I swore that I was not going to tune in to watch what I was certain would be the car wreck titled Celebrity Apprentice on NBC. I wasn’t going to watch it or even mention it here on Screen Rant.

But my wife wanted to watch at least the first episode, and I’ll be damned if I wasn’t going to watch it if she was… and guess what?

It was far better than I expected.

Now I’m not saying it was great television, just that it looks like this twist may actually have made it worth watching again if you were a fan of earlier seasons of the show. What exactly made it worth watching? Not what, exactly, but who:

Gene Simmons.

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I’ve been a fan of Donald Trump and NBC’s The Apprentice since the first season, but back in January I wrote that the show had jumped the shark by adding elements of Survivor, with the losing team having to live and sleep outside while the winning team lived in luxury. There were also other twists thrown in for the sake of trying to bolster the sagging ratings.

For the most part, it didn’t work, and now with the show is veering further off into “shark” territory, I predict that the next season will be the show’s last.

I’ve always been a big fan of The Apprentice and in preparing to write this was suprised to find that we’re already on the sixth season! Unfortunately I think that The Apprentice L.A. has jumped the shark this season.

I don’t follow ratings very much, but from what I’ve heard last season’s show slipped from previous years, so I suppose the producers thought it was time to throw some changes in the mix. In my opinion they’ve made the show at best silly and at worst just plain dumb.

Oh, the whole drama of trying to become the ultimate Type A personality is still there, but they’ve thrown some really odd stuff into the mix that really dilutes the core concept of the show, and unless they go back to basics next season (if there IS a next season) the ratings are only going to get worse.

Not much to say about the final battle between Lee and Sean in the finale for the 2006 season of The Apprentice… they were both awesome competitors and both qualified for the job (does Lee make anyone else over the age of 30 feel indadequate?).

Anyway, I would have been happy with either one of them winning.

I think Lee really tanked on his last task… the choice of people to work for him was perplexing and he let his friendship with Lenny blind him to Lenny’s inadequacies. In the meantime, Sean did indeed pick a “dream team”, his selection making him worthy to win the title.

Oh well, it’s not like Lee is gonna starve, right?

On a side note, I thought that Randal once again came off like a bonehead, with Trump introducing the guy and giving him props (no doubt due mainly to the fallout from last season’s finale), and Randall takes the opportunity primarily to pimp his website. Yeesh.

If ever there was a neck and neck finish on The Apprentice, it was this season (Season 4) between Randal, the uber-educated, calm and kind business owner and Rebecca, the cool as a cucumber, broken ankle trooper and business journalist.

When it came down to the final moments, I honestly didn’t know who Trump was going to select, and I almost thought it was going to be Rebecca, when he suddenly made his decision and selected Randal. I’d been pulling for Randal and have thought that he would win for weeks now, so I was pleased with the decision. I was impressed with the fact that someone could actually go through the process with their integrity intact and with no one holding a grudge against them and still win. This, as opposed to the animosity always generated against the finalists by the end of any season of Survivor.

Ah, the Fall TV season is on it’s way… being more of a TV than movie watcher I’ll have more to write about once again.

Season 4 of The Apprentice will soon be upon us, and in view of last seasons lower ratings, Donald Trump has decided to step up and act like a CEO in regards to production. Apparently last season Trump had made some suggestions as to who should be considered as candidates and ALL of his suggestions where disregarded. He ended up with a bunch of candidates that he wouldn’t want working for him.

Although the idea of college vs. non-degreed seemed like a good idea (and one I suggested a couple of years ago), in reality (no pun) it didn’t work out quite so well. In season 3 it seemed like part of the degree requirement at college was a course taught by “Miss Manners”. For the most part the non-degreed folks came across as childish and foul-mouthed, while the college grads came across as much more sophisticated.

So this season “The Donald” has decided to drop the hammer: He hand picked 17 out of the 18 contestants, including one woman who the producers told him was “too beautiful”, two ex-professional athletes, a Rhodes scholar with five degrees (I personally wouldn’t bet on that guy), and an ex-stripper.

After last season I thought that perhaps The Apprentice had peaked in it’s second season, but maybe there’s some life left in the show yet.

Source: NY Times

Can we be nearing the end of the Reality TV show era? Some recent newcomers have come and (thankfully) gone quickly, and even Mark Burnett’s golden touch can’t seem to give The Contender big numbers. In an attempt to lure back viewers who are burnt out on mean-spirited, backstabbing behavior, CBS has a bunch of “kinder, gentler” reality shows slated for next season no doubt spurred on by the success of ABC’s Extreme Home Makeover.

Using myself as a barometer of the average viewer (hey, it’s my website, I can do whatever I want), I would say the public has reached saturation as far as reality TV is concerned. I’m not a voracious viewer of reality TV… I don’t watch Fear Factor, America’s Next Top Model, or Big Brother. I have tuned in to one season of The Bachelor and The Bachelorette, but that was enough for me. Being a fitness buff and really annoyed at the state of obesity in the U.S., I did tune into The Biggest Loser. It was unnecessarily cheesy and the supposed drama too drawn out, but I loved seeing the changes these folks made to their lives. I even watched Wife Swap this season because it did my heart good to see the children in some of these families benefit from the exchange.

It should come as a surprise to no one that Omarosa from Season 1 of The Apprentice is not going away anytime soon. She still gets news coverage by doing and/or saying controversial things. Her latest comment was made during an NBC teleconference for another reality show. She made the comment that the way The Apprentice was produced and edited caused black male contestants to appear lazy and timid, while black female contestants were perceived as being on the opposite extreme.

Finally got around to watching last week’s premiere of season 3 of The Apprentice (Hey, my DVR got twitchy, thank goodness for the rebroadcast on CNBC!).

I’m really glad that they’ve gotten rid of that STUPID men vs. women premise and instead have gone to what they should have done since the first season: College grads vs. self made non-grads. Being in the latter category, I am, of course rooting for the “street smarts” gang to win. Having said that, I have absolutely no doubt that a non-college grad will not win the title of “The Apprentice”.

I believe that no matter how well the street smart side does Donald will defer to the college grad side for a VP position in one of his companies. He can’t help himself. Of course that may not be entirely a bad call, since if you want a corporate lackey you should select someone trained for the job.
We’ll have to see how it goes, but the first episode showed that those high school folks aren’t fools, and the project leader for the first task will go far in the show.

If TV ratings are any indication, the reality TV genre seems to be losing some steam. Just about two years ago right now, Joe Millionaire was one of the top shows on TV, but these days it seems like any reality show that doesn’t have Mark Burnett’s name on it is headed straight for the history books. Latest case in point: The Will, which has already been canceled by CBS after just one show.

The concept of The Will sounded sleazy on paper. Friends and family of an elderly rancher had to compete with each other for the deed to his ranch. That meant two things. First, the show technically should have been called The Deed, and second, we had yet another opportunity to watch a family destroy itself in the name of reality TV. The overwhelming majority of Americans wisely decided to pass. (The fact that The Will was competing against an NFL playoff game and Battlestar Galactica couldn’t have helped.)