If the first episode of Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May’s The Grand Tour is anything to go by, it is going to be an undisputed success. The former Top Gear trio’s debut on Amazon Prime is now officially the most-watched premiere in the streaming service’s history, knocking down a previous record set by The Man in the High Castle.

Amazon announced on Monday (November 21) that “millions of Prime members streaming the first episode in the US, UK, Germany, Austria and Japan” viewed The Grand Tour when it premiered last Friday (November 18). There were also a record number of new Amazon Prime subscriptions last Friday, topping all other days except the Prime Day super-sales.

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos announced The Grand Tour’s impressive new record: “The guys are back, doing what they do best – the chemistry between Jeremy, Richard and James is what makes The Grand Tour so entertaining. Their creativity, along with the amazing production quality and 4K HDR streaming, has Prime members responding in a big way. Kudos and congrats to the whole team.”

While Amazon Prime was reported to have invested £160 million into the series in The Grand Tour, that figure might actually only be a fraction of the actual cost. Netflix boss Ted Sarandos (who bid on The Grand Tour) reckons that Amazon will have spent nearly a hundred-million pounds more than has been reported.

“It was about a quarter of a billion dollars,” Sarandos insisted. “We’ll be able to figure out later what it was that made the show the show. It’ll be interesting with Grand Tour to see how much of that is the players, who in many cases are big personalities, but what elements of Top Gear will people miss?”


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