Trumped: The Apprentice Special – The Previous Seasons

Features, Shows

Lets start this week by taking a brief look at what happened during the previous seasons of the show…

Season One
The first season was lightning in a bottle, and the season that other “win a job” shows are inevitably compared to. Despite producing a stinker of a reality show for NBC called The Restaurant, Mark Burnett returned with this mid-season show centred around self-promoter extraordinaire Donald Trump, featuring a format similar to his hit CBS show, Survivor.

The show was an immediate hit, averaging around 20 million viewers, ranking in the top ten shows and making “You’re fired” into a hit catchphrase (which Trump then trademarked – that had to piss off Vince McMahon). The first winner of The Apprentice, Bill Rancic, is still a member of the Trump Organization, and has appeared in many of the following seasons as an associate during the Boardroom.

We also got our first Apprentice “showmance”, as candidates Nick Warnock and Amy Henry got close during the season, and made it all the way to the Final Four together.

Season Two
Capitalizing on the breakout success of the show, season two debuted in the fall of 2004-05, featuring the male vs. female format of the initial season, 2 additional candidates and a few new twists – an exemption from getting fired, and the ability to bring two or three people to the boardroom (as opposed to the previous two). The ratings showed a slight drop, but the show remained in the top 20 with around 16 million viewers.

A few things stand out in this season. First was that the winner, Kelly Perdew, was greatly favoured by fans and fellow candidates over runner-up Jennifer Massey, whom Trump really seemed determined to hire. Second was that the finale was probably one of the worst live reality finale’s I’ve seen, and I’d consider it THE worst if it were not for the finale of Treasure Hunters in the summer of 2006.

The final thing is Raj Bhakta. Raj was, far and away, the “breakout” candidate of the show as far as capturing the audience’s imagination. Sure, the bowtie and cane helped, but what he’ll be remembered most for was his (usually rejected) perusal of women he encountered during the show. Mind you, the fact that he got more than a “you can’t afford me” from Anna Kournikova is impressive in my books.

Season Three
The third season started in January 2005, and featured a twist in team selection – book smarts (college degrees) vs. street smarts (entrepreneurial backgrounds). It sounded good in theory, but in reality, Trump had in previous seasons noted his bias towards those with college degrees (although he also preferred that people do something with those degrees). It was also rather apparent that Trump wanted to hire a woman in this season, so it was no real surprise that Kendra Todd became the third winner (Kendra being one of three women that, given the editing, appeared to stand a realistic chance of being hired).

This was also the first Apprentice to feature a reality television sophomore. Kristen Kirchner was previously blonde and (shockingly) disliked on the cult favourite reality competition Murder in Small Town X. She was fired early, but returned for the final task.

Season Four
The fourth season continued the ratings slide, dropping from #15 in season three all the way down to #38, with an average of 11 million viewers watching. This had to be a bit of a disappointment for Trump, as he “hand picked” the candidates for this season. The teams were once again organized in the male vs. female format of the first two seasons. A new twist was introduced so that the winning manager would receive an exemption from firing only if the other team members agreed to it. Another occurred when the final two candidates were allowed to choose their teams from among all the previously fired candidates.

The season is memorable for two reasons. The first is the number of multiple firings. Four people were fired in week 6, two in week 8 and two more in week 11, which left Randal Pinkett and Rebecca Jarvis as the Final Two by default. The second is when Randal (after winning the job) noted that the show was called The Apprentice, not The Apprenti in response to Trump asking him if he should hire Rebecca. Aside from that… nothing really special. Randal is bloody smart though.

Season Five
The fifth season of The Apprentice saw a move to Mondays, where the ratings eroded even further (despite following the red-hot rookie show Deal or No Deal), finishing with around 10 million viewers and 51st place among the 2005-06 shows.

Once again, Trump “hand-picked” the candidates, which included people from the UK and Canada. Twists included teams created through a schoolyard pick’em and the rescinding of the exemption. We also got another “showmance” as winner Sean Yazbeck got involved with Tammy Trenta. The show itself was more of the same, and Sean was hired after an online vote showed that he was an overwhelming favourite over runner-up Lee Bienstock. Must’ve been the accent. Lee ended up hired by Trump anyways (after the show ended), so good for him. And we have Roxanne Wilson as a recurring columnist, and she’s done a great job thus far.

Season Six debuts on Sunday, January 7th. Will a move to the City of Angels provide a much-needed spark to The Apprentice? Tune in to find out!

Sir Linksalot: The Apprentice

Kevin has been an Insider since 2003, writing on a variety of topics ranging from The Amazing Race to Mixed Martial Arts. His current hobbies include Fantasy Football, Sporcle, travelling, making liberal use of his DVR and wondering what the heck he's gonna do when his two daughters are old enough to date. You can follow Kevin on Twitter (@starvenger).