Censorship of Top Gear (2002-) on PlutoTV

[Masha]

The automotive/wrenchhead/self-indulgent man-cave that is: Top Gear (2002-) is available now on: PlutoTV for viewing for free with advertisements. Individual episodes can be watched: On Demand and there is a dedicated channel on which they loop the entire series. I will warn that using: PlutoTV On Demand can cause excessive advertisements and occasional lock-up as it searches for targeting information.

I would not usually speak in public of one of my guilty pleasures but I have noticed an oddity of the censorship.

For those who do not know the series: it is three presenters demonstrating vehicles from supercars worth hundreds of thousands to family automobiles affordable by the average Brit. They do this with timed runs, strange races and insane stunts.

The frequency of coarse words varies from perhaps one per episode to one per second when the tall git is on a rant.

We have: Closed Captioning enabled at all times because it helps on occasion with thick accents and rapid patter.

The oddity which I noticed is that audio and CC are not the same. The CC for an episode wherein one of the team is supposedly stranded in sub-zero weather in the: Rockies while his mates quite leisurely race to his rescue shows statements such as: "BLEEPing idiots" and: "where the BLEEP are they?" The audio is never censored in any way and so the f-word is heard quite plainly at every use.

I have seen this effect in movies where the audio track, translated subtitle and Closed Captioning incrementally reduce the 'severity' of the language but this is my first experience with it in a television programme. It is the first time also that I have seen CC substitute the f-word with: "BLEEP".

I suspect that this is not sufficiently of interest to motivate any person to watch it in hopes of seeing the effect but I will warn that you should perhaps wait a few days. They loop the entire series and I see this morning that they are in the years after the good presenters left and the programme has been sanitized, homogenized and purified for your protection. It will be necessary to wait until they reach the end of those episodes and begin again with the first years to see the fun and interesting version.

[ElCid]

I'm a "car guy" and watched Top Gear a few years ago for several episodes. Never cared for it. To me it was just a bunch of juvenile delinquents doing silly or dangerous things with cars as an excuse.

[Dargo]

I'm a "car guy" and watched Top Gear a few years ago for several episodes. Never cared for it. To me it was just a bunch of juvenile delinquents doing silly or dangerous things with cars as an excuse.

I got into the show for a while a few years back. Thought the three, ahem, "gentlemen" who originally hosted it were quite often funny and played off each other very well at times.

And hey Cid! Look at one of the classic cars that'll be on the bloc next week at the RM Sotheby's auction on the grounds at Phoenix's Arizona Biltmore Hotel...

https://rmsothebys.com/en/auctions/az23 ... le/1317518



(...my wife and I are planning on driving down there to attend this free open to the public preview of the all the cars next Wednesday...have gone to the Barrett-Jackson auction a number of times, but never this one...really looking forward to it)

[ElCid]

I'm a "car guy" and watched Top Gear a few years ago for several episodes. Never cared for it. To me it was just a bunch of juvenile delinquents doing silly or dangerous things with cars as an excuse.

I got into the show for a while a few years back. Thought the three, ahem, "gentlemen" who originally hosted it were quite often funny and played off each other very well at times.

And hey Cid! Look at one of the classic cars that'll be on the bloc next week at the RM Sotheby's auction on the grounds at Phoenix's Arizona Biltmore Hotel...

https://rmsothebys.com/en/auctions/az23 ... le/1317518



(...my wife and I are planning on driving down there to attend this free open to the public preview of the all the cars next Wednesday...have gone to the Barrett-Jackson auction a number of times, but never this one...really looking forward to it)

Thanks. Enjoy the show.
That's an Adventurer and I never really cared for them - or the Chrysler 300 for that matter. The gold anodized trim is too much in an era where many cars went too far. However, if you want to buy the De Soto Adventurer for me, feel free to do so.
Of course the 1958 Hudson in its last throes may have been the worse. Couldn't find an image that I could copy.

[Masha]

To me it was just a bunch of juvenile delinquents doing silly or dangerous things with cars as an excuse.

You say that as if it were a bad thing.

That is precisely the appeal to me. They are sufficiently technical to provide an air of being a documentary but quit that when it begins to be boring. They are then silly twits.

[Dargo]

To me it was just a bunch of juvenile delinquents doing silly or dangerous things with cars as an excuse.

You say that as if it were a bad thing.

That is precisely the appeal to me. They are sufficiently technical to provide an air of being a documentary but quit that when it begins to be boring. They are then silly twits.

Well said Masha, and exactly the reason I liked watching this program as well.

[Masha]

You may speak of how overblown and juvenile and even asinine this series is but I have watched just now the interview with: Ronnie Wood when he was a guest.

It was so very wonderful! This incredible man telling of how he and Keith Richards accidentally stayed up for six days straight because they would hook up with Eric Clapton after a concert and go all night until it was time for the next concert. He was quite lovable even when speaking of how he taped over his wedding video. So full of life and so impish and such a verve for living! It was nice to see that he did very well on the track also while doing the: "star in a reasonably priced car" segment.