The Apprentice Blog - Week 5 - Eleven

The Apprentice Blog - Week 5

by Joe Brett Apr 22nd 2009 10:00PM

What do you have for breakfast? A fry-up? Two double espressos and four cigarettes? Or a bowl of foul-tasting gruel with doubtful health benefits? Well, if you had the chance to eat this morning then you should be grateful. After all, there are people out there who don't always have the luxury of food first thing - and I'm talking about the 11 best brown-nosers in business, who this week were prised out of bed before 6am and whisked to the IMAX in order to suffer a ten-minute rally cry from twin-deck VCR magnate Sir Alan Sugar and the strands of All Bran caught in his facial hair.

But why the IMAX? Well, at 1500 square meters, the billboard outside that nobody noticed is one of the largest advertisement hoardings in the country – and yet again, Sir Alan requires the biggest crowbar in Britain to make the location relevant to the chore ahead.

"I've come up with a brand new breakfast cereal", a fifty-foot Mr Twit snarls from his place on the IMAX screen. No you haven't, chum. You've just got your between-stairs maid to Dyson out the kitchen cupboard and drench whatever she collected in some gold top, so you can masquerade it as nourishment for commoners. You've no more invented a cereal than I have. Still, I doubt that's the end of it. I await breakfast goods invented by other past and present members of the world's business elite (Anita Roddick's untested-on-animals mixed grills? Larry Flynt's 'Porn Flakes'?) with a heavy heart and a sack of Immodium.

To cut a long brief short, this week the teams must each develop a brand name, a character and an advertisement for Sugar's swill. And the most boring feature ever broadcast in 48 frames per second is livened up considerably when Nick and Margaret lurch out of the shadows like ruffian fairground children trying to liven up a ghost train. "Ignite, I'll be following yo-o-o-ou", moans Nick, before disappearing back into his his cloak. "And Empire, I'll be following you", warns a shrill Margaret Mountford, before closing her ice blue eyes and vanishing in the darkness. Brrrr.

- Read part two of Joe's blog >>

Comments (7)

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Apr 23rd 2009 5:56AM

Sue commented:

User rating: Neutral

Did you actually watch the show?

Apr 23rd 2009 8:04AM

fourstar commented:

User rating: Neutral

Er, if you just want a run-down of what happened in the show, maybe go over to the BBC site and sit quietly reading the facts, trying not to move your lips.

This is the real analysis, right here. Carry on Joe.

Apr 23rd 2009 5:39AM

9Red commented:

User rating: Neutral

Wow, do you think the guy that writes this blog has piles or something? The whole thing is foul tempered, b*tchy and not even romotely entertaining.

Apr 23rd 2009 5:46AM

Bob commented:

User rating: Thumbs up

The contestants on this show are all assumed to be the tops in industry. No wonder the country is done for. Maybe we should have a similar show to choose the next incompetent lot to sit in Westminster.....

Apr 23rd 2009 7:22AM

Andy Cooper commented:

User rating: Neutral

Another week, another travesty. Did 'Nurofen' (sic) actually speak a single word this week? Has there ever been a worse presentation pitch than that excruciating drivel that emanated from Mona's mouth? And, on the subject of excruciating, has there ever been a more ill-conceived pile of doggy-do masquerading as an advertising campaign than 'Pantsman'?

So, Blunder Woman copped the tin tack for the whole shambles, but the lion's share of fault surely lies elsewhere - the part of the task that Kimberley actually took personal hold of was actually complemented by the ad agency execs who obviously know a good ad when they see one. Yeah, right. The truth of The Apprentice lies in that the truly ghastly stay on while the less colourful fall on the ratings altar. Yet again. And the horrible fact is that The Apprentice is the loser in that it has transparently sold its soul to BBC executives: Surallun (for it is he) is clearly a latter day Faustus, and indeed Nick Hewer does a more than passable Beelzebub, whilst Margaret Mountford is being to look evermore like Linda Blair from the head-spinning scene of The Exorcist.

Once one realises that its less about reality telly than it is about light entertainment, The Apprentice becomes enjoyable once more. A cheapened and shadowy version of its former incarnation, but enjoyable nonetheless. I keep thinking that Keith Allen is about to appear as the arch villainous Sheriff of Nottingham again! And that's why this series of The Apprentice is falling short of the benchmark set by its own high standards from yesteryear: it has become throwaway TV worthy only of early Saturday evenings for us all to bay and shout at. And still, I'm hooked.......

Apr 23rd 2009 2:54PM

Ztarfizh commented:

User rating: Neutral

Actually, I think it's still a good show. Although we all had a good justified laugh at the Pantsman campaign, the Treasure Flakes team did a really good job in the limited time available and gave the professional ad-men a run for their money.

I'm not particularly convinced that Kimberly did a good job with the advert - maybe she got the structure right but it was still soulless, unfunny and embarrassing. I think we were just told that the advert was good to keep a bit of tension in the boardroom, because this was truly the most one-sided task in the series.

Kimberly's biggest mistake was in taking the noisy people into the boardroom instead of the wastes of space who would have been dead meat.

Apr 23rd 2009 9:41AM

Gonebuttnitsforgiven commented:

User rating: Neutral

For Apprentice read Big Brother - when it started The Apprentice had some seriously sparking talent - now, in a direct follow-my-leader, they have found what can only be descrribed as the also ran Clan from previous show rejects - I would have thought that the first twenty one year old claiming he/she has ten years experience is either not quite up to GCSE maths or, more likely, works for Aston Zorraster as a recruitment consultant throw back from 1988!! They are all bluff merchants and the only one I would employ (And yes, I do actually employ people!) is the Northern lad who told those two silly ass's where to get off last night - you are in charge therefore you take the bullet - and those whinging liberals who seem to think that sitting quietly in the background and saying nothing bad would do well to drop a CV to Wm Morrisons, they like yes men there as well!