All this domestic bliss is interrupted by Lord Siralan showing up at the front door. The candidates scramble to decide whether to get dressed or offer him a cup of tea, before stumbling into the living room still in pyjamas, making it look like the world's most organised and depressing sleepover.
Knock, Knock.
Who's there?
The Bloody Apprentice.
Lord Siralan announces the task and it's the scavenger hunt. He tries to claim this is all about negotiation but given that the Apprentii having nothing to bargain or negotiate with, no repeat business, no bulk orders, no reputation, all they can really do is beg for discounts in front of a camera. And with a fine for getting back late to the boardroom or not getting a full set of items, we all know what this task is really about.
In a slight twist, all the items they have to collect come from previous scavenger hunts from the past ten years. So we have another 'best of' compilation task. There is a bit of cheekiness, the full sized human skeleton was from the odd 'inverse' scavenger hunt from a few years ago when the Apprentii were given items and had to sell them for as much money as possible. And in Dubai last years candidates were sent to buy an oud, which is a musical instrument, which they got mixed up with oudh oil which this years candidates are being sent to get.
The BBC Worldwide sleepwear range
As if by magic, Nick and Karen appear. Where they hiding in a cupboard? Daniel thinks he should be project manager of team Tenacity because he knows London so well. But Mark also claims to know London pretty well, while Katie argues that this task is about organisation. So all they can really agree on is that the Project Manager should not be Felipe. Daniel, on solo cam, admits to being desperate to be PM. He pushes his local knowledge for all it's worth and ends up practically begging Mark for support. Mark gives in possibly just to prevent Daniel suffering a total mental breakdown at the table.
Sanjay ends up as Project Manager of team Summit. He justifies it on the basis of his local knowledge, but admits to solo cam that he's trying to prove to Lord Siralan that he isn't complete crap after last week's boardroom demolition.
Daniel has a strategy to deal with the rift in the team. He makes Mark and Katie a sub-team and appoints Katie as sub-team leader, giving them half the money and half the items on the list to buy. He will team up with Felipe. So it's very much a kill or cure approach. Either the two of them come back having settled their difference, or one of them comes back having settled their differences.The strategy doesn't seem to be working brilliantly. As soon as Katie and Mark get in the car, Mark claims he only supported Daniel as PM to stop him destroying the team from within, while Katie says she's fed up of Daniel thinking he's better than her.
It turns out Daniel is Jewish and heads straight for Golders Green to get a kosher chicken. After a lot of shaloms and mosletophs he manages to knock the price down from £6 to £4. A decent discount, but on low price item. Given that failing to secure an item only costs you the list price of that item, prioritising the cheap items isn't very smart.
Sanjay has taken a very different approach to the task. He wants the team to call around lots of suppliers before leaving the house. His theory is that 30 minutes extra planning will save time in the long run. Fine in theory, but it relies on them actually using the time productively. The team have to get a diamond and Bianca suggests going to Hatton Garden. Roisin ignores this and starts phoning around independent jewellers, who don't tend to leave big piles of diamonds lying around. Has she considered calling the seven dwarves? In the end one of the people on the phone suggests Hatton Gardens and Roisin makes a careful note of this, because now someone on the phone has said it, it's good advice.
Bianca gets on the phone to a guy called Declan in search of a second-hand sink. But Mark and Katie have already arrived at Declan's place to pick one up. Mark manages to get a £5 discount and spends £75. He then tries to get Declan to promise not to give a better discount to the other team. Bianca rolls up minutes later and straight-forwardly asks for a better discount than the other team got. Declan offers her a bashed up sink for £60. This could be a pretty good strategy. Just follow the other team around and ask to pay slightly less than they did for everything.
Sanjay, for all his pre-planning, has been distracted by a skeleton in a shop window. He then breaks the cardinal rule of negotiation by marching in, announcing he's desperate to buy the thing and has no idea what a reasonable price would be. Unsurprisingly, he is asked for a ludicrous price of £5000. Sanjay decides he' not that desperate after all.
Meanwhile, Felipe thinks he's come up with a clever trick to save money on the Skeleton. He's found a shop that has a paper skeleton, that comes unassembled. But the list of items says nothing about the skeleton being assembled. He reminds Daniel he's a lawyer. I'm not sure relying on your law skills is a great way to win Lord Siralan's approval Felipe, given that a few weeks ago he was in favour of torturing you for that very reason.
Daniel and Felipe hurry to the shop to pick up the skeleton and even hold hands to cross the road. How things have changed from last week. Though this is starting to feel like a married couple getting over a fight. They collect the skeleton, in a flat pack, and Felipe begs for reassurance from the person in the shop that this is anatomically correct. So there you have it Lord Siralan, certified anatomically correct by the guy in the shop. Daniel and Felipe speak to Mark and Katie over the phone about their triumph. They sound a bit dubious about the paper skeleton, but Daniel says that if it goes wrong it's on him and Felipe. Remember this, because Daniel may forget it later. Felipe thinks Lord Siralan will be impressed with his creativity and this will win him the task. He then flies fate to Paris for a candlelit dinner including truffles, caviar and champagne.
Solomon, meanwhile, can't even say "anatomical". He and Bianca stop at some kind of medical supplies superstore to find a skeleton. Solomon tries to establish a rapport with the sales person, but this mostly consists of a lot of babble while Solomon plays with the skeleton. Bianca finally gets bored and pushes for a price. They end up paying £230, saving about enough money to buy a paper skeleton as well just to be on the safe side.
Solomon and his new best friend
Both Daniel and Felipe and Roisin and Sanjay arrive at Hatton Garden at almost exactly the same time. Daniel plans to tell a shaggy dog story about how he's getting married. Given how he and Felipe have been getting on, they may think Felipe is the intended groom. Unfortunately, Daniel ends up meeting with an experienced salesperson who seems insulted that Daniel would even ask for a discount. Daniel finally manages to get him down to £172. Meanwhile, Roisin is talking to a diamond cutter who acts like he has never spoken to a human being before and who asks for £140. Roisin isn't happy with that and eventually beats him down to only £50. Sanjay comments that this is like a heist movie.
Speaking of criminality, Mark and Katie have ended up at a block of flats looking for a perfume dealer to sell them some oudh oil. With Nick Hewer hovering in the background it looks a bit like a drug deal that someone has brought their Dad to. Mark thinks they over paid at £48; meanwhile Sanjay is buying oil in a perfume shop for £100.
With little time left, the teams mop up a few last items. Felipe and Daniel get a bag of scallops, while Mark and Katie debate whether to try and cut down the piece of rope they picked up at a Garden Centre so that it's exactly one metre long before deciding they probably don't have to bother. Sanjay gives up on the Kosher chicken in a mad dash for scallops, but still ends up getting back late.
Everyone's happy for now
In the boardroom tenacity are very complementary about Daniel. Katie thinks he has turned over a new leaf and Felipe says he has become a man, which raises all kinds of questions about what exactly they have been getting up to. The camaraderie is spoiled somewhat when Lord Siralan decides to interpret one metre of rope as being 'exactly', and not 'at least', one metre. But the best is reserved for the paper skeleton. Lord Siralan looks at it like Felipe has taken a shit on his desk and asks if they're taking the piss.
What?!
It's at this point I'm disappointed that this isn't a slightly different show. There's a good argument to be made that the instructions were purposefully vague in order to catch the Apprenti out. Not to mention that predicting how Lord Siralan will behave is a difficult business. On another day he might have praised the ingenuity. But none of the team have the nerve to make this point, or if they did it was edited out of the broadcast. The instructions actually call for an anatomically correct human skeleton, it doesn't say anything about it being a model. If they strip all the flesh off Felipe they would probably do. Actually, he might not meet the 1.8 metre height requirement. Daniel maybe?
Summit come in for some criticism because Roisin didn't know where Hatton Gardens was and didn't listen to Bianca, and because Sanjay turned up late and without a Kosher chicken, but in the end it's all about the skeleton. Tenacity win on numbers, until Lord Siralan insists on adding the full cost of the skeleton to their total and so Summit are sent off racing cars at Silverstone on a technicality. Mark and Katie look furious.
In fact, in the cafe, Katie out right admits that she has never been so mad in her life, which at least suggests she has lived a pretty tranquil life up until now. Felipe is still arguing that they followed the rules. It's too late Felipe, you forgot the golden rule that Lord Siralan is always right even when he's wrong.
Back in the board room, the formally united and triumphant team now have the knives out for Felipe, with everyone denying any involvement in the skeleton. Mark and Katie can at least claim they never saw the thing, even if their claim of total ignorance is a touch dubious. But Daniel's denial is staggering in its barefacedness. Remember earlier how he said that if there was a problem with the skeleton it was on him? He certainly doesn't. He all but accuses Felipe of using his terrible mind powers, claiming he was duped and knows nothing about skeletons. Nick actually comments that its painful to watch.
Lord Siralan makes a half-hearted attempt to spread the blame around by commenting on Mark's and Katie's inability to find a pair of scissors to cut the rope in central London. Felipe claims he would have cut it with his teeth. It's a bit late for that Felipe, but maybe you could have found some paper rope that you could just tear? Daniel brings back Katie and Felipe to the boardroom, further enraging Katie who claims he's only doing it because she told him things he didn't want to hear. Daniel points out, not unreasonably, that if this was personal he would have brought back Mark.
Katie is fine with being brought back to the boardroom
After this it's really just a question of whether Daniel or Felipe will go or both of them. Lord Siralan claims that Katie's common sense wouldn't necessarily make her a good business partner, which may be true but puts her ahead of candidates with no common sense or indeed sense of any kind at all. The case against Daniel is essentially that he's been in the boardroom so many times Lord Siralan is starting to suffer from deja vu. But he's saved because, despite the loss, he does seem to have made some improvement. Felipe is booted, though he gets in one last third person statement. "This is not the end of Felipe."
Back at the house, Mark thinks its unbelievable that Daniel is back. He sounds like he actually means it, as though Daniel gave the taxi-driver the slip and snuck back in the boot of Katie's car. In an attempt to mend some bridges, Daniel suggests Katie has been improved by her experience in the board room. Katie thinks she was fine already.
Next Time: The Apprenti design desserts, Roisin and Bianca try to stop a tragey and Lord Siral thinks someone has given up on the process, probably himself by this stage.
No comments:
Post a Comment