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Eighteen men and women have been chosen by the most powerful man in real estate for a 15-week job interview, in which only one can be named president of one of his companies.

Who will Donald Trump choose as his next Apprentice?

Who's fired this week? Check the Apprentice 2 Portfolio!

Recaps by Gordon Pepper, GSNN


FACT FILE:
Host: Donald Trump
Assistants: George Ross and Carolyn Kepcher
Creator: Mark Burnett
EP: Mark Burnett, Donald Trump, Jay Bienstock
Packager: Mark Burnett Productions, Trump Productions.
Airs: Thursdays at 9:00pm ET on NBC


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No infringement of copyright is intended by these fan pages; production companies of shows this site covers retain all rights to the sounds, images, and information contained herein. No challenge to copyright is implied. 

Web design by Jason Elliott. Logo by Chico Alexander. 

"A Tale of Two Project Managers" - October 28

It's time for the usual chit-chat with everyone else, so they can guess... wrong... as to who is back. Their guess this time - Andy. What's up with everyone picking on Andy? Andy wonders this too, as he says that he feels like the kid in Dodgeball who no one picks. Awwwwwww.... he says that tomorrow, they will see a side of him that they have never seen before.

We do see him - in his pajamas (well, that's a side of him that we've never seen before) as he is told that everyone must meet Trump at 8am via video conference. He will be going to the Miss Universe pageant - and will meet Bill, the winner of season 1, there. Also from season 1 - Donnie Deutsch, but he is in NYC where everyone will be meeting him. The contest is an advertising one, as they are to create campaigns of the NYC police recruitment.

They all meet Donnie, who tells them that the assignment is a recruiting campaign for the NYPD. He tells them to focus on the emotional part - why would they want to work for the NYPD? Andy gets the random draw as the project manager, and he wants to create something that would have people asking questions. He immediately gets into an argument with Maria, who says that Andy is slowing them down. Maria want to talk about sex appeal, and she says that with her advertising expertise, she could have taken the project manager position. She actually sort of tried to, but finally stepped down when she realized that no one is going to deter Andy. It's very evident that if this goes down, so will Andy, and he knows it.

Apex, however, is the first to visit a compound training facility where they can tape footage. The project manager is... Elizabeth, who admits that she didn't win the last time she was Project Manager and she knows she needs to win this. Raj offers her a military frontline idea - and Elizabeth wants to look more for the emotional angle. She did say that - but she didn't know what to replace it and that concerns the team. Raj says that his idea isn't negative, but Elizabeth didn't like it. Unfortunately for her, everyone else didn't like anything else on the table, and Elizabeth can't come up with anything better. Raj jokes that he should have a savati bomb attached to his chest with the police gunning him down and him blowing up, but the look on Elizabeth's face suggests that in her mind, that would not be a bad idea.

Mosaic gets filming in second, but they know exactly what shots they want and they get shooting. Meanwhile, Raj gets helicopter shots and people with guns coming out of the helicopter. Mosaic starts to shoot when it looks like the rain is going to come down. Undaunted, Andy gets in as many shots as he can. 'I'm not weak, I didn't come here to be weak. I came here to win and I wanted to make sure that we got the job done, and every time line was met because of it.'

Trump's lesson of the week - 'You have to Love It.' They have to be driven and love the idea - or you'll never be successful. He and Bill schmooze with the models, and you have to think that womanizer Raj wouldn't be a bad Apprentice after all.

Going back to Raj, he is sleeping while Elizabeth wasn't satisfied with the creativity. She talks to Kevin about it and they talk about refocusing the idea. They decide to change the focus about making it a hip job. She says that she may be making enemies, but she WILL NOT change her mind. That makes Kevin happy and he goes to sleep.

Kevin thinks the team has turned the corner, but when she shows it to Ivana, Jen and Raj, they all hate it. Notice that Kevin wasn't there to defend Elizabeth and the group convinces her to change her mind - again. Kevin will be less than thrilled about that.

Meanwhile, Andy leads his idea to the rest of the team, and while Maria and Kelly don't like it, adding that it strips sex appeal from the campaign, Wes and Sandy like it, so Andy continues. Andy and Wes are in the video room when Maria and Kelly voice their concern via walkie-talkie - as George is in the room. Way to undermine your leader, gang. Andy fires back, saying that the action is sexy, and wondering if they want to see them straddling bodies with their shirts off. 'Young people understand class, and they want to take the job due to a sense of responsibility, no because they are going to get laid.'

George is listening in, and asks what is going on. Andy wisely says that it's just them planning an exit strategy when we should be focusing on trying to win the task. Andy is absolutely right, and although he'll get the boot if he loses, he'll be in great shape if he wins.

Someone who is not in great shape is Elizabeth, who now creates a different campaign to Kevin, who is pissed that Elizabeth hasn't made a decision. They are now 5 hours away from presentation time and they still don't have an angle. "I think our project manager sucks. Flat out." She leaves and everyone else wonders if they can fire Elizabeth. Well, you can't, and Kevin wonders why Elizabeth can't make up her mind. She says that she has made a decision - and she wants Kevin to manage it. He tries to talk to her, and in a painful 2 minute sketch, she isn't listening to Kevin - at all. A frustrated Kevin gives up and walks away from her, as he plans his own exit strategy.

Back to Mosaic - Kelly wants to be the person to do the speech, even though Andy has been a debating champion. Andy says that Kelly joined the military (not the police force) and even though they clearly don't like each other, Andy will give Kelly some of the presentation, adding that Kelly doesn't respect him. Respect - or jealousy?

Elizabeth says that she did her best to try to soften her campaign, while the team is trying to convince her otherwise and Carolyn is noticing the animosity and disorganization that is forming as a result. They try to convince her some more, but nothing is happening and all of Elizabeth's team has walked away from her in a mutiny.

That's not going to help as Deutsch, Linda Sawyer and Kathy Delaney are there to judge the competition. Elizabeth does relent and joins the Front Line campaign, and the TV commercial, to be honest, seems like something you'd see more in an embattled third world nation that is about to experience an uprising than NYC. Elizabeth says that action is needed, but you can see the look of pain on Deutsch's face as he sees the campaign.

It's Mosaic's turn, and Andy is the person who is giving the speech, while Kelly foes through the print ads. The theme is "When is the last time", which pulls you into your own soul to ask those questions. What was even better is that they had the police people at the compound saying the lines, and Deutsch said it was perfect and seamless. There's no competition here, it seems, as the women thought Mosaic hit it right on the money in terms of the emotion, while Apex's ad could actually scare people off.

Deutsch calls up Trump and tells him that Apex turned New York into a military state, while Mosaic followed the directions exactly. Mosaic wins it in a landslide. As the reward, the group will get surprised tomorrow at 9am. The losers will have to go back to the Board Room, where someone will get uprisen personally by the Donald.

Andy says that he is happy that everyone knows that some 22 year old kid led them to victory. They get picked up for the surprise - in Times Square. The surprise is that their ad gets played in Times Square for everyone, which uplifted everyone's spirits.

Those spirits are equally downtrodden, as Wes tells Elizabeth to be opinionated - and hope that her opinions match the Donald's. I agree with it, but it's going to be tough with the rest of the team against him. Jen overhears Wes and calls him for it, adding that he shouldn't be helping her. Why not? All's fair in love and Apprentice, and if it means that he can get a strong player out of the way, then he should do it. Wes tells Jennifer that all he told her was "Don't be a p#ssy," to which she replies, "She can't help it." OUCH!

Raj asks what she is thinking - and she tells him that she disagreed with his idea. Raj realizes that he is going to be the person under fire, and he needs to set up a strategy to defend it. That could have been a really bad move for Elizabeth to broadcast her strategy...

...and we will see what happens when they all go to the Boardroom. Donald asks her what went wrong, and she said that they didn't have a good idea. She says the team didn't come up with a good idea, adding that their definition of a good leader is someone that stands with their convictions. She says she followed through with that - the problem was that they couldn't come up with a better idea.

Donald asks to see the ad - and he does. He looks just as in pain as Deutsch does and Carolyn adds that it's awful. Donald: "Forget about shooting the Apprentice - I should go upstairs and bolt my doors. Most wives aren't going to tell their husbands to go join up... unless they have a very bad relationship and want to lose their husbands."

Donald asks Raj if it was his idea, and Raj says that he pushed it because it was the only idea on the table. "It was better than any of the alternatives - which is none." Jen says that Raj took a position, which Jen and Chris agreed, as Chris added that there was no direction. Ivana says that Raj pushed it because there was no pushing by Elizabeth. Donald: "Was she weak and ineffective, or just weak?" Ivana: "Both." OUCH. Jennifer adds that she was weak, ineffective and indecisive to the point of paralysis. "Other then that, I thought she was terrible." OUCH!

Elizabeth adds that she wanted to come up with a better campaign, but Kevin, her only ally, seals her coffin by saying that she did have a better idea, but the team made changed her mind. Donald says that the team can't make a strong leader change her mind, and he says he sees no leadership. Donald asks her who she would bring, and she says Raj and Chris. Donald doesn't think it would be necessary, and he fires her right there, adding that he doesn't want to waste any more time. Whoa.

So for the first time in the series, we get no miniature Board Room session as Elizabeth gets canned. He says it was a no-brainer and Carolyn and George agrees. Well, at least we won't have any guessing by everyone at the top on who is going home.

Since we have no mini-board, I'll say what I think the rationale of Kelly is. He is going after Andy because it's not that Andy is too young, but that he is the biggest threat for him to win everything. Based on what happened this episode, you would think that Kelly's fear is realized, as Andy is now a new threat to win everything. With that, we get to the ratings -

So Far, So Good - Jennifer M., Kelly, Andy, Kevin
So Far, Not So Good - Wes, Sandy, Chris
In Trouble - Raj, Maria, Ivana
You're Fired - Elizabeth

Next week, in an episode that should have been aired this week, the ghosts of their past come back. That spells trouble for Maria and Ivana, who were instrumental in getting rid of two of said ghosts. We'll see if that comes back to haunt them.

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