...suing makes Tesla look guilty as hell, and every news outlet will now cover the tesla-looks-guilty lawsuit...
Er...maybe being sued would make them look guilty. Not sure I see how filing a civil lawsuit as a plaintiff makes one look guilty...
Make an excuse and let them test again with a car that does get 200+ miles per charge.
The car they were driving does get 200+ miles per charge...on the EPA combined cycle. Which is exactly what Tesla claimed. No car Top Gear has ever driven achieved the rated miles-per-tank or miles-per-gallon numbers. This is really basic.
Unless you were standing there with video cameras (like top gear was) to prove the car lasted more than 55 miles or the brakes didn't fail, I'd say Top Gear probably has this one in the bag.
Perhaps if Top Gear was denying the facts you'd be right. As it stands, they admit that the car never died during their testing. That is to say, they admit to staging the scene where Clarkson says "uh-oh" as the car "dies" and then staging the scene where a bunch of guys push the car back to the hangar! I'm sorry, but if you don't call that misrepresentation, I don't know what else to say.