Here's how to watch The Grand Tour a day early (and get a Prime membership for $79)

Shawn Knight

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If you’ve been considering an Amazon Prime account but haven’t yet pulled the trigger, tomorrow would be as good a time as any to do so. That’s because, for one day only, Amazon is discounting the annual service by a full $20.

Black Friday is still a week away, so why the discount now?

Turns out, November 18 is a pretty special day for both Amazon and fans of the BBC motoring show Top Gear as it marks the debut of The Grand Tour, the new car show from former Top Gear presenters Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May that’ll be available exclusively on Amazon’s streaming video service.

Amazon paid big bucks for the original series (anywhere from $5.5 million to $7 million per episode according to rumors) although based on the lead-up and legion of fans the trio have developed, it’ll almost certainly prove to be a solid investment.

On November 18 from 12:00 a.m. ET to 11:59 p.m. PT, newcomers will be able to purchase a Prime account for just $79, down from the standard $99 rate (or from £79 to £59 for those in the UK as of writing). The show will initially only be available to viewers in the US, UK, Germany, Japan and Austria although Amazon said it plans to bring the original series to some 200 countries in December.

That last bit shouldn’t be glossed over as an expansion of that magnitude will put Amazon on level playing ground with Netflix, assuming of course that Amazon is bringing its full Prime video service to the new territories and not just The Grand Tour. My guess based on the wording in the announcement, however, is that the show will be available globally next month, not Prime Video and the slew of other Prime benefits. I've reached out to Amazon for clarification and will update this story accordingly if I hear back.

Another key bit of information is the fact that the show will launch on November 18 at 00:01 GMT worldwide meaning those in the US will have access to it later today at 7:01 p.m. ET / 4:01 p.m. PT.

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Not available in Canada eh? Looks like I'll just have to resort to the usual methods of acquiring region locked shows. And to think I was almost sold on getting a Prime account just for this show, and the occasional order I place.
 
Not to worry, I'm dropping my Prime Membership .... nice to get things sent early, but frankly, why should I pay extra for something they should be doing to keep my business?
 
Unless you use a lot of the Prime membership benefits it isn't even worth the $80 a year. Amazon Prime video offers little to be desired and like in the world of cars, almost everything else is an optional extra. You have to pay more, per episode or season to watch a lot of the content on Amazon Prime. This is incredibly frustrating and irritating to say the least.

Now if you buy at least a good 15-20 items a year off of Amazon, that wouldn't otherwise get the free two day shipping then it is worth it...

I have mixed feelings on Prime membership... it just feels so spotty and I don't feel I get all that much out of it. Plus I'm betting once they have you hooked on this new show, only season 1 will be included with Prime and all subsequent ones will be an additional charge. Amazon needs to knock off this optional extra sh*t and stop screwing around. Give us a full package, or multiple package options... but this is just annoying. So much so, that I'm considering dropping my Prime membership once I've used the year.

Oh and another thing Amazon, this Prime only requirement for buying groceries is pissing me off as well. I don't want to buy all my groceries on Amazon.
 
It really sucks that amazon doesn't offer any prime video options to Canada, not to mention the gimped amount of items that can be bought compared to amazon.com.
 
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