MNRS S1: The Apprentice

## Series Chronology

***The Apprentice*** is the first spinoff season of M&N's Reality Series, which premiered on July 9, 2023, and ended with Will J. being crowned the Apprentice over May W. at the Final Boardroom on August 7, 2023.

It is a format adaptation of NBC's *The Apprentice*, where each round players compete in teams or as individuals to complete and present difficult business-related tasks to earn safety avoid being sent into the Final Boardroom for potential firing.

## Production

*The Apprentice* was revealed as the name and format of the first spinoff season. Applications opened on June 28, 2023, and closed nine days later on July 7, 2023. Anyone was eligible to apply without restriction. 14 people applied, 0 were cut, and 14 went on to become the players competing in the game. The full cast was announced on July 8th, 2022, and the season premiered on July 9th, 2022.

The series is produced and hosted by .oldnewz with production assistance from mike.guy and yeehawmofo, and logo creation from .oldnewz.

## Format

Each episode consists of a Task, the Presentation Boardroom, and the Final Boardroom. For each task, teams will select a Project Manager. The Project Manager is responsible for running the team and submitting the end-product to Newz, myself, and Wyatt. Project Managers cannot be repeated until everyone on the team has been Project Manager at least once. Once everyone has been a Project Manager, then the same thing applies until everyone has done it twice.

At the Presentation Boardroom, both teams will present their projects to the judges. Newz, myself, and Wyatt will then ask questions, give our thoughts on the submissions, and ultimately declare a winning and losing team. The winning team earns safety and is immediately escorted from the Boardroom. The losing team's Project Manager must then select two other individuals on their team to attend the Final Boardroom, where they will each have to plead their case on why they shouldn't be fired. At the Final Boardroom, Advisors Mike and Wyatt will give advice on who should be fired, but ultimately Newz will decide which candidate has made the worst case and they will be fired.

This process will continue until only four candidates remain, at which point the teams will disband and everyone will now work individually. At the Final Four, a difficult semi-final task will be given, and the two worst-performing candidates will be fired. The final two candidates will then face off in one Final Task to determine the winner of *The Apprentice*.

## Game Summary

### Episode Guide

* **^Note 1** : Sammy was fired before proceeding to the Final Boardroom.
* **^Note 2** : Project Manager Andi was fired before proceeding to the Final Boardroom.
* **^Note 3** : The entire Hydra team attended the Final Boardroom, but ultimately no one was fired.
* **^Note 4** : Despite winning the task, two members of the Hydra team were fired after expressing their desire to no longer play the game, and no Final Boardroom was held.
* **^Note 5** : Goof was fired before Team Hydra was given the opportunity to keep or fire Eli.
* **^Note 6** : The remaining members of Team Hydra were given the choice between keeping Eli and sending Team Phoenix to the Final Boardroom, or firing Eli and receiving a random member of Team Phoenix. Team Hydra chose to fire Eli, and received Joey from Team Phoenix.
* **^Note 7** : Matt did not submit for the task and was fired before proceeding to the Final Boardroom.

### Episode Progress

**Key**
     The candidate won the Final Task.
     The candidate lost the Final Task.
     The candidate won the Task.
     The candidate won the Task as Project Manager on their team.
     The candidate lost the Task as Project Manager on their team.
     The candidate did not win the Task, but was not brought back to the Final Boardroom.
     The candidate did not win the Task and was brought back to the Final Boardroom, but was not fired.
     The candidate was fired.
     The candidate was immediately fired without proceeding to the Final Boardroom.
     The candidate lost as Project Manager and was fired.
     The candidate quit the competition.
* Vertical rectangles represent the team each player was in for that episode.

## Weekly Summary

### Week 1: Sweets 'n' Doughminos

* **Task**: Come up with a new dessert item and dipping sauce for Domino's.
* **Hydra Project Manager**: Matt
* **Phoenix Project Manager**: Eli
* **Winning Team**: Hydra
	+ **Reasons For Win**: Newz and the advisors felt that their choice of Mini Cheesecake Bites was more original and fit Domino's branding. Their price breakdown and general reasoning for target audience and overall choices were commendable and praiseworthy.
* **Losing Team**: Phoenix
	+ **Reasons For Loss**: While they had the better presentation and dipping sauce idea, their S'mores idea was critized by Newz and the advisors - specifically the choice to serve the dessert at room temperature and suggesting that consumers can heat up the S'mores at home. Furthermore, their overall camping theme didn't seem to really align with Domino's and came across as weaker overall.
* **Sent to Boardroom**: Eli, Joey, Skinny
* **Fired**:
	+ **Skinny**: While Eli was the most responsible for the loss, everyone agreed that he should not be fired as he had contributed the most amount of effort towards completing the task. Joey and Skinny were both seen as contributing next to nothing, but Skinny had been more active overall. Ultimately, Joey was spared after Skinny failed to make an appearance at the Final Boardroom and defend herself.

### Week 2: Three Day Getaway

* **Task**: Design and pitch a three-day vacation/tour within a country of their choice.
* **Hydra Project Manager**: Sean
* **Phoenix Project Manager**: May
* **Winning Team**: Phoenix
	+ **Reasons For Win**: Team Phoenix's choice of Sri Lanka was seen as smarter and more original compared to the other team's choice of Italy, which is heavily saturated with touring companies. The name of "Sri Lacruise", the accompanying logo, and overall detail for their three-day schedule were also praised. Despite criticism surrounding the threat-level of traveling to Sri Lanka and an itinerary event that started at 3:00 AM, the Advisors agreed that their tour was overall better than the other teams.
* **Losing Team**: Hydra
	+ **Reasons For Loss**: Despite having the more visually appealing presentation, not enough reason was provided as to why someone would want to use their tour over others. This lack of reasoning was very harmful to their presentation as Italy, specifically Rome, has a very competitive touring industry. The choice of Italy, specifically Rome, was also criticized for being very unoriginal and safe. Finally, they failed to provide the sample image advertisement, which was one of the base requirements.
* **Sent to Boardroom**: Andi, Javon, Sean
* **Fired**:
	+ **Sammy**: When Newz asked who was responsible for creating the sample image advertisement, there was a lot of confusion during the Boardroom. Sammy, who had contributed nothing up until this point in the game, immediately stood up and declared that she had been responsible for not submitting the sample image advertisement (a lie to save her teammates) and should be fired. Newz happily obliged and fired her on the spot, before proceeding to the Final Boardroom.
	+ **Javon**: During the Final Boardroom, accusations flew around about who was responsible for the team's loss. Andi was seen as someone who positively contributed to the project, and was quickly ruled out from being fired. When asked about what he contributed to the task, Javon stated that he worked on the presentation, but when pressed for more details his responses were vague. Additionally, Andi was unable to confirm if this was true and Sean contested that Javon actually helped on the presentation. Ultimately, the advisors didn't see Sean as being solely responsible for the team's loss and felt that he was able to defend his case better than Javon.

### Week 3: Viral Visionaries

* **Task**: Create a new Youtube content house. Teams had to choose the Youtubers and create merch designs, choose sponsors, and create a sample advertisement video.
* **Hydra Project Manager**: Will
* **Phoenix Project Manager**: Goof
* **Winning Team**: Hydra
	+ **Reasons For Win**: Both teams were heavily criticized for their choice of YouTubers, but Team Hydra was seen as outclassing the other team on the rest of the base requirements for the task: target audience, merchandise, sponsors, and the video advertisement.
* **Losing Team**: Phoenix
	+ **Reasons For Loss**: The Advisors thought that their Fortnite theme was a great idea, however, Newz strongly felt that their were better options for their YouTubers and that the assembled creators were seen more as Twitch streamers. Wyatt also felt that it was a questionable decision to include some content creators with shady backgrounds, specifically Clix. Overall, the rest of their submission was deemed as weaker in comparison to the other teams.
* **Sent to Boardroom**: Austin, Dylan, Goof
* **Fired**:
	+ **Dylan**: Both Austin and Goof presented strong cases for why neither of them should be fired. Austin made the argument that he strongly contested many of the choices that were made, and that Goof was responsible for green lighting these decisions. Goof, on the other hand, claimed that Austin and Dylan did not contribute much in general and should have stepped up more. In the end, Newz felt that Goof should be spared after he worked hard on the task and did a fantastic job with the presentation. Due to real life circumstances, Dylan was unable to be as active as he would have liked. He was unable to attend the Final Boardroom to defend himself, thus leading to him being fired.

### Week 4: New House Who Dis

* **Task**: Pitch a new theme for CBS Big Brother house. As part of the submission, each team had to think of twists to accompany the theme.
* **Hydra Project Manager**: Andi
* **Phoenix Project Manager**: Austin
* **Winning Team**: Phoenix
	+ **Reasons For Win**: The other team didn't submit anything.
* **Losing Team**: Hydra
	+ **Reasons For Loss**: Submitted nothing
* **Sent to Boardroom**: Eli, Goof, Matt, Will
* **Fired**:
	+ **Andi**: Was the Project Manager and was inactive the entire time. Newz called him a clown in the firing.

### Week 5: Hidden Gems

* **Task**: Following the steps of "Welcome to Wrexham", teams had to find a non tier-1 sports team for Newz to acquire and improve into a successful team.
* **Hydra Project Manager**: Matt
* **Phoenix Project Manager**: Joey
* **Winning Team**: Hydra
	+ **Reasons For Win**: The only reason Hydra squeaked out the win was because their overall plan to turn the team around and initial selection of Rochester Red Wings was better thought out.
* **Losing Team**: Phoenix
	+ **Reasons For Loss**: Phoenix made a strong pitch but their choice of moving a minor league baseball team to Austin was very questionable as Austin already has tons of sports teams. However, they were also praised for their jersey designs and presentation design.
* **Sent to Boardroom**: None
* **Fired**:
	+ **Goof**: Proof was provided of Goof actively mentioning in other discord channels how he's done with the Apprentice.
	+ **Eli**: Eli, while active, showed to have a tough time dealing with all the stress. So it became evident that for his mental health, it would be better if he was fired.

### Week 6: Drop It Like It's Shipped

* **Task**: Each team had to find create a dropshipping store by finding 3 products on Alibaba or AliExpress.
* **Hydra Project Manager**: Joey
* **Phoenix Project Manager**: ~~Ashanti~~ May
* **Winning Team**: Hydra
	+ **Reasons For Win**: Although Wyatt thought they should have lost, Newz felt like Hydra's attention to detail was praiseworthy and really highlighted their plan to turn a profit. It was also commendable to see them use an Ansoff Matrix to explain their marketing plan. The only criticisms by Newz and the advisors was the lack of connection between their 3 items and their overall brand. Furthermore, even if they chose good items, one issue was their choice of "Right2You" as a name was unclear and very generic.
* **Losing Team**: Phoenix
	+ **Reasons For Loss**: Phoenix had strong branding by targeting pet owners however, the biggest issue by Newz was the lack of attention in pricing where a one-time discount for first purchases by AliExpress was used as the regular purchase price for one of the items. Furthermore, their presentation didn't go into much details on their how their drop shipping site was better than the competitors. It was highly entertaining to see May present it all through a drawn slide-show.
* **Sent to Boardroom**: Austin, May, Sean
* **Quit**:
	+ **Ashanti**: Due to an unexpected personal emergency, Project Manager Ashanti was sadly forced to withdraw from the game. May stepped in and replaced them as the Project Manager for the round.
* **Fired**:
	+ **Sean**: While May was under heavy fire by Newz and the advisors for being the sole reason why Phoenix lost the task (as they did everything by themselves), May made the case that they did a really great job considering they stepped up for Project Manager halfway through the round when Ashanti quit. Newz agreed that if it weren't for the quit, May would have been fired but he decided to look at overall season resume, which Sean fell short on.

### Week 7: Heard All Around the World

* **Task**: Each team had to create and plan-out a one day music festival
* **Hydra Project Manager**: Will
* **Phoenix Project Manager**: Austin
* **Winning Team**: Phoenix
	+ **Reasons For Win**: While Wyatt criticized Phoenix's choice of Paramore as a headlining act, Newz and Mike thought it was a good selection due to the festival being in Brazil (as Paramore is huge there). Furthermore, their accompanying video and breakdown of different ticket packages was praised by Newz and the advisors.
* **Losing Team**: Hydra
	+ **Reasons For Loss**: Hydra did an exceptional job in scouting the location, venue and vendors however, their choices of second-tier artists was deemed highly implausible as they had Coldplay and Olivia Rodrigo. Furthermore, another general criticism was their generosity in ticket prices as Newz and the advisors felt like they could have gotten more money.
* **Sent to Boardroom**: Joey, Matt, Will
* **Fired**:
	+ **Joey**: When discussing the breakdown of who did what, it became evident that majority of the bad choices fell on Joey's stubbornness, specifically his Coldplay choice, as Matt had warned him that they were too popular to not headline. Furthermore, their set list was deemed too diverse as they had ASAP Rocky performing, who was also chosen by Joey.

### Week 8: InnovaSAAS

* **Task**: The teams were broken and each individual had to think of a SAAS business, alongside the logistics of cloud platform, road map, etc.
* **Advanced to Final**: Will
	+ **Reasons For Win**: Will's CRM business pitch was strong from start to finish and was arguably the strongest presentation throughout the season. Newz and the advisors had a tough time coming up with complaints. Mike did question the business's viability however, Wyatt backed Will's idea, stating that current businesses aren't focusing on service, the way Will's CRM business is.
* **Losing Candidates**: Austin, Matt, May
	+ **Reasons For Austin's Loss**: The idea, while good, lacked depth and understanding from Austin.
	+ **Reasons For Matt's Loss**: Didn't submit
	+ **Reasons For May's Loss**: May's idea was fleshed out but, Newz and the advisors felt like it was almost too risky as it was following similar footsteps of Google Stadia. While May made good pitches on how to avoid Stadia's pitfalls, Newz and the advisors weren't so sure on the plausibility of it all.
* **Sent to Boardroom**: Austin, May
* **Fired**:
	+ **Austin**: As stated before, the idea to offer shoppers a cheaper sale price on another website was good however, Austin was not able to correctly identify his main competitors and furthermore, didn't know what gave his product the edge over Honey. When questioned, it quickly became apparent that Austin did not have a good grasp of what he was pitching.
	+ **Matt**: Didn't submit

### Week 9: PR Palooza

* **Task**: For the Final task, each finalist had to set up an exclusive charity gala for a charity of their choice.
* **Teams**: Each finalist was given the chance to draft two contestants each. May recruited Ashanti and Austin while Will recruited Joey and Matt.
	+ **May's Team**: Ashanti, Austin, May
	+ **Will's Team**: Joey, Matt, Will
* **The Apprentice**:
	+ **Will**: Will's victory did not come easy as his "Shine a Light" charity gala was questioned heavily by Newz and the advisors however, his answers cleared up some major issues. What helped seal his win was his major improvements on the graphics end which was previously underwhelming for previous tasks.
* **Fired**:
	+ **May**: While May's multi-year gala named "The Clash" was very appealing, the combination of a very long presentation (lasted 30+ mins and advisors zoned out in multiple segments) and some long answers to questions, it became apparent that they did not improve on a season-long complaint of Newz and the advisors surrounding their brevity and conciseness. In the end, Newz felt that a pitch as long as May's would have ended after five minutes if it was presented in front of the real Trump.