Formula E: Driver, Prime Video review - inside the world's first zero-carbon sport

The success of Netflix’s Drive to Survive not only provoked a viewer-stampede towards the world’s most expensive sport, but also triggered a chain reaction of similar behind-the-scenes sports documentaries. Suddenly we had Break Point (tennis), Full Swing (golf) and Tour de France: Unchained (cycling, obviously), hotly pursued by series on rugby, soccer and American Indiecar racing.

Thus, a series about Formula E, the electrically-powered baby sibling of Formula One, was a no-brainer (indeed, Formula E previously aired its own show, Formula E Unplugged, on its YouTube channel). Since the formula began in 2014 its audience has been growing steadily, with the 2024 season seeing it surge to a global TV viewership of about 500 million. Amazon Prime’s lavishly-produced series thus seems smartly timed to catch the burgeoning E-wave.

Comparisons to Drive to Survive are inevitable, and a couple of familiar F1 faces pop up in the form of drivers-turned-commentators Karun Chandhok and David Coulthard, though this is only a four-part series whereas Drive… gives you 10. Perhaps that’s because at the moment Formula E doesn’t have the kind of mystique and legacy of identifiable stars that F1 has amassed over its 75-year-history (even if you have no interest in motor racing you’ve probably heard of Jackie Stewart or Stirling Moss).In addition, FE also has a completely different and rather bewildering set of rules which takes a bit of getting used to. Sometimes they have two races on the same weekend, for instance, which can induce a degree of viewer confusion, while an innovation like “attack mode” – where a driver must make a compulsory manoeuvre to trigger sensors which give him a temporary power boost – just seems like a daft gimmick. And of course the cars don’t sound like “real” racing cars, with the deafening howl of traditional high-performance engines replaced by the wheezy, whining noise of E’s electric powertrains.

But ultimately, it’s the mental and physical struggles of the protagonists that will (or won’t) keep you watching. The series mostly focuses on four drivers, all of whom might be in the mix for winning the world title, and there’s plenty of see-sawing agony-and-ecstasy as they win, lose, crash or find they’ve been lumbered with an undriveable car.

They’re an interestingly mixed bunch of characters. Likeable Portuguese star António Félix da Costa previously won the series in 2019-20 with a team called GTS Techeetah, but here we see him with the TAG Heuer Porsche team and initially struggling to revisit his winning ways. He starts to feel the displeasure of his team boss, Florian Modlinger, a glowering Bavarian who unsportingly starts testing for a new driver in the middle of the season. Luckily, da Costa rediscovers a rich streak of race-winning form.

Another former champion is Nuneaton’s own Jake Dennis, who drives for Andretti, but isn’t finding the 2023-4 season quite so agreeable. On the other hand, Jaguar’s two New Zealanders, Mitch Evans and Nick Cassidy, are both in contention for the championship as they prepare for the season finale in London.

The most fun, though, is had with the rogueish British driver Dan Ticktum, who’s the star of episode two. He’s evidently known as the wild man of Formula E (pictured right by Thfeeder), and has never quite recovered from the notoriety he incurred at age 15, when he was banned from racing for two years after deliberately ramming a competitor off the track at Silverstone. He’s stuck with the lowly and impecunious ERT team, and Dan makes no secret of his frustration at his car’s limitations. In the midst of an “ePrix” (as they call them) in Italy, Dan lets off some steam over the team radio: “Man, how is my car so shit? I’m driving a fucking bus.” Chandhok recalls his reaction to the first time he saw Dicktum drive – “the guy’s got unbelievable car control, but he’s also quite mad.”

But Ticktum is, as da Costa points out, “a real person” who says exactly what he feels, and he’s the nearest thing Formula E: Driver has to the expletive-splattering extrovert Guenther Steiner who became the best-known personality in Drive to Survive. The exhilaratingly blunt and tactless Ticktum really ought to have his own series.

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