The Reason Why Fast N' Loud Was Cancelled
Some TV shows wear their hearts on their sleeves and tell viewers exactly what they can expect right from the off. All the information you need is right there in the title. The Discovery Channel's "Fast N' Loud" perfectly exemplifies this. The formula was a simple one: the proud petrolheads of Dallas' Gas Monkey Garage toured the nation in search of some glorious classic cars in need of some TLC, then serviced them, tweaked them, celebrated them, and had a phenomenal time putting them through their paces.
Watching these majestic vehicles being renovated and seeing exactly how much they sold for when Richard Rawlings and his crew had finished with them triggered something primal in the brains of auto lovers worldwide. In December 2013, as Season 4 was drawing to a close, the show hit 3.176 million viewers in the U.S. alone. Its run would continue until May 2020, when the memorable final episode, "Flippin' The Bird," featuring DeMarcus Ware and a majestic retro Firebird, premiered.
Granted, it may not always have torn up the ratings, but "Fast N' Loud's" long run certainly topped several other similar auto shows that have come and gone. Why did it end seemingly abruptly? Its star wanted, or rather needed, to move on.
The breakup of the dream team
As viewers will know, Rawlings did not present the long-running show by himself. Aaron Kaufman, one of Gas Monkey Garage's mechanical masterminds, joined him. In a March 2017 episode, Kaufman told his co-host he was leaving. In the episode, he had just returned from a break, and as he put it on returning (in the clip shared by Discovery on YouTube), "My vacation from Gas Monkey is going to be a permanent one."
Speaking to Art of Gears about his decision the month before the fateful episode aired, Kaufman explained that the pressures of television and the need to produce work quickly had just become too much for him. "I wanted to build cars that were big, and then TV needed cars that were much smaller," the mechanic said, adding that "there were some growing personal issues and professional differences of opinions" to boot.
Moving to Shifting Gears With Aaron Kaufman in 2018, he was then able to create more elaborate, time-consuming builds of his own design, rather than those quicker projects required by the pace of the hit Discovery show. The dream team was no more, and the "Fast N' Loud" format soon proved to be a poor fit for Rawlings, too.
Richard Rawlings' revelations with Joe Rogan
MIC reports that, in December 2016, Rawlings wrote on the Gas Monkey Garage blog, "Aaron has been a part of Gas Monkey Garage since day one, and it will be a painstaking process moving forward without his talents." He didn't touch on the disagreements Kaufman spoke of, perhaps out of a desire to, as he put it in the post, "keep the drama away from the cameras."
Speaking on The Joe Rogan Experience #1578, though, Rawlings wasn't afraid to get more than a little candid about the reasons "Fast N' Loud" ended. During the turbulent year of 2020, the former host took some time to reflect on what he wanted to do in the future and concluded it was time to bring the run to an end. "I've exited Discovery and, uh, I'm a free agent," he said in the clip shared by PowerfulJRE on YouTube.
Rawlings revealed to Rogan that his Discovery contract was very restrictive. "I signed off on all media," he stated, leaving him with little control of his own social media accounts. He even said that if he bought an auto and wanted to share a photo, he couldn't without Discovery representation.
Rawlings, like Kaufman, wanted more creative freedom, and pursuing that ultimately led to the sad demise of "Fast N' Loud."