New Top Gear Episode 3 - the magic is back!

SWMBO and I watched the new Top Gear episode last night, and it was amazing. The Top Gear that we all knew and loved is back!

Rory and Chris Harris made their main show debuts last night, and I thought they did very well. Harris's Ferrari F12tdf piece reminded me a lot of a Chris Harris on Cars episode. I loved his enthusiasm throughout the entire show, and it was clear he was really, honestly excited to be there. You could say the same for Rory's Focus RS film. You can tell that he's not as accomplished a driver as some of the others, but he does really well talking to camera, and has been knocking it out of the park in the studio on Extra Gear all season.

Matt LeBlanc, I know you'll never see this but I owe you an apology. I told everyone that would listen that you were going to be crap, and that you were going to ruin the show. You were good in the Ariel Nomad film from two weeks ago, and absolutely hysterical with Ken Block and the Hoonicorn. I was wrong about you, and I'm sorry.

Which brings us to the shouty ginger. Because so many other people were on the show tonight, his talking was kept to a minimum and the show improved immensely for it. His R8 film was actually not bad, other than the fact that he's still too shouty. Sabine, as always, is one hell of a driver, and she was a joy to watch hot-lapping Laguna Seca in the R8. My absolute favorite line was her going through the Corkscrew - "Hold on tight to your balls!"

Still not sold on the Star in a Rallycross Car segment format. It definitely takes the right guests for that to go well - luckily for the TG crew, Kevin Hart totally carried it for them. It seems like the one thing that Chris Evans would actually be good at would be the old format Star in a Reasonably Priced Car, I don't know why they don't just let him do that.

But overall - this episode was firmly on the level of the good non-special episodes of the old Top Gear. The magic is back, which makes me super happy

So... for those of us without cable, where are we watching these episodes?

There is a chrome extension I use to get into iPlayer on the BBC website. It's called Hola, and is available on the chrome app store.

I'm behind the times, because I just watched the premier. It was a little awkward and cringeworthy, but so were some of the later original TG shows from 2-3 years ago, when they were forcing it pretty hard.

Amazingly enough, I wasn't nearly as annoyed by Chris Evans' voice as I was told to expect.

szeis4cookie wrote: There is a chrome extension I use to get into iPlayer on the BBC website. It's called Hola, and is available on the chrome app store.

Perfect. Seems like I tried it before without success, but good now.

In reply to szeis4cookie:

Seriously, its about time someone made an easy to use vpn. Works flawlessly.

I used hola for years. I found an article that said it opened your computer up to nefarious uses? Then it stopped working. Can anyone confirm that Hola is the devil?

I had some hiccups watching last night using Hola, looked like the BBC IT team was trying to shut down some of the addresses that Hola connects from. I turn Hola on only when I use it, and the rest of the time it stays turned off. I also only use it on geo-restricted TV networks like the BBC, so I have a higher level of trust in the sites I connect to.

I don't mean to hijack, but I wonder what you guys and girls think about article.
http://www.wired.com/2015/07/proxy-services-totally-unsecure-alternatives/

I don't know enough about this stuff to understand much of what the article said, so I deleted Hola. Is it safe?

I think that those are valid concerns, and I'll be reviewing my VPN provider. That said - even with the risk of a VPN provider injecting their own ads into the served page, there's one, known source of that risk, and as the article notes choosing a proxy wisely can help to mitigate it. With BitTorrent, you are exchanging bits with many, unknown sources, and I believe the risk of malware associated with BitTorrent is much greater.

I agree, this was a great episode. The fact they did a gymkhana or whatever it's spelled on it with Ken Block was fantastic as well. That's the kind of content they need.

I kept saying give it time. The previous Top Gear didn't find it's way (or it's final host arrangement) until the second season.

The chris harris segment was excellent. Seeing him kind of drift that classic ferrari a bit made me giggle.

Chris did a great job. I've never watched any of his other videos, but I've read his print work. He's a great match to the program. And Rory was also well done.

I think Ginger is better in the supercar tests because the shouting fits when he's trying to talk in a loud car.

That was a very enjoyable program, although I miss The News (which was 100% chemistry) and the old SIARPC format.

Watching Sabine introduce the Stig was hilarious. Anyone speak German?

Keith Tanner wrote: ...Watching Sabine introduce the Stig was hilarious. Anyone speak German?

I generally watch Top Gear with a friend who speaks German (born there), but we still have not watched Ep2. I will post up it up when we get to it if no one else does.

According to FinalGear.com, it translates as "They say, he is the man who's also a race driver, and he has 2 feet. "

Hola is a free VPN, it's free because the users are also the exit nodes. A paid VPN (PIA is a popular one) is cheap and safe.

BrokenYugo wrote: Hola is a free VPN, it's free because the users are also the exit nodes.

What does this mean?

DrBoost wrote:

BrokenYugo wrote: Hola is a free VPN, it's free because the users are also the exit nodes.

What does this mean?

"Some say, he's a racing driver who also has two feet" in nerd.

I noticed in the Ken Block segment there was a minimum of tire marks on the street from previous practice runs / camera takes. In his regular videos you can usually see where he's run the course a million times.

I smiled the entire episode. Huge smiles at some points. I hope the ratings are enough to keep it going because I like it a lot.

Just finishing up the overnight showing on BBCA. Much much better than the first episode. I'm trying not to be biased due to my love of the Hoonicorn, but it really was a step in the right direction. They may have a chance, but only time will tell.

Huge improvement. Less Evans and more of everyone else is a good thing.

OK It's a big improvement, but it's not a patch on the old, new Top Gear. That's not a damnation, it's just that the old trio made for a perfect buddy show.

Fire copper top and it would be an even better show. It would be interesting to see the chemistry between LeBlanc, Rory and Harris developed after a few years.

I was hoping for more of a departure from the old format, but it's identical in reality.

I just watched the Hoonigan ride and rather enjoyed. But what does the red button do?

Evans to take a "less prominent" role going forward: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/13/chris-evans-to-take-less-prominent-top-gear-role-after-audience/

DrBoost wrote:

BrokenYugo wrote: Hola is a free VPN, it's free because the users are also the exit nodes.

What does this mean?

Normally with a VPN you're paying for a highly encrypted "tunnel" to some server elsewhere, at which point you cross back over into the regular internet traffic, this provides the illusion that you're in whatever country that "exit node" server is (and makes the traffic more or less untraceable, handy for illegal torrents). With Hola, to my understanding, there is no dedicated server, all the users also function as the servers through their idle bandwidth. So if you're using it to watch BBC stuff in the UK, some random European might be using your computer/internet connection as an exit to watch US Netflix or whatever.

There was also some controversy a while back that Hola was also selling that idle bandwidth, which can be used for all sorts of questionable things (botnets and the like).

For what a proper VPN service costs(~$40/year), it's not worth messing around with.