The Apprentice viewers slam ‘fake’ scenes at start of episode BBC still hasn’t fixed
Zip Zap #ZipZap
BBC The Apprentice: Lord Sugar sets candidates marketing campaign task
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The Apprentice viewers have complained about fake scenes at the start of the BBC1 reality business show tonight that have been going on for years.
The task on Thursday asked each team to brand an electric motorbike and come up with an advert for their eco-friendly e-bike to a panel of industry experts.
The teams came up with ‘Zip Zap’ and ‘Soldier’ but it was a scene at the very start of the ep that got viewers talking.
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Viewers saw one of the candidates take a call at ‘4am’ in total darkness to tell them the cars would arrive ‘in 20 minutes’.
Cue the regular scenes of the candidates dressing, applying fake tan and throwing on crinkled shirts with bleary eyes.
But moments later, the cars arrived – seemingly in broad daylight.
© BBC The ‘fake’ scenes have been used at the start of the episode for years
Viewers spotted it, such as @toneboy who said: “Phone rings at 4am in pitch darkness, cars get there 20 minutes later in bright sunlight. Right you are. #TheApprentice”
@buddinggenius said: “4am – the cars will be with you in 20mins. 4:20am bright sunlight. How does that work? #TheApprentice”
@bennyP1977 said: “Can we stop the charade that they wake up, get washed, changed and then out of the house in 20 minutes. It was bloody light when they left at (apparently) 4.20am #TheApprentice”
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@airfixnikon said: “Hold it!! The phone rings very early in the morning, outside it’s still dark. The voice on the phone says “Cars will be in 20 minutes.” 20 mins later, they come out of the house. It’s very bright daylight, like it was TWO hours later! #TheApprentice”
@kathfox said: “How is it that the apprentices get a phone call at 4.00am in the morning and have to leave the house in twenty minutes. They then are seen leaving in broad daylight! I know it’s sad but it bugs me every week”
@giftednumber10 said: “A call at 4 am when it’s pitch black and they’re supposedly coming out twenty minutes later in bright daylight. I’m calling b*****”
During the task, both teams were given a ‘blank’ electric bike to brand with a name, logo, slogan and colour scheme of whatever they saw fit, and would then be tasked with branding the bike.
One team pitched ‘Zip Zap’ as the name for their e-bike, while the other team came up with Soldier, with the tagline ‘Ride dirty, drive clean’.
“It’s fun, it’s cool, it’s sexy, and we wanted to encompass that in our advert,” the team said as they pitched Soldier and their ad to a board of ad execs.
© BBC1 ‘I wish he hadn’t said that’: the pitch for Soldier and Zip Zap both went poorly
One of the execs asked: “You decided to go with sex appeal. It can be quite a cliche thing. Why did you decide to go with that?”
Tony Campbell, chief executive for the motorcycle industry said that the ad comes across as an advert for ‘a dating site’.
He then told them they used a word not used in the biking industry: “The word drive is often taken as a bit of an insult,”.
Zip Zap’s pitch went worse, as he asked: “Who knows what an onomatopoeia is? Hands up if you do.”
© BBC1 The boardroom was feisty as the bottom three battled to stay
He then added: “It gives connotations of speed. And of electricity!”
The team were told: “You missed the best thing about owning a motorbike which is riding a motorbike.”
Another said: “Can I just ask who came up with the name?
“It is just a dreadful name. Is it the first thing that came into your head?”
Warning: spoilers ahead!
Lord Sugar, perhaps unsurprisingly, opted for Solider over Zip Zap in the end.
Each of the bottom three including Bradley, Shazia and Avi were told they could have been fired for the ‘complete mess’ of the task which produced ‘a load of rubbish’.
Lord Sugar said: “Shazia, it is with regret that you’re fired” as he lambasted her ‘many mistakes’.
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