‘Roadkill’ has ended as MotorTrend Productions is reportedly shutting down

The enthusiast world has just lost another great show. After Top equipment And The Grand TourMotorTrends Roadkill has reached the end of the road.

Mike Finnegan, one of the two Roadkill hosts, revived a two-year-old Reddit thread to announce the end of the show.

‘I just found out it’s over. After the end of season 13, which we just finished shooting a few weeks ago, no new episodes of RK will be filmed. The production company MotorTrend is closing. No specific reason was given to me for its demise. We’ve had an excellent run and I’m proud of what the team has achieved, but this seems to be the end of RK. I’m not sure who owns the RK IP or who to ask why it was terminated.”

Roadkill aired its first episode on YouTube in 2012. Keep in mind that the automotive media landscape was completely different at the time: the idea of ​​a YouTuber was not as clear as it is today. Instead of reviewing new cars, hosts Finnegan and David Freiburger have turned their mutual passion into a show aimed at enthusiasts. In the first episode, the duo went to El Paso, Texas, spent $1,500 on a car, got it roadworthy and drove it back to Los Angeles. Another catch was that they had to sell it on eBay Motors before returning to Los Angeles.

Planning an adventure around a car that most would write off as a lost cause became Roadkill‘s trademark. The list of classics that have appeared at the show over the years includes a 1971 Datsun 240Z powered by a 4.3-liter V6 engine from the Chevrolet S-10, a 1978 Lincoln Continental converted into a coupe has been chopped, and a 1980 Chevrolet Monte Carlo with a hydraulic system. suspension system with which the duo rode to Las Vegas on three wheels.

Roadkill grew rapidly in the 2010s. It spawned a spin-off series, a magazine launched in 2016, and an annual drag racing festival called Roadkill Nights, sponsored by Dodge. It was moved from YouTube to a streaming service called MotorTrend On Demand and became available on Discovery+ when Discovery bought MotorTrend in 2017, according to The Autopian. Later the show ended on Max. Although this business model seemed to work for years, Finnegan publicly questioned whether it did Roadkill would return for a 14th season in a post published on Reddit in October 2024.

There’s no word on what’s next for Finnegan and Freiburger. Both hosts have YouTube channels, so they haven’t launched their latest hot rod yet. If MotorTrend’s productions are halted, it’s fair to assume that other shows will end in the not-too-distant future, so we’ve reached out to the company for clarification on that front.

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