Did something happen in the boardroom after Lauren was fired? The editing was very different this week, and rather abrupt.

After Lord sugar saying 'you're fired', we were taken straight to the taxi cab scene, and then back to the house. There was nothing shown of Lauren leaving the boardroom, no post words with the saved candidates, followed by the usual 'go back to the house' line, and we didn't see them leave through reception and hug the fired person. Weird.

I'm guessing something might have kicked off?

They film the exit through the glass doors before the process begins so they would have had that footage available - maybe there was a continuity issue with using it?

I noticed that Lauren appeared to walk out without saying anything yet on you're fired they showed the usual 'thank you for the experience' type comment and I did wonder if that was filmed afterwards.

Maybe Mark told her to GTFO?

I think if something had happened between her and the other candidates it would certainly have been broadcast, as that would be more entertaining. Think about Melissa's 'well done ganging up on me, you horrible people' - that was memorable because she was so unreasonable about the whole thing. I reckon if it was cut out, it's because nothing out of the ordinary happened at all. Maybe they had overrun the episode a little and needed to cut something out.

When I watched this bit (just now on youtube) I went "yipee" (I'm a bit of an old codger) "it's gonna be a double firing" (as I think both Mark and Daniel are horrid and Mark is bordering on the odious). I thought we were gonna be brought back into the boardroom and see one of them fired. In fact I'm wondering if perhaps that happened but the producers have to have a certain number of weeks for the show and another double firing is impossible.

Another double firing is entirely possible. There are now the same number of candidates as there would be at this stage in a series with no double firings as yet and the normal number of people at the start. In fact, it would theoretically be possible to have two more double firings and have only four people at interviews stage (or three, if they have the Series 7/8 format for the final - I don't know what they are doing this year). The latter scenario has never happened, but there is no reason why it couldn't.

If anything happened that was truly unbroadcastable they'd just reshoot the sequence.

Which I think is a shame, because sometimes the 'unbroadcastable' things are the most interesting. There was a scene in Series 1 when Paul made some incredibly sexist remarks about Rachel in the reception area, and these days I don't think that would be broadcast because it's too controversial. But I think it really gave the viewer some insight into Paul's character, which was good because up until that point he had had a fairly positive edit.

Lauren looked like she was close to tears and that was why she didn't say anything initially (she seemed very close to tears during 'you're fired' and that was weeks after the event.) I believe they went back and shot her 'thank you' afterwards when she was less emotional.

I was thinking more of libellous comments or extreme bad language or even I guess physical violence. I don't think they'd edit out sexism - it was a key plot point of the UAE episode last year and if they could have found more explicit footage to back up Leah/Natalie's claims they would have. Racism or homophobia might be more of a grey area though...

Yeah, but last year's accusations of sexism at Zee were pretty minor, and no one could quantify if there was actually anything in it. Similar with the accusations of homophobia towards Mona in Series 5. It was suggested that she was homophobic, but actually she didn't agree with the decision to go with the gay market, and you can't tell by watching it whether she actually said anything homophobic - if she did, it wasn't broadcast. What Paul said about Rachel was thoroughly different. He said, and I quote:

'The first time we've had a girl as a Project Manager and the first time we've lost. Put a woman in a position of power and they go f***ing doolally. Think they're Adolf flaming Hitler.'

I remember that word for word, and it still shocks me every time I watch that episode. He had had a pretty decent edit up until that point, and in about ten seconds the nation's opinion of him completely changed with that statement. Imagine the reaction if Mark or James said that. And I think that these days the BBC is too politically correct to broadcast something like that if it was said, which I think is a shame because it showed a really, really nasty side of Paul, and I think he would have had a really different light on him today. His edit would be either positive or negative because that's how they do things now, but they wouldn't show a statement like that. That's my opinion anyway, feel free to disagree.

I just think that if they're happy to encourage for candidates to be branded as sexists by the audience based on subjective perception of their attitudes and behaviour (Adam Corbally is another recent one where they were practically doing Youtube Supercut level editing on him on You're Fired episodes to make him look as sexist as possible), then they'd be happy to air actual sexist comments (unless they came from a winner/F2 candidate, but then I think that always would have been true).

I think the show has gradually featured less overt sexism over the years, but I'd like to think it's because people have become less sexist about women in business and specifically on the show in general. The early series in particular feature a lot of "can women work together?", "are women as good at business as men?" and "what are your childcare arrangements like?" stuff, both on the show and in the press, that just wouldn't happen now.

Physical violence? Perhaps someone punched Sugsy and it had to be edited out.

How on Earth would someone punch him with the layout that they have? That boardroom table is massive, no one would be able to reach across there and get to him. And if you got up, someone would restrain you before you got to him. There are a lot of camera crew people in that room.

Well it could've been Nick or Karen. Just sayin'.

Oh honestly, if I was a producer and Nick or Karren punched Lord Sugar, there is no way in the world that that would be left out of the edit. It would be the most memorable moment in Apprentice history.

I'd say Karren's more likely to lay him out that Nick.

I wouldn't be at all surprised to find out there is some footage from tonight's task showing James being even more bullying and misogynistic. The way his editing changed so much this week makes me think he made a much bigger mistake than just calling Hot Tub Bloke by the wrong name...

shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.....just.....shhhhhh

I'm laughing away at the thought that one of them just randomly punched Lord Sugar after the firing!

It may not be random. Many employees harbour grudges against their managers, especially ones as belligerent as the Lord.