A RETURNING Jeopardy! champion suffered a brutal loss over a clue that fans raged was ‘unfair’ and ‘wrongfully categorized.’
The big blow came during Tuesday’s “underwhelming” game which set a new show record – but not for a reason producers hope for.
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Returning contestant Dave McBride was the latest one-day winner in a season that has had very few multi-day victors.
The compliance consultant from Fuquay Varina, North Carolina was looking to extend his winnings of $22,401.
He went up against Jason Singer, a real estate agent from Portland, Maine and Heather Kompanek, a product support manager from New York City.
Jason was off to a fast lead when he had $3,400 by the time he found the first Daily Double under the category “Homophones.”
He went for a big swing but missed as he didn’t answer in time – losing his entire $3,400 earnings and bringing him back down to $0.
By the first break, Heather was in the lead with $2,400 while Jason earned $1,000 to put him in second.
Monday’s winner, Dave, had accumulated $600 and stayed in third place.
However, the standings shifted by the time the trio of players entered Double Jeopardy!
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Heather was still in the lead with $3,600 while Dave climbed to second with $3,200 and Jason dropped to third with $2,400.
Jason furthered his good fortune when he found the second Daily Double under the “Art House” category.
After correctly answering, he doubled his score to $4,800.
He continued his impressive streak when he found the third and final Daily Double under the “Tough TV” category.
The correct answer allowed him to surpass Heather by adding another $3,200 to his score of $11,200.
Fans felt one of the categories in the Double Jeopardy! round, “Literary Characters”, was “mislabeled” as it didn’t actually pertain as much to literature.
“Three out of the five clues were based on books turned into huge fantasy movie franchises, making this category feel more ‘pop culture’ than literary,” a critic noted online.
Another asked: “Literary characters seemed wrongfully categorized, no?”
FINAL BOW
Heading into Final Jeopardy!, Jason snagged back his lead with a whopping $17,800.
Heather dropped to second with $11,200 while Dave remained in third with $6,000.
Host Ken Jennings, 51, then introduced the final category as “Buried at Westminster Abbey” as the players placed their wagers.
He then read: “In 1991 he became the first actor in over 85 years to be interred in Poets Corner & rests near Shakespeare’s memorial.”
Jeopardy! Contestant Rules
Passing Jeopardy!’s online Anytime Test is hard enough, but there are also many rules players must follow once they make it to the stage:
- The returning champion is always at the leftmost podium and keeps playing until they lose.
- Contestants don’t have to say “who is” or “what is” in the first round but must do so in Double Jeopardy! and Final Jeopardy.
- Contestants can change their responses as long as Ken Jennings or the judges haven’t made a ruling.
- The minimum wager for a Daily Double is $5. The minimum wager for Final Jeopardy! is $0.
- Written responses in Final Jeopardy! do not have to be spelled correctly, but they must be phonetically correct (the judges decide this).
- If there’s a tie after Final Jeopardy, the tied players enter a bonus clue shootout, and whoever buzzes in first correctly wins.
- If all three contestants wager everything in Final Jeopardy! and are incorrect, leaving them with $0, there will be no returning champion (it’s happened before—six times).
Both Jason and Heather were correct with writing down “Who was Olivier?”
Jason ended up winning the game with $22,401 while Heather stayed in second with $15,200 and Dave finished with $4,700.
Fans felt that the lackluster game could’ve been avoided if the writing had been “more fair.”
“Disappointed Dave couldn’t replicate his game from yesterday. Felt some of these categories weren’t totally fair and he just had an unlucky draw,” a fan wrote.
The game was also notable for matching a new record for longest steak of one-day winners.
If Jason loses tomorrow’s game, season 41 will officially have the longest streak in Jeopardy! history of single-game winners.
Fans have called the end of season 41 a major “disappointment” and labeled this new record as “sad.”
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