Thoughts on “The Apprentice” Finale

Okay folks, I probably should have taped the finale of this latest “Apprentice” and just skimmed to the good parts.

The biggest problem with the finale of this whole show is that for some reason Producer Mark Brunett just can’t seem to get the timing right. Everything else can be timed perfectly. But when it comes to the finale show, either it’s TOO long or it’s TOO short. Some folks would say that it was just because it was a live show, and that you can’t really predict how things would work in a live show, but I don’t think that was it. Most of the whole two hours was prepared footage.

This finale show squeezed so much of the final task and the aftermath into the two-hour slot that there was barely enough time to get Trump to announce the winner. I suppose having too much stuff is better than not having enough and getting Regis Philburn to work the crowds for fifteen minutes.

In the end, Trump picked Randall over Rebecca. There I said it. Mystery over. Randall was a clear winner, but Rebecca also held her ground, and people could have easily seen Rebecca get picked as well.

So that brings us to this one offer, which really – in my opinion – soured the finale. Trump was ready to hire BOTH of them! He was. In fact, some folks were hinting that the whole finale was set to do a double hiring. But when he gave the option to Randall, right after the JOY of winning out of all of the other candidates, Randall said this is “The Apprentice”, not “The Apprentii”.

That’s unfortunate. Seriously. Trump did several mass-firings this season. He should have also seized the opportunity to do a first-ever multiple hire. As Trump would probably phrase it, in business you don’t miss an opportunity to recruit quality talent when you see it, and they BOTH would have made an excellent addition to the Trump Organization. Plus they both really didn’t do too well in their final tasks. Randall’s lack of organization hurt his challenge when the primary event was rained out. And Rebecca’s letting Yahoo dictate the course of the charity event and not letting the charity get any money hurt her efforts. That and she didn’t have anyone greet “The Donald” when he arrived. Come on guys, that’s the unwritten rule!

And that’s where I think that not having enough time fits into this. With so much time put into the pre-recorded material and not enough on the live portion, there really wasn’t any chance for Randall to savor the victory and think. If they did more of a reunion catch-up with everyone, I think that Randall might have realized that he STILL would be the winner, but that Rebecca would have also been recognized for her efforts. Instead, there wasn’t even enough time for Trump to wrap things up in his usual way or to hint at the next challenge. They just ended things with a sour taste in this commentator’s mouth.

By the way, according to MSNBC, Trump personally selected 15 of the 16 candidates, after having been disappointed by candidates in the previous show. I would have been curious to know whom the one candidate was that Trump DIDN’T handpick into this show. I have my suspicious (Marcus), but it would have been nice to see who it was.