For the second week in a row, Celebrity Apprentice is only an hour long. Either Donald Trump has accepted the fact that his show is no longer two hours interesting, or they didn't want to compete with Revenge or Mad Men. Regardless, whew. Once Gary Busey is eliminated, this show will only be half an hour long.
Everyone is pleased to see that Donald finally took the initiative to fire Omarosa. They're even delighted to see Dennis Rodman, who has decent ideas for a celebrity. Brande is convinced that without Omarosa, they could have won every task.
In the atrium of Trump Tower, further evidence of plunging ratings, Donald Trump introduces the celebrities to his child bride and Real Housewife baby name inspiration, Melania. I wonder if Ivanka will be around for this task to resent her a little. Melania struck gold, and she's taking advantage of it starting now.
The task this week is to introduce Melania Trump's new skincare line: Melania Caviar Complex C6. The tagline should definitely be, "yes, it's for rich people." The English-speaking vice president of marketing for Melania Collection tells the celebrities that their task is to create a two page advertorial and product display. The project managers are selected by default: Dennis Rodman and Penn Jillette. I'm sure Melania is thrilled. Or she doesn't know what's going on.
Dennis fears being the project manager of Team Power, because he doesn't like to "run people." When meeting with Melania and the executives, Dennis asks Melania if she started the brand and she confirms that yes, "I create everything." Then, Dennis jokes about going into Melania's bathroom and seeing what she has in her medicine cabinet. Melania doesn't have time to process and translate, but manages to respond that Dennis is not allowed in the bathroom.
Over at Plan B, things are a bit more professional. They find out that the target demographic for Melania Collection is ... women? "A mother, a wife, a business woman," Melania tells them. The VP of Marketing tells Plan B that the line is "synergistic." Then, Gary gets into it, confessing in an interview that his genitalia was so excited it was spinning like a ferris wheel. As ya do.
Team Power tries to come up with an idea, a plan, anything, for Melania Complex. Brande notices that it's a lot of white and gold, so there's something. Trace hopes there will some day be a task where they are asked to sell horse feed. Selling meatballs was pretty close, and he begged out of that one.
Over at Plan B, it's going about as well as celebrities coming up with an ad campaign could go, particularly with Gary Busey on hand. Gary likes the idea of "feed your skin caviar" as a tagline. He says it's not fear-based, which is true, but the word "feed" is horrific. Lisa prefers "nourish your skin with caviar." Penn thinks that is good enough. He plans for a gold tray with a gold spoon, loaded up with caviar.
Team Power is also looking at gold. Lil Jon asks for anything gold, and Dennis just sort of hangs out and looks around. In the other van, Marilu decides that the word "nourish" isn't quite right. She and Lisa call Penn, who already came up with "let your skin taste the luxury." Go forth and buy caviar.
Over at Team Power, Dennis is trying to figure out how to spell/pronounce "Melania."
Ivanka Trump graces Team Power with her presence. She sees the nice work Trace is doing, and likes it for the skincare line of her father's wife. Eric Trump rolls in to supervise Plan B, who are taking pictures of caviar. Everyone runs in to try to tell Eric about their great ideas, and Penn pats Eric on the shoulder telling him he is a disruptive force. In a confessional, Penn compares Eric to ten pounds of hamburger (in front of sled dogs, but I would compare him to ten pounds of hamburger in numerous contexts).
Oh no. Oh no, oh no, oh no. Trace is working on the graphics, and tells the graphic artist that everything looks perfect, but Melania's name is spelled "Milania" on the copy. Even though it is all over the room, on every bottle, and Dennis was spelling it out loud earlier in the day. Would Trace do this on purpose? Surely not, I think. Trace asks Dennis to sign off on the artwork, and to rely on Dennis for anything, particularly copy editing, is a fatal flaw. The camera keeps zooming in on it, to let us know that there is an egregious error.
The day, the day of the presentations, the teams walk into their respective rooms to see the final displays and artwork. Plan B loves their stuff, which probably doesn't have disastrous spelling errors. We are set up to believe that Lil Jon will notice Team Power's errors on the large poster, especially with the product name spelled correctly just below the misspelling. But Lil Jon doesn't see it, everyone feels great about what they did. The camera zooms in, yet again, on the difference between the two spellings. If there's one thing you should notice in this episode, it is that Team Power spelled Melania "Milania" at the top of that one poster.
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Plan B's presentation seems to be going well for Penn, until he says Melania is the line's "spokesperson." Judging by a few reaction shots, this is almost as big an error as spelling her name wrong. But no way is it as unforgivable. Then, Penn tells them about how much caviar they had, and says they were "maggoty" in it. He corrects himself, and Gary Busey steps in to talk about the way the product absorbs into your skin, and is "no longer a secret weapon, but a secret miracle."
"Okay," the Trumps say, excusing Plan B from the presentation room. , Team Power is up. Dennis introduces the boards, and hands it over to Brande. Brande starts talking about how the brand is for her, and every woman. The camera zooms in, yet again, to the misspelled name, and cuts away to Melania, who at least knows how to spell her own name. Back and forth, from Trump face to "Milania." Team Power leaves their abhorrent posters in the room for Melania to keep reacting to.
In the boardroom, it is anyone's and everyone's challenge to lose. Nobody really won this. Donald asks Trace to review Dennis as the project manager, and Trace says he doesn't remember Dennis delegating. Brande found a good way to turn Dennis's weaknesses into strengths. Donald says Brande did a good job presenting. No mention yet of the big turd in the room.
Donald asks Plan B how they feel it went, and Gary volunteers himself to be a spokesperson for the skincare line. With his spinning genitals and all. Marilu covers up for this with compliments for Donald's selection of wives.
The teams look at each other's work. And there it is. Stephen Baldwin brings up, loudly, that Melania's name is spelled incorrectly. You could argue that "Melania" is a crazy, rich person made-up name anyway, but as the name of the brand and the product, there's no excuse. Penn looks stunned, and relieved.
In the review, Eric penalizes Penn for referring to Melania as the spokesperson, when she has dedicated ten years of her life to reversing any signs of aging in those ten years. Dennis tries to jump on that, but it just doesn't measure up to misspelling someone's name. The display and presentation from Team Power was better, but the mistake too great. Dennis's team lost, obviously.
Penn's team heads back to the suite, by default. In the boardroom, Dennis blames the graphic artist. Trace agrees that it is an inexcusable mistake, but also chooses to blame "that little girl" who was working on the graphics. I would have spelled it with an "I," too, because that's how Teresa Giudice spells her daughter's name.
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By Carla Sparks
The teams look at each other's work. And there it is. Stephen Baldwin brings up, loudly, that Melania's name is spelled incorrectly. You could argue that "Melania" is a crazy, rich person made-up name anyway, but as the name of the brand and the product, there's no excuse. Penn looks stunned, and relieved.
In the review, Eric penalizes Penn for referring to Melania as the spokesperson, when she has dedicated ten years of her life to reversing any signs of aging in those ten years. Dennis tries to jump on that, but it just doesn't measure up to misspelling someone's name. The display and presentation from Team Power was better, but the mistake too great. Dennis's team lost, obviously.
Penn's team heads back to the suite, by default. In the boardroom, Dennis blames the graphic artist. Trace agrees that it is an inexcusable mistake, but also chooses to blame "that little girl" who was working on the graphics. I would have spelled it with an "I," too, because that's how Teresa Giudice spells her daughter's name.
So everyone is at fault for seeing "Melania" so many times that the word lost all meaning. Trace and Dennis are the most at fault, though. They should not blame "that little girl," for knowing how to use Photoshop when they could barely operate a computer. Donald offers Dennis to just bring Trace back and let Lil Jon and Brande go, and I have a feeling Lil Jon is about to be the only black person left on this show.
Trace argues, effectively, that had they spelled everything right it would have been a home run. He notes that he's embarrassed for all four of them, but Dennis signed off on those pieces of paper before they went to the printer. Then, Trace brings up how Dennis asked Melania about her bathroom.
Donald gives Dennis the "comeback player of the year" award for Celebrity Apprentice, but it is meaningless. Dennis is fired, and probably relieved. On his way out, Dennis tells Amanda the Receptionist that he "finally got fired." She notes this silently on her pad of paper. I want to see an exhaustive interview with Amanda. Who is she? What does she know? Would she be able to spell "Melania" correctly?
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