Finally, the final Apprentice final has finally arrived. Stella “Hot or not?” English takes on Chris “Cocksure toffee-nosed alpha-male berk ” Bates. One of them will work in some capacity for Lord Alan, before jacking it in to get a presenting job on Five, while the other will drift off into obscurity. Actually, they’ll both drift off into obscurity.

Dara O’Briain opens the show, in front of a gaggle of gormless members of the public. Or “consumers” as the tits on this show call them. He’ll be back later for an extended You’re Hired that we won’t bother watching, but first, it’s the moment we’ve been waiting for. The return of Liz <3

It’s the final Early Morning Phone Call, and they’re off to The Langham Hotel. Sugar arrives in his Gitmobile, and brings back the fired candidates – notably, minus Baggs – to assist in the task.

Chris picks Jamie, Liz <3, Alex, and Dr Shibby; Stella takes Joanna, Christopher, Melissa and is left with Paloma. Their task - to create an alcoholic drink, bottle and advertising campaign.

Chris goes for a rum-based spirit, while Alex bangs on about pomegranates. Stella wants a bourbon, even though custard creams are nicer. God, that’s the worst joke ever. Sorry.

Liz suggests “Crown Jewels” as a name, but Chris doesn’t fancy the idea of putting his lips around that. They do like “Crown”, though. Inexplicably, Jo first think that blue signifies happiness, before hollering out “BLUE’S GAY”. Only Anthony Costa.

Chris comes up with Cubed as a name, but a Soho shopkeeper doesn’t like it, so he abandons it immediately. Alex yawns a bit. Stella doesn’t have a name, either. Out of nowhere though: Urbon. Or Ourbon. Or Ourbourn.

Liz taste-tests the rum, while Shibby makes an hilarious and unpredictable “spit or swallow” joke. Cock. On an unrelated note, Liz has a pearl necklace on. Premium white rum, infused with pomegranate. Chris argues with her over the phone over the colour of the drink. The pyramid bottle will house this mix, now called Prism.

Prism looks really good, Urbon, slightly browner. The budget for the bottles is clearly loads bigger than those crap bottles of Germinator from the other week. It should be noted again though, that the Prism bottle isn’t actually a prism. It’s a pyramid. Chew on that one, smart-arse.

As he pitches the idea for his TV ad, Chris falls foul of the ASA regulations about alcohol. In short, he can’t show alcohol as being interesting, fun, or anything good. If they had their way, all beer adverts would show a row of middle-aged men sitting in a pub joylessly ordering pints of bitter while avoiding their wives.

He gets tetchy over microscopic parts of the advert, swiftly heading towards a point where he’ll only have one take to do the lot. Meanwhile, in Stella’s team, a stoned sounding bloke asks tentatively “can we have four Urbons, please?”.

Adverts somehow in the bag, it’s bedtime, ready for tomorrow’s pitches.

Chris has his pitch written, but his monotone durrring through the speech makes him sound like someone recovering from serious brain trauma. Stella hasn’t written her speech, but it’ll probably be fine. Instead of practising the pitch, she bickers with Jo and Melissa. Just like old times.

Chris gives his speech to the industry bigwigs (and Lord Al) first, welcomed onto the stage by a troupe of dancers, for absolutely no reason whatsoever. Somehow, he’s learned about intonation – one Hell of a crash course from Jamie. He calls the bottle “iconic”, which is a bit fuckin’ rich for something that was only created 24 hours ago. The advert is as generic as they come; vaguely hot girl; people drinking; shot of the product.

Important questions from the crowd now, and he’s asked if he’s worried about the angularity of the bottle. Angularity. Bloody angularity. Do one, love. He makes a weak joke about it influencing the price of pomegranates, and THE CROWD GO WILD!

Next up, Stella. Her slogan should be: “Urbon – the drink that gets fucked by spellchecker”. It’s amusing to see Alan sipping a cocktail through a straw. We imagine he only drinks turps at home. Stella gets laughs for another weak joke, and her pitch seems well received. Well done, Stel.

Alan gets feedback from da industry, as the teams get to go home for the night. Before the final trip to the boardroom. Stella says that there is no competition: She’s the winner. She hasn’t really understood this, has she?

THE BOARDROOOOOOOOM OF DOOOOOOOM

Stella gets slated for the taste, even though she delegated that task to Christopher and Melissa. Alan comes up with a bloody long joke about nobody, er, inventing an, um, a, er, device, for, er, tasting over the phone. You’re the telecoms expert, mate.

Chris is praised for improving his speaking style. The various firees offer their opinions, as though anybody bloody cares. You’d hire Stella would you, Jo? Great. Out.

The feedback on Chris’ advert was poor, but they liked the concept of the three sided bottle and three ingredients. Stella’s bottle looks like vinegar, but they love the brand name.

Stella gives an impressive speech about how her skills have carried her this far. Chris comes across as a big-headed arse-wit with no humility, and goes for the horrendous “I’m just like you, Alan” approach, while Stella demonstrates her smug smirk and almost-imperceptible eyerolling. She has ten years more experience than him, though. Does Alan want to have to train Chris, or just slot Stella in?

Chris needs the process and the support more than Stella; she could apply to hr@viglen.co.uk and walk into most jobs.

Lord Al sums up their various strengths, but reveals that his apprentice will be…

Oh wait, he’s stalling. His apprentice will be…

Stella.

Well done Stella.

Chris resigned from his previous job when he was accepted for the Apprentice, so the tit is unemployed. Good.

After twelve weeks, loads of bladdy bizness, Lovely Liz, monstrous Melissa, shitwit Stuart and cockbrain Chris, we’ve finally come to an end. What have we learned? That there are too many bellends out there, that making money is the most important thing, and that Karren Brady is no Margaret Mountford.

Same time next year, then?

Comments

1. Tim says:

   December 20, 2010 at 11:08 am

   At least Chris didn’t say the Prism brand was “revered”. ;-)

   Sugar definitely made the right decision. Stella’s rivals had recently tried to portray her composed and professional demeanour as a weakness – only on TV could that be considered to be a bad thing! – but she had been consistently strong throughout. In the final she also showed she could be creative and stand up and pitch to an intimidating room of experts as well.

   To be fair, Chris performed very well in the final task too. But, as his presentation and advert showed, he was more style than substance, and represented potential rather than proven ability. Stella may not hit the creative highs that Chris is occasionally capable of, but (a) that’s what you hire creative teams and agencies for and (b) unlike Chris she is capable of delivering immediately, something Sugar had stressed right at the outset. Why take on Chris and spend a year or two developing him,only for him to bugger off soon after?

   http://slouchingtowardsthatcham.com/2010/12/20/substance-triumphs-over-style-as-stella-english-wins-the-apprentice/
2. Dave says:

   December 21, 2010 at 12:24 pm

   “LOL” – me lolling.

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