When I got YoutubeTV, on Roku the Motor Trend channel is free, so I binged on Wheeler Dealer (a favorite), Chasing Classic Cars (yup good one), the Automotive Guild (really nice stuff and Dave is goofy enough to enjoy), Watching the Guild construct a Ferrari 250GT from scratch, or a Bugatti from scratch is mesmerizing. Wonderful to see true meatcraft. Bitchin Rides, nice builds, great looks, contrived drama that is a bit more obvious, but funny, and Dave Kindig is easy to like. Graveyard Carz gets old after a while but Mark Worman at least drives deep details on Mopars. Full Custom Garage, a one man show, is interesting at least to see how he creates some of his ideas. Same for Bad Chad, can be interesting at times just to see how he develops a build, but have to wonder about the details underneath it all. Bulldog and Leppo had to be the worst, that people would actually buy the "skinned customs" derived from salvage yard cut ups baffled me. But a lot of the rest are way to contrived and scripted. Certainly they all are scripted, as is obvious everytime it seems these automotive "experts" go to start a new build or a rebuild and "surprise", no one set the timing before they cranked it over. Gotta set some flames shooting out the intake for drama?

I like Wheeler Dealer (bring back Ed China) because they worked on cars, even the odd Brit or Italian cars, that seemed more like the work you or I would do. They strived to stick to a budget and reasonable parts sourcing, and the profits they made from resales were more realistic. And I could actually learn a few things from Ed as the rebuild progressed. But shows like Counting Cars, way too contrived, like all the motorcycle build shows that can only create expensive, dumb-ass useless butt jewelry that never really gets ridden. I would like to see a Bitchin Rides car up close to really take in the fine details of a truly custom, expert build. To me its the underside, the details under the sheet metal that define a true, well sorted, driveable custom.