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Is it an orange? Is it a 'vegatable'? No, it's… SOUP MAN!

The genesis of Soup Man

The emergence of a new Apprentice superhero in the shape of Jim gave followers of our Twitter page and on Facebook more than a soupcon of delight last night.

"Loving 'Soupman' Jim!" tweeted Emma_Sydenham. "Seems to have a very dry sense of humour… and a lovely accent!"

"Soup Man – he didn't need corporate clichés to help him along," wrote Emma Passfield Yeo on Facebook.

However, former Apprentice candidate Philip Taylor chimed in to point out that there's a long way to go before this new creation matches his own:

"ApprenticePhil: @bbcapprentice stop kidding yourself #soupman will be here for a week. #PANTSMAN is now pure legend."

The jury is still out on that one, although the online verdict was fairly unanimous in relation to Lord Sugar's decision to fire Project Manager Edward.

"No surprise there then," tweeted lollydollyla. "The accountant who forgot to count is out for the count."

Miss_R_Millie was on hand to tweet some reassuring words: "Don't worry Edward, getting fired was one of those punches you had to roll with! Oh well!!"

Lord SugarÌý– yes THE Lord Sugar – was a bit more sympathetic on Twitter: "Edward was real nice guy. Hard being team leader on first task."

Edward's subsequent appearance on You're Fired managed to win over many viewers. ÌýOn Facebook, Amy Lewis said: "Thought Edward came across really well in You're Fired. Best of luck to him". Christina James replied: "I agree, I'm sorry he's gone now". "He should have been more like himself in the real show," added Thomas Perkins.

Many fans felt that Edward's Team Logic was doomed from the start. "OMG! If they can't even establish if the fruit is an orange, this is going to be a disaster!!!" tweeted sahara_woolie. GerryPimm predicted: "An accountant as a leader can't possibly win. They don't lead, they bore". No wonder Edward tried to keep his numeracy skills quiet!

However, Lord Sugar tweeted the boys' team had "clearly a good and simple idea but all went wrong in the factory."

Our very own @bbcapprentice account posed the question: "6 boys + 1400 oranges = ____ ?"

The responses were very amusing, with DoctorDamocles answering "Team of Lemons" and ginger_ninja24 replying with "Unmissable TV!"

The first episode of Series 7 was warmly received, with many finding it one of the funniest yet and #bbcapprentice climbing up to the third position in Worldwide trending topics on Twitter. As Steve_titley tweeted: "Soup Man and the forensic identification of an orange… gotta love the return of @bbcapprentice"

Finally, the #bbcapprenticequotes hashtag was in full flow throughout the episode as tweeters kept their ears open for any gems – of which there were many. We'll leave you with the following highlight from Edward:

"Not only am I the youngest in the team, I'm the shortest…"