The Grand Tour – aka Amazon does Top Gear – is back with a new trio of presenters. Whether you care will largely depend on your general attitude to television. If you think its purpose is to push boundaries, entertain, inform and edify, you may as well stop reading now. If, on the other hand, you treat TV like soma, then the lightly revamped show is probably worth your consideration.

I’m in the soma category. The only job of TV, as far as I’m concerned, is to relieve me of having to make conversation with the Fawn while I’m having my supper, and then to distract me long enough for me to be able to half-digest my food so that I’m ready to have my bath and go to bed. I don’t need great art or masterclass acting or high drama – indeed I’d almost rather not because I don’t want, at this point in my day, to be excited or filled with admiration or awe. I just want to slump there gawping, and not be made so incensed – by, say, diversity casting or an implausible excess of lesbian characters – that I want to chuck things at the screen.

They must be doing something right, because I sat through three episodes without switching over to Reacher

They must be doing something right, because I sat through three episodes without switching over to Reacher

Judged by these criteria, The Grand Tour does the job just fine. One of the........

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