This week’s episode begins with Surya telling how happy he is with his decision to move to Arrow.  Interestingly the rest of the group isn’t as impressed with Surya as he is with himself.  James (especially) and Frank aren’t shy about their thoughts about Surya.

The candidates meet the Donald with Bill Rancic by his side.  They meet in Echo Park with a GNC executive.  The task is to put on a halftime show for a Los Angeles Galaxy soccer game.

Arrow starts brainstorming in the van.  Surya is taking notes as ideas fly.  James is incensed about Surya’s style.

At Kinetic, Kristine becomes the project manager.  The all female team gets off to a smoother start and also brainstorms while riding in the van.  Muna and Kristine are at odds over how the team will function but they move on.

At Arrow, Tim had the idea of having a boxing match.  James, predictably is at odds with Surya.  James manages to always have something negative to say.  As the halftime approaches, Arrow seems very chaotic.

Kinetic goes first with a vitamin Olympics theme.   The event came off good.  Arrow was next with the boxing theme.  The Arrow exhibition didn’t look as good to me.

Shortly we will find out what Donald and the GNC executive thought.

When the results are revealed, Kinetic won easily.  The team was thrilled with the win and the reward was to golf with Trump at one of his prestige courses.  In addition to playing with Donald, each one received a set of Taylormade Donald J Trump golf clubs.  The women were surprisingly good at golf.  Angela was (not so surprisingly) especially good.  Donald paid a lot of attention to Angela.

Surya has a between the bushes survival strategy discussion with Kinetic.  He knows his team will turn on him in the boardroom.

Surya’s concern is correct and all of the team places blame on him.  There is some discussion of James being difficult and Tim for the solo idea from brainstorming being his.  Bill is particularly annoyed by James and puts pressure on him a time or two.  Surya is getting the most pressure but he reminds Trump that his 5 and 2 record is the best of the candidates.  Surya decides to bring James and Tim back to the final boardroom.

Tim obviously can’t be fired.  He has romantic interest in Nicole to pursue; although this week, the only romantic interests that made the cuts was Trump’s affection for Angela.

In the final boardroom there is a lot of pressure on Surya.  Surya was aggressive on his feet in defending himself.  Thanks to Bill, there is also a lot of pressure on James.  Only once did the pressure turn to Tim.  It was correctly pointed out that Tim shouldn’t suffer for having the one and only brainstorming idea.  It might have even worked if the production had come off smoother.  As the boardroom progresses the tide turns more and more against James.  Then Surya inadvertently commits boardroom suicide.  It wasn’t quite as bad as Derek last week but I think Surya wishes he could put his last comment back in his mouth.  He said he was a better follower than leader.

Trump zeroed in quickly and James was saved.  I don’t think Surya could have survived to the end but I would have preferred to see James fired tonight.  But Surya controlled his own destiny on this one.

See you next week.

This week begans with Aimee leaving after being fired on the previous episode.  She is giving Derek the look of death.  Derek says, “We just got rid of another piece of Riff Raff.  (Hmmm, that name seems familiar.  Wasn’t that the butler on Rocky Horror Picture Show?)

While they are talking, Jenn volunteers to be the next Project Manager.  Derek says off-screen that Jenn is the last of the riff raff.

Next we see James and Frank both picking Surya apart.  Tim weighs in on Surya also.  Surya is seriously short on allies and I am not sure he realizes it.

The teams meet Trump in Beverly Hills on Rodeo Drive in front of all of the ritzy stores.  Randall Pinkett is there in place of Ivanka.  I still haven’t forgotten what he did to Rebecca in the last episode of season 4.  I’m sure she has found success at whatever she is doing.  She is that kind of person.

Anyway, the task is to create an owner experience for preferred guest to introduce a new Lexus model.  Each team has a $50,000 budget (which probably wouldn't come close to buying one of the cars they are featuring).  Kinetic comes up with the theme of a sixth sense of luxury but had difficulty developing it.  Ideas ranged from having a tarot card reader, a magician, and go-carts.  The go-cart idea was poopooed but there were no better ideas.  Heidi and Muna learned extensively about the car but the rest of the team floundered.

At Arrow, Surya was busy at the whiteboard.  His group mostly ignored him.  Tim and Nicole were gazing into each other’s eyes, of course.

At Kinetic, Derek and Angela are working on graphic designs.  For reasons not clear to me, the design is delayed and they are limited in banners for the presentation.  Derek makes it clear that it wasn’t his fault saying, “Angela is responsible.  I report to her.”  I'm not sure the buck has ever stopped at Derek. 

Over at Arrow we hear the predictable, “Oh Tim, you’re the best” from guess who… Nicole.

During the presentation, Arrow’s prototype car battery runs low and all of the special features go haywire.  At Kinetic, Jenn is babbling and has difficulty reading the monitors due to glare.  The presentation comes off very sloppy.  The guests who participate in the go-cart event seem to enjoy it but they didn't rate it as conveying the luxury of Lexus.  The magician looks like a hoodlum and is only on screen momentarily.

At Arrow, there is a demonstration of the self parallel parking feature.  Nicole states that this is sick (the car being able to parallel park itself).  [I too find this very interesting.  Suppose you go take the driving test and they ask you to parallel park and the car parks itself.  How about a car that drives itself to the gas station and fills itself with gas.  Or one that gets a job and pays for the gas.]

After the event, it isn’t surprising that Arrow won.  Arrow won a jam session with Snoop Dogg, who according to Trump is an astute business man and a hip-hop artist.  Arrow is very excited especially Surya who says Snoop Dogg is his favorite. 

At the reward event, James and Frank attempt freestyle rap.  I am not a rap fan but I know enough to realize that James and Frank need to keep other career options open.  At the event, Surya stood by the wall and barely spoke.  He seemed very preoccupied with something.

Back at the boardroom for Kinetic was interesting.  Trump asked Derek what he thought went wrong.  Derek started out saying that he was white-trash and couldn’t really say what went wrong.  Trump questioned him about this and he went on and on about being white-trash.  Trump promptly fired him for being stupid.  [Boardroom rule #7  Don’t commit boardroom suicide.]

Some years back there was MASH.  I am talking about the movie that predated the very cleaned up TV show by the same name.  A song in the movie was “Suicide is Painless”.  The same tune was used in the opener for the TV show but the words were omitted as part of the cleanup.  I’m not sure boardroom suicide is quite so painless for Derek.

Somewhat to the surprise of the rest of Kinetic, the boardroom resumes.  There is a lot of focus on Jenn’s botched presentation.  Then there is focus on Angela for lack of marketing.  The toughest focus is on Jenn and she was feeling quite vunerable.  Jenn looks to Surya for support.  Surya, who hasn’t spoken a word yet, says, “I didn’t want to interrupt”.  Trump says, “I don’t mind if you interrupt, just say something.”  Moments later, Randall starts talking and Trump says, “Wait Randall”.  Randall resumes, “Derek was against the go-carts after you brainstormed”.  Trump cuts in again, “Excuse me Randall…Enough…Enough”.  It seems Surya is supposed to interrupt and Randall isn’t.  Go figure.

There is a little discussion about who Jenn will bring to the final board room then Trump decides to fire her on the spot.  I think for the first time this season, everyone was cordial after the firing.  Jenn and the team wished each other well.  [Boardroom rule #8  It doesn’t hurt to show a little class on the way out.]

As everyone is leaving the room, Trump chides Angela for a poor performance.  I am thinking that Angela would be smart to be Project Manager next week and a good one at that.

More to follow after another episode.