Tycoon Tower

Congratulations to ITV. They've managed to rip off another TV show. First came Torchwood, then came Primeval. First came Deal or No Deal, then came For The Rest Of Your Life. First came The Apprentice, then came the wonderous Tycoon (Tuesday, 9pm).

Tycoon has been advertised all week as Dragon's Den meets The Apprentice. Multi-millionaire and self-made smug bastard Peter Jones has been kind enough to choose six people to start their own businesses. In fact, he's so generous, he's investing £10,000 in each of them! Brilliant! The only flaw is each one of their ideas for a brand new scheme or invention seems to exist already. I don't know if you agree with me. Let's go through the list shall we.

First we meet duo Kathy and Helen. They are a couple of girl gardeners (in other words, unemployed). Their entrepreneur-tastic idea is to make a bunch of gardening tools for girls. What would fall into this category then? How about pink wellies. These two girls are seriously suggesting selling pink wellies as an original idea. I've seen pink wellies. I'm pretty sure they exist already. But, they seem pretty confident that their idea will make millions. Next up on the list is Elizabeth who wants to invent a new Vodka Juice Drink aimed at girls. Her plan is to use fresh fruit juice like orange and pineapple. Again, I draw a blank. I had a night shift at a pub on Sunday, and I'm pretty sure I made a couple of vodka and oranges.

We finish with some model whose name I didn't catch because it kept showing us images of her in a bikini.

Out of the six teams, my favourite is Justin. He lives in "Worcester in Worcestershire", and has come up with the most brilliant invention. A plastic bag... that you put other plastic bags into! How original is that idea? It's so brilliant, my own Mother also came up with this idea about ten years ago, and now we can't put anything in the airing cupboard for all the plastic bags filled with other plastic bags crammed inside of it. Justin also claims to have invented recycling. Justin is brilliant.

Next we move onto fitness instructor Ian. He's invented, well... designed, the next future Boy's Toy. A remote-controlled helicopter! But it's not just a normal remote-controlled helicopter.. it's for indoors! Ian has essentially invented smashed vases. Kudos to Ian. It's still better than 17-year old Tom's idea to create a newspaper aimed at teenagers and schoolkids. Hate to break it to you Tom, but that's what The Sun is for. We finish with some model whose name I didn't catch because it kept showing us images of her in a bikini. She wants to invent hair extensions that you just clip onto your hair. Now I know this already exists. If it doesn't turn out that this show was actually filmed in 1998, I don't think I'll be impressed by anything that features in it at all.

Now, the show wasn't too bad. It was an enjoyable watch, and would be mocked on TV Burp if it was still on the air. The downsides to it involved a rather loud musical backdrop underneath each of the character's backstories. It really didn't work.

*Sounds of violins and drums and stuff*

"Yes, I want to design a remote controlled helicopter"

*Choir singing dramatically*

There's also the brilliant name of the building where all the Tycoons-in-waiting worked. "Tycoon Tower". It's such an exciting name. I'm also pretty sure that's where the Animaniacs lived.

After watching 55 minutes of these idiots dawdle around wondering why the public don't want to buy pink wellies, it came to the exciting climax: who would Peter give a further £20,000 to? Well, the answer would be Ian, the helicopter-crazed lunatic. After a while explaining why Ian deserved the money the most, Peter decided to have a word with Elizabeth; the woman who invented Vodka and Orange.

Now to have an exciting business-orientated show, you're going to need a gritty catchphrase. "You're Fired" was made famous by Alan Sugar. "I'm Out" was made famous by the Scottish one from Dragon's Den. What is Peter's gritty catchphrase? As he stood by Elizabeth on a pier, he had to give the sad news.

PETER
"I didn't think that two weeks ago, I'd be talking to somebody about.. pulling the plug on their business. I'm sorry."

ELIZABETH
"I'll do better!"

PETER
"Okay, I'll think about it."

And then when it showed you "Next Time on Tycoon", it showed Elizabeth happily sat at her desk designing labels for her stupid drink. Peter's catchphrase is essentially "You're about to be fired, oh wait, no you're not".

Well done ITV. Well done.