It was a neat series, but the start where they whinge about not getting free bikes from their brand of choice was so incredibly entitled and such a turn off.
That's right. I wonder if the decision-makers at KTM regretted that afterwards.
Addendum: Considering that the GS has been a bestseller ever since. It feels like every other motorcycle enthusiast in Germany rides one. It has been the best-selling motorcycle almost every year since then. In Italy, many also seem to prefer riding GS bikes over Guzzi/Ducati/Aprilia.
Similar: During pandemic Ewan and Charlie did an electric bike ride from Argentina to the US and the support crew were in Rivians along with the Rivian CEO or head of engineering or something, as an extended QA run before full production. It was my introduction to the brand and sufficiently impressed me such that I think it’s the only option I’d look at for an EV.
What I remember from that show is that they plug in the Rivian to charge, and 12 hours later the charge level has increased by some miniscule amount. At some point they have to bring in a gas-powered support truck with a gas-powered generator to charge various electric vehicles. If anything, it was a commercial against EVs at the time.
It seems that EVs didn't make much sense in the environment of that trip (going through all of South America, where fast chargers were rare at the time)
They offered KTM a 10 hour advertisement series, which would go on to become a classic for motorcycling enthusiasts worldwide. KTM's response was "eh no you could never pull that off, and will make us look bad". It had nothing to do with the cost of the bikes.
He was coming off the high of being the "star" of the new Star Wars movies. He was a main character in the story but not The main character. I recall watching these on physical DVD via netflix in ~2008 and wondering why he seemed (what we now casually call) entitled; I'd been watching the series for ~3-4 episodes before it clicked with me that he was one of the actors from star wars, despite being a long time star wars fan. He was definitely entitled, the blow up was centered around KTM not being interested in what a Star Wars actor was doing and not taking him seriously. I distinctly recall seeing him cry, or almost cry on camera.
That said, ignoring that drama, the rest of the series was quite good, when they published "The long way Down" from Scotland to South Africa I jumped on that and watched it as well. Someone else pointed out they did an EV thing from Argentina to... Alaska? with Rivian, I might go look at that too.
And it really want's Ewan that was put out about the KTM rejection--he wanted to ride the BMWs, but Charley Boorman was pissed. Charley had dreamed of the KTMs for years.
But given that McGregor has millions in the bank, he could have bought 3 KTMs and not even noticed the cost. Instead, they insisted that they will only ride bikes that someone gives them for free. Because the poor millionaire Hollywood actor "I was in a Star Wars movie!" couldn't possibly pay for his pet project out of his own pocket. Oh how unfair, those evil oppressors at KTM!
It was a neat series, but the start where they whinge about not getting free bikes from their brand of choice was so incredibly entitled and such a turn off.