Sunday, January 07, 2007

Out Like a Fat Kid in Dodgeball

Picked last and out first sums up Martin's short lived existence as a potential bright star of Trump's empire. The first episode started with a bang, with Trump shouting in his car, kissing babies and taking restroom requests, all of which makes me hopeful for this season of The Apprentice. Upon arrival to Chateau Trump, the candidates were tasked with assembling a tent which everyone fussed over, except for this season's dandy, Martin who seemingly was afraid to even stand in dirt let alone get his hands in it. This task led to the selection of this season's first project managers Frank and Heidi, selected by cohort consensus because they were the most "vocal" during the task. Apparently loud is the main qualification for leadership.
Schoolyard picks ensued leaving Martin last, forced to be adopted by Frank. The first face off came at the car wash. A simple task, earn the most money by washing cars. Heidi's team, stationed in West L.A. appealed to the homosexual populace with bare chested ivy leaguers (no, really that was her plan). I kept waiting for Martin to come around, but his candy ass was busy wussing out on sales for Team Frank. While Heidi was busy parading men, Frank opted for the opposite approach of sending out the female team members. His critical error was that he gave them no signs, so for the first hour or so citizens of LA were most likely confused by a bunch of leggy chicks waving their arms frantically, and rather aimlessly, at passers by. Once the marketing flaw was remedied with poster board and a Sharpie, Frank's team was finally off, with a low initial price point, and grand plans to upsell clients with wonderful car wash cliches. I swear Tim must have spent a summer at Supersonic what with the crap that came spewing out of his mouth: "we highly recommend wax for your particular paint job"...please spare me.
At the end of the day Heidi was triumphant by a hundred and change, although not a landslide, a win is a win on The Apprentice.
In Burnett-esque style this season came with a few twists. My favorite is that the losing team is relegated to living in the backyard Hooverville while their competition whoops it up in the mansion with a statue modeled after Ivanka, all hips and no torso.
The other main twist is that the project manager of the winning team joins Trump in the boardroom to make pithy remarks and hopefully have a say in the dreaded cobra strike. I do miss having yes-man George in the boardroom, but I'm excited to see how this new twist plays out over the season. This episode led to a struggle between Frank and Martin, which I was pretty sure would end in Martin getting sacked especially after Trump referred to him as a "pompous ass." For a while though, Frank was doing a good job of talking his way into getting fired, he seriously could not shut up. Luckily for Frank, Trump saved his fellow New Yorker and fired Martin who ceremoniously ended the first episode by saying "I can't say that I regret telling Mr. Trump I had to go the bathroom, I had to go."

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