'The Apprentice 5' - Ep. 10 -or- "It's Two, Two Firings at Once!"

First, I have to get a gripe out of my system. Feel free to skip this paragraph if you're a fan of Deal or No Deal. I refuse to be held responsible for any hurt feelings of readers. Okay. Here goes: Get that stupid Deal or No Deal off the air on time! What's with that usurping the first few minutes of what should be The Apprentice? What's the deal that idiots opening briefcases is so exciting? If it has to be on, end it on time.

There. I feel better already. On with tonight's The Apprentice episode...

The rather typical brouhaha about the Boardroom events went down in the show opening. Allie was all hugging and sweet-as-pie with both Roxanne and Tammy as she thought they were on her side. Then she points out that Sean didn't back her up at all. (Remember last week he kept mumbling "you've put me in an awkward position" over and over again? Well, he's still awkward, perhaps more awkward since Allie made it through and his friend Andrea got fired.) Now Allie and Roxanne have a target drawn...right on Sean's back. He can't be trusted! Tammy is leaning towards, "Oh, he wasn't malicious." On it goes...and on and on.

This is the second week they've been running the "Get Rich With Trump" gimmick with home viewers. I wonder how this works outside of the East Coast as viewers are asked to tell Trump who they want fired via text messaging or the NBC website. One home viewer wins $10,000 each week. Hmmm...do they give out another 10 grand to West Coast viewers three hours later? Is it just an East Coast thing? It hardly seems fair. Ah, but who am I to complain? I neither text message, nor go to the site during the show.

This week it was back to Bill Rancic and Carolyn being Trump's Hitmen. Um, er...make that assistants in judging the task at hand. Yeah, that sounds good! They met up with the candidates and an executive from Hair Cuttery, a chain of hair salons. The task wasn't thrilling. At least, I didn't think it was. The teams each had to hype separate grand openings; whoever sells the most wins. Yawn.

Charmaine was the project manager for Gold Rush while Tammy took the reins for Synergy. Once again, I don't think Trump sees these candidates in the light of how a home viewer or their teammates see them. The more I see of Charmaine, the more I'm just not thrilled to death by her. I don't think she's a good leader and she whines way too much. (Just a note: I would never go on a national television show because I whine too much. It takes one to know one and she indeed is a whining Nellie!) Charmaine started out her project manager leadership by not leading. The rest of the team wanted a theme, so she arbitrarily chose the first they mentioned - "Making You Happy." Feel free to roll your eyes; I did.

The after-commercial break clue of what will come was "Watch Your Back." Trump lectured us about how people will come after you and when you're right, fight for yourself. Stay focused. Now, a few different people came to mind for me with this one. Most are fairly clearcut and you know who will end up fired. This time I was thinking Sean with Roxanne and Allie targeting him. Or, it could be the Charmaine/Tarek squabbling.

The oft-promoted romance between Tammy and Sean during the week turned out to be a simple pizza lunch. Yes, they seem to like each other. Perhaps they're dating now. Who knows? Who cares? I only care in regard to how it will affect the show and the remaining candidates.

I didn't need Trump's clue to determine which team would win the task. It was clear that Charmaine blew it. Lee, as usual, kept pushing marketing. Well, duh, Charmaine should have listened to him. Instead, they tied up 5 hours making the shelves of product look pretty. Then, when it was basically too late to really market anything, she sent Tarek and Lee out to litter cars with trashy flyers. I so hate those things. It's actually illegal to do that in many towns and with good reason! When Bill stopped by, Charmaine was having her own hair done. That calls for a double eye-roll, doesn't it?

Meanwhile, over at Synergy, Sean and Tammy started handing out flyers to passerby the night before the event. And, once the day was on, Allie pushed selling product and did very well at it, too. Her reasoning was that more people would buy a product, it's less time-consuming and it's money in the till. She was absolutely right.

In the initial Boardroom, there was no question in my mind which team would win. Sure enough, Synergy earned about $1000 while Gold Rush only earned a paltry $700. The Synergy team got to write a song with Burt Bacharach. How exciting, huh? Again, I think I'd rather swim with sharks. When it comes to singing, they should all stick to their day jobs. The lyrics they put together were okay, though. It's certainly not anything I'd run out to buy.

So, the scheming started for the Gold Rush team members, each one wanting someone else to get fired. In watching Lee, though I think he's a great marketing type, he's sneaky and slimy. Yes, he's been called a politician by Trump many times. He's playing the hand to get Tarek fired by plotting with both Charmaine and Michael. Tarek has been his quasi-buddy, but does that stop him from the backstab? Nope!

Once the team gathered in the Boardroom, all heck broke loose between Tarek and Charmaine while Lee just sat there. Michael spoke for Tarek's firing, but did so politely. Lee squirmed and talked in double-speak. He looked like a cornered rat every time he was asked anything. The tension between Charmaine and Tarek shouting at each other finally broke above the heck breaking loose level forcing Trump to break in...

"Charmaine, you're fired! Wait, stay in the room. Tarek, you're impossible to work with or for. Tarek, you're fired."

So, they're both out of the running for the job. I personally think it was a good call. I think that Lee's days are numbered, too. I predict he'll be the next gone. Or maybe not. I'm never good at predicting these things.

I felt tonight's show, with the exception of the Boardroom at the end and the double firing, was a bit ho-hum. I think that even the part which was meant to be funny when Trump defended his hair wasn't all that humorous. The task was a bit mundane and so similar to others they've done before that it brought nothing new to the table. Now, if Lee and Tarek had been picked up by the cops for putting all those flyers on cars, that would have livened things up a bit.

Dollar bills, y'all...