Top Gear

From The TV IV

Top Gear

Premiere	November 20, 2002
Finale
Airs	Sunday 8pm
Creator	Jeremy Clarkson Andy Wilman
Network	BBC Two
Style	1 hour
Company	BBC
Episodes	81
Seasons	10
Origin	UK

Top Gear (2002-) is a BBC show about cars and motorsports, and the UK's number one motoring show. Airing on BBC Two, Sunday nights at 8pm, the show takes a light-hearted and often hilarious look at cars, motoring and destroying caravans. Top Gear is currently hosted by Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May.

Top Gear first orginally aired in 1977 as a 30 minute long show. It was a fairly conventional magazine show reviewing new cars and following other car-related issues and news. The show became much more popular in the early 1990s with the arrival of Jeremy Clarkson, who helped steer the show into becoming more humorous and controversial. Following Clarkson's departure from the show in 1999, the show lost over half its audience, prompting the BBC to cancel the series in 2001. The remaining presenters jumped ship to a new network and launched a similar show, Fifth Gear.

Top Gear returned in 2002, under a new format pitched by Jeremy Clarkson and executive producer Andy Wilman. The show was lengthened to one hour and introduced new elements, such as The Stig, and new features: Star in a Reasonably Priced Car, Power Laps, the "Cool Wall", and a car news segment. In addition, there are frequent features such as competitions between the presenters, races, and fairly outlandish stunts.

The first season was presented by Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and Jason Dawe. Dawe's contribution to the first season was mainly presenting different bargains for used and new cars. Dawe was replaced by James May in the second season. The eighth season brought a new "co-host" in the form of Top Gear Dog, a labradoodle, but Top Gear Dog all but disappeared from the studio segments in the ninth season.

Note: Some episode articles contain currency conversions. These were made at the time the articles were written and may no longer be accurate. Conversions were done directly and may not reflect pricing changes made for different markets.

1 Seasons
2 In-Depth
3 DVD Releases
4 Links

[edit] Seasons

Season	Premiere	Finale	#
Season One	November 20, 2002	December 29, 2002	10
Season Two	May 11, 2003	July 20, 2003	10
Season Three	October 26, 2003	December 28, 2003	9
Season Four	May 9, 2004	August 1, 2004	10
Season Five	October 24, 2004	December 26, 2004	9
Season Six	May 22, 2005	August 7, 2005	11
Season Seven	November 13, 2005	February 12, 2006	7
Season Eight	May 7, 2006	July 30, 2006	8
Season Nine	January 28, 2007	March 4, 2007	6
Season Ten	October 7, 2007	December 23, 2007	10

[edit] In-Depth

At a Glance: Technical information on the series (awards, international airtimes, etc.).
Star in a Reasonably Priced Car: A star in a reasonably priced car completes a lap around the Top Gear test track. Complete results.
Power Laps: The Stig takes a car and completes a lap around the Top Gear test track. Complete Results.
The Test Track: The Top Gear Test Track.