Despite rumors that swirled earlier in the year alleging the upcoming third season of The Grand Tour was the show’s final run, the Amazon motoring program has been renewed for a fourth season. Fans of fast cars and accident-prone middle-aged men, rejoice.
Taking to social media on Thursday afternoon, the show confirmed its renewal while also announcing that it would lose the studio tent and “take on big adventure road trips” instead.
The show will be dropping the admittedly sometimes-awkward studio segments and presumably track tests, power laps, and other smaller items in favor of episode-dominating road trips. Typically referred to as Specials, the epic, episode-long films date back to Clarkson, Hammond, and May’s Top Gear days and have often proven to be some of the trio’s most popular work.
While I’m sure many fans will welcome the revised format with open arms, the gearhead in me who just wants to watch Clarkson powerslide a Ferrari 488 Pista around an old airfield in 4K while spouting metaphors will miss some of the auxiliary pieces.
Those in agreement need not worry too much though, as Amazon says Clarkson, Hammond, and May all have plans to bring individual spinoff shows of their own to the platform.
“We’re proud to say that Prime Video will continue to be the home for Jeremy, Richard, and James,” Prime Video vice president Jay Marine told the Guardian. “They’ve got some ambitious new ideas that Prime members are going to love. We’re excited to bring more Clarkson, Hammond, and May to Prime Video for years to come.”
Season 3 of The Grand Tour will begin streaming on Amazon Video on Jan. 18. It’ll see its three presenters poke around in new muscle cars, old pickup trucks, British hypercars, and off-road Lambos. Business as usual for now, then.
Anyone in the market for a large, black tent once used to film a multimillion-dollar motoring show can probably find one crop up on Amazon in the coming months.