Hmmmm, Ansell was certainly more likeable than Paul (was it the same series?) but I don't think he was a particularly impressive performer.

Paul certainly had some dislikeable qualities, but then people who are good at business generally do.

I thought he performed well, though not as well as Ruth. I would have had them in the final together, but given Ruth the prize.

AGREED, THANK YOU.
I agree that the skeleton was wrong. I was still miffed that Tenacity lost because of it, though. And the way LS did it. They were clearly a much better team throughout the task and, despite the error with the skeleton, had a virtually flawless negotiation tactic.

Even if the skeleton was wrong (which it was) Lord Sugar should've added the fine before the results were announced. The way he did is just seemed like: "Your team was better, but the skeleton was wrong. You lose."

And that's my take on it.

Oh yes of course, they've felt the need to add pointless drama for a while. There was the sixteen candidates entering, Lord Sugar picking up the phone and saying, 'Can you send the other candidates in?' (And ironically, in walked Pamela, Sanjay, Sarah and Scott, the four who were never going to get the investment or pose any sort of threat to the sixteen already there.) They didn't feel the need to do that in Series 3 when it went from fourteen to sixteen. And then they had the whole thing with Claude's grand entrance - Karren Brady didn't get one of those when she took over from Margaret! They're trying to add drama, when the programme has survived for ages without needing to. I just think it looks quite sad.

I feel like next year, Lord Sugar may fire someone in the opening boardroom. I can see it happening; he goes through their business plans a little bit, then he says to someone, 'You know what? Your business plan is rubbish. I'll save your time. You're fired.' And if that happens, I will stop watching, and I will not switch back on again.

While firing Felipe for the skeleton was perhaps harsh, I wouldn't class it as unfair in the sense that Felipe wasn't a particularly strong candidate - he was never realistically going to win the whole process.

I would classify unfair as when a candidate is very able, and demonstrates this throughout the tasks, but Sugar somehow gets the impression that they're incompetent through a misunderstanding.

Or when the firee gets the blame for something that was clearly someone else's fault - I remember Saira from series 1 being particularly teflon in this respect.

I don't quite understand what you're saying about Saira - do you mean she blamed people, or she was blamed?

Blamed people, or rather somehow managed to avoid the blame each time she ****** up, which was often.

Do you not think she should have got as far as she did then?

Personally, I really liked Saira. She did have some poorer tasks, but I think she was rarely the worst performer - the only possible exception being in Week 9, when it was her or Raj who had done very little in the nine weeks. And I felt she was set up a little on that task anyway - Matt House from Spurs didn't like that team from the start, even before he took umbrage at the way Saira spoke to him.

So he was punished based on the fact that Sugar didn't really know him because he had performed so well throughout the series that he wasn't brought back into the boardroom?

I don't think he was exactly punished as such, it just counted against him. His interview and his application were terrible, and although he had performed well on the tasks, Lord Sugar didn't know him well enough to feel confident trusting him in his business.

On the other hand, the next time someone got through the whole process without being brought back into the boardroom, that person went on to win - Lee McQueen in Series 4. It has never happened since.

No way!

Didn't like her at all. Loud, strident, unprincipled,bullying, devious and not very good - she so.e bow managed to wriggle out of load of cock ups.

The media adored her because she was a young, ballsy Asian woman and for that reason seemed blind with regard to the many unpleasant aspects of her personality.

Raef was definitely one I was shocked about. I did love him

I can see Saira's faults, but I don't think she bullied anyone. I have been bullied; I take allegations of bullying very seriously, and I think it is a word thrown around quite a lot. I'd say that to be a bully, one has to behave in a way which is intentionally designed to hurt another person, and I don't think that was what Saira did.

Yes, fair point "bullying" was far too strong a word in saira's case.

Agreed
There's a few problems with The Apprentice these days - the fact that the process doesn't relate to whether the business plans are good, the fact that the candidates are picked purely for the foot-in-mouth syndrome, etc. But the biggest problem is that they're adding unnecessary drama. And not even in big ways, but in small ways too.

The editing is the main issue. In the older shows, they seemed not to rely as much on tense background music, but they add is pretty much every second in the BR scenes. They often overexaggerate arguments between the candidates and, at times, portray some as villains.

I think another problem is the number of candidates. Sixteen was enough in my opinion, and the increase to twenty just seemed to add unnecessary drama, by eliminated hoardes of candidates in double firings. Jemma was in the process for five weeks and we barely got to know her - the only thing she really seemed to do wrong was the tour.

What's worse is that I think Lord Sugar knows how overexaggerated the show is. I saw him do an interview prior to the start of this series about having more serious candidates, adding that they'd be older. But this series just seems as contrived as the last. These candidates don't seem any more serious (Ruth? No. Dan? No. Mergim? Definitely not.)Eighteen candidates is too many and will call for more unnecessary double firings, along with editing trickery to make us think there'll be a double firing when, in reality, there won't. ("And it's for that reason, Mick, that (long pause) I'm struggling to keep you in the competition. Andy, you're fired.")

I really enjoy The Apprentice, and I think it's a really interesting show (the "thinking mans'" reality show). But perhaps it's faltering slightly because of the unnecessary drama.

I think Luisa Zissman should've won.

Unfortunately George had enough, and quit the show and forum after Episode 4. Big shame

I agree completely, Saira was by far the least likeable candidate of Series 1 and her frequent emotional outbursts were anything but professional. How she got to the final five let alone the final is beyond me.

That's true actually, about Karen. She was fired because he didnt want another corporate lawyer, but she hadn't done anything wrong