The Final - The End and the Beginning

After a nine week epic struggle between a bunch of liars, back-stabbers and idiots, we are have reached the final, which, sadly, is often the dullest part of the process. The morons and comedy candidates have been eliminated and only the moderately competent remain, so chances of galaxy spanning idiocy are low. We get a bunch of the former Apprenti back for a last hurrah, but as nothing is at stake for them beyond the way they come across on TV, there's no incentive for back-biting or double-crossing.

We don't even have the spectacle of a woman who wants to make money by slashing up your face, competing with a helium-addled pixie with an uncertain business plan involving baking supplies. This year, the candidate are moderately competent and have decent business plans. Mark wants to set up an online marketing company, which is a highly competitive industry but one he know very well. Meanwhile, Bianca plans to make tights in a wide range of colours, which is, apparently, a genuinely good idea and, although she doesn't know the industry, she has done some pretty extensive research.

So it looks like we're in for a pretty dry experience in which two moderately competent and professional individuals compete to sell their generally sensible ideas.

Lord Siralan drags the candidates to Bloomsbury Ballroom to kick things off, where he brings in the candidates who couldn't find anything better to do since they were kicked off the show. In this case

Katie, Solomon, Felipe, Sanjay, Lauren, James, Daniel and Sarah.

 The Damned

But at this point, events take an unexpected turn. Instead of announcing the forthcoming task, Lord Siralan begins chanting in a strange, eldritch language. His suit splits apart and his body expands and distorts, turning red and growing scales as he is transformed into a fir-breathing dragon over one hundred food tall. The Sugar Dragon tears off the roof of the Ballroom before soaring into the air on its mammoth wings, belching fire and smoke across the London skyline.

The Dragon awakes

The stricken Apprenti have no time to do anything but flee to the cars. Nick Hewer is trampled under foot, while Karen escapes by helicopter. With no time for any discussion, the apprentii scramble for the nearest car with no thought of friendship or previous rivalries. Katie, Felipe, Daniel and Lauren join Bianca, while Sanjay, Solomon and James are with Mark. Sarah is tragically incinerated in the chaos.

The teams quickly assemble impromptu business meetings. Bianca believes she can translate her manufacturing research into a weapon that can bring down the dragon, while Mark intends to parlay his online marketing experience into a multi-media campaign he can use to assemble an army.

Bianca and Felipe go to see the Oracle, an ancient Sorceress with extensive experience of magical beasts. She tells Bianca of a process that can be used to make tights that, although invisible to human eyes, can resist even dragon fire. Bianca decides to recruit an elite force of warrior women to wear these tights and face the dragon. However, in order to afford to manufacture her tights she will have to charge for them and she thinks a price of £35 is reasonable given that they are dragon proof. The Oracle thinks she should lower her prices to appeal to a wider market. Bianca agrees to lower the price to £25.

 The Oracle

Meanwhile, Mark is climbing the Cliffs of Dread in search of recruits for his army. Sanjay is filming his journey to broadcast as a promotional video. But after the Tesco disaster in week eight, Mark has lost his nerve and can't get his words out. His followers are left dangling over a cliff while Mark goes through take after take. Then a shake of the Sugar Dragon's mighty tail creates an earth tremor and one of the climbers plummets to their grisly death on the rocks below. Encouraged by their sacrifice, Mark finishes his video.

 Climbing the Cliffs of Dread

Mark raises his army

Bianca's team have successfully manufactured their dragon-proof tights, but are having trouble getting women to take them at the requested price. The poor quality packaging is letting them down and one potential customer refuses to pay more than £6. Bianca refuses to listen to warnings of her team mates. She will only listen to Katie, the two of them are secluded away researching battle strategies.

Forging a weapon of war

Mark, at least, knows how to manage a team. Solomon and James may be useless, but he has at least kept them busy by having them summon elemental spirits to fight the Dragon. They probably won't be much help, but it keeps them busy. Mark has left Sanjay editing the final video as he rehearses the rousing speech he has to give to his Internet army. The two embrace in the knowledge that one of them (let's face it Sanjay) may be killed the next day.

As the next day dawns the usually busy streets of London lay desolate as the small percentage of the London population with a home take refuge under their beds, while the rest seek refuge in tube stations, museums, phone boxes and those news stands that sell crap postcards and souvenir hats. The Sugar dragon has taken up residence on top of the Gherkin and, as the Sun rises, belows a challenge to the world.

 Lord Sugar will see you now

The challenge is answered by Bianca, striding forth accompanied by an army of dragon-proof-tight-wearing warrior women. They are brave, but few in number. As yet there is no sign of Mark's army. The warrior women scale the gherkin. The Dragon belches out fire and smoke, but to no avail. It seems momentarily confused, but then strikes, outraged at the insolence of these insignificant humans. The battle is fierce.

 The Warrior Women advance

Suddenly the sound of drums is heard. Sanjay leads an army of pale computer geeks, social network warriors and vile Trolls. The Dragon is assailed on two sides, but belches flames down on the army. James and Solomon's elemental spirits offer a momentary distraction but they are soon swept aside. James is bitten clean in two, while Solomon is crushed under the Dragon's mighty talons.

 The Elemental Spirits are doomed

The warrior women are almost all destroyed, Bianca is beginning to regret her choice of a premium product. Sanjay's army is flagging. Sanjay leads a valiant charge, but is swept out into the Thames with a flick of it's tail. But what's this? From the river comes the sound of a horn. Sanjay's army was only part of Mark's force and now he leads his reserves up river on duck buses. Now assailed on the three fronts, the Dragon is staggered. The warrior women press their attack and Mark lands the final blow slicing off the dragon's head.

With the Sugar Dragon defeated, it morphs back into the form of Lord Siralan. He is impressed by both candidates work, but believes Bianca made a mistake in the choice of a premium price for her tights. His instinct is to go with Bianca, as he in a "product man" and Mark faces tough competition. But, in the end, Mark's management ability, knowledge of the sector and his willingness to sacrifice Sanjay, Solomon and James to achieve his ends win him over. Mark is the new Apprentice and will lead his Internet-based army on a march through cyberspace, laying waste to his enemies in the name of Lord Siralan.

 The Victor

So that's the final as I remember it. I may have drifted off once or twice, but I'm pretty sure that's how it went.

Episode 12 - July 17th 2013 - The Reckoning

And so, after eleven weeks, we come to a crescendo, the final, the most exciting moment of the series. Or not. To be honest, I always find the final a bit anti-climactic. The worst, and therefore most entertaining, candidates have gone and the task itself is far too serious and self-important  to be any fun. At least, this year, the program-makers have seen sense and given us a proper final instead of using the interview round as the final, that way we get some of the old candidates back for a last hurrah. But even this is muted. With their irons well and truly out of the fire, the bitching and back-stabbing is largely toned down and all that's left is Lord Siral thinking long and hard about a decision that, by now, only he and the candidates are truly invested in. It's a dubious prize in any case. £250,000, but in return you have Lord Siral as your business partner, that's a heck of a sacrifice.

Must... resist... urge... to... stick... out... foot

The build up to the task is even more overblown than usual as Leah and Luisa are forced to stand side by side in a massive atrium, facing Karen and Nick, before Lord Siral marches in behind then, between the candidates before failing to make any kind of impression at all. The urge to stick out a foot as he walked past must have been overwhelming. The task? Launch their businesses, overnight. So all they have to do is come up with a brand name, logo and advert before giving a presentation to an audience of industry experts. Something tells me that the victors brand will be subject to considerable revision before actually being launched.

 Pendulum arms

Incidentally, Leah seems to have developed a very odd walk. She swings her arms vertically in front of her like a pendulum. Judging by her limited range of facial expressions, I'm starting to think she might be a clockwork android like in that episode of Doctor Who.

The best possible candidate?

Leah and Luisa are shoved off into a back room to pick their teams from the losing candidates who are willing to show up. Unfortunately, this year the finalists don't get to pick them by name, schools sports style allowing us to see exactly who respects who and how much. Instead, they have a bundle of CVs to look over before calling them up. Luisa has pretty good idea of who she wants, unfortunately, Leah had the same idea and was quicker on the phone snapping up Myles, Alex, Francesca and Uzma. Luisa is left with Neil, who she did actually want, Zee, Natalie and Jason, who she definitely didn't. I bet they all felt good finding out the were the consolation prize live in the audience for 'You're Hired.'

Leah has some very clear ideas of what her cosmetic surgery brand should be and already has a name, Niks, which is skin spelled backwards and not someone slipping with a knife. If you made that mistake you won't be the last one to do it this evening. Leah is keen to listen to suggestions, providing they're hers and after consulting herself concludes that this is definitely the brand name to go with.

 Branding Concept

In fact, after weeks of blending into the background, Leah appears to have three months of bossiness stored up and proceeds to full on dictator mode ordering the designers and her team about. Still, no-one can say she doesn't have clear ideas about what she wants.

The same can't be said for Luisa who is struggling to explain her brand to her own team. It definitely involves baking supplies, definitely equipment, possibly ingredients. She wants to sell to the trade, but not the public, or possibly to the public? It's not very clear. She stops off at a cake shop to survey her potential market place, by which I mean she tells them exactly what they should want and gives them the opportunity to agree with it.

Crystal Clear

Her choice of branding and logo don't make any thing clearer. If she is planning on selling to the trade then she should, surely be going for a professional look. So her choice of covering everything in pink and crowning it with a cartoon version of her own face looks decidedly odd. Neil tries to warn her that market research shows that pink could be off-putting to men, but Luisa decides to go with pink anyway because she likes pink so STFU.

A bit pink

Meanwhile, after weeks of standing around looking meek, Leah has saved up all her reserves of dictatorial bossiness and is letting it out full force with her designers and the rest of the team. She definitely wants professional and medical, but is also enamoured with a back to front letter K for some reason.

The bossiness extends into the next day when shooting an advert in a hastily mocked up clinic. Alex and Uzma can't even set out plants in the waiting room without Leah moving things around. I bet they wish they'd waited for Luisa to call now. The situation gets worse when Myles and Francesca, having carried out some last minute market research, warn her that the general public hate the name Niks and think it sounds like an accident with a scalpel. Leah has to change the name to N.I.K.S, which doesn't sound quite so threatening but invites questions about what it stands for.

My Face!

Things are going better at Luisa's advertising shoot, even if she is just reading things off idiot boards held up by Jason (I'm saying nothing). The production has the feel of an infomercial, except for the presence of two children who have to pretend Luisa is the Mum. They look less than happy, which is to say shocked and horrified, at the idea.

 Happy to be working with you

Presentations are looming and Luisa steadies her nerves by icing a million cupcakes. On the plus side the pink spotlights are out and Neil has brought plenty of pink balloons. Luisa has to give her presentation to the leading lights of the baking industry and Lord Siral. She stumbles over her words, but basically gets it out. The bakers don't seem to be any clearer on her target market than anyone else, but it basically goes okay. So it's surprising when she bursts into tears straight afterwards. Maybe its the emotion of the moment or possibly the thought that she might actually win and have to work with Lord Siral.

Luisa gets emotional, maybe she doesn't like balloons

The experts conclude that there is potential here, but the details need ironing out. Not least, who the hell is she actually trying to sell to?

No tears at Leah's presentation. Though that may be because she's injected so many chemicals into her face that she's no longer capable of experiencing human emotions. She wants her chain of plastic surgery clinics to be hyper-medical and specialise in three of the simplest procedures. One member of her audience, who likes she's had a bit of work done herself, thinks this is a mistake, as the major selling point in cosmetic surgery is a personal relationship with a doctor. To give her credit, Leah stands her ground pointing out that the market leader is a chain and is completely impersonal.

 Hands up everyone who still has their original face

The conclusion, pretty much the same as Luisa, decent idea, know the market, needs work. And the branding is pretty terrible.

 Backwards K

Back in the boardroom the former candidates essentially support their team leader. Even Jason, who thinks that Luisa's decision to choose him shows a level of respect. Good thing he doesn't know that she went through every other option, including the furniture, before settling on him.

 Jason is just happy to be here

The candidates dismissed there follows a good deal of waffle, but Lord Siralan's principal insight is that Luisa's branding looks too personal and Leah's too professional. He would call the clinics 'Dr Leah.' She doesn't like that. Okay Leah, it's great that you've found your confidence, but I'm not convinced it's a good idea to argue with the money.

The question is really the same as last week. Does Lord Siral go with the simple option of selling stuff to people or something risky that he hasn't tried before. The safe versus risky option is pretty much the same dilemma as last year, but as we know, last time he went with the safe option. So this year risky wins out and Leah gets the crown and the money and demonstrates that she is actually capable of smiling, though it may cause her physical pain.

 Disappointed Luissa

We then switch over to 'You're Hired' in which Luisa apologises to Jason three times in quick succession in a bid to show that she is, in fact, still human, and then Leah comes on in triumph only to be overshadowed by Lord Siral who insists that the new business venture won't involve doing face lifts on school children. We're all so relieved.

 Victorious Leah

Episode 12 - June 3rd 2012 - Final

Well here we are at the final episode. It's time for the interviews. I have to say, I don't really like this round and was genuinely sorry when it was made the final. For me, the fun part of the Apprentice is watching a bunch of arrogant, self-important people make fools of themselves by making mistakes that everyone can see coming, while ignoring all sensible advice. Of course the tasks themselves are contrived and unreasonable, but at least the Apprenti are effectively digging the own graves.

The Interview round is different. Here the surviving candidates, usually the least worst of the bunch, are confronted by a group of people whose job is to be even more obnoxious than they are. The candidates are interrupted, ignored and insulted and expected to just sit their and take it. It doesn't help that its inevitably a stitch up. The worst example came in series 3 when, eventual winner Lee, was ordered to do his pterodactyl impression and then told off for doing something so inappropriate in an interview. Then it was revealed that he had lied about his qualifications on his CV, something the production team most have know about but kept to themselves so it could be used against him.

The interview round is fundamentally unfair and that makes the candidates sympathetic, and that's the last thing we want.

 Firing squad

Anyway, the interview round is what we get so I'm going to have to make the most of it. The candidates are assembled and asked to summarise their proposed business in one line. This is a new innovation, probably introduced because last year no-one, even Lord Siralan, fully understood what they were babbling on about. Nick wants to add a button to food websites that allows the user to buy all the ingredients for a recipe with one click. Tom plans to set up a £25 million wine hedge fund, essentially what he already does on a much larger scale. Jade wants to run Europe's largest telemarketing call centre (!!!). Ricky waffles for a while about ethical and sustainable businesses until Lord Siralan gets him to boil it down to a recruitment company. Again, the job he already does. These plans actually sound quite reasonable compared with last years, which included a posture consultant company, a concierge service for the poor and a charity. Even Jade's, which is a borderline crime against humanity, sounds like it could actually make money.

No that's proper Evil. "Pure Evil" take note.

Next up its time to meet the interviewers, each of whom are introduced with a kind of nickname, like their professional wrestlers. Ricky should be right at home. Two of them "Award Winning" Mike Suter and "Former Young Entrepreneur of the Year" Matthew Reily are essentially the same, faintly evil looking men in dark grey suits. Then we have "No Nonsense" Margaret Mountford, veteran of many an Apprentice series, who perfected the art of looking like a disapproving head mistress when Karen Brady was still in nappies or running a football club, whichever came first. Finally we have the hulking, Baron Greenback like form of Claude Litner "King of the Killer question", former global troubleshooter for Lord Siralan and nemesis of Danger Mouse.

The guys don't seem to rate Jade's chances very highly. When Tom asks, Ricky gives her 2 out of 10 and Nick 3. While this may be slightly patronising, it has some truth in it as no-one seems much impressed with her business plan. Claude seems particularly scornful, calling it a "grubby little business." His principle concern seems to be that he doesn't want to be called at home of an evening. To be honest, this sounds like a good reason to cough up. If Jade does get the thing going, she probably won't use it to harass the people who paid for it. She has more problems though. Her business plan doesn't include any costs, because she reckons Lord Siralan's 250 grand will cover it. Nor does it help that one of the anonymous grey-suited men has bought one of the domain names she wanted to use for her website, essentially just to be spiteful.

Nick is doing somewhat better. No-one really understands the technology behind his proposal, but he has a working prototype and a good business plan. Matthew Reily, the "former young entrepreneur of the year", a title less a source of inspiration than a horrible warning about the effects of the ravages of time, is reduced to insisting that no-one would use it. Nick suggests that it would be useful for families planning out weekly meals, but Matthew apparently knows no-one who does this. Nick can't do much more than assure him that real people, who don't just swallow whole sandwiches or eat only at business meetings, do in fact exist while trying not to giggle. Nick's biggest problem is his somewhat hubristic insistence that this could be as big as Facebook or Twitter and a lack of focus, he already has three businesses on the go.

 Nick tries to keep a straight face

Tom has a similarly impressive business plan and clearly knows the industry. In fact, he is so solid that the best "Award Winning" Mike Suter can do is ask if his dad wrote his proposal for him. Why stop at his dad? Why not claim he copied it off the Internet or was given it by magic business fairies. Claude Litner does little better, choosing simply to quibble endlessly over his description of himself as "entirely well-rounded" because he's only 23. He then insists that the business won't work because he can't raise the money. Tom thinks he can, but Claude still says he can't, leading to a pointless back and forth that I expected to be interrupted at any moment by Lord Siralan jumping out in a pantomime Dame's costume to yell "he's behind you."

Ricky also has a good business plan and knows his industry, but the interviewers have found another line of attack in the form of his CV. It's not really fair to attack Ricky over a document he wrote to attract the attention of BBC recruiters months ago, but it's funny so I'll let them off here. Claude thinks it's one of the most crass and immature documents he's ever read and parts of it apparently made Matthew Reilly want to be sick. But its Margaret Mountford who teases out the best material. Ricky likens himself to the God Thor and sees Lord Siralan as Odin. Disturbingly, when trying to justify this Ricky seems to claim he actually is a son of God descended from the Heavens. I'm hoping that's just nervousness. Given that Ricky has previously claimed to be a shark, I'm not sure being a God with lightning based powers is necessarily an advantage.

Matthew Reilly tries not to be sick

Even more disturbing than this is the revelation that Ricky has not been saddled with an unfortunate name. He is, in fact, Richard Martin. He chose to use Ricky in order to attract attention. Ricky's belief is that its worth doing anything to get noticed and be memorable, a position I seriously hope he will reconsider after his experiences on this show.

 Ricky looks to his divine father for guidance

Back in the boardroom.. Lord Siralan dispenses with Jade first. He's hardly a popular man and if he went with Jade's proposal there's a dangerous chance he might be tarred and feathered. Nick is next to go, as much, it seems, because Lord Siralan doesn't fully understand his proposal. The glory days of Amstrad are clearly far behind him. This leaves Ricky and Tom, both of whom are essentially proposing versions of their existing business. Ricky's plan is dull but will probably make steady money, Tom's is risky but could make a fortune. Nick Hewer likens working with Tom as like a last throw of the dice. This seems a touch fatalistic given that Lord Siralan is going to be putting another twelve victims through this nonsense next year.

In the end he goes with Ricky. Apparently,given his position in society he can't be seen to be associated with failure. Hang on, wasn't he an advisor to Gordon Brown's government? (Thought I'd go with the Amstrad Emailer joke didn't you, I'm too unpredictable for you).

Anyway, congratulations Ricky. Now you can leave your job in recruitment to work as your own boss, except for the terrifying hedgehog man standing over your shoulder controlling the purse strings. And all it cost you was twelve weeks of ritual humiliation.