But the final episode trashed all that, turning a programme that could have ended on a definitively elegant grace note into a cack-handed murder mystery that thudded in out of nowhere and clunked everyone across the head in the blind hope that we'd all be too concussed to realise how stupid it was.
Turning a programme about cars in to a programme about three cartoon character blokes having disasters in cars has meant it reaches audiences other parts of the BBC don't.
"They turned a training programme into a massive programme that required all kinds of infrastructure, all kinds of security, all kind of bodies," the senior US official said.
Unless they identify new brownfield sites, it could very quickly turn into a programme of estate demolition".
Fascinatingly, it turned out that he was known in Australia for being a standup, an impressionist and a sketch show turn on a programme called Full Frontal.
In turn, as a programme of interventions is formed, this means that a different approach is required to population level interventions such as pricing policy for the promotion of healthy choices.
His allies at the BBC did their bit on Wednesday with a Horizon programme that turned a serious study of virology into grotesque scaremongering, with solemn music and voices crying, "there's no escape", "this could take a devilish turn", and "we don't even know how many viruses there are!" Children writhed in agony from smallpox.
It would be very easy for a new owner to turn the current programme into a low-cost interview show with just headline news and claim it was still producing analysis.
It's not clear how he can turn that record into a programme for leadership.
The flexibility of the "natural experiment" designation was fully embraced by the NIHR as it drafted the Call for Proposals and other guidance documents to turn CLAHRC policy into a programme, and is evident in the nine different approaches that the nine CLAHRCs have taken towards implementing their understanding of how to address the "second translational gap".
