I used to like the programme when it started, lost a bit of interest for a couple of series, but I thought it was back on form last week.
The close-up of the bonny banker wrapping her lips around a sausage shows someone in the production team has a sense of humour.
I watch as much telly as anybody, but The Apprentice is the only programme I look forward to.
What do you think of it?
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Afraid I've never taken to it which may seem odd as I have spent my whole working life "in business".
I admire Lord Sugar for his achievements but I can't like the man. Too abrasive for me and as for some of the contestants, well I'm not a violent man but I could cheerfully punch some of them.
Maybe I've spent too much time in the company of that particular species over the years.
Not for me Im afraid. Incidentally, I feel much the same about Dragon's Den. Makes me cringe mostly.
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"I admire Lord Sugar for his achievements"
Tacky plastic hifi systems with tape decks that weebled and warbled when playing Ultravox in the 80s?
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Granted, but no, I admire anyone who can make that much money legally in a lifetime. Still don't like him though. I expect he wouldn't like me so fair enough.
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...I admire anyone who can make that much money legally in a lifetime...
I can't warm to the guy, it's fine for him to make a few bright remarks, but not for anybody else.
I think you would never know where you stand with him.
On the plus side, he's one of the few Thatcher-years entrepreneurs who have survived and prospered.
And there's never been even a whiff of scandal or dodgy dealings.
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he dun good pre thatch iff
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...he dun good pre thatch iff...
The cheapo radio/cassettes and PCW word processors were late 70s and early 80s, Thatcher time, surely?
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i was selling his products in 75 so he was already a rich man when maggie got her bag in no.10
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"I think you would never know where you stand with him"
I'm guessing the top of his head would just about reach my armpit.
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>> "I admire Lord Sugar for his achievements"
>>
>> Tacky plastic hifi systems with tape decks that weebled and warbled when playing Ultravox in
>> the 80s?
>>
Don't forget the Amstrad 1512!
Sugar was on the one show last week - they were creeping up to him and he made some retort about the world being a better place because of the "emailer"
What does he do now? I though he had sold all his electronics business?
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Sugar's business these days is mostly in property.
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Just flicking through wiki - Amstrad stands for Alan Michael Sugar TRADing.
Never knew that.
"the world being a better place because of the "emailer""
Ha ha ha ha ha! - that was the telephone on top of which someone had glued a monitor wasn't it? I remember seeing one in Dixons. Straight from the Homer Simpson School of Product Design. Hands up who bought one...
Last edited by: BiggerBadderDave on Wed 13 Oct 10 at 21:14
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>>
>> Sugar was on the one show last week - they were creeping up to him
>> and he made some retort about the world being a better place because of the
>> "emailer"
>>
That was in an interview with Piers Morgan and the remark was very much tongue in cheek, a joke against himself. I admire Alan Sugar, I don't know whether or not I would like him because I've never met him, but I wouldn't judge him by what I see on The Apprentice. That is heavily edited for viewer impact and the real person may be nothing like that.
Sugar made his fortune selling sound systems to people who didn't know their wow from their flutter and couldn't have cared less. He never pretended otherwise. His PCWs probably got more people on the computer bandwagon than any other single product and made the typewriter obsolete overnight. His only major fault was preventing Tottenham Hotspurs from going bankrupt, but we all make mistakes.
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I like it. The early episodes are good when there is so much testosterone pumping in the male team its funny. Surprised they were not all eating the raw meat in last weeks.
I find that dragons den is all "look at me". The dragons are only in it for themselves and how much they can make out of others.
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>>as for some of the contestants, well I'm not a violent man but I could cheerfully punch some of them.
I haven't seen the current series yet, but I think they must select at least half of them for just being bung full of it.
I quite like watching Sugar, he has a wonderful turn of phrase.
I can't watch Dragon's Den either.
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sugar ?looking forward to it immensly and i do pick up some people skill tips watching it
dragons den is not for me either
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The guy that was kicked out last week badly mismanaged his style, he came across as a right wally in the show but in the interview he came across as a hard-working self deprecating type with a decent smile.....shame he cocked it up..altogether nicer than some of the others.
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>> The guy that was kicked out last week badly mismanaged his style, he came across
>> as a right wally in the show but in the interview he came across as
>> a hard-working self deprecating type with a decent smile.....
Husband of one of my cousins worked with him a few years back - he confirmed that what we saw in the show was the genuine article...
Oh dear.
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It was ok to start with, but if these contestants are the best and the brightest, we are all doomed. Countless times total lack of common sense prevails and they make a failure thats easy to seecoming from a mile off. Which makes it something of a joke and about as intellectual as Big Brother.
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>> Not for me Im afraid. Incidentally, I feel much the same about Dragon's Den. Makes
>> me cringe mostly.
Yes, but I especially like the people that get the cold shoulder from the dragons, then go on to make a success of their business.
There are some really obnoxious people on The Apprentice, but thats the point of the programme, viewing entertainment for the rest of us. Wouldn't be any fun if they were all goody two shoes.
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Fair enough corax, I do understand that it could be entertaining to some. I suppose I just encounter twonks like that too often at work to want to be watching clones of them in my free time. Give me Ray Mears everytime. I'd quite like to be Ray Mears. I've got a penknife and everything already.
:-)
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>> Fair enough corax, I do understand that it could be entertaining to some. I suppose
>> I just encounter twonks like that too often at work to want to be watching
>> clones of them in my free time. Give me Ray Mears everytime. I'd quite like
>> to be Ray Mears. I've got a penknife and everything already.
He's the salt of the earth. When he was kayaking through Canada, he amazed me by being totally unaffected by the clouds of nasty biting mosquitoes you get in the North. Mind you, I don't know how he was off camera! But I always like watching him. A great antidote to the madness of modern life.
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>> I suppose
>> I just encounter twonks like that too often at work to want to be watching
>> clones of them in my free time.
Well you see you've nailed it there, because I havn't worked in an office for years now, so I suppose I just like to watch something that is now totally alien to me :-)
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Sorry, no time to chat, trying to light a fire in the garden by rubbing mushrooms on a dandelion leaf...Got my khaki shirt on specially...
:-)
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We've been regulars since Series 1, when it seemed genuinely fresh and as if Surallen's job might matter.
These days the fun is more in looking for moments when a contestant, consciously or otherwise, presses one of Sugar's buttons. There were two last week - Dan's cocky slouching in the boardroom, and the two lady bankers making a show of managing the costs in the sausage exercise. It may have been coincidental, but my money's on them remembering last year's first episode, when one contestant gleefully blew her team's budget on car cleaning materials and received an early bath.
It always takes a few weeks for the personalities to emerge from behind the bravado, which can make the first few programmes seem a little slow, but it's still good entertainment and I'll be watching tonight, and soaking up the analysis in the morning.
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Stu - I agree. I think I could do a better job than some of the contestants, and some of engineering folks I work with could blow them away.
Does make you worry for the future, although its good to see there are a few who left school at 16 and have worked for what they have
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...I think I could do a better job than some of the contestants...
One of the things I liked about the first programme was they all seemed reasonably competent.
I was expecting one team to order a ton of meat to make a hundred sausages.
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According to the preview article on the Telegraph web site, one of the teams sets a new record for failure tonight.
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...one of the teams sets a new record for failure tonight...
Thanks Andy, anticipation at Iffy Towers has now reached fever pitch.
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>> ...one of the teams sets a new record for failure tonight...
>>
>> Thanks Andy, anticipation at Iffy Towers has now reached fever pitch.
>>
>>
I like seeing people do well, but there is something satisfying about seeing them really cock it up
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>> I watch as much telly as anybody
I don't. It's normally crap, and there there are other things I need to spend my time on.
>> The Apprentice is the only programme Ilook forward to.
>>
>> What do you think of it?
I saw one a year or so ago. It's manufactured "light entertainment", like most programmes are.
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Spoiler alert - if you don't want to know the result...
Good one last night, with a very odd conclusion. The women's team failed for two key reasons: constant bickering, which cost them time at crucial points, and missing the chance to place their bizarre product exclusively at Boots, which would have won the day for them. Leader Laura was culpable for both -flapping, dithering and flouncing off in tears while her team fell apart - then changed her mind about whom to bring back to face Sugar, yet somehow escaped when Sugar fired harmless Joy, who hadn't even been Laura's first choice.
Sugar said afterwards that he'd trusted his 'gut', perhaps to acknowledge that Nick and Karren couldn't understand his decision either.
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Now that the 'formula' has been established, the programme has become, well, formulaic :-)
For me, the 'Halal/Kosher' episode was the most memorable!
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We've watched every series since it started.
This crop is the worst bunch of the lot so far. If this is the cream of the candidates that applied, then this economy is doomed.
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I think the 'candidates' have got worse as the programme has gone on. Probably because in series one they were perhaps serious etc. Now they're a bunch of people wanting to be on TV and anyone who really is any good does not need to work for AMSTRAD.
Think about it - we've got people earning six figure salaries wanting to win a job earning £100k. One this time is a surgeon who owns businesses. They all want to be famous.
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From what I've seen, some 'contestants' would only warrant a six-figure salary if that figure included the pence :-)
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Never seen the program myself, only know about it from the Torygraph.
Hats off to Alan Sugar though. He made a fortune by pioneering the sale of crap quality Taiwanese and Korean made home electronics in the UK in the 70s and 80s. Those tower stereos especially were awful, but clearly what people wanted, so can't fault the man.
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>> I think the 'candidates' have got worse as the programme has gone on.
It's *entertainment*, in particular a sort of "reality TV". People are paid to make the show. The TV people put it on, for money (advertisers or licence fees). The masses watch and say oh err. It's not really real.
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Err I think the job they are given at the end of the process is *real*. Of course it's "reality" TV, because it's real. The whole thing is a fun way to pick an applicant for a job, with cameras. You seem to think there is something more in the way of being false in some way.
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>> The whole thing is a fun way to pick an applicant for a job, with cameras.
No, it's grist to t'mill for the masses after they've finished watching "Coronation Street", "The X-factor" or "Eastenders".
>> You seem to think there is something more in the way of being false in some way.
Yup.
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>> This crop is the worst bunch of the lot so far. If this is the
>> cream of the candidates that applied, then this economy is doomed.
>>
No, the economy is not doomed because of the standard of the "Apprentice" applicants. The people who apply are attention seekers who want a bit more than their 15 minutes of fame and those chosen are picked for their likely "entertainment" value. It is just another "big Brother" type of TV show, nothing more, nothing less.
Last edited by: John H on Thu 14 Oct 10 at 12:57
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Their CVs tell a different story. Many running "successful" businesses or running company departments before applying. Hence my comment that if this is the best this country can produce, no wonder we are in the poo
Last edited by: VxFan on Fri 15 Oct 10 at 00:40
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>> Their CVs tell a different story. Many running "successful" businesses or running company departments before
So you believe their CVs? And you claim to have watched previous series?
I seem to recall that in most cases in the finale, during the tough interview phase by the outside "experts", quite a few fibs have been exposed.
In this current series, there are reports already of alleged non-disclosure of criminal convictions as well as dubious qualifications and achievements.
I do also wonder what a qualified medical doctor/surgeon is doing on this show.
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That's why I said, they are the worst bunch yet.
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How many of the previous winners are still working for Lord Sugar???
I watched it last night and there was a lassie with straight hair who was trying her best to be a posh lookalike and never said a word or contributed to anything. But she did have a short skirt on.
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>> How many of the previous winners are still working for Lord Sugar???
None would be my guess. Most have quit not long after starting.
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I suspected that might be the case, here's a definite list...
www.digitalspy.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?p=44629251
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.
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>> I do also wonder what a qualified medical doctor/surgeon is doing on this show.
>>
Think if you dig around tinternet you will find that he has been disciplined by the general medical council for misconduct
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I would have thought a fully qualified surgeon (still working in that field) could make well over £100k pa. There's more to the characters in this series than meets the eye I think. Definitely more reality TV programming as the series have gone on IMO.
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The Apprentice - Runfer D'Hills
