Top Gear Tonight: Cheap ‘Classics’ in Borneo, Rolls-Royce Cullinan and Bob Mortimer

Top Gear tonight – Series 27, Episode 4 – sees Paddy and Freddie in Borneo with cheap ‘Classics’, Chris in the Rolls-Royce Cullinan and Bob Mortimer as guest.

New Top Gear with Freddie Flintoff and Paddy McGuiness, with poor old Chris Harris as the straight man, looks to be getting properly in to its stride after three episodes, with a formula and line-up which actually works. It’s taken a while since the departure of Clarkson, Hammond and May, but it’s definitely working.

Of course, there’s a limit to what the new trio can do that’s actually ‘new’, but Clarkson and Wilman’s long song-book of Top Gear outing themes is a rich seam, and it’s mined once more tonight with a trip to a jungle country with old cars.

This time the premise is to find cheap and rare classic cars to take off to the jungle of Borneo to see how they cope in terrain they were never designed for, not doubt with wildlife encounters and maybe a bit of ‘I’m a Celeb’ unpalatable eating going on.

Freddie chooses to take a car no one has heard of – the Matra Bagheera, a long forgotten 1970s French sports car – and Paddy opts for something probably now as rare but rather more prosaic – an Austin Allegro Estate – without the infamous ‘quartic’ steering wheel as it looks to be too late a model.

Back at home, and in sensible-ish proper testing mode, Chris Harris gets to grips with the world’s most expensive SUV, the Rolls-Royce Cullinan, to see if it’s a marketing ploy or proper Roller.

This week’s Star in a Reasonably Fast Car is Bob Mortimer, so expect some convoluted tall tales and much mirth.

Top Gear – Series 27, episode 4 – is on BBC2 tonight at 8pm.