by David McAlpine
 


Last time on The Celebrity Apprentice, the world exploded when it became high school all over again for Melissa Rivers. The popular girls, Brande and Annie, outcasted her in the boardroom and she got fired, bringing the wrath of her and her mother upon all the contestants.

Now, Brande's all fired up. She's got her game face on, which really doesn't look like any other face that she has. In her words, "game on." But she really won't have anyone to fight with if Joan doesn't come back, so I don't really understand her challenge.

Clint gets to give money to his charity, which is fighting to get rid of a disease that killed his niece. His brother shows up and they share some heartfelt moments. Hurray for donations!

Clint, Jesse, Annie and Brande all show up to the beginning of the task, but Joan does not. At least, until she shows up on the elevator at the last minute because of a "late taxi." How...not staged? Either way, she looks like she wants to kill someone, so I'd invite Brande to rethink her challenge to Joan.

The task this week is to create a 30-second radio commercial and a jingle for everyone's favorite tuna brand, Chicken of the Sea. The look on Annie's face is priceless when she turns to KOTU and realizes that they have a Grammy winner while she has...Brande. She steps up to be the Project Manager for Athena, while Clint takes the role for KOTU (surprise, surprise).

Annie and Brande start making fun of how screwed they really are. Neither of them know the first thing about music, so they just kind of look at each other and laugh a lot. They get a good overview of the product from the executives and get to work. When KOTU meets with the heads, it turns out one of them loves Clint Black. How unbiased! Of course, Joan steps in with a dose of reality, voicing her concerns that the ad won't be funny because Clint is heading it.

Brande starts singing her own tune, attempting to break glass all over Manhattan. Annie looks like she wants to crawl under a rock and die, but she's still confident they can beat KOTU based on their understanding of the product. KOTU hits the recording studio right away, where Clint nails down the jingle and Joan and Jesse write the ad.

Annie decides that Athena should do the ad first because if they get that done, it may give them more confidence to get over the hill of making and recording their jingle. They struggle to get below 30 seconds, but finally make it fit. KOTU, on the other hand, starts off with the jingle, which Clint seems to have complete control over. Joan doesn't like the slowness of the jingle, so she tries to use Jesse to talk to Clint. Clint, surprisingly, listens to the suggestion and records a quicker jingle.

After KOTU's ad is finished, Joan is adamant about adding comedy and wants to add "cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck...splash!" to the end of the jingle. Because it's Chicken...of the Sea. Get it? She seems to enjoy it, but Clint is less than amused. He says no, but Joan decides say it at the end of their playback, anyway.

Athena wraps up their radio commercial and it seems tight. They really crammed a lot of information into 30 seconds, especially since it's a conversation between two soccer moms. Joan and Jesse decide to take a snappy approach by creating a "did you know?" segment, but their voice actors can't seem to keep up with the tempo, so Joan and Jesse do it themselves.

As Athena sits down to work on their jingle, Annie starts to sound less and less confident. In fact, she wont shut up about how she doesn't have that "I'm going to kick the other team's ass" feeling. She sits down with their musician and struggles working out the tune and lyrics. The more she works with it, though, the better she thinks it sounds, to the point where she makes it the greatest accomplishment of her life. Now she can't shut up about how great she is.

Before the presentation, Joan still wants to add in more comedy. She tries the clucking idea, but it doesn't work. Then she suggests she make swimming motions across the front of the stage, holding their sign. Another no from Clint.

Athena's presentation ends up very solid, with Annie selling every point the executives told them to, from their demographic to everything about their jingle. Annie isn't sure she won, but apparently she's happy enough to leave (though I doubt that). KOTU's presentation is also very well put together, including a defiant Joan Rivers walking across the front of the stage holding a sign in front of her face. Clint's jingle is obviously more professional, but a lot slower and more country-esque.

Everyone is happy with their result, especially Annie, who is out of her mind that she thinks she has songwriting talent. Donald likes both, as do the executives. The executives didn't like the extreme straightforwardness of Athena's ad, but they also didn't like that KOTU made a country-themed jingle. Donald gives the win to Athena and Annie starts overreacting. I mean, crying.

It's obvious the issue with KOTU was the jingle, because it was too slow and limited the demographic. Joan tells Donald about her clucking idea, and no one seems to be laughing. Annie comments that it's about "as funny as Hitler." Zing! Looks like the poker player has a sense of humor, too. Without a second thought, Donald fires Clint, whittling it down to four.

Some awkward moments and shuffling of celebrities later, Donald reveals that Piers is interviewing them all and the final two will be decided in a matter of minutes. Panic! Brande is called in first, who comes at Piers very defensively. She's plays the blonde model card, feeling underestimated.

Joan comes at Piers like a hawk, very sharp and to the point. She claims she'll kill to win the last task if it's between her and Annie (and I don't think there's one viewer who doesn't believe her). Annie talks up her "Joan is a reincarnation of Hitler" theory to Piers, which makes her the third person that Piers thinks is taking everything way too personally. Jesse is last, and Piers is less than impressed. Piers doesn't understand why Jesse won't use his wife or her connections, but Jesse says he wants to keep his personal life and the game separate. Looks like Jesse is going to be out first.

Annie backhands Joan, saying she's love to compete with Joan in the final two because she's the worst at fundraising. Brande jumps in, saying she's the only viable candidate to compete against Annie. Joan scoffs at that and Donald fires Brande, who leaves knowing she couldn't have fought any harder.

Since it's been made pretty clear Annie is in the final two, it's between Jesse, the guy who hasn't called in any of his connections, or Joan, who hasn't raised a lot of money. Donald's pick to fire? Jesse, because he hasn't fundraised, either.

Predictable? Sort of. I don't know if anyone wanted to outright say it from the beginning, because there were a couple dark horses, but our final two is Joan Rivers and Annie Duke. Annie won the last battle between the two, but can she win the war?

The three-hour, unnecessarily long but still entertaining finale of the Celebrity Apprentice 2 airs Sunday on NBC at 8/7c.

(Image courtesy of NBC)

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