Clarkson’s Farm, series 3, part 2, review: informs, educates, entertains – the BBC must be green with envy

Gerald is back! The tears of Jeremy Clarkson and his partner Lisa Hogan in the early episodes of series three of Clarkson’s Farm (Amazon Prime Video) may have been over the fate of their pigs, but the real hammerblow was the news that loveable farmhand Gerald Cooper had been diagnosed with prostate cancer.

The second tranche of episodes is now out, and episode five finds Clarkson driving through his wildflower meadows when he spots a familiar figure doing a spot of dry stone-walling. It’s an uplifting moment. “Gerald! You’re back! You’re back!” says a clearly delighted Clarkson.

Gerald explains that he’s had 37 sessions of radiotherapy, and doesn’t have the all-clear yet “but touch wood”. Then he describes the treatment, in his inimitable and indecipherable way. “You got that big round mushroom, one that’s wizzling round, got a teapot in it or summat, dumph dumph dumph dumph dumph dumph dumph.” At least, that’s what it sounds like.

There is other good news. Clarkson promised that these episodes would be less traumatic than the first lot, and he’s right. No piglets sadly expiring in front of the Aga here. Instead, Clarkson is mostly raising mushrooms. He’s trying to make money from the non-arable land on his 1,000-acre farm, and a disused bunker provides ideal growing conditions for fungi.

Soon he’s overrun with the stuff. The crew end up eating mushrooms on toast every day for a month. Lisa has the idea of turning the lion’s mane mushrooms into a powder to be sprinkled in tea. It’s the kind of girlie, woo-woo nonsense that boggles his mind. “How many men do you know who do that?” he splutters, but soon gives in.

In the absence of pig-related drama, these episodes follow a familiar pattern. Clarkson or Lisa want to run with a money-making idea, advisor Charlie Ireland puts the brakes on. “Mr Rules and Regulations arrived to make his usual tiresome recommendations,” sighs Clarkson in voice-over, when Charlie points out that producing nettle soup will require someone to have an environmental health certificate.

Everything goes well for a bit – making cider, raising goats, constructing a car park – until disaster strikes. The cider explodes. The goats keep kicking Clarkson in the nuts. I’ll leave you to discover the saga of the car park. Clarkson and his wingman Kaleb Cooper have honed their comedy act to perfection.

And there is an entertaining urban diversion when Kaleb and Charlie go to London for a Downing Street summit. Kaleb may be wise beyond his years when it comes to farming, but there are other areas of knowledge he could work on. “You know what the Cabinet is?” asks Charlie. Kaleb does not. Charlie points out Nelson’s Column. “Who’s Nelson?” Kaleb replies.

Once inside No 10, his first words to Rishi Sunak are: “You’ve got lovely hair.” It has been said before that Clarkson’s Farm has done more for farming in a few episodes than Countryfile has in 30 years. He may be hamming it up for the cameras at times, but Clarkson puts his all into this and shows just how much hard work goes into farming, for so little financial reward.

He explains clearly why culling deer is a necessity – the numbers are too high, they cause damage by eating everything – and goes out hunting (with royal pal Hugh van Cutsem, chairman of the British Deer Society). But when he does pull the trigger, the screen goes blank. “If I were to kill a deer on television, they’d all go berserk,” he says of Townie viewers.

Those Townies must love it as much as the farming community, though, because when the first episodes were released last week they instantly topped the UK streaming chart. His BBC days may be long gone, but Clarkson took the Reithian principles with him: here is a show that informs, educates and entertains.

Episodes 5-8 of Clarkson’s Farm (series three) are on Amazon Prime Video now