Be Excellent To Each Other

Wouldn't the producer man have to press charges for it to become a police matter, or is it just an automatic criminal offence?

If it's the latter - shouldn't they have got involved a little earlier?

BBC report: http://t.co/Qw2uxgzDsW

If I was the producer, I'd totally press charges now that the vile arsehole has found himself shitcanned.

I think I would have smashed the fat old turd in the face with the nearest heavy object there and then.

The producer probably wants it all to just go away. It's criminal that he was publicly named by the BBC in my opinion, I wouldnt be surprised if he's been hounded online and offline by Top Gear / Clarkson fans.

The only saving grace is the producer wasn't a woman.

Imagine the volume and severity of the hate mail then? We'd probably get Gamergate on the case as well.

It looked like it had all been settled between them or he was not prepared to take it further for fear of career issues.

Loved the PC statement from North Yorkshire Police, they can't help themselves, if this guy doesn't want to press charges then they would be better served doing some police work.

Odd it was Clarkson who raised this with BBC but I guess he was just getting out in front of it as somebody would have told his bosses in the end.

All the "sacking" headlines are rubbish as well, the BBC have got a nice out by simply not renewing his contract which expired at the end of the month.

BBC got the decision right in the end, when it became clear how badly he behaved they were right to cut him loose.

I'm annoyed that Top Gear is no more, as I enjoyed watching it. But that annoyance is firmly towards Clarkson, as it's his fault.

No. He should have been sacked post investigation. He physically and verbally assaulted a colleague. Just what does one have to do to be put on the ship Doone?

The BBC has taken a poor stance on this.

Too late for that - he was named by the newspapers a while back and has indeed had a load of abuse on twitter etc. On the up side, he's apparently passed this to his lawyers so they may get a nasty surprise.

Or the papers were ringing him up and saying "guess what we know?".

Like Trooper, I am most sad that I won't be able to watch Top Gear for a while, and I think (now that there's actually some facts) that he should have been actively fired rather than just not re-hired.

People are treating it like it's a bad thing for him, but there's going to be a huge bidding war and he's going to make a killing.

I suspect that's a pragmatic choice based on the timing. If he had six months to run on his contract he would have been sacked, but as it is, by the time the BBC got the sacking paperwork in order the contract would have run out anyway. I agree that it would have been nice to send that message though.

I wonder how many of the million signatures on that petition feel differently now. Too few, I suspect. There were a lot of people on Twitter saying, basically, "I don't care what he did." HuffPo rounded some up here.

I like to think there won't be any bidding war for him now that the truth is out, and that the severity of the verbal and physical assault he subjected someone to is known.

I mean, is someone at ITV going to say 'Well yeah he's a bullying oaf with the capacity for verbal and physical violence against his own team, get the chequebook out!' ?

Who would want to work with him now?

It'll be interesting to see if the police get involved too, a 30 second physical assault is quite a serious thing, and whilst I imagine a lot of that was pushing or poking or whatever, it appears there was at least one proper punch in there too - and that's a criminal assault by any definition.

(Battery)

I think Sky have ruled out any interest, but I wouldn't be entirely surprised if they end up doing a motoring show on Netflix.

I've just come up with a lawyer joke. Hang on, picture incoming...

Best I could do on short notice.

Bonza

I like that. It's the kind of thing that Viz would print.

The title of chapter in one of my chemistry books was, 'Heavy metal - A salt and battery'.

He only has 5 days left on his contract so I supposed they want to avoid the hassle of sacking him and legal stuff??

Actually... I hadn't considered this. The result may be all but the same, but yes, a sacking is a stronger message that he has done wrong and that this should not be tolerated than not renewing contracts.

Still, it's probably cheaper this way, and it would be coming out of funds that are probably be better spent making good TV and radio, rather than lining lawyer's pockets.

Have May and Hammond said what they're going to do?

No - May has said "they only work as a package" or something, but that's about it.

I would be surprised if they carried on.

Chris Evans, who is vey vey chummy with all the TG chaps was getting a bit narked on the radio today with newspaper reports saying they wouldn't carry on without Clarkson and ruling out carrying on without him, basically saying it was a FACT that this was nonsense (I assume because he has talked to them personally).

May's Twitter description now says 'Former TV Presenter...'

It's said that since this all started.

Some important points here: http://deadline.com/2015/03/jeremy-clar ... 201398407/

* the Top Gear format is wholly owned by the BBC, whereas until 2012 it was 50% owned by Clarkson. Buying him out is starting to look like a smart move for the Beeb.
* both Sky and Netflix have distanced themselves from Clarkson
* Top Gear is lucrative but doesn't make as much money as people think ("sales of the 21 Top Gear series packages and sub-packages and associated brand rights were likely to have contributed £50M... in 2013-14")
* a lot of that money comes from things like the magazine and format licensing for Top Gear USA and Top Gear France, all of which the BBC still owns and can monetise without further input from Clarkson
* even more of that money comes from broadcast rights for the 21-and-a-bit seasons the BBC owns, and again, it can continue to monetise those without him
* Top Gear USA and France are both very popular without Clarkson; he's not the only ingredient in the show's success

Top Gear USA is dire.

I don't dislike it, or the Aussie version before it was canned. It's not as good as ours at its best, but then it's aimed at a different audience.

I seen to recall that some of the setpiece stuff is effectively conceived and produced by the motor manufacturers themselves. So when James May does a piece on 'Which goes faster down the side of a mountain, a Subaru Impreza driven by a rally driver or three nuns paragliding?" then what happens is that Subaru did that whole thing, took presenters from 5 or 6 different car programmes around the world to film their bits against the backdrop and the race, such that you saw, didn't exactly take place.

Could be wrong as I've got nowhere to point at to show this to be factually based.

The Australian version was SHIT, because they'd got three presenters together that were OK individually but together were trying too hard to be the Aussie May/Hammond/Clarkson.

Lighthearted car reviews, some tomfoolery and set-piece japes should translate quite well across regions, but trying to simply 'be' May/Hammond/Clarkson didn't work out, not least because those characters had become a bit too stale and predictable well beforehand.

I... What?! What was the point in getting rid of him then?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-32062579

But they haven't: they are just not renewing his Top Gear contract. I guess that means that they could offer him a new contract at any point.

I guess he might show up on QI or HIGNFY again on a freelance basis.

He is doing HIGNFY soon I think.

Well that will be something to watch.

Katie Hopkins?

Bravo Sir

If they are going to relaunch the show, they should just go mad and grab anyone they find wandering round the BBC...Top Gear presented by John Humphries, Sandy Toksvig and Christopher Biggins.

I'd watch, which hasn't been the case recently.

Follow the HIGNFY model?

I'd watch anything with Sandy Toksvig in. she's definitely one of my favourite people on TV.

Why not, you could even have two permanent hosts (say off the top of my head Mike and Ed from Wheeler Dealers) and a random guest host each week...one that's a confirmed car nut such as: Chris Evans, Pink Floyd Drummer bloke, Rowan Atkinson, Jodie Marsh, JK...even old 5th Gear hosts.

Not Mike and Ed, you could get John Torode and Gregg Wallace to present it!

I suggested Rowan Atkinson the other day to my father-in-law, I think he could be really good on it.

Also that Vicki Butler Henderson posh woman.

And what was your man called? Tiff Needell? Didn't he actually used to present Top Gear?

Aye...and what's his face the used car fellow

...or Guy Martin, he'd be up for driving a rocket car over a lake and up a mountain.

It could be a weekly segment "Trying to Kill Guy Martin"

Tiff Needell is really annoying and his name is beyond stupid.

They need a bit of Zog Ziegler.