The Grand Tour's new presenters: 'I hope we prove the critics wrong'
YouTubers James Engelsman, Thomas Holland, and Francis Bourgeois have been named the new presenters for Amazon Prime's The Grand Tour. The trio acknowledges the pressure of replacing the iconic Clarkson, Hammond, and May, but expresses optimism about the new series.
Why it matters
The transition marks a significant shift for one of the world's most popular motoring shows, testing whether internet-native personalities can sustain a legacy television franchise.
Image source, The Grand Tour Image caption, Francis Bourgeois, James Engelsman and Thomas Holland are the new hosts of the motoring show, which was released on Friday on Amazon Prime Video
For more than two decades, Top Gear and The Grand Tour were defined as much by the three men presenting them as by the cars they drove.
Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May built one of television's most recognisable partnerships, meaning anyone taking over The Grand Tour was always going to face a daunting task.
Now YouTubers James Engelsman and Thomas Holland and, perhaps most unexpectedly, train enthusiast-turned-internet star Francis Bourgeois are stepping into their shoes for the new series.
And, with initial reviews generally mixed, they knew they had some convincing to do.
"They literally changed the car world," Holland says of the previous trio.
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