Tycoon (Week 2)

 

This week, the disputably humanoid Peter Jones and his motley crue of shameless arse-kissers carry on where they left off last week in attempting to turn their mainly shoddy business ideas into something so astoundingly brilliant that they will knock baby-faced beanstalk Peter Jones’ socks off.

Something tells me it ain’t gonna happen. Ever. Well, not for most of the so-called entrepreneurs on this programme anyway. Among those expected to fail miserably are camp Tom (and his teen newspaper) and Elizabeth – that snotty-faced bint whose feeble brainwaves have materialised themselves in the form of fruity vodka smoothies, while the chances of success for the others still hang in the balance.

If you need a recap as to who the rest of the contenders are, then here you go: Eco-bag man Justin, whose invention is simply a bag to keep plastic shopping bags in,  former glamour model Lauren, with her hair extension business, (who, by the way, is quite attractive but resembles a waxwork dummy) and toy-fancier Ian, who came up with the remote-controlled-crash-proof-indoor helicopter concept, which is just what the world has been waiting for, clearly.

Also in the running are Cathy and Helen and their gardening for women thing (Sod), which isn’t just for women anymore, it’s now for everyone, though what it is that they are specifically offering still evades me.

The six competitors have so far been trying to market their respective products, attempting to sell as much of their wares to whoever will take them as they can, with the goal obviously being to make as much money as possible.

In this episode, Jones has supplied each set of entrepreneurs with their own individual targets to try to complete in time for the next meeting, where they will be scrutinised, resulting in the weakest of the six businesses being shut down. The meeting also being the point at which each business gets to double any money they have made, as Jones had arranged to personally equal any profit gained. As it turned out, only Sod and Helicopter boy had made anything substantial anyway, Sod making around £3,500 and ‘Copter boy with approximately £4,000. None of the others made any profit at all, aside from bag man Justin who had raised the princely sum of £80.
Before this meeting however, Peter Jones had set up a press launch to see how the soulless drones manage to cope with the media. The most memorable point of which seemed to feature camp Tom, who, after managing to get several top newspapers interested in the possibility of adopting his free student rag as a weekly supplement, delivered such a life-draining presentation that all interest swiftly died on it’s arse, leaving the wilted boy pondering the many errors of his approach as well as his product.

The next best thing in this sequence was hearing Elizabeth, who looks like Gillian McKeith’s slightly less evil twin, claim that her drink is “as refreshing as a cup of tea would be if you were in the desert”. Now I don’t know about you, but the last thing I would want if I was traipsing through a desert would be a hot drink of any description.

Sod hardly featured at all in this episode for some reason, and neither did the eagerly anticipated Paul McKenna. In fact McKenna only got one scene in which he semi- successfully brainwashed Eco-bag man into becoming a good speaker. To be fair it did seem to work, but fortunately it wore off later; halfway through a presentation to Peter Jones.

Elizabeth, who cried last week, cried again this time. Partly because she really can’t hack it and partly because she didn’t get to meet McKenna. I noticed from the trailer at the end of the show that she weeps again next week too. So that’s something to look forward to. If only she were not so nauseating and contemptible, I really would feel a bit sorry for her.

When it came to crunch time after the meeting, Jones narrowed the worst of the bunch down to two, waxy Lauren and paperboy Tom. Lauren, who so far seems quite sound, despite her plastic dimensions, got Peter well and truly riled when she revealed some sensitive information about her business over the phone to a stranger. She was blabbing, it turns out, to Sir Phillip Green, who was pretending to be a journalist. This was something Jones had arranged in a bid to get Green interested in her business. Jones considered the blunder to be catastrophic though, as for all she knew she was sharing compromising details with a potential rival. Aside from being almost entirely pointless, drippy Tom found himself on the chopping board for hiring an ex-editor of OK! magazine to basically create his product for him. A product by the way, which went from originally being a newspaper to becoming yet another celebrity gossip mag.
In the end, Lauren was saved and it was Tom who got his marching orders, which is probably for the best, as everything he said sounded like a double entendre, which I found unnecessarily disturbing.

Peter Jones lacks both the straight-talking manner and killer lines delivered by Alan Sugar which contribute to The Apprentice being such an entertaining show, but this is still pretty watchable, especially as it seems to be livening up a bit now with some bitching creeping in between the contestants. I will say this though, I’m already absolutely sick of hearing the word ‘tycoon’ and it’s only the second episode. Last week the word was uttered so frequently that it completely wore out it’s own sense of meaning.

Tags: Crap TV, Fruka, Gurning twats, ITV, Paul McKenna, Peter Jones, Sod, Television, The Apprentice, The UK, Tits