The Apprentice -- 1/27 (Spoilers)

Cafe Society
#41

What I learned from the task: Fresh paint stinks to high heaven. Replace toilet seats, not the whole toilet, where reasonable. Plan a budget FIRST. Let people rest.

What I learned from the firing: Profanity and abrasiveness are no substitute for earning your team’s respect as their leader. And do NOT use profanity in a corporate board room, ever!!!

Danny saved his butt with his idea for a motel party. I think that was worth at least a half point on the ratings right there, and I’m sure the team knows it was his idea.

Speaking of Danny… Why didn’t Verna go to the team’s Chief Morale Officer with her stress load? That’s what Danny said he was there for.

#42

I missed the beginning of the show, but did I hear correctly that the evening party was entirely Danny’s idea? If so, NotGoodEnoughForSumma should be thanking their lucky stars that he didn’t get fired last week. From the comments, the partying seemed to be the key to the victory.

#43

Hey, thanks for the simulpost answer, Scuba_Ben. :smiley:

#44

Wow, now that was a surprising episode and just a mess of good ol’ reality TV Schadenfreude. The likes of which I haven’t seen in a while. Hoorah for it not being boring!

#45

If I’d been on one of those teams, I’d’ve taken that $20k and booked those 14 guests into excellent rooms at a really fine hotel, plus hired limousines to take them to and fro. You’d still net a couple grand, which would be a helluva pizza party.

How’s that for outta the box?

#46

Exactly.

But did Kristen (was the yowling woman Kristen) give the team any time to survey the place? Can’t do a budget until you know what you need.

Maybe they tried to do too much. Smell is the first thing you notice, then cleanliness, and the condition of the plumbing.

Just clean it up – open the windows, shampoo the carpets, wash the walls, make sure the faucets are shining. Use the money you save to do a poolside buffet in the evening, and a breakfast buffet in the morning, and give your guests a discount coupon for their next visit.

#47

I heard, “My body was mentally exhausted”, which is funnier and makes even less sense. I called my mom right away all, “WTF does that mean?” Am I the only one surprised by Trump practically applauding her for that stunt? What the hell? I expected him to be furious! And I loved: (Ashlee Simpson, current) "Oh, you poor baby!!!1 :hug, cuddle: (cut to Ashlee Simpson, confessional) “What a dumb bitch, I hope she DIES!” Snake. Psycho, back-stabbing whore.

Net Worth is so doomed. As far as I can tell, it’s a group of obnoxiously loud, whiny bitches.

And how stupid is that guy? When anyone including, and maybe especially, Donald Trump says, “Should I fire you?” you absolutely do not answer yes. I don’t really get why he wasn’t fired right away. It’s not like Trump hadn’t made up his mind already, so what was the point of everything else? It wasn’t even that interesting. At least he didn’t whine too much in the cab.

Me: “He did not just take off in a helicopter from his boat.”

My mom: “It’s a big boat.” No. Way. :stuck_out_tongue:

Until dipshit opened his mouth, my mom and I had narrowed it down to her or the PM. What’s his name? Anyway, I hate her eyebrows. That’s really all I want to say about her.

#48

Did you guys look at the surveys on the Yahoo website? It looks like the guests stayed for free, and that they knew it was connected to The Apprentice.

I expect the reviews would have been worse if they had been paying guests.

Anyway, one of the guests commented that “Verna wouldn’t give up the bucket”. Wonder what that was about.

#49

I think she said both.

Reading the Yahoo reviews provides some insight into this episode. One Sea Garden reviewer said:

So, apparently, they had some idea of what was going on, and the rooms were free. Another reviewer notes that guests knew that the staff had 24 hours to prepare.

One Sea Garden reviewer provides this bizarre comment:

To see the reviews just follow the instructions from the end of the show (search for apprentice motel at yahoo.com)

On preview, AuntiePam got to it first, but I’m not going to let all this typing go to waste.

#50

I hate both teams. Is there any way George can win this thing?

#51

I vote for Carolyn. She was a class act tonight.
And she looked good, too – not that it’s relevant.

#52

Kudos to the casting directors and the editors. It’s only the second episode, but I feel like I’ve gotten to know the majority of the candidates a bit.

A decent task, too. Renovating those hotels in 48 hours with $20,000 was impossible, so it was a matter of how you were going to get the guests to give you decent ratings, anyway. And I have to say, the Book Smarts team pulled one of the most classic schemes ever–if something is going wrong, try and get your customers to have fun anyway.

Here are my thoughts on the candidates and my predictions, where I have any:

Book Smarts:

Danny: Good job redeeming yourself this week. You toned down the “personality” and the dress. I hope this week showed you that there is a time and a place for your hamminess. But in the right situation, it can save the day. You sparked the party, which won the task. You win MVP for that.
Prediction: High probability of a spectacular flame-out, with a chance of real solid performance.

Pocketbook (Verna): Tha hell? It’s only the second task! You’ve never stayed up for 48 hours? What kind of crappy school did you go to? And what’s with the pocketbook? Who paints with a pocketbook on? But I admire your for admitting your mistakes. You even admitted that a lot of your frustration stemmed from your desire to be the belle of the ball. Wow.
Prediction: She’s toast. And everyone knows it. So everyone is going to be really super nice to her from here on out. She might escape firing for a pretty long time, as there are more interesting fish to fry, but she’s definitely on The Donald’s to do list.

Schmatte (Erin): I hate you.
Prediction: She will be gone sometime in the mid-game. Her firing will feel extremely satisfying.

Bren: I just love this guy. He just seems like the epitome of “genteel southern lawyer.” He actually seems like a decent guy, and he gives good interview. We haven’t seen much from him in terms of leadership or business skills, but it’s still early. I liked how he made sure to get the coffee right away for those guests.
Prediction: He may turn out to be an ass. But if he’s good, he has a great shot at going all the way. I think that The Donald is going to be looking for someone less bland this time around.

Michael: I like him well enough so far. I’m not overly impressed, but not unimpressed either.
Prediction: Too soon to tell.

Alex: Seems a little whiny in his interviews.
Prediction: Too soon to tell.

Kendra: No opinion.
Prediction: None

Stephanie: She reminds me of Katrina from season 1—not a good thing. But that could be unfair of me, as we’ve hardly seen her.
Prediction: None

Street Smarts:

Fireplug (Brian): Thanks for making us all look bad, jackass. You were right about ordering the dumpster right away, and were a disaster from there on out.
p.s. Your tough-guy persona suffers when you look like you’re about to burst into tears.
Prediction: No surprises here.

Eyebrows(Kristen): It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s the Villainess of A3. She’s louder than a whining Omarosa! She can leap Maria’s ego in a single bound! And she just can not seem to SHUT THE FUCK UP!
Prediction: Trumpie will keep her around for a while for the drama potential. But she’s so fired.

John: Overconfident, but seems to be a strong player. Plus, he’s entertaining.
Prediction: A contender.

Chris: Was that you with the weird outburst in the boardroom? What was that all about?
Prediction: The Donald will crush you like a bug.

Tara: We haven’t seen too much of you. You annoyed me last week, but I can’t remember why.
Prediction: Too soon to tell.

Craig: You seem to have a good sense of when to just stand back and let the others self-destruct. You’re also funny. We haven’t seen enough to really tell.
Prediction: Contender, with a chance of weenie.

Tana: You have an extremely annoying personality, and you seem to think that you know how to act around customers. You don’t. Nevertheless, you seem like a pretty sensible sort. You might grow on me. And even if I continue to hate your personality, I won’t hold it against you.
Prediction: Will not win. But she may make it to the end-game.

Audrey: Smart smart smart. She seems to be one to try and solve conflicts, but not by being wishy-washy. She stands her ground. She’s only 22, so she may be hurt by her lack of experience. So far, she’s my favorite.
Prediction: A contender

Angie: I like your world-weary way. The hair I could live without. You obviously don’t suffer fools gladly, and that could hurt you, but I’m totally pulling for you. You’re my other favorite.
Prediction: A contender, but might be too rough around the edges to win.

#53

Looks like someone went and pulled themselves a Bradford. Make a big macho gesture to impress Trump and wind up in the cab before you know what hit you. Dumbass.

I mean, woweee, talk about clueless. Brian’s little diatribe about how he reads people and how Trump would totally hire someone like him because Trump was just like him…oy. For one thing, the fact that The Donald isn’t shy about telling people they suck doesn’t put him on the same level as this foul-mouthed twerp. There’s a difference between telling someone they’re a disaster and telling someone they’re shitty and should just fuck off. It’s a subtle difference, perhaps, but a pretty important one. For another thing, while His Hairness might be rude and abrasive at times, he doesn’t hire people who are rude and abrasive. The people he surrounds himself with are smooth, polished, and retain a certain amount of diplomacy even in their bluntest moments. And they’re all smart enough to can the profanity in the goddam boardroom. Lastly, if you have to tell someone how well you read people, you can’t fucking read people at all. Oh, and if you know your loudness makes you come across badly to others, for fuck’s sake, make some marginal effort lower your fucking voice.

The fact that he and Budget Girl (Kristen, was that her name?) were having a screaming match right there on the grounds in full view and hearing of all the guests makes me wonder how they ever managed to get anywhere in the professional world. Who was it that kept trying to shut them up, anyway? I can’t tell any of the women apart, except for Budget Girl with her hideous makeup and the one who looks like she’s dressing up as Xena for Halloween.

#54

First off, I’d just like to say that everyone reading the Raj Ratings is a loser, a degenerate, and not fit to waste the oxygen you use to live. Oh sorry, I got caught up in the thinking that this was the week that everyone should completely undermine their own chances of success by pointlessly saying or doing idiotic things. At first, I though the task was awful. 2 days, 20K to renovate a hotel? Failure was the only possible outcome. But, it was a valuable lesson. You can’t always have a winner of a task. How someone reacts to the impossible and at least tries their darnedest is a good indicator of what the person is really like. Near as I can tell, 4 people submarined their chances in fairly major ways. Who might they be? Read on, dear friend, read on. You’ll see the person’s name, current team (BS or SS), and prior week’s ranking.

Nursery School - Full of crying, childish people that could use either a potty break or a nap. These folks deserve to be watched by the crooked daycares profiled on “60 Minutes”.

Todd (BS) – One more week before you fully fade into the obscurity where even your mom requires picture ID of you.
Brian (SS) (Middle School) – Submariner #1. Sweet sassy molassey, you are clueless. No budget? No timetable? At least with those, you could pawn off blame. I’m guessing you thought taking blame and asking to be fired would so impress Trump he would ask to hire you immediately. Interesting time to try reverse psychology. Also, a skilled negotiator isn’t just able to get a viking helmet for free. A skilled negotiator can persuade an adversary to reach middle ground on an issue. Way to succeed there, little man.

Elementary School - Some growth, but in the end it’s a place rife with playground fights, name calling, and a trip to the Principal’s office.

Kristen (SS) (Middle School) - After 2 episodes, all we have seen from you is a complete inability to relax. You have such a huge stick up your butt, you could visit Muir Woods and be accused of shoplifting. Know when to stop saying too much in the boardroom. Brian was gone, but you dug your own grave.
Verna (BS) (High School) – Ummm, what? That was the weirdest thing. Turning into Jules Winnfield and deciding to walk the earth isn’t the greatest way to win. Trump likes a comeback, but not an unstable weirdo. Don’t expect to move anywhere but down in these rankings.
Chris (SS) (High School) – If Kristen said too much in the boardroom, you might as well have given the nominating speech at the 1988 Democratic National Convention. 2 people threw themselves under the bus, when you barged in all tough and blustery and suicidal. Just effing brilliant, my man.
Erin (BS) (Elem. School) – One week, you are Morticia from The Addams Family. The next, Cousin Itt. If you are still around to turn into Grampa, I am out of here.

Middle School - A group that might be growing up but still prone to wild swings based on playground fights, name calling, and puberty.
Danny (BS) (Elem. School) – You still need major damage control, but you understood what was at stake and made an effort to meet Trump more than halfway. That’s smart. Another week of this, and you are back to square one.
Angie (SS) (High School) – Tough call here. You were pretty much a bystander in the Brian/Kristen spitball fight of doom, but an ugly side of you was shown. Trump’s Apprentice winner usually gets a fairer edit. I’m just saying.
Audrey (SS) (High School) – See Angie. You are much more salvageable, but until you show something positive, all we have seen is someone a bit biting. But, just a bit.

High School - Not quite a child, not quite an adult. Frankly, I still don’t know what to make of these folks.
Bren (BS) (High School) – Not much action, but a credible effort. Your longing glances at Steve Forbes disturb me.
Michael (BS) (High School) – You were a task leader? Really?
Stephanie (BS) (High School) – A quiet week after a spotty one, just what the doctor ordered.
Alex (BS) (Middle School) – Good job. After a dangerous and damaging boardroom, you needed to shut up and work and win. You did all 3.
Tana (SS) (Middle School) – You seemed well suited at the front desk. Trump looks for those well suited to hire those at the front desk.
Craig (SS) (High School) – Let me know when his plane arrives and he joins the show.
Tara (SS) (High School) – Tara must be on that same fligh.

College - Older and wiser, things are looking up. Maybe not ready to enter the real world yet, but getting close.

Kendra (BS) (College) – Kendra’s appearance this week was brought to us by Steve Forbes for President, 2008. “Then, more than now. Forbes, dorkier than most.”

Grad School - These people have a clue, have some seasoning, and have a chance to make an impact.
None this week. Although, Carolyn bouncing on the bed and then hosting her own segment of “Where in the World is Verna San Diego” was nice to see.

PhD - Ready for tweed jackets, big paydays, and a chance to personally tend to the Donald’s combover.
John (SS) (Grad School) – The first PhD of the year. A winning task as PM and a task where you did and said all the right things. You have a favorable edit which suggest a lengthy stay. You seem solid and normal, as well. However, could you please do something to remind me less of Buster Poindexter. I am disturbed by this imagery.

All in all, an odd episode. It’s like 25% of the cast decided to say “Screw it, I want to see how many dumb things I can do at one time. Maybe next week, I’ll staple pink ties to myself and dance the Hora for Trump.”

#55

Nice work as always Mullinator. :smiley:

My thoughts:

Kristen: Does she apply her makeup by dipping her face into it?

Erin: Talks in the interviews like a dozen childrens’ photographers are behind the camera with puppets trying to get her attention. Seriously, what’s wrong with her?

Verna: Drop the purse and step away. As Green Bean mentioned, she wore it while painting. She also had it on at the front desk too. Was she always planning on making a break for it?

Angie: Earned points for yelling at Kristen, lost points for dressing like a flight attendant from the 70s (no offense to anyone who was a flight attendant in the 70s). :wink:

Chris: Irked the hell out of the the moment I heard his voice last week. Got worse when he opined that he was a millionaire and couldn’t believe he had to flip burgers in last week’s Yahoo clips. Tonight proves that he’s a complete moron.

Brian: Oh captain, my captain. This show has its ups and downs, but I admit I love a good in-front-of-the-whole-team-firing. Couldn’t have happened to a more deserving person.

John: Awesome - my favorite so far.

So far so good.

#56

Even if you get to eat lobster, dinner with Steve Forbes is not a reward.

#57

It’s a game, folks, with a nice six-figure job for a year for the winner.

That’s all this game players can see.

What they fail to see is any potential real-life employers for the weekly losers will be judging their skills (or lack thereof) as well, too. Didn’t someone from the last series get fired from their real job based on what they said/did during their stint on the show?

#58

I, too, was extremely surprised that The Donald commended Verna for her ‘comeback’ rather than just going, “the hell?”
I have to wonder, though, how the African American females in the business world feel about their representation on this show throughout the 3 seasons. Omarosa, Stacie, and now Verna.
They couldn’t find a stable African American businesswoman anywhere?

#59

Nice analysis, Mullinator. I just wanted to react to a couple things you said.

I thought this was an awesome task from the get-go. See, you know that there’s no way to get everything done and refurbished up to an acceptable level. So the key to success is to a) figure out what things are going to please the customer, b) come up with a plan and prioritize all the things that you must or could do to get a good customer rating, and c) focus on the things that are do-able with the time and budget alloted. So this whole task forces the teams to do some analysis and trade-off – what refurbishments and amenities will get the best customer reaction with the least effort?

Except neither of the teams seemed to quite grasp the fact that some sort of plan was necessary. Especially “Net Worth” – Good Lord, Brian, way to showcase every possible type of failure in a single episode. In point of fact, though, this team lost primarily because they had no plan at all, as Carolyn (or was it George?) noted – they were just doing random shit, screw the budget, screw a cohesive plan. And “Magna” was only moderately better, and pulled it out only because of Danny’s inspired balcony party idea, which was exactly the sort of low-cost, high gain idea they should have been putting into their plan to begin with.

Other random thoughts:
a) Painting the rooms? Have none of these people ever painted a room before? It takes time for the fumes to clear, don’tcha know. Magna in particular… they spent an enormous number of man-hours painting, which only decreased their customer satisfaction scores. Look at the reviews if you don’t believe me.
b) All that aside, how on Earth did Magna get 4/5 stars with rooms as crappy as they were? Were team members giving hummers in the utility closet?
c) How could anyone not have the business savvy to…um… NOT engage in a screaming match in front of the customers? Sheesh. It was noticed, and probably resulted in a few dings to final ratings. At least take it to someplace private.
d) Kudos to Tara for pointing out that the excessive fighting was hurting team morale… and performance. It seems silly to be giving kudos for pointing out something so entirely obvious, but with the rest of her team imploding in such a spectacular fashion, she gets points just by not being an idiot. Sad, isn’t it?
e) Speaking of idiot, could someone explain to me what happened with Chris in the boardroom? I’m serious – my attention wandered for a few seconds, and then it seemed like out of nowhere he was getting a raft of shit. I don’t remember him doing anything, positive or negative, during the task. Why the attention in the boardroom?

Hmmmmm… Dunno about this. I don’t mind the guy, really, but he just strikes me as loud and blustery without much substance. Not that much different from Brian, in other words. I give him credit for being open and speaking his mind (preferable, IMO, to last season’s back-stabbers), but I see him as eventually rubbing people the wrong way.

And, also IMO, his PM win last week wasn’t that impressive. First off, this week’s task was much harder than last weeks, what with that pesky budget and all this week, as well as the helpful BK staff last week. Second off, Magna was terrible last week, with two obvious blunders (the promotion and cashiers), and yet lost by only 8% or so in sales. Hardly an overwhelming victory by (the admittedly better-managed) Net Worth.

I agree he’s probably got a lengthy stay, but I’m thinking that the next time he PMs, in week nine or so, he blows it.

#60

I agree Auntie Pam, she was good, must be those Midwestern values… :wink:

I think I’m in love with Angie. Or Carolyn in that jacket.

I don’t think anyone’s mentioned the woman (Vera?) that picked up the paint roller and asked if she should use it this way, (flips it 180 degres), or that way?? Please.

In all fairness to Vera, i don’t think I’d be too nice with 48 hours of no sleep. Though if i was working for Trump, i might gut it out.

Last month I did something so strange. I bought a new toilet seat. Took the old one off, gave the toilet a good cleaning(for a guy, a Great cleaning!) because it’s much easier without the seat on their. Put the new one on and it looked good as new. took 30 minutes total, and cost $10. I guess I’m overqualifed for that show.