The unreality grind goes on, The Apprentice (BBC1, Wednesday 9pm) back piping more human offal into pinstripe casings misleadingly marked 'dynamo'.

The series six opener took that sausage-factory approach to its logical conclusion, pitting the boys' bargain bangers against the girls' gourmet efforts. Shockingly, it turned out people would rather eat sausages made from real meat than condoms stuffed with sawdust.

The blokes went for the minimum 42% meat that legally separates sausages from abattoir sweepings. They got royally stiffed by a savvy Smithfield trader and ended up with a product even Mexican drug mules would think twice about swallowing.

And there was production-line strife for the girls, shrill harpies whose manicured talons were designed for gouging rivals' eyes, not fluffing a plump wurst.

Their quality fare edged it, though sales were oddly close. Brits will ultimately eat anything suggestively shaped if you yell at them enough.

The chaps were more interested in their own personal sausage-fest anyway, compulsively whipping out their CVs like randy chimps to see who had the meatiest. There were more chipolatas than Cumberlands on show. But then anyone with half a brain wouldn't swap a real job for a one-in-16 shot at playing Smithers to the increasingly Burns-like Lord Sugar.

Amid the bankers and failed salesmen, a petulant human-hedgehog hybrid calling itself The Brand stood out, his confidence as mystifying as his virulent mauve shirt. He emerged from boardroom sparring with Sugar about as well as his spiny brethren typically do when jousting with an oncoming lorry. Yet he somehow survived Sugar's verbal debagging, while team leader Dan shoutiest of the omega males was returned to Smithfield to become idiot pâté.

Of course, finding fault with the show's annual roster of delusional prats is like shooting fish in a barrel. Yet being stuffed in a cask and blasted with a shotgun is too good for these insufferable malcontents.

The cruellest, and therefore fairest, fate would be to spend the whole series in each other's company. In that sense, Dan the departed is already the winner.

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