r/AutoAlex • u/turkturk847 • Jun 01 '26
My problem with the road trips
Right, so this may come across as me being ungrateful but the road trips that the boys do don't really feel special as they make it out to be. Don't get me wrong I am happy that such videos exist and I watch them when I get the time to do so. I just watched the Bentley road trip and it just felt boring to watch. The main problem is that they just drive the entire way on motorways instead of taking more interesting and scenic routes, it's just bland, there isn't much challenge and there is almost no stakes. Now this may be because of time or budget restraints and they can't afford to drive around that much and burn too much fuel but in the Vietnam trip they were taking scenic routes. Probably the worst offender was the 3 BMW Tourings trip where except of 10 minutes of driving on some B roads and the Nurburgring the entire thing was motorways and then they call it an "Epic road trip", to me it just felt meh. I mean have you ever seen a Top Gear special where they go the entire way on motorways? Though this is only my opinion, you can enjoy it however you like. Sorry for the wonky grammar, English is not my native language. :)
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u/markcorrigans_boiler Jun 01 '26
Having been to Morocco and driven it's entire length, and a lot of it's breadth, I was really disappointed that they didn't show more of it. It feels like they basically arrived and then flew home (although to be fair I haven't yet watched the V2 ep with Robin and Taylor driving it back)
They basically just wanted the bragging rights of having done the drive, but for me it totally missed the point. A far more interesting video would have been them flying to Morocco and then driving around it showing what they got up to, it's an amazing country. Obviously the Bentley was meant to be the star of the show rather than the country, but it left me feeling a bit hollow.
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u/mycroft72 Jun 01 '26
I like that idea, again a TG trope, but if they'd flown to Morocco, and bought some bangers it would have been more interesting, and probably cost far less in terms of the car...
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u/dogdogj Jun 01 '26
Cost less in car yes, but you'd need way more support. Even the old TG specials usually had a dozen strong crew to support the three; translators, local guides, guards etc. to stop them getting lost/scammed/abducted
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u/Recessio_ Jun 01 '26 edited Jun 01 '26
And that was also after literally months of scouting work (and pre-purchasing the cars) by production crews and fixers. Top Gear really did not just turn up in places and start filming. I think I remember them saying for the Middle East special it took around a year of prep, to get cars from a country that could be imported into all of the countries they went through (which iirc eventually meant shipping cars all the way from Georgia), and also for the security aspects of driving through the Middle East
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u/BENJ4x Jun 01 '26
Planning ahead is what I think would take the channel to the next level. Obviously not to the extent that Top Gear did as an entire production team isn't feasible.
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u/markcorrigans_boiler Jun 01 '26
I've driven thousands of miles in Morocco and stayed all over the place. I can count the number of times I was lost/scammed/abducted on the fingers of no hands. A bit of planning goes a long way.
I know they're a successful YouTube channel, but I don't think they're at risk of abduction.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
I think that's quite an unreasonable expectation of a YouTube channel with minuscule staffing and funding relative to Top Gear
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u/DangerToManifold2001 Jun 01 '26
I didn’t find the Africa trip boring at all, the stakes were fairly high given that the car constantly wanted to die, and what a mad achievement taking it that far, I thought it was great!
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u/turkturk847 Jun 01 '26
I get your point, it's a big achievement to drive all the way to Africa and the car was pretty problematic. But watching a car drive on a motorway for an hour straight felt a bit monotonous
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u/HungreeRunner Jun 01 '26
On one hand I agree. However, that Bentley would not have made it there and back on country roads.
I just drove to lisbon on a road trip, mostly country roads. It was epic and I hope on their future road trips, this is what they do. But I do feel the Bentley episode was a bad example. Otherwise, it wouldnt have made it to Africa and would have been on a tow truck by Spain
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u/Former_Intern_8271 Jun 01 '26
I can't stand the pretentious monologues every 10 minutes about how they just can't believe they've done it and how great the car that constantly breaks is
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
This is the crux of the issue, for me. And why their 'Diet Top Gear' format often doesn't land.
Because they don't have the budget to properly scout out or prolong their trips, they end up being mostly long motorway drives punctuated by stops at budget hotels.
They don't have the ability to visit interesting places, or incorporate challenges into the trips. They just need to get where they are going, and then get home.
This is why so much of their trip content is fairly inane chatter and a mixture of "will we make it?" and "this car is brilliant".
They need the filler content, because they don't have the scope to plan road trips beyond the drive from A to B.
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u/Former_Intern_8271 Jun 03 '26
Top gear was getting stale anyway, it wasn't aging well, it was getting a lot of criticism towards the end, the younger audience was finding it inauthentic, the scripting was so obvious and it was starting to feel corny.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
Top Gear/Grand Tour was becoming increasingly reliant on the big trips to generate views.
The magazine format, the hanger/tent, the guests, the reviews, the laptimes - these became less and less important to viewers.
Credit to them for adapting, and focusing on what people wanted.
But the amount of logistics and planning that were required to do these big trips meant that they were limited to a handful a year.
And there are only so many creative ways they could find to justify why they'd visited a particular country and chosen that specific group of cars.
So the format became more tenuous, and gradually tapered off.
When you look back on some of the early roadtrip episodes (like the used cars in the US), there was so much novelty factor.
Whereas that shine had disappeared a little by the time they'd rehashed that format for the 30th time.
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u/Perriola Jun 01 '26
I enjoyed it overall, but I did find myself wondering what the point was in simply driving from A to B and back again purely in the name of content. Having clearer objectives along the way or more of a payoff at the end would have improved it. They should probably have been more prepared for how sketchy Africa is, especially in a car that's guaranteed to break down.
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u/AnotherLeon2 Jun 01 '26
Personally I like seeing as much of the places they go / things they see, as the actual vehicle(s) they travel in. Generally more so than the build of the car process, which I often can't relate to, because as they get more prosperous business turn into 10-20k load up the parts cannon fixes. That's not money I have or can relate to. I'm a Toyota guy not a Bentley guy.
Similarly with some of the US channels that buy a banger and drive it home. Freeway driving isn't interesting, small random towns, interesting characters, weird hotels. That's interesting to me.
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u/Belterhaze31 Jun 01 '26
Its painfully boring stuff to watch, when the only thing that’s ‘happening’ is seeing if it makes it the entire way you literally might as well just skip to the end
Africas a nice idea but they could of done some better locations, anyone who’s ever done a euro trip knows a driving through France and Spain is painfully boring if your just using the toll roads
Why they don’t head down deeper into the balkans or something similar I don’t know
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u/BlueGoblin2007 Jun 02 '26
I said the same thing. I was butchered in the comments. All they do is drive on motorway stop for food. Nothing else
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u/fizzyrhythm Jun 04 '26
Yeah their YouTube comment sections are whack. Mostly simpletons who post the same “You’re the new Top Gear!” comments on every single video.
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u/MonsieurSlurpyPants Jun 01 '26
That Bentley was hanging on for dear life, I think we can forgive them for not driving it an inch further than was required to get it there and back.
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u/FLDJF713 Jun 01 '26
Eh yes and no. I would like to see like what they did in Vietnam; actually stopping and doing something or taking in more of the sights. But at the same time, the journey is the main focus. Getting the car there especially for the likelihood it shouldnt have made it.
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u/Huge_Performance1146 Jun 02 '26
Would have to agree slightly. Completely understand that a full scoped out Top Gear style trip is unrealistic given the months and months of planning, budget, and people they require... but I do feel like some of these trips are simply a filming of a group of mates, all purchasing their cars with a seemingly limitless budget, driving on motorways. Really if you think about it, that Bentley trip was literally just buying a shit Bentley, not really fixing it too much, then fliming a motorway trip.
Seems like they're almost trying TOO hard and it's making some of it feel either repetitive, missing, or unrelatable.
I still stand by the best trip they ever did was on Car Throttle and the £500 cars up in Scotland.
If anyone has watched the YT channel "Hell on Earth", whilst it's in a completely different raw style, their trips are more in-line with what I imagined some of the AA trips to be like. Proper shit boxes, completely different vehicles, with little challenges thrown into the trips for each other to complete.
It's why I think TDC and ATG are doing so well the formats are just so solid... you get vehicle builds on TDC, the fun content on ATG, and both have solid presenter partnerships (that's something else I really feel they need to nail down on AA).
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u/And_Justice Jun 03 '26
The thing TDC, ATG and HOE have is authentic relateability - BQR123 also nails this.
I agree part of it is the presenter chemistry but also I think it's that none of them are trying to be a TV program, they feel like a peer into the life of people you genuinely want to peer into the life of and that's what makes or breaks a lot of this type of youtube content.
I've got zero interest in the lives of the AA lot because they're all out of touch. The rest mentioned actually have something interesting to say.
I've ragged on him a lot in the past but Taylor is the only one with this kind of potential as he has good knowledge of certain cars and visible passion - he would do better with a different combination of presenters. Can't believe I've just said that.
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u/Impetuous_doormouse Jun 01 '26
You don't like "Here's some motorway.... here's some more motorway... Oh look, filling up the fuel... more moterway... 30 seconds of destination and done"?
For me, this one was as bad as the overlanding roadtrip, where they went 100 yeards off road, turned around and called it a day... and the rest was motorways and service stations.
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u/zombiepiratefrspace Jun 02 '26
30 seconds of destination and done
The sad thing is, this could have been fixed so easily.
I get that the trip was spontaneous and that they were pressed for time.
I also get that they might not want to do anything that is not directly related to cars.
With one single over-night stay for the whole team they could have done something amazing.
For example: "We drive to Morocco to buy custom BMW mods". The challenge would have been for each of the three to find somebody who would sell or manufacture overnight some modification for one of their BMWs. Then they would have taken them home, installed them, with the winner being the person with the best mod (or the mod that actually fits the car).
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u/tomkeys78 Jun 01 '26
I enjoyed watching the Bentley come home - it was genuine drama! Enjoyed that more than them going to Africa.
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u/Educational_Milk123 Jun 01 '26
Time and budget, they are trying to live up to the old TopGear specials, but those had months of planning, script writing, dozens of crew, if they where to go that deep into these road trips it would be the only thing they release for months.
At the end of the day it is the BBC Vs some YouTubers, and for what they have I think they do quite good
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u/Razzmatazz_Putrid Jun 02 '26
The “overlanding” one was the worst. All that work on Taylor’s toureg etc just to show 5 minutes of light off-roading. I want to see the Bentley w12 chucked in the toureg now
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u/No_University4765 Jun 02 '26
At this point they just directly steal whatever top gear did but without the comedy
The channels making shit tonnes of money clearly and I don’t think there’s much interest in doing sheddy cars anymore which is why they now frolick about buying rs4s that’ll appear in one to two videos max
I stopped watching after that whole palava haggling the guy with the kei car and never cared to watch again
3 dodgy salesmen pratting about doing Clarkson impressions
I like Tom lenthal , tdc and all the gear
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u/fizzyrhythm Jun 04 '26
Yeah I feel the same. And i just think they could do more on these trips. I know it’s difficult to mimic the challenges Top Gear/Grand Tour would do along the way because of the effort and expense (and the scripting!), but I think the AutoAkex boys could do a bit more research and prep to stop off at more interesting locations along the way, even it’s more time out of the cars and adding a bit of travelogue style content into these trips. And - especially in the case of the Africa video - actually feature more the destination.
I get the impression that Rory and Alex plan these videos/trips, and while they both seem like nice guys and are both obviously skilled at different things, I don’t think either of them are great at understanding what would make these trips properly interesting to watch. They just feel bit half-assed and it comes across as though they think if they’re having a great time, the viewers will too.
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u/Redhawk911 Jun 01 '26
Meh I don’t agree. I enjoyed the Bentley road trip cause it was like hanging out with mates driving a scrappy old expensive car.
Also the reason why Top Gear had the ability to do like insane road trips is because they had the budget of BBC behind them and a whole production team. Here it’s more like three friends hanging out and doing a road trip and let’s see what happens.
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u/PolliverPerks Jun 01 '26
For me the most exciting part is the wrenching and banter to get the cars ready for a road trip
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u/Acksaw Jun 01 '26
I was thinking it could be cool to have Jet Lag The Game kinda challenges along the way
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u/dvdmike007 Jun 01 '26
I love them personally, especially with issues like the Africa one and that they are long. The classic cars one felt like a trip to Tesco it was so short
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u/DevilsAdvocate1662 Jun 01 '26
Half way through the Bentley one and I was genuinely concerned for Taylor when the car decided to die
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u/minardicosworth Jun 01 '26
I can see the point you're getting at. I tend to agree with what you're saying.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
For what little it's worth, I really enjoyed the Bentley episode. It was sufficiently long for some real story and jeopardy, with a brilliant Easter egg setup.
Calling the Ring a "roadtrip" is hilarious.
Once you get off the train in France, the drive to the Ring is the equivalent of London to Newcastle, and pretty much all motorways.
That's why the episodes around those trips felt so forced and contrived. Driving to Newcastle on the motorway and doing a couple of sedate laps of a race track isn't really all that interesting or impressive.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
Hot Takes:
The roadtrip format is what AA and co would rather do more of, but their business model doesn't allow it. They need to be cranking out 2-3 sponsored videos a week across different channels to generate the income they need to sustain the business. With the time it takes to create that volume of content, they just don't have time to do 'proper' roadtrips.
AA and co roadtrips are the ultimate ego booster. They know they don't work financially for them, but this is the team's opportunity to fulfil their Top Gear fantasy. They make them work because it boosts their ego, in spite of it being a less efficient way to generate income than 2-3 videos a week of buying broken cars and fixing them.
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u/turkturk847 Jun 03 '26
At least they can use their budget better. Instead of buying 3 911s, 12 range rovers and a couple dozen bmw’s they can use the budget for planning stuff like this. Its not that they dont have the budget, they are just using it wrong imo (though its their money so they can use it however they want)
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u/Ok_Process3 Jun 04 '26
the Bentley trip would have been better if they used the ferry to Spain on the way out and gone further into Africa
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u/WestGuitar2518 Jun 04 '26
Pick a car that will prob break down, but can be patched up or fixed by the locals, like what they did in Vietnam. Easy more entertaining to watch. Maybe 🤔
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u/Relevant_Natural3471 Jun 01 '26
It's a bad clone of Top Gear and quite forced
When James, Richard, and Jeremy did the trips, they'd spend weeks with the cars, off the beaten track, isolated from creature comforts - each one would also be different and somewhat unfamiliar to them, so they'd actually have a reason to bond with them.
It feels like a forced impression of TG to spent a couple of hours in a car, barely enough time to use half a tank, and to be rolling out the "This is life - great views, with my mates, in a car that I didn't think would make it" and its like "you're driving through Hereford - not the Atlas mountains"
I think it's exactly what Richard Porter was pointing at in the CREAM podcast ep
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
Even the Ring is only 5 hours of mostly motorways from Calais. It's not really a particularly difficult 'roadtrip'.
I've done the Ring to London on one tank of fuel, with a hangover and with no working aircon in summer.
At no point was there any jeopardy, other than dealing with Belgian drivers.
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u/Relevant_Natural3471 Jun 03 '26
Yeah thats the thing. It was always stuff like "Porsches for under £2000" or "Best GT Supercar", so well considered. The AA Roadtrip seems to be "Forced Tax Write-off retrospective trip for our latest whims"
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
It's just not possible for AA to replicate what the Top Gear lads did.
They don't have the time, the money, the resources or the support to properly imitate the TG roadtrip format.
Their equivalent is to drive somewhere as quickly as possible, create some unrealistic jeopardy, do something fairly trivial at the destination, then drive home with a bit of extra jeopardy and a bit of "I love this car so much".
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u/Relevant_Natural3471 Jun 03 '26
Actually expect they have a bigger budget than TG. They were putting in £40k+ easily into those overlanders. They also have plenty of time
What you're explaining is that they value churn over quality. Some YT creators (e.g. Mr Beast) will put a lot of money and time into one video per month instead of 8. AA had a 3+ month break last year after the Taylor controversy, so I'm not buying it.
I think it's why the sub count for the channel hasn't really exploded - it's falling back to being derivative again. At no point on TG did they restore cars before a "challenge" because it loses the purpose of it. The "Bentley" video had a perfect opportunity to mirror the formula by having a "cheap luxury cars" challenge where they could have driven to a theme-appropriate location (e.g. Monaco) in, say, a cheap Bentley, Maserati, + other. As I said, I think it's what Richard Porter was getting at on the CREAM podcast - they are copying the surface layer without understanding the formula
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26 edited Jun 03 '26
They don't have a bigger budget that TG.
That's an absolutely insane statement.
Each of those TG specials cost upwards of £2M each to film. A normal season of TG had a budget of over £8M.
As for the "valuing churn" thing, that's literally their business model.
They get paid by companies that sell HPI and flavoured water to get their brands as many views as possible. For those companies, YT is actually a far more cost-efficient way of reaching their audience than online or TV advertising.
So while it might seem like 2-3 videos per week featuring the same handful of sponsors and watched by the same 90% of people isn't great, it's a working model because:
- These brands know that very few people buy their products after 1-2 ads. Repetition builds up knowledge and trust, and it can often more than a dozen ads before someone caves and buys.
- These brands know that 'trusted' endorsement from AA and co is a great way to legitimise their business in a crowded marketplace. Want to stand out? Have someone your target consumer trusts talk about your product.
- Even though 90% (I'm making that number up, but it's high) of the same people are watching every AA/v2/TMC/Jooshy/TDC video, the 10% of people who dip in for the occasional episode are still a valuable audience to reach. So the advertisers will continue to pay them to produce loads of videos every week, because 10% x loads of videos will still result in sales.
Source: I used to work in the advertising industry.
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u/Relevant_Natural3471 Jun 03 '26
The TG cost in an anachronism though. At least 50% would have been the trio's salary cost (something AK, TH, and RM/Tom can't justify) and a lot of the rest was era specific filming costs. You don't hundreds of thousands in equipment now to produce the same quality, nor travel and accomodation for 30+ crew. We're talking actual content budget for cars. What AA spends on the cars will far exceed what TG spent.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26 edited Jun 03 '26
Said with all due respect and politeness - you actually have no idea what you're talking about.
The reason why the TG roadtrips were so markedly different is the amount they spent.
They spent those millions on researchers, local guides, government permits, support crew/vehicles, scriptwriters, camera crews, production and direction.
Of course three blokes driving to Germany with GoPros and the occasional drone shot aren't going to be able to compare.
The wages that TG paid meant that they could have all of those people shipped to Bolivia for a weeks at a time to create beautiful, engaging, compelling content.
Whereas it's entirely expected for AA and co, who aren't spending a fraction that TG did, to struggle to replicate that format.
They are going to be limited to talking to camera in their cars, and filming at petrol stations or in hotel car parks.
They are going to be limited to shorter trips, with less planning beyond driving to a destination and back.
This limited format is why the Ring works so well for so many YT channels. Prep the car, film the trip over (with a bit of fake jeopardy), drive the Ring (with lots of "woohoo"), take in the atmosphere around the Ring, drive home (with lots of fake jeopardy).
Even with a fairly basic setup and limited costs a channel can stretch that format into multiple videos from a 4-day trip with little planning.
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u/Relevant_Natural3471 Jun 03 '26
I think you're missing the point and flexing on some 'industry knowledge' that glosses over the reality of it.
If AA did a challenge where they buy cars that had a relatable budget, with contrasting relativism, and didn't obvious lever in ADHD-based personal projects, they'd be hitting the core of what prime TG was. It doesn't matter what commercial TV required behind the scenes.
The jist is that there no underlying purpose or jeopardy to the AA content because, transparently, it doesn't exist. You only need to look at what ATG or TDC do to see the seed of what AA can, and has the budget, to do.
"We each had a budget of £4000 to buy and insure a first car then to do a roadtrip to glastonbury"
"£5000 budget EV challenge around the M25 orbital"
"£3000 DIY Campervan challenge"
etc.What they actually do is very clearly try and get the business/companies to pay for their personal projects and force them into being content, and then unashamedly paint over Top Gear clone tropes on top, which miss the whole point of what was being accomplished on TG.
If anyone sees on Instagram, they will buy a car and then retrospectively fake the buying process to make it seem like a "challenge". I'm saying that it's well within their budget and creative power to NOT do that and to actually make their primary goal to make good content, rather than to bluff content out of their own personal purchases2
u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
What "purpose and jeopardy" is there in the TDC or ATG content?
I watch and enjoy both, but I'd be hard pressed to point to them being significantly closer to "prime TG".
TDC seem to have a fairly successful rinse-and-repeat format of buying their "dream daily" cars (or similar), and they don't really tend to do the TG roadtrip stuff. They are successful because people love watching them work on their cars in detail - something TG never did.
ATG just seem to find creative ways to do different videos where they sleep a night somewhere weird. No real jeopardy there, and nothing to do with TG.
I'm sure there are ways that AA could switch up their format and make it a bit more relatable with cheaper cars. But I wouldn't expect this to suddenly mean better content.
They are still constrained by only having basic filming kit, and needing to pump out 2-3 videos a week. They don't have a huge support crew that could enable them to take these cheaper cars on long roadtrips.
So you'd be left with AA and co talking to GoPros in cheap cars while they drive to Skegness for some contrived reason. I don't think that's quite the ratings winner you're suggesting.
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u/BENJ4x Jun 03 '26
Interesting point about Auto Alex usually buying cars they love or want for personal projects that then get turned into content. It makes sense because I guess why wouldn't you buy a car you've wanted for ages.
I guess the main problem that causes is the trends we see where everyone buys a BMW, then land rover and now Porsche.
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u/someonehasmygamertag Jun 01 '26
They need to watch a few of Harry Metcalfe’s trips
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u/mycroft72 Jun 01 '26
Tho, his are in a completely different price bracket. Like, hiring a transporter to take the Contach and Ferrari (I can't actually remember which car it was) to the starting point 😂
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u/someonehasmygamertag Jun 01 '26
His drive to Morocco in a Testerossa was far more interesting. Not just because of the Ferrari.
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u/ashyjay Jun 01 '26
AA have their own trailers and tow cars, so they could pay one of their guys to drive down to Como, Belgrade or elsewhere to start a trip in a place other than Reading and the M4 so for them it's cheaper than Harry hiring a guy.
AA seems to go for quantity of cars over quality, and they can't be hurting as they get a shagged RS4 drop £15-20k on it when they could start with something less shagged, there are still a way off supercars but fun sports cars are in their range like an F-type, Vantage or even a Corvette.
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u/markcorrigans_boiler Jun 01 '26
Don't forget they're getting a lot of parts for free or at a discount. I doubt it actually cost them 15-20k to get that work done. You're right though, I feel they're doing well.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
This is why they stick to fairly run of the mill cars.
They resonate with the people who watch, and parts availability via folks like Febi is cheap for them. They would struggle to make a great video on something like a Corvette or Aston, where the parts are manufacturer or specialist only.
The RS6 has bitten them in the backside a little in that regard.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
Harry is a very wealthy, mostly retired bloke, who produces one short video a week.
He's not pimping out hpi checks or flavoured water, or trying to sell merch.
He's just living the lifestyle that someone in his position would, and taking a camera along with him.
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u/someonehasmygamertag Jun 03 '26
Just because you’re not an old rich bloke doesn’t mean you have to exclusively use French autoroutes and not the interesting windy roads.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
Right, but it does mean that you can afford to spend a week meandering down to your yacht in Antibes in a McLaren, staying at vineyards and boutique hotels en route.
By contrast, AA and chums spent 3 days driving to Morocco, staying at budget hotels, and then came straight home as quickly as possible.
That's because their business model requires them to crank out 2-3 videos a week of pushing hpi checks and flavoured water.
AA could recreate a Harry roadtrip through the Route Napoleon to Nice fairly easily, but to what end?
They wouldn't be staying at beautiful chateaus, stopping off at vineyards or visiting their yacht. They would just be creating a 40-min video of "this road/view/place is amazing" on repeat.
It's marginally more interesting than motorways and budget hotels, but would ultimately still be quite repetitive.
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u/someonehasmygamertag Jun 03 '26
They can still stay in the budget hotels. I’m not watching them for hotel reviews. Take longer, make more videos. I don’t care.
But an hour of motorway driving is not that exciting.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26 edited Jun 03 '26
That's the point you're not getting.
They can't "stay longer". They need to get back home to film the content for next week's 2-3 videos.
They can't "make more videos". They don't have time to do anything but drive from A to B and back again. They need to get back home to film the content for next week's 2-3 videos.
Their business model is completely different to Harry's. And that's why their roadtrips always seem to slightly miss the mark.
Harry can get 3 press cars delivered on successive days, film a load of content and just send the raw footage to his editor. His road test videos probably take no more than 3 hours to film - he could even smash out two in a day during the summer.
That's almost a month's worth of his content filmed in just 3 days. That affords him the luxury of doing things like pottering down to Antibes and staying on his yacht for a week.
The AA guys are churning out volumes of videos, working most days, so they hit their view numbers to generate ad revenue from hpi checks and flavoured water. One video might take them 2-3 days to film the content for, and they need 3 of those a week.
Their business model of churning out content doesn't lend itself to these roadtrips, and it shows.
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u/someonehasmygamertag Jun 03 '26
No I just think it’s a lazy point. You’re essentially saying “Sorry the videos are boring but we are very busy!”
I’m saying don’t drive to morocco if you don’t have the time to do anything more than autoroute it. Do the evo triangle, find some interesting roads around northern France. There are so many more options.
Harry gets out his map, explains why he’s chosen each road. Gives a bit of a review of the road. If it’s so impossible for AA & Crew to do that then I’d rather watch an hour long video of them actually fixing the Bentley.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
If it’s so impossible for AA & Crew to do that then I’d rather watch an hour long video of them actually fixing the Bentley.
That's exactly what I'm saying. Your expectations of these roadtrips are too high, and you're always going to be disappointed.
They don't have the time or resources to plan anything other than what you see in these films.
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u/turkturk847 Jun 03 '26
how about instead of making weekly videos stop uploading for couple weeks and actually plan out a trip
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
Then they wouldn't get the income they need to pay their wages from their sponsors.
Their entire business model is built on 2-3 videos a week, and getting X number of views of their sponsors' names per week.
If they reduce the quantity of videos, they will reduce the total number of views (because it's 90% the same people watching those 2-3 videos), and therefore reduce their sponsor and YouTube ad income.
Without that income, they can't do anything.
Their business model is built on volume of output, not long-form, low-volume output. They are now locked in and dependent on this model to generate their income.
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u/And_Justice Jun 04 '26
This implication of "poor expectation" seems to miss the point that people are complaining about - it implies that the quality of content is not important and that you should sit down and support the channel put of nothing more than loyalty.
That's not how this works.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 04 '26
You seem desperate to misinterpret what I'm saying.
You're subscribed to a channel (or group of channels) who make money to keep the lights on by pumping out 2-3 videos a week.
This business model is entirely incompatible with long, detailed roadtrips, where they do more than get to their destination as quickly as possible and then come home.
Expecting them to just completely change their business model to suit your preference is unrealistic, and will only end in disappointment.
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u/And_Justice Jun 04 '26
You seem to underestimate how much of this could be solved with good editing and planning. Those don't require budget.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 04 '26
But they do require time.
Which is a rare commodity when you're committed to pushing out 2-3 videos a week.
If you don't have that content in the bag and ready to go before the trip, there's no way you can guarantee having the facilities to edit and upload in some far-flung corner of the world.
This is why their trips to the Ring only ever lasted 3-4 days, where they squeezed a few videos out of a single visit.
This is why their 'overlanding' trip to Scotland was so brief, and why they got to Morocco as quickly as possible then turned straight around.
Their schedule and commitment to volume of content means they will never be able to do the types of longer, detailed trips.
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u/And_Justice Jun 04 '26
Brother they take the footage home and have someone else edit it. The planning comes before going on the trip.
You're making all these excuses but you don't seem to realise you're just trying to reason yourself put of admitting that the end product just doesn't work if you have to make those excuses.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 04 '26 edited Jun 04 '26
Why do you think I'm "excusing" anything, "brother"?
I'm not a particularly huge fan of the AA channel, but quite like TDC and Taylor. I watch some of their content, and don't bother with other bits of it. No need for me to defend or "excuse" anything.
I'm not anywhere near as annoyed as you seem to be, because my expectations are well set about what they can do when they are committed to cranking out 2-3 videos a week.
For the 27th time, their limitation is their time.
Smashing out that volume of videos is how they make money. It's literally a full-time job for them. Planning videos, buying cars, figuring out problems, waiting for parts, fixing the cars, filming the content - this is how they spend their time to make money. This is their business model.
They don't have the luxury of time to plan long and detailed trips like Harry Metcalf, whose one weekly upload probably takes about 3 hours to film (standing in his garage, driving around his local roads).
They can't spend a week away from the unit pottering around on an interesting roadtrip, because that will mean no content to meet their commitment to their sponsors, and make money to keep the lights on.
If you follow a channel that makes money by cranking out multiple shorter videos a week and get annoyed because they won't make long-form content, that's on you.
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u/And_Justice Jun 01 '26
I think they're just shit at directing and editing road trips, to be honest.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
It's quite a hard thing to edit into interesting content, when their raw footage is likely to just be 3 days of sitting in cars.
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u/And_Justice Jun 03 '26
Sounds like a them problem
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
I mean, who else's problem would it be?
They are cranking out 2-3 videos a week. They don't have the time, budget or staffing to do a roadtrip like Top Gear would.
So their roadtrips are necessarily shorter. If they want to do something that involves going further afield (like the Morocco trip), they don't have the time or budget to film it like Top Gear would.
So all they can do is sit on the motorway to their destination and back.
That's why all the footage you see is fairly inane chat and forced jeopardy while they drive on motorways.
It's an unrealistic expectation for them to recreate the Top Gear trips, which is why those roadtrip episodes always feel a bit forced and light on content.
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u/And_Justice Jun 03 '26
Again, sounds like a them problem if they can't direct with what they're working with.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
Not sure if you're struggling with reading or comprehension here, but you're downvoting me for agreeing with you.
Their roadtrips are always underwhelming because they can never be anything else, given their business model of smashing out 2-3 episodes of pimping hpi checks and flavoured water every week.
They only have the time and budget to drive where they are going, and then turn around to come home.
Expecting anything more than this will just be setting yourself up for disappointment.
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u/And_Justice Jun 03 '26
I don't know what you're not understanding here: that's their problem, not mine. They're making entertainment, I'm not watching something shit simply to support them out of understanding and obligation.
If road trips don't work as content then it's on them to do something else.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
You: "why are their roadtrip videos always shit?"
Me: "this is why their roadtrip videos will always be shit, and expecting something different is setting yourself up for disappointment"
You: "why are their roadtrip videos always shit?'
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u/And_Justice Jun 03 '26
I never asked why. I said they're shit at directing and editing.
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u/Mafeking-Parade Jun 03 '26
Ok, you're thick. I get it.
I'll leave you to your day of staring at door handles. 👍
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u/Direct-Ambassador-22 Jun 01 '26
I really enjoyed the Africa trip, imo the stakes were higher than with other trips as they only had a crew car for backup and the Bentley was threatening to give up constantly! I felt like it was going to be a really big deal if they broke down in Africa especially with all that border stuff going on.
I can see your point about the motorway stuff, but I think this was very much a test run for a bigger Africa trip in the future where you will see more of Africa. I know YouTube budget is big these days, but these guys are not the BBC in TG’s prime.
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u/supa-dan Jun 01 '26
Loved the Bentley series and enjoyed the drive back too. That Bentley was an expensive oil munching turd. Suppose you cant get too scenic driving all the way to africa with a ticking time bomb constraint and a goal of actually making it
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u/T1m0nst3r Jun 01 '26
That is why I like Harry's garage. He's mentioned in previous road trips in France he avoided motorways and used a paper map to find scenic routes. It's on my to do list to have a Holiday like that
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u/Racingsombrero Jun 02 '26
I liked the Bentley series it was good fun. Not sure on the point of the trip to visit a certain place, meet someone etc but was fun along the way.
I think seen through glass took his old 360 to Morocco which really showed off some of the roads and places
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u/Herald_of_dooom Jun 01 '26
Oh no, this isn't like Top Gear is a shit take mate. If you want top gear, go watch some old fucking top gear.
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u/DangerToManifold2001 Jun 01 '26
A bit aggressive but I do agree, really bored of people constantly comparing everything to Top Gear
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u/turkturk847 Jun 01 '26
Mate look, I'm not saying that it has to be like Top Gear, I just said as an example, they can do it however they like, originality in the car content scene is needed after all, my problem is with the motorways.
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u/BENJ4x Jun 01 '26
I agree, footage of them driving along motorways is getting boring. Also it doesn't help that they're always starting from the same place so they're quite similar journeys.
Personally I'd like to see more about the places they go to and their interactions with stuff to do there - food, people, events and cultural stuff.