If there's one thing this nation needs more of, its smug gits in business attire spunking away money that isn't theirs whilst being rewarded with lavish amounts of champagne and opportunities to stab those who have irked them squarely between the shoulders.
Yes, that's right, it's week 9 of The Apprentice!
This week everyone's favourite job applicants have the task of buying 10 rare items with a budget of ?1500. Whoever spent the least won the task. Simples. There were obviously fines for failing to procure all the items or for not turning up to the boardroom on time, just in case anyone fancied playing fast and loose with the rules.
Sir Alan/Lord Sugar/The A-Train also decided to return to a boys versus girls format, so be prepared for lots of bitching and over the top macho posturing! HOORAY!
Synergy hit the ground running, project manager and world smirking champion Jamie took off on his own, leaving Chris, ?all the personality of an investment banker,? Bates and Stuart, ?Iceland own-brand,? Baggs to duke it out for the title of Britain?s dullest man.
Apollo, meanwhile, took the time to call ahead, finding out what their products were and where they could find them. When they finally did hit the road, they were able to get straight to their suppliers and bagged all 10 of their items with relative ease.
The only exception was Liz and Joanna?s late return to the boardroom, which was caused by them trying to haggle with a man who moved so slowly that, upon reflection, he may have actually been dead.
Apollo?s organisation and efficiency looked like a solid plan, which naturally meant they would go on to lose the task to Synergy, with their plan of randomly walking up and down streets in central London the vain hope that they just happen upon one of the items on their list, despite the fact they often had no idea what they were looking for.
Another key component of Synergy?s plan seemed to be the acting ability of Chris. Jamie asked his team to have a story ready to sell to suppliers that would allow them to get the best price and boy did Chris take this advice on board. Our lovable investment banker started making up bizarre stories about how he'd left items in Nottingham, or was going to a wedding in Scotland with his Nan whilst also bleating about how he had no money left.
There were only 2 problems with these stories. Firstly, none of them made any sense. Secondly, Chris was a sharply dressed man, accompanied by another sharply dressed man AND A CAMERA CREW. There was no way anyone was actually buying these stories, they just wanted to get him and his lively, investment-banker personality out of their shops before he made their heads explode with his ridiculous monotone lies.
When we got to the boardroom it was announced that the boys, despite failing to get all 10 items, had won the task. Which shocked Jamie so much he actually continued to apologise for his performance despite winning. Cue VT that sees the boys spend the weekend in Paris, frolicking in parks whilst wearing berets, oversized sunglasses and turtle neck sweaters.? It made you want to reach through the TV and throttle them until the twitching stopped.
That's right, the boys got rewarded for their failure. The Apprentice has now officially become a bizarre hybrid parody of the banking sector.
The girls, looking like a bizarre corporate girl-band, tried to ditch Stella faster than Girls Aloud tried to ditch the Ginger one by subtly editing her out of their videos. But eventually it was 22 year old rah and professional glass ceiling dropper, Laura, that bit the bullet.
Let this be a lesson to you, if all you're really good for is looking a bit like a horse and crying a lot, then an angry old man probably won't hire you to be his assistant. Unless he's a pervert.
BEST MOMENT: Tie between the surprise on everyone’s face when Synergy won and the audible groan when both Stella and Liz walked back in to the house.
WORST MOMENT: Liz trying to grab a pen out of an old man’s hand because he was taking too long to write a receipt. Classy.
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Tim says
A shocking result,but ultimately the right one. The girls deserved to lose for treating the task (in Sugar’s words) like a treasure hunt, rather than as an exercise in proper business skills, like negotiating.
Stuart got it spot on afterwards when he said “How good are we? Even when we’re s***, we win!”
And the boys WERE awful. Having picked up three fines for unpurchased items, there is no way they should have been anywhere near the girls, let alone win. But with the exception of Joanna, all the girls negotiated extremely poorly. Truffle-gate became the focus, but in reality they lost this task everywhere, not just in Knightsbridge.
Anyway, thank God Laura the Whinger has finally gone! What did she actually do in nine weeks, other than secure NO orders as PM, cry a bit, whinge a lot and then back away from every decision which might backfire on her. She was a complete passenger throughout – which is kind of ironic, given that next week’s task involves buses …
http://slouchingtowardsthatcham.com/2010/12/02/no-joy-of-six-for-laura-as-apprentice-loser-suffers-buyers-remorse/