Take Another Little Piers of My Heart

In a showdown about as thrilling as you'd expect from two competitors helping each other on the same task, Piers Morgan won the battle billed (by The Donald, at least) as The Ultimate Fight Between Good and Evil. Uh huh. What this basically boiled down to is that country star Trace Adkins is an absolute gentleman with a great cause and a few fairly well-off friends, while Piers is an absolute prat with a great cause and a ton of filthy rich friends.

Which is all well and good, really – you kind of know what you're getting if you sign up to watch The Celebrity Apprentice. Unfortunately, what you're also signing up for is a hackily produced live finale which amounted to Donald and his kids sitting on a fake table on the Saturday Night Live set while the taped episode played out on TVs in the studio, serving as an uneasy laugh track for the home audience.

Say what you want about Survivor (and what I say is that even tho this season is getting better ratings and raves, I can no longer muster up interest in watching a bunch of Type As sit on the beach and eat bugs) but they do their finale well. There's a healthy amount of cheese, as the taped ep often ends with host Jeff Probst apparently spanning the space/time continuum by leaving tribal council months in the past and showing up in the present seconds later wearing exactly the same outfit. But they reserve the live stuff for the reveal of the winner and then a reunion show Q&A with those who didn't Survive. Works.

The Apprentice, however, flips that formula on its ear, presenting two hours of live table-sitting and awkward narration capped by an extremely brief (and seemingly redundant) boardroom, a final hiring/firing celebrated by a smattering of shiny confetti, and a promise – or threat – from Trump that we can join them next year, because they're gonna be around for a looooooong time.

Frankly, I hope he sticks with the Celebrity version of The Apprentice, as it brings some interest to a flagging franchise. Round up another odd collection of has-beens, never-weres and who-are-theys and have at it. It's pass-the-time fun with a nice charitable angle. Just leave Omarosa at homearosa. Enough already.