Okay, I may be the only one who still gives a shit – but dammit, it’s time for a new season of Smarmy Trumperific Cheesiness – and with the candidates in bathing suits, to boot! No Carolyn – but the lovely Ivanka – who probably looks better in a bathing suit anyway.
Anyone else planning to watch?
I am sure Ivanka looks lovely wearing nothing but her checkbook. 
thanks for the reminder. I wanted to see it and had totally forgotten about it.
I’ll watch it, but the ads don’t leave much to be desired. Sleeping in a tent now? This isn’t Survivor.
Ugh.
If you’re on the fence, fair-weather fans – check it out. There’s a couple of new twists.
I hate these new “twists.” They’re pointless and have nothing to do with business. And judging by the preview they will only get worse. :rolleyes:
Well, that was a well-deserved firing. Talk about having no fire in one’s belly.
I came home from work at 9:45 and my daughter was sniggering on the couch at the marvelous tackiness of it all. So that’s The Donald’s TV demographic: the 14-to-18 group who watches merely to see if he can top last season’s tackiness.
She reported that the opening bit with the baby in some kind of christening robe (?) was especially enjoyable.
I’d start watching again if I thought that Trump was actually looking for someone to work for him. For the last couple of seasons, it seems like he’s just been doing his schtick, acting, being The Donald. And phoning it in, even.
Thinking back, we’ve never seen him laugh on camera. And there’s been plenty to laugh at. He’s in a rut.
Dunno – PM of the winning team getting to sit in on the boardroom? Info on your competitors – not too irrelevant.
The “losers sleep in tents” promo seemed to me to be a rip-off of a rip-off, namely the abortive show My Big Fat Obnoxious Boss. On that show, the winning team got a reward (in one episode, a fancy meal at a top-of-the-skyscraper restaurant) and the losing team got a punishment (in the same episode, baloney sandwiches in an unused aqueduct).
I ain’t watching the show this season. I figure I’ll get the good info from the Dope threads.
During the first commercial break when Donald and Ivanka were doing the intro for the play at home game, Ivanka’s chest looked inflated- I just assumed she had implants or something. But in the boardroom, she looked somewhat less chestalicious. Then next break, she’s sportin’ the D-cups again, then on the show, back to normal.
Martin was a putz. How many “old African sayings” did he treat us to?
I noticed that, too. How could I not, really.
I went to bed after 45 minutes. The first few episodes are always too confusing for me—too many people to keep track of—and I just really, really, REALLY wanted to hit Frank repeatedly until his eyes bugged out even more. I, too, figured I’d catch a reecap here.
Good news – he’s still in the game. For another five minutes or so, anyway. Martin was deemed – by Ivanka – the more annoying of the two.
As abrasive as Frank was, Martin was definitely the more aggravating.
Here’s a tip, sir. When trying to plead your case, please try not to sound like Mr. Rogers on Prozac. No wonder Ivanka felt that you didn’t have any drive or determination.
Maybe it just didn’t make the air, but I can’t believe Martin wasn’t going on at length about Frank spending an hour implementing his brilliant plan to wave down moving traffic with 8 1/2 X 11 pieces of paper! Flyers? At that point? That was just dumb. Has the man never seen a carwash? Even the JV cheerleaders know better than that.
But yes, Martin seemed like a bit of a ass and lazy as hell to boot.
I have never watched more than a few minutes of a few shows of the Aprrentice (just enough to form an opinion about it) and I would never watch it otherwise, because it is symptomatic of all that is worst in western and American society. Capitalism as we know it desreves the same demise as Communism.
The Apprentice is the big-shit capitalist boss firing people left and right in what is supposed to be a pursuit of excellence but is really a big ego trip.
The show bolsters the American dream and myth that anyone can grow up to be rich or President. (Sure they can, and it is only by accident that 90% of Presidents were upper class, and that most of the wealthy in the western world inherited their wealth).
The problem is that if you believe that America is a land where anyone can make it if they try hard enough, the flip side of that myth is that anyone who is poor and unsuccessful is a undeserving loser who need expect no pity or help. Social programs can then be castigated as handouts, and the taxes necessary to support social programs can be slashed, allowing people like Trump to go from billionaire to multi-billionaire.
Programs like “Survivor” propagate the myth that competition and ruthless elimination and betrayal of one’s peers is the norm for a human “tribe”. In fact, take a look at most real tribal societies and you will see that the secret of their survival is mutual respect and cooperation.
Just once I would give anything to see one of these apprentices stop shaking in their boots in front of the mighty god Trump and say: “I have decided to change things a little, Donald. I am resigning, whether you want to fire me or not. Because I have just realized that there is more to life than clawing and fighting for the opportunity to kiss your ass for a big salary.”
By the way, is there any truth to the rumour that the role of Trump’s hair will this year be played by Pawtucket Pete the Groundhog?
I don’t mind the ‘loser tent’ aspect – I figure it’s mainly due to practicality. How many rental houses do you suppose there are that can provide adequate sleeping quarters for 18 adults?
The ‘winning PM sits in at the boardroom’ I think might be interesting. How do you gracefully do the ‘dump the not-quite-worst without making it obvious’ dance? Given that everyone knows that’s what you should do.
In this episode, I don’t think it mattered. Neither Martin nor Frank are assets to their team. (BTW, they showed team names in the opening credits. I noticed one name was Arrow, but didn’t catch the other?)
Quite often they’ve had times where one team gets to choose a player from the other team. At least this way the PM has a bit more info on the picks than simply going on looks or how cool they are when not working.
The change I’m most dubious about is that “Winning PM” stays as PM. Doesn’t that simply invite fragging by his/her team? Because if you work your hiney off to make your team successful week after week, all you do is make it look like your PM can walk on water. NOT a good thing, when you are directly competing with them.
Valteron – thank you for sharing. :rolleyes:
OTOH, I’m going to argue that this is actually closer to real life than the previous system of switching off – since generally one does have the same boss for project after project, and making it clear to the big boss what one’s contributions are is something people actually have to deal with.
I realize that we see a highly edited version of the board room, but Frank should have been able to put the nail in Martin’s coffin pretty easily with simple numbers. If we accept as true the notion that Martin didn’t up-sell as much as the other two guys, all Frank needed to say was, “Look, we only lost by $60. Salesman 1 up-sold x% of his sales, and salesman 2 up-sold y% of his sales. If Martin had performed at their level, we would have won by $240 (or whatever the figure is). Clearly my strategy was sound, Martin just didn’t pull his weight compared to the others.” I think Trump would respect and respond well to a cogent argument like that.
But, I suppose Frank would have had to shut up for a couple of minutes to let his brain process this information. That clearly wasn’t going to happen.