexus LS 400 vs. Ford Crown Victoria. E46 M3 vs 996 Porsche 911 vs Nissan Pulsar GTi-R on dirt. Kei cars dressed up as a pantomime school bus, Jenson Button, an incident with a tollbooth, the Pagani Utopia, falling off a bicycle, exactly the sort of shenanigans we want to see.
It all launches on Sept. 4 on Amazon Prime Video, but before that, here’s a bit of a surprise: Thomas Holland and James Engelsman will briefly be joining us at 11:00 a.m. EDT today, and we want to metaphorically turn the mic over to you. Warm up your keyboards and pull up the comments section, your question just might get a response. Oh, and massive shoutout to James and Thomas for their willingness to play ball. They really are some of the nicest people in automotive media, so let’s show them love.
Top graphic image: The Grand Tour
Which car smells the best?
My original question was kinda dumb, so I’ll just offer congratulations to our guests and wish them luck in their new endeavo[u]r.
One of the things that amped up the drama from the old British set was (admittedly manufactured) drama – the “butting of heads” over differences of opinion in subjective matters of taste among other things. I watch a lot of Throttle House and honestly – it seems like you guys are going to have much less of that – and since Francis seems like such a friendly, amicable bloke I’m honestly hoping we won’t see any attempts to stir up questionably legitimate friction.
I don’t know if there’s a question here except in the multiverses of Spider-Man we know the iX3 is James’ Mary Jane, so what’s yours, Thomas & can you speculate on Francis’?
That’s very true.
The “false happiness” or “contrived conflict” of shows drives me mad.
The original-3 had, what felt, both genuine conflict and genuine happiness. That, to me, made it much easier to watch. I get there’s a script, but you could tell where things went too far or they were just genuinely having a great time together.
I know that the last crew, Clarkson especially, were prone to keeping the vehicles they “bought” for the challenges. Have any of you guys fallen into that trap yet now that the season is done filming?