The sixth episode of “The Grand Tour” came just in time for the holiday celebrations and the boys celebrated in Finland by bringing out Formula One driver Kimi Raikkonen to be killed in the forest by what appeared to be excessive alcohol consumption.
After that, there was a mostly boring Ford vs. Ford battle pitting the Mustang – newly reconfigured and made available for UK buyers – against the Focus RS. The Mustang was, of course, driven by Richard Hammond while the Focus was driven by Jeremy Clarkson and it included all the former “Top Gear” staples of lively banter, a race around some twisty bits of road and, naturally, a drag race. That was followed up, regrettably, by an appearance of “The American” – the caricatured American race driver Mike Skinner who we can only hope will soon be replaced by newly retired real F1 driver Nico Rosberg in future episodes.
After that segment came a holiday shopping bit where Clarkson displayed a pair of rocket skates, Hammond had a mobile ambulance [see clip below] and James May sat idly by until he brought out aging Brit musician Bob Geldof on a tablet on wheels which keen viewers may remember first seeing Jim Parsons’ Sheldon character cart out in an episode of “Big Bang Theory” years earlier.
The final segment was a lengthy history of Ford’s Le Mans racing history from the mouth of May which was all very interesting for a tiny segment of the worldwide population – us included – but became a bit boring midway through as it was all about the usual avoidable motorsport drama and theatrics.
This episode had some bits and pieces that were good but really could not shake off the yoke that it was merely an extremely long advertisement for Ford when they could have utilized their Finnish locale for much better purposes. ASN therefore awards it an 83 – good but not one of the best so far
