Top Gear Has Finally Been Canceled

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It’s the end of an era as the BBC has confirmed it’s giving Top Gear a “rest… for the foreseeable future.” That’s a big deal considering the program has been a constant since 1977. And while the American version of the show is still going, let’s face it nobody watches that rubbish. Actually, not many were still watching the UK program so its cancellation, because that’s what it really is, comes as no shock.

Preteen steals forklift, chaos ensues for over an hour.

Let’s also face another fact: Top Gear was just a ho-hum show until Clarkson, May, and Hammond turned it into a cultural icon. However, their willingness to thumb their noses at the cultural sacred cows being foisted up by more modern BBC management led to Clarkson being suspended then fired. The cover story was some fracas involving cold food and long work hours, but who actually believes that tripe?

With May and Hammond smartly departing once Clarkson was jettisoned, the show’s just not been the same. The spice and zest of the thing just wasn’t there. They’ve cycled through hosts like Jerry Seinfeld going through girlfriends, some of them admittedly better than others, but ultimately none could recapture the magic of that dynamic trio.

Supposedly, the catalyst for the Top Gear cancellation was an incident where host Freddie Flintoff rolled a Morgan Super 3 at the Top Gear test track in southern England while filming of an episode. We’re not entirely buying that excuse like we didn’t buy the cold food and fisticuffs story years ago. The BBC sure does like telling exotic stories about Top Gear, don’t they?

For anyone crying about the end of Top Gear we have a challenge: name all three hosts (first and last name) without looking. Few can and that’s likely the reason the show’s been canned. Sad.

Images via BBC