I think this task may have been even more of a mess than usual, I could barely keep up.
In this episode, each team had to split themselves into two for the purposes of the creation and marketing of a soft drink. Half would base themselves in Luton and design and create the soft drink, whereas half would jet off to New York to create a television advert and pitch to a group of experts. The team leaders were a really generic dude who has somehow totally escaped my notice before and who I shall thus call Genericon, Tyrant of the Plains, and Bianca.
Genericon, Tyrant of the Plains’ team came up with AquaFusion, a health drink with pineapple, lychee and raspberry as the flavouring.
It was a disaster: Apart from the fact that the logo was absurdly bad, with yellow text on blue on yellow on yellow meaning that pretty much nothing could be seen, it also just looked bland. I’ve seen more exciting designs from cut-price bottled water sold at airports. Combine with that a pitch in which two lawyers stared soulfully at a panel of experts, and a TV advertisement (executed by the always, um, interesting Philippe) in which an elderly woman pressed the drink into her childrens’ hands, whispering solemnly about how it would ‘never let them down.’
I struggle to imagine a more insipid advertising campaign for a blander product (even people who drank it didn’t like it, with most people saying it didn’t taste of much and one lovely gentleman kindly referring to it as ‘subtle’, which I think was a charming and wonderful thing for him to say. I salute you, Gentle New Yorker), and the team absolutely could not get along. It seemed like every time they weren’t on the phone with each other they were screaming about how all their teammates were literally Satan risen from Hell and wearing an ill-fitting suit.
Bianca’s team fared slightly better. Their drink was an energy drink named Big Dawg (the name was suggested by James, who then refused to shut up about it), and apart from a rather awful advert in which various people meandered by, mumbling about how Big Dawg had really changed their lives in a way that reminded me vaguely of meth addicts who had just escaped a cult, the marketing was a lot better. The packaging was good, the name was apparently good, the digital billboard was good, everything was good.
Bianca’s team also gave us James rhapsodising over how straight the roads were in New York, which should tell you much about the UK’s urban geography.
Obviously, Bianca’s team won, but during the brief scene of them receiving their reward (a nice dinner), they were arguing too - mostly over whether James coming up with the name ‘Big Dawg’ was solely responsible for their victory. I think somebody might actually murder James before long. I genuinely am concerned by that possibility.
Genericon, Tyrant of the Plains, meanwhile, brought Rachel and Daniel back into the boardroom with him, possibly because Rachel and Daniel were in the boardroom last week as well and it seemed the most likely way to save his own skin. Lord Sugar wasn’t very impressed with any of them, but Genericon, Tyrant of the Plains, did manage to escape to be totally forgettable another day, as Rachel was fired on the basis of Lord Sugar’s instinct that she wouldn’t make a good business partner for him.
Next week is … next week is … I did see the preview, I swear. They’re, um, they’re - you know, I’ll just go check.
Oh, right, they didn’t say what next week is about. Except James wilfully lying, apparently.
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