Drive to Survive has made a lot of people angry for a lot of reasons – the least of which is showcasing Romain Grosjean’s unfavorable montage of crashes on the track. The Netflix series excels in carving out a juicy storyline where there aren’t any, pitting friends as archenemies and turning harmless pranks into acts of bitter rivalries.
Among the myriad of misunderstandings and biases that rose from Drive to Survive‘s selective editing, one of them remains Grosjean’s volatile 2018 era. While the Netflix show did not hesitate to highlight his every fault behind the wheel, the same dedication on the crew’s part was missing while Grosjean made a stunning comeback during the second half of the season.
Romain Grosjean and his iconic fireball crash
One of the most circulated videos in F1 history has been Romain Grosjean’s horrifying and fiery crash in 2020 during his final season in Formula One. In the opening lap of the Bahrain Grand Prix, the French-Swiss racer collided with a metal barrier at nearly 120 mph, causing his VF-20 to be ripped in half.
The ensuing moments saw the car being engulfed in a fireball while Grosjean remained trapped inside for 28 seconds. As a rescue operation ensued on the tracks, the racer miraculously walked out of the blazing fire, seemingly unharmed, in what has now been deemed one of the most iconic clips in recent Formula One history.
However, that was not the only headline-grabbing crash of his career. He also became the first driver to receive a race ban in 18 years after causing a multi-car collision at the 2012 Belgian Grand Prix.
Romain Grosjean has been labeled as the proverbial Charlie Brown of Formula One for his sheer bad luck and inability to hit the mark. The first half of the 2018 season was well-documented by Drive to Survive for being riddled with errors on Grosjean’s part.
And yet, what really angered the fans was Netflix’s reluctance to do the same when Grosjean did manage to score a favorable comeback in the latter half.
Netflix disregards Romain Grosjean’s comeback
Ever since its conception, Drive to Survive has been faulted for fabricating rivalries for dramatic effect and applying quotes from media interviews or radio calls to unrelated videos to make an incident seem more ugly than necessary. Max Verstappen and Carlos Sainz had already suffered because of the show’s careless editing but the attack on Grosjean was more apathetic.
Drive to Survive singled out Romain Grosjean in its debut season in 2019 by shining the spotlight on the driver for every wrong gear shift and corner crash throughout the season. However, Grosjean hardly let the noise get to him and returned in excellent form in the latter half of the 2018 season.
However, those races were elusive to the crew of Netflix’s Drive to Survive as they seemingly lost interest in capturing his winning moments despite their earlier investment in documenting his spiraling downfall as a racecar driver. A fan on Reddit noted:
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byu/RX0Invincible from discussion
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For a show that thrives on fabricating lies and animosity for the sake of views and ratings, a downfall followed by a stunning comeback and a redemption arc seemed like quite an interesting storyline. However, by then, Drive to Survive had already moved on from Romain Grosjean to focus on other mid-grid drivers.
The latest season of Drive to Survive which documents the 2024 Grand Prix season will premiere on Netflix on 7 March 2025.
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