From Nick's review:



I think indecent exposure pretty much sums up this entire season. I keep bleaching my brain to get rid of the blinking, sweating, fingerpointing, fembot of a season, but nothing seems to help.

goobaletta, Sarah Quigley might be able to write a sentence but she lost me completely when she said her favorite remaining candidate is Ivana!

Fluff! Get your fluff here! Slim pickin's thus far.

Interesting oddment involving TD from The Boston Globe. Second item on the page. Fascinating. Helps if you're a movie buff, but not a requirement.

Bidders get attached to staplers of the stars. Chicago Tribune. Free registration may be needed. Mentions TD and Bill.

Lucabella, I don't disagree with you at all. But isn't it nice we have Nick's piece as well to balance things out?

Okay, I officially ::heart:: Nick...

Mowgli, I don't have the link handy to the Salon article from a few weeks back, but they asked Branson the obvious question which compared Trump to him. I'm paraphrasing here, but he said that he'd had dinner with Trump once, and the whole dinner conversation was about Trump getting revenge against his business adversaries. Branson went on to say, "Well, that's one way to look at it." His whole business philosophy is 180 degrees from Trump's, and one that I happen to agree with. YMMV, of course.

You know I can understand why Trump wouldn't be thrilled by the idea of copycats but that letter was just in bad taste. It also showed a lot of chutzpah, since Branson's business record is a heckuva lot better than DT's. He after all really was self-made. I've seen interviews with Branson and he comes across as very funny with a self-deprecating sense of humor. I doubt his show was much good, but there's no need to get nasty about that. Interesting what Trump said about business being about trashing your enemies-if that's really the way he thinks it might help explain some of the odder firings this season. He *wants* someone who can be nasty. But that wouldn't explain why two class acts likeBill and Kwame were the final two last season...ok now I'm just confused.

I had to break down and purchase the Maxim edition featuring the Apprentice kittens. I think through the magic of touchup (probably more so in the case of Sandy and Jenn C and most especially with the newly "enhanced" Pam) they all looked extremely good.

I personally dug Stacie J (the finest of them all) with the straight hair. I'm sorry, her shot of the butt cleavage - nice!!!!

Perhaps someone can help me here with a current timeline on Jenn C? She in no way looked as trim and fit during her pre-firing shows and especially her post-firing comeback when it appeared she had gotten somewhat heavier. Are the Maxim shots indicative as to where she is shape wise currently?

I must say that she came across the most significantly transformed in the photos. She doesn't even look like the same person on the show. She really cleaned up for Maxim.

I agree that for any legitimate corporate job, these girls just put nails in their coffins.

I agree that Jen C looks more than just a little airbrushed. Throouout the show and during her post firing red carpet travails she has consistently looked...inconsistent. Thin upper body, roundish lower body. See This Pic for An Example In Maxim, she looks totally proportionate. That's my first tip off that she was retouched...big time. Her legs and thighs are thicker (not huge by any stretch, but thick) and those photos make them look very, very slim. And her stomach? No way it's really that flat. Not in a jealous, catty "No way" but rather based on her red carpet shots...girl has some serious meat on her bones. Again, not fat or chunky...just curvaceous.

I believe that shoot was done in mid to late - OctobeEarly November. Jen never mentioned anything about Maxim in her post show interviews in early October.

He needs class acts like Bill and Kwame in his organization -- to smooth over his rough edges, excuse away his boorish behavior, and give himself a veneer of class. Didn't Nick say earlier this year in one of his recaps (when writing about Raj) that there was room in Trump's organization for only one eccentric model-hound, and it wasn't Raj? I think Trump's MO is to surround himself with polished, courteous, congenial people who will offset his bitchiness and allow him to play the raving, bombastic tycoon -- but still look semi-lovable. Interesting how he dated lower-tier party-girl models, but became engaged to and/or married models who either have some inkling of how to conduct one's self in public and have a certain facile charm (Marla Maples), or remain silent in public and try to project aloof elegance (Melania Knauss). Even Ivana Trump was a former model, and she's admitted in interviews that she had a good deal of polishing while with Trump. God help Melania if she ever opens her mouth in public without okaying it with Donald first; she'll be out the door faster than you can say "prenup."

Fortune photos we may not have seen:

Wes, Jen C
Kevin, Stacie J
Kelly & Sandy...Hmmmmmm
Pam & Brad
Ivana & Raj

Yeah, pocha posted those back in September and they've been posted in the fashion thread several times as well. You left out Chris & Jen M., Rob & Lizzie, the other threesome, and Andy & Stacy Rotten.

I hadn't seen that one of Andy and Stacy. Heeeeeeee! There's so many jokes in that one I'll leave it to one of you clever ones to come up with the snark. Except ....

Andy juggling ball in the air (only one! after the bitchfight) while shrimpy Stacy looks on thinking "He's a ball juggler and chaos-wreaker!"

Hey, Chris is looking at his Presidental Rolex. Ha!

He's probably still making payments on it.

This week's Ask the Reality TV Experts column at MSNBC. The first question is TA relevant.

Right you are, goobaletta. There are always two sides. I was just surprised to see an intelligent and well-written article marred by a declaration of admiration for Iguana.

The weirdest thing about that photo is Smeagol holding up the hem of a mini-skirt like she's a little girl showing off a new dress. What was that all about? "Look, Mommie -- the nice man with the camera gave me new clothes! And he gave Andy a ball!"

Okay, really, is Miss Alli actually Gael Fashingbauer Cooper? Cause The Apprentice updates have several lines that seem to echo the recaps. MSNBC Apprentice Update

Berrylicious877, Gael is a member of our TWoP community and posts here occasionally - hence her snarkalicious MSNBC commentary.

Gael's the bomb. She writes like that because she's a kindred spirit, basically.

Here is Black Enterprise's review of the last task - blackenterprise.com

I'd like to know if Black Enterprise has done an analysis of the slander Stacie J received. Does anyone have any links for it?

The blackenterprise coverage for the week Stacie J. was fired can be found here.
Nothing too exciting exept for saying maria should have been fired instead, as her flier budget lost the task for them.

Hey good TWoPers, I missed the Pepsi episode, and no one I know taped/Tivod it, (wwwaaah!!!) so just wonderin' if anyone here has pix of the bottles they designed? Care to post them here, or email 'em to me?

I'd love to see exactly how fugly this Mosaic geodesic bottle could possible be...

With the Hair's stupid firings, and all the hair-tossing, finger-pointing, complaining, blinkety-blinking candidates, I quite despaired of ever recovering my season one interest in this show. Just watched for the hell of it, since even the Ivana-hate faded to boredom. Missed this one epi by accident (got my timezones confused when home for turkeyday. yes, I do feel stupid) and ..well..I guess this show still has a few evil tenterhooks still stuck in me, cause I'm so pissed about not having seen, with my own hotly obsessed little eyes, Andy's tipping, pizza-denying ways..not to mention the corporate presentation..(sigh)..

Here are some links.

Mosaic's losing bottle

Apex's winning bottle

Branson and Trump: Two Business Styles, Televised. You can listen to this All Things Considered piece at NPR.

TD and NASCAR. NY Post. Who'd've thunk?

Also, in TVGO's Ask Ausiello column today you can find the following:

If this is true, it raises some interesting questions about this season. Is the show being deliberately edited so that DT looks bad? Since he is coming off so much worse than last season, I wouldn't be surprised if there was a deliberate attempt to ruin the goodwill Trump garnered from TA1, and push him off the show.

I also wonder if Trump demand for $100,000 per episode (do I have that right?) made Burnett & Co. decide to get rid of him.

In any event, I'd love to see Martha Stewart helm this show. Both Martha and the show are in great need of an image makeover, so this could be a great thing. Or quoting Martha, "a good thing."

I'd also love to see the PR spin Trump would put on this turn of events, if it indeed does happen. I believe he and Martha Stewart are friendly. So I wouldn't put it past him to say he was too busy to continue and that he "gave" the show to his friend Martha.

Thanks for the info, goobaletta. I'm more excited about this possibility than I am in seeing who wins this season.

This? Would Rock.

I'd love to see Martha deal with some of these nit wits. Can you imagine how those boardrooms would be?

Squeee! Count me in! Ratings would probably triple for TA/Martha.

I despise Martha Stewart. I can't even imagine. And what would happen to Carolyn and George? Would we get assistants to Martha? Oh, ewwwww. What the hell would the tasks be -- create a Christmas wreath solely from things under your kitchen sink? Gross. Design the best corporate businesswear restricted to the color orange?

God. The Trump is really getting on my nerves, but I'll take him over "That's Ms Stewart" any damn day.

I actually think Martha Stewart in charge would be pretty interesting, and say what you will about her but she IS a self-made multi-millionaire...and I don't know about the rest of you, but I would LOVE to see a bunch of Wharton MBA's trying to say-hand paint 300 Easter Eggs and put them in handcrafted baskets with homemade Chocolate bunnies. I would love to see guys like Chris or Raj having to host Princess Tea Parties for a bunch of 3rd grade girls. Or maybe have them tour a white-collar prison and get tips on how to succeed at Jail. Hee! It would be more fun than promoting toothpaste that's for sure.

To each their own, and I certainly don't want to deny anyone's right to hate Martha Stewart. I happen to admire her, but I understand why many do not.

But with Martha fresh out of jail and struggling to put her company back on top, I think she'd be much more fascinating to watch than Trump. And I think she could come up with overall better tasks - candidates could write an article for her magazine, or do a promotion or advertisement that would really be used in the magazine or on TV. She has so many divisions in her company, the possibilities are endless.

And I would bet that Martha would only have tasks that would benefit her business and really test the skills of the candidates to see who would best fit into her company - no selling lemonade, candy, etc.

As far as George and Carolyn, I would be sorry to see George go, but Carolyn is starting to wear out her welcome with me. I somehow think that George wouldn't mind ending his stint on the show. I guess it just remains to be seen whether or not any of this happens.

Donald's Trump's claim that The Apprentice is bringing in "top ratings" is getting really old, considering how untrue it is. The show doesn't win its time slot (it's soundly beaten every week by "C.S.I.") and it's certainly not the No. 1 show on NBC. And Trump has had business failures too: his currently bankrupt Atlantic City casinos, for starters. Just SHUT UP, Donald.

Heidi's commentary is up at the NBCTA2 site.

Sir Richard's victory, Trump or no Trump. Sydney Morning Herald. Well, they like Rebel Billionaire in Oz. I have to admit, I watched it for the second time last night and enjoyed it.

You know, I think the absolute minimum qualification we can ask in an alleged font of business wisdom is that they must not have served jail time.

Still, you can just imagine the tasks:

"This week on The Apprentice: Apex and Mosaic are challenged to make shivs out of common jailhouse objects. The team that brings in the most cigarettes wins. Mosaic's toothbrush shiv passes the practicality test while Apex's bickering leads to the Most! Shocking! Exercise! Yard! Ever!"

I think Martha would rock this show! She's probably the best female equivalent to Trump as far as being a looney hardass.

Well, her candidates would have to make the candy, and come up with a new, exotic recipe for the lemonade (starting with extracting the sugar from the cane).

Yeah, count me in! And it seems completely natural to me that they would plan to turn the show over to someone else periodically. A real business person would want and need to be able to focus their time on actual work, not just this TV show. And wouldn't want to hang around so long that the ratings for the show (and their own personal Q rating) start to go down, which is inevitable. With a new mentor, you can revitalize the show.

New mentor I can get with. But shouldn't it be somebody that is not so intricately tied to ethics violations? Not to mention questionable business tactics. We've already got one mil(bil)lionaire who is a little shady with the accounting stuff. I also question Martha's "corporate empire". Lots of self-promotion and incestous business stuff going on there. Though that's how Mr. Trump got to be the Most. Successful. Real Estate. Developer. EVER!

So maybe Martha is the next obvious choice. I also realize that this qualifies as a rumor at this exact moment and I may be veering dangerously close to breaking a topic rule, so I'll stop.

No stated reference to TA whatsoever... but check out the article's title!

Forbes

Thank you so much, Biff42, for the links to the bottles. Light finally dawns on marble head... the E's in the labels are the E's at the beginning and end of "EDGE" in Apex's bottle, yes? That was so NON-obvious to me.

Same. Who reads the label of a soft drink?

Bill Rancic Helps Inspire Mercy Home for Boys & Girls' Volunteers. PR Newswire. That Bill. He's just a good guy at heart. And he apparently always has been. Yay!

Thanks SO MUCH for the pics biff42!!

Wow...I think geography's pretty neat, and generally have a soft spot for nerdy efforts of any kind.. but that? Is one hideously terribly, horrible, no-good bottle design. What the hell were they thinking?! To even include a base?? I guess if you're a yooge player in the business world, a titan of industry, a giant among men and whatnot, you need to camoflage your secret soft-drink addiction ...that bottle would sit well on a leather clad desk, next to a banker's lamp...or not.

Regarding the Es on the Apex bottle..I agree that having the name jump from label to bottle surface to label is pretty silly looking...but including the brand name in the new product name seems like standard business marketing. 7up marketed a new lime-flavored version a year or so ago (They were giving 'em away free at a indie-rock show in NYC a year ago. It tasted gross, so maybe the plan didn't get past focus groups)..the name on the bottles and cans? dnL. Like, you take the word 7up and flip it upside down? and you get dnL! cause it's a twist! oooh boy. So clever, those marketing guys, I tell you..

peepertina, ITA -- dnL is nasty. Unfortunately, it's still sold in Georgia. (For those who haven't tried it, it's like the grosser Pepsi version of Coke's Surge.)

tags suck

I think Martha Stewart will be alot of help to Trump and Burnett. She may bring the show back to some true credibility as decisions may be done more true to the tasks.
As for the "jail time" , I think history and facts will provide that countless important and high profile people, business, politics, etc. would have served time or should have had they not been lucky with their political influence etc., not to mention countless everyday americans.
There are numerous preisidents, and celebrities who were amazingly never charged with things that they themselves know they did. Life isn't fair. Especially to people who have already served their obligations. I think it is a credit to people who have overcome the challenges to move forward in a positive way.

The Onion weighs in on Trump's casino's going under

Wow, this is a possibility! It's one of the few things that sounds like a plausible explanation as to why the show has turned 180 degrees in just a few months. Two seasons of the same show in the same calendar year couldn't be more different than Apprentice 1 & 2. But wouldn't Trump have retained some control over the show? I mean, if he were being deliberately shown in a bad light, wouldn't he try to push his weight around and change how the show is depicting him? If he's actually been watching, he'd know just how bad he looks.

And wouldn't it be a risk to purposely bring down the ratings only to relaunch the show with a new host(ess) next year? And is Martha even considered to be a billionaire anymore? Not that Trump ever really was one....

I'd like to see Martha Stewart as the host of The Apprentice but I don't think she'll do it because her public image is that of being the real-life Betty Crocker. If she's shown to be the tough businesswoman that she really is, she may end up hurting sales of her own products.

The second thing is that she'll be so busy working on saving MSO and revitalizing its brand and sales, that she probably won't have the free time to waste on a game show. She could get her cooking show back, though.

update: the MSNBC article doesn't say that her show is The Apprentice
Martha Stewart to Host Reality Show

Oh please. Betty Crocker? No commentary I've ever seen has made that comparison to Stewart seriously, yet the tough businesswoman aspect is almost always mentioned and has been for ages. The last couple of years, prior to her legal mess, she made real efforts to NOT be so perfect on her shows. They began leaving in mistakes because she and/or her producers finally caught the clue that her utter perfection was too unreal and that she'd be far easier to relate to, and thus marketable, if she was more human. The strongest evidence of this involved the times I saw her have children on her show. Several years ago her exchanges with kids were very stilted and uncomfortable. The last year or so, however, her kid guests and she were far more at ease with each other and Stewart even let herself get bested by a couple of them in segments. (I'm especially thinking of the origami savant boy. He totally showed her up the last time he was a guest.)

IMO Stewart is ideal to take over for TD. And, frankly, I think she'll be better in many ways because she's smarter than he is and not so grotesquely gaudy. Stewart's reputation is built on quality and marketing the best of the best. No gilded apartments for her so far as I'm aware. Or boytoy trophy boyfriends. I can't imagine anyone referring to Stewart as being a vulgarian as they do Trump. Bitch on wheels with good taste is far more likely.

The MSO brand can only be strengthened by an affiliation with TA. The PR value of her taking over for TD is yooge. Also, MSO is already recovering if the stock increases for the last week continue. The Sears/K-mart merger is nothing but good for MSO and I have no doubt that both those brands would love to have Stewart on the TV every week in primetime pitching her products that just happen to be sold in their stores.

ETA: I've only just started looking, but so far there doesn't seem to be anything much in the papers this morning TD/TA oriented. Y'all know the drill. I find it, I post it.

Carolyn's appearance on the Jane Pauley Show is being rebroadcast today. Check your local listings.

Jen C. made Page Six. So did Stacie J. NY Post.

Thanks for the link sinclair. When you become fodder for America's Finest Satirical News Source you know your days on tv are numbered...Martha may have inspired a million stale variations on "decorating the bars on your window" jokes but she *is* still regarded as having a brilliant business mind which is more than DT gets these days. And I for one don't see why so-called "girly" industries like home decorating and kitchen appliances shouldn't be treated with the same respect as as so-called "manly" ones like cars which is why Chris's firing was so delicous; he showed utter contempt for the idea of brides dresses and it came back to bite him on the ass.

Didn't see this posted, but there's an interview clip with Carolyn over at ABC website.

http://abcnews.go.com/WNN/

'Apprentice' team: Ivana's time is up. The Cincinnati Enquirer.

From Stella's column in the Chicago Sun-Times: