They're having a laugh aren't they?

What? Tell me this isn't true? I love some of his work way beyond La Vida Loca but what's he doing on The Apprentice? Why do they feel they need to bring in a big name especially someone as random as Ricky Martin. I can understand The Voice maybe but The Apprentice? How odd.

You ARE joking aren't you?! :
(Just in case you really are serious, and don't know, Ricky Martin is the name of a former Apprentice winner who happens to have the same name as the La Vida Loca fellow!)

Course he's joking...but that Ricky Martin would be more qualified to give an interview than the AP one

The Puerto Rican singer is more qualified to give an interview than HR consultant and recruitment agent Ricky Martin?

Alright, then.

Other than the guy's name, I can remember nothing about him - or the series he was in.

Yes because he's been involved in business, albeit the cutthroat music business, far longer than Apprentice Martin, who is still a kid really

Why? He runs a recruitment agency. Surely that makes him perfectly qualified to run an interview?

Just think it's a gimmick

Oh, it is - as well as a free bit of promotion for Ricky's recruitment business. But he's certainly better qualified to do a proper HR-type interview than, say, Margaret.

Judging from the preview at the end of yesterday's episode, there's no Borden, no Margaret, and no ugly woman with the fat face (what's her name again?).

At least Claude is back.

He's the reflection of perfection.

If you mean Claudine Collins, the MD of MediaCom, she's back this year.

The interview process is a gimmick in itself. Having Ricky there makes more sense than, say, asking someone to make a pterodactyl impression and then slating him for actually doing it.

I think it will be hard for Ricky to be very critical especially after the slating he got by Mike and Claude. However, Claude probably gave Ricky the best commendation there's ever been when speaking to Lord Sugar which was a strange Apprentice moment. I think it will be Roisin and Mark for final; I'm convinced Daniel has been saved to this point for comedic or shock reasons in interview stage.

Almost forgot about him completely. Not particularly looking forward to seeing him again.

Borden hasn't been there since Series 6.

He runs a recruitment agency and he has been a candidate himself. If anything, I think he is the most qualified.

Having said that... what is the purpose of the interviews. Is to drill down into their business plans and get a sense of the candidates personalities. However, in practical terms, it is just there to make good TV, watch them roast, crumble and cry, cos that entertains us...

If it was about drilling in their business plans, I am sure that the production team already has a team of accountants, lawyers and busiess consultants that have made their evaluations, apart from Sugar himself. If it was about their personalities, then surely after 10 weeks following them and evaluating their behaviours and performance, it would have already given Karen and Nick a much better insight than what Claude and Ricky could get in a 20 min interview.

To be honest, I suspect the business plans receive only the most cursory of scrutiny - or else we wouldn't get so many terrible plans at the interview stage. (Remember Francesca and her made-up £5m turnover last year? Seriously?!?) The production team are just there to make a TV programme under commission from the BBC.

Of course, they could engage outside consultants to assess the business plans (and may well do, I honestly don't know), I tend to think that they will still allow some duffers through on the basis of having a quota of candidates who will make "good TV". For sure, there is absolutely no way that the 20 candidates we saw this year represented the 20 best business plans. No way at all.

I'm exaggerating somewhat to make the point, but the sole purpose of the interviews is to gather sufficient evidence/footage to justify why we end up with the final two candidates that Sugar wants. To do one final task would be to leave things to chance. This ensures we get to where we need to get to in a manner that satisfies the average viewer that we have a "fair" process.

The same goes for the final too. It's no coincidence that this is the one task which is always judged based on subjective criteria - who "did better" rather than who got the most orders or made the most sales. With judicious editing, you can adjust the final edit to justify either finalist winning.

That's why I don't like it, he's only been in business two minutes and was a snivelling candidate himself a few short years ago. He's hardly alongside Claude and the others as an equal is he.

Yes, but Claude doesn't so much interview candidates as score points off them ...

I suspect Ricky may actually conduct the most professional interview of the lot. And having been a candidate himself is an advantage in this case.

But is it? I wouldn't want to be patronized by a bloke who was in my shoes very recently.

I'd rather be blasted by Claude who has at least, been there and done it. You can't not respect his career - Not that I'd let him speak to me the way he does others.

That is a good point.

It may well be the case they scrutinize their business plans yet they let them through for good tv. That reminds of Jordan three years ago, it wasn't until the interview stage when he revealed he had no participation the shareholding stracuture of his business, neither he owned any intellectual property. By no means I believe that the program realized that until then, I think they knew from the start but they just let him continue to dig his own grave and make good TV.

Whose behaviour was more deceitful, Jordan's or the BBC's?

It was only last year! To be honest, it was worth letting him get that far if only for the moment Mike Soutar brought out that Rubik's cube ...