TV characters in shite cars

[chaseracer]

  On 29/10/2024 at 09:51, Rocket88 said:

Been watching re runs of George Gently… some heroic shite on there…

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...including @Inspector Morose's old Rover 60 as a police car...

[catsinthewelder]

  On 29/10/2024 at 09:51, Rocket88 said:

Been watching re runs of George Gently… some heroic shite on there…

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Off topic but the police station on the later series is my old school.

Hate to take this to a US show but Jakes Mustang in Brooklyn 99.

[5speedracer]

  On 29/10/2024 at 22:34, somewhatfoolish said:

Is that in the book? The TV show had a Series 2a with the quietest 2 and a 1/4 in the world as they could hold an ordinary conversation at speed.

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Oh is it a 2A, my apologies to it. I know it's relative but using the word speed in connection to a Series L/R 🤣

[juular]

  On 29/10/2024 at 16:46, Soundwave said:

Some of those Ashes to Ashes cars have post-2001 number plate font. Because I'm a deeply sad individual, this bothers me more than it should.

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Lightweight. Pray you never get an interest in trains or aviation, and feel the crushing horror of the inaccuracies in all media. 😄

[MiniMinorMk3]

  On 29/10/2024 at 19:50, Jim Bergerac said:

I dread to think what they will wedge him, err me, into for the forthcoming remake. 

Probably an aging SAAB/Volvo. 

 

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  On 29/10/2024 at 21:49, AnthonyG said:

Would laugh if they gave him/you a Triumph Stag! 

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More likely a TR7 with all the licence fee money going on presenters and crap dancing shows.

[Stinkwheel]

Has anyone mentioned Lance's TR7 in Detectorists yet?

Or Shoestrings Cortina Estate

[garethj]

As I got offered Apple TV free, I’ve watched Slow Horses which is excellent.  One lead character, a scruffy git, drives a late 90s Honda Accord which is excellent except for the amount of dirt on it.  Even leaving it in the rain would have it cleaner than it is.

There’s a saddo who has a Fabia Estate which is a good choice too.  Sometimes it works.

[chaseracer]

  On 30/10/2024 at 11:59, Stinkwheel said:

Has anyone mentioned Lance's TR7 in Detectorists yet?

Or Shoestrings Cortina Estate

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Yes 😉  

Fun* fact: before the orange Cortina, ES had a blue Hillman Hunter that got rammed and punted into a particularly industrial stretch of the Avon: http://www.imcdb.org/vehicle_541523-Hillman-Hunter-Arrow-1972.html

One of his girlfriends had a Renault 14, not old but already going the way of all 70s Renaults... http://www.imcdb.org/vehicle_541537-Renault-14-R1210-1978.html

[eddyramrod]

Yes, I've modelled that Hunter using the old Corgi rally car.  Cortina estate?  I'm not holding my breath.  The R14 belonged to his landlady, who, it appeared, he was paying in kind because we never saw her chasing him for the rent!

[warch]

  On 29/10/2024 at 22:34, somewhatfoolish said:

Is that in the book? The TV show had a Series 2a with the quietest 2 and a 1/4 in the world as they could hold an ordinary conversation at speed.

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The petrol engine is whisper quiet, its everything else, mostly wind roar that makes for a less than refined driving experience. 

[Volksy]

  On 30/10/2024 at 12:45, garethj said:

As I got offered Apple TV free, I’ve watched Slow Horses which is excellent.  One lead character, a scruffy git, drives a late 90s Honda Accord which is excellent except for the amount of dirt on it.  Even leaving it in the rain would have it cleaner than it is.

There’s a saddo who has a Fabia Estate which is a good choice too.  Sometimes it works.

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Civic 😉

[Barry Cade]

Can't top this...

[MiniMort]

  On 29/10/2024 at 06:09, plasticvandan said:

The cleaner on BBC drives an acclaim

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Does he? I thought he had a VW Type 2-based pickup. 

Also, this is in one episode:

[DSdriver]

  On 28/10/2024 at 21:01, Missy Charm said:

Screenwriters do seem to get this stuff wrong, I think. 

In real life, non-car people tend to either drive brand new boring boxes obtained via the hire-purchase scheme du jour, boring box company cars or nearly new boring boxes bought with borrowed money.  Very occasionally, someone will have an older and/or more interesting car that they came by via tangential means such as a gift or inheritance from a car-person relative.  Also, rarely, they will be the husband/wife/relative of a car person and have a more interesting set of wheels foisted on them as the car person will inevitably be the household purchaser of vehicles.  

Inheritors and car-person WAGs/HABs sometimes, also, get upgraded to car people by virtue of forming emotional attachments to their interesting jam jars.  

Car people, on the other hand, are the all bets are off group and can and will drive anything from a brush-painted Ford 100e to 1,000 horsepower, electric purple Nissan Skyline.  There's no rhyme nor reason regarding what they like and tastes are often eclectic.  

The problem, of course, is that fictional characters also need fall into one of the two camps.  Non-car fictional people have got to behave in similar ways to non-car real people if realism is aimed at.  Non-car fictional people ought, therefore, to be driving boring cars.  Fictional car people can drive what they like; however, screenwriters and authors often don't bother to make their characters into car people when thinking about the construction of the person as a whole.  Instead, they create a typical non-car person and foist a dreadful old classic on them for no reason other than 'it looks cool'; no thought is given to why the character might own that car and the impact it would have on his/her lifestyle.  Doing that is not only lazy, it's a sign of bad writing as it evinces lack of an holistic perspective. 

One programme I thought got it right was Anthony Horowitz's 'Magpie Murders'.  The protagonist, played by Lesley Manville, had the typical telly-issue MG Roadster, but was written convincingly as someone who would own an MG Roadster in the 21st century.  That's fine.

Caveat: historical drama is different.  They often make mistakes (see ITV's Joan and the boyfriend nerking about in a 1970s BMW), but it's legitimate to have non-car people driving old cars in that context.  

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Their accountants probably advise them to spend money on lease-purchase or loan to reduce the amount of their tax bill. Better to drive a new car than give the money to the revenue.

[NorfolkNWeigh]

  On 30/10/2024 at 11:59, Stinkwheel said:

Has anyone mentioned Lance's TR7 in Detectorists yet?

Or Shoestrings Cortina Estate

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Not really a shite car at the time, quite a nice 2000XL and only 4 or 5 years old at the time.

[Stinkwheel]

  On 30/10/2024 at 18:47, NorfolkNWeigh said:

Not really a shite car at the time, quite a nice 2000XL and only 4 or 5 years old at the time.

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I agree, it’s just that the whole shoestring personified, including the car gave off a sort of ‘down at heel’ aura to me 

[chaseracer]

A 5yo mk3 Cortina would be past its prime!

[NorfolkNWeigh]

  On 30/10/2024 at 18:51, Stinkwheel said:

I agree, it’s just that the whole shoestring personified, including the car gave off a sort of ‘down at heel’ aura to me 

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Yes, but then I thought Hazell had similar run down  vibe but he had a brand new Stag, not sure if it was ever explained in the programme.

edited to say; It was only a year newer,

[EyesWeldedShut]

  On 30/10/2024 at 15:10, Volksy said:

Civic 😉

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That's the boss' (Gary Oldman) car - Boy Blunder there gets to drive something much more modern- it's an 08 or 09 plate Seat thingy.  He's such a good spy that the car features nowhere on GoogleFoo - in fact, so undercover that it's not even on https://www.imcdb.org/movie_5875444-Slow-Horses.html

 

[sheffcortinacentre]

  On 30/10/2024 at 18:59, NorfolkNWeigh said:

Yes, but then I thought Hazell had similar run down  vibe but he had a brand new Stag, not sure if it was ever explained in the programme.

edited to say; It was only a year newer,

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Two different estates were used both with the same false plate, in the second series the interior is black cloth (L spec) so with rectangular lights it was a 76 1.6 L.

Where as the  one above is an early facelift XL with vynil ( square pattern XL) interior also has chrome underiders  ( replaced by  rubber overiders during 75)  I need to get out more.

[warch]

I think Dr Who’s Bessie (introduced by Third Doctor Jon Pertwee) was an early adoption of this particular phenomenon i.e. something deliberately old* and quirky.

*Before anyone writes in I am aware that the actual car was a contemporary replica of an Edwardian roadster.
 

[eddyramrod]

  On 30/10/2024 at 20:40, warch said:

I think Dr Who’s Bessie (introduced by Third Doctor Jon Pertwee) was an early adoption of this particular phenomenon i.e. something deliberately old* and quirky.

*Before anyone writes in I am aware that the actual car was a contemporary replica of an Edwardian roadster.
 

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Before The Doctor, of course, there was John Steed, the spy in the 40-year-old Bentley (which would now be 100 years old!).  I'm led to believe several such were used...

[bigstraight6]

James Bolam in a shite Vauxhall HA van in the Beiderbecke Affair.

[Barry Cade]

  On 30/10/2024 at 21:33, bigstraight6 said:

James Bolam in a shite Vauxhall HA van in the Beiderbecke Affair.

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I thought that was Barry from Auf Wiedersehen Pet 😆. Oz had the Zodiac,Wayne had the LHD 5 series. Ally Fraser had a Jag, Nev had a W124 later on, and Barry got a Bentley!

[bigstraight6]

  On 30/10/2024 at 21:38, Barry Cade said:

I thought that was Barry from Auf Wiedersehen Pet 😆. Oz had the Zodiac,Wayne had the LHD 5 series. Ally Fraser had a Jag, Nev had a W124 later on, and Barry got a Bentley!

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How man, ye know ya stuff like.. (apologies to Geordie contributor’s but I do a canny Newcastle accent for a Southern Shite like) 

[bigstraight6]

Lenny Henry in a Bedford HA ‘Ice Scream’ van, Coast to Coast…

[Barry Cade]

  On 30/10/2024 at 21:41, bigstraight6 said:

How man, ye know ya stuff like.. (apologies to Geordie contributor’s but I do a canny Newcastle accent for a Southern Shite like) 

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Best thing on TV, ever!  I do remember being annoyed as a kid watching it -it was supposed to be  Dusseldorf, but all the cars had HH plates, so was set in Hamburg. They hired an Ascona IIRC, and picked up the chap that was on the run from the Army.

[sheffcortinacentre]

  On 30/10/2024 at 21:33, bigstraight6 said:

James Bolam in a shite Vauxhall HA van in the Beiderbecke Affair.

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Its being shown on Freeview ch95 rewind TV.

The van survived on the road for a few years after the trilogy ended.

[caffeine]

In a rather tonally different example from Ashes to Ashes, I’m surprised Father Ted’s blue 1981 Cortina hasn’t got a mention yet…






“He’s puncturing the tyres, Ted”



I’m not sure if these have quite attained  'endearing classic' status just yet, but were probably at peak ‘unfashionable-ness’ in the Mid-‘90s, so at the time very much in line with the ‘crap old car for perpetually downtrodden character ’ trope.

[Metal Guru]

  On 30/10/2024 at 18:57, chaseracer said:

A 5yo mk3 Cortina would be past its prime!

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Certainly would have a good deal of rust.