Jeopardy! Season 37 (2020-2021)

[saber5055]

The convoluted FJ clue caught me too, I said Lake Superior. And I should know better, the answer the writers want is ALWAYS after "this." But the clue was so weird, I totally missed that. Even rereading it, my brain was all "Whaaaa?"

[Grundoon59]

As a proud Michigander, FJ was an instaget even with the convoluted clue. But now I have the poem and the song alternating in my brain.  I knew the poem first but the song was omnipresent in my college years (and of course I remember the actual wreck).

Edited October 1, 2020 by Grundoon59
spelling error

[secnarf]

Like many of you here, I was momentarily confused by the FJ wording - initially I thought they were looking for the one lake without a Native word or tribe name, which is obviously Superior. But then I realized that they wanted the former Native name for it - unfortunately, having never heard of Gitche Gumee before, understanding the clue did not help me answer it correctly.

[GrannySmith]

Never mind. 

Edited September 30, 2020 by GrannySmith
Question answered above.

[hoosiermommy]

8 hours ago, Trey said:

Northern Ireland

GB is the name of the island. UK is a sovereign state.

[Bastet]

It was an archive night for me, due to the presidential debate.

The Bob Dylan TS made me sad, but it seemed like a good game.  I am surprised two bungled the FJ clue so badly, though; not really that none of them got it right, but that two didn't get it was looking for a Native American name (hello, "this Native American name") -- one got the poem, at least.

I only knew Who's the Boss? in the pop culture bosses category, and missed three others in the first round, so I was not off to a good start.  But I only missed three in DJ and knew FJ, so it wound up okay.

[GreekGeek]

9 hours ago, Prevailing Wind said:

I'm not sure I would have gotten FJ if not for Gordon Lightfoot.  And since the clue was shown, "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" has been running through my head.

 

I wondered how many knew the answer because of The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald. 

I got Lucretia Borgia largely because of a colleague who once dressed up as her for Halloween at our school

[Ailianna]

12 hours ago, Quickbeam said:

Highway 10 in Wisconsin!

I was yelling at the TV when they took light headed for syncope. 4 years of nursing school come in handy. The reversal was correct. But final jeopardy ....the question made no sense to me. 

They didn't say what the answer was supposed to be; as a non-medical person, I would like to know what it was supposed to be.  Thanks.

[Katy M]

1 hour ago, Ailianna said:

They didn't say what the answer was supposed to be; as a non-medical person, I would like to know what it was supposed to be.  Thanks.

Fainting.  When the contestant said light-headedness, Alex said "or fainting."

[WI GIRL56]

Going back a few shows.

[Lois Sandborne]

I had to pause tv to parse that FJ clue. I'm not ashamed to admit I read it out loud a couple of times before I understood what in the world they were going for. I landed on the answer, but put me in the camp that thinks it was terribly written. 

Re: UK/GB, I'm enough of an Anglophile that I answered UK immediately with no waffling about GB. I keep them straight by remembering that kingdom = nation. And a few tried but nobody outdid those imperialist monsters when it came to colonizing there, so it was the only choice to my mind.

[Mindthinkr]

I got the TS of Pavlova and then lost the rest of the game due to a nearby tornado warning. I looked up FJ and don’t know that I would have gotten it so another big zilch for me. 

[DrSpaceman73]

Any Community fans on here think of Abed with the Who's the Boss clue? 

Syncope means to pass out of lose consciousness.  Light headed is sometimes called pre-syncope.  or dizziness.  Just being light headed is not syncope though. 

On the Africa/UK FJ question, I think a few of them were just out-thinking themselves and not going for the obvious answer.  I almost did, thought maybe it was Germany since it was 1945, but didn't know what two letters would be german, so just went with UK. 

[Trey]

Only two ts's for me, pavlova and Lucrezia Borgia.

Re FJ, like the rest of you, I had to reread the clue to get what they were asking for but I got there pretty quickly. Not sure I would have spelled it correctly though. Apparently the Song of Hiawatha was much parodied when it first came out.  Here's a fairly modern parody that I really like.

(from Wikipedia)

Another parody was "Hakawatha" (1989), by British computer scientist Mike Shields, writing under the pen name F. X. Reid, about a frustrated computer programmer:[71][72]

First, he sat and faced the console / Faced the glowing, humming console
Typed his login at the keyboard / Typed his password (fourteen letters)
Waited till the system answered / Waited long and cursed its slowness

[bad things are bad]

Quote

Any Community fans on here think of Abed with the Who's the Boss clue? 

Totally. Abed proved without a doubt that Angela was the boss! 

and the "old" version of the Michigan sign 

[853fisher]

I didn't quite get FJ.  I knew what it was about, but was watching later than usual having enjoyed a few too many drinks.  Given another 30 or 60 seconds, I might've gotten there.  I always think of Lucy in one of her old episodes, trying to get into the act with her Hiawatha recitation as she and Little Ricky popped up between other numbers.  "Daughter of the MOON, Nokomis!" indeed.

As much as many of us have been amused by these Californians not knowing things that might not have been TS with contestants from the regular pool (Auburn/Alabama?!  I've lived in Maryland and California and really don't care for football, and even I knew that one), Taskrabbit seemed to me like it was exactly in the urban California wheelhouse.  I live in San Francisco and friends in their 20s and 30s absolutely love it.  I prefer to deal with someone licensed and bonded whom I can call on again, rather than whoever the app assigns me at the requested time, but that kind of relationship-building with service professionals seems to be regarded as a relic of the past.

Anyway, I'm getting off track.  I hope it will be possible to widen the pool again soon.

Edited September 30, 2020 by 853fisher
old / own

[bybrandy]

We had a car chase for most of the episode.  I got Pavlova (if that was this episode, well.. no matter what episode it was) but didn't see any double jeopardy.    I did not get final jeopardy.  Didn't know it.  But having read the question I did know that the were looking for the name prior to the great-lakes name.  I just had no idea at all what that might have been.

[peeayebee]

18 hours ago, ams1001 said:

Okay, here is the answer: "An 1855 poem gives us this Native American name for the 1 Great Lake not known to us today by a Native American word or a tribe's name."

Now I understand the clue but I was not going to come up with the correct question.

Thanks for posting this. I struggled with it and actually paused my DVR so I could read and reread it. I said Superior and thought that was way too easy. So is Gitche Gumee the Native American name for the lake called Superior?

I got Pavlova, pearl, and Lucrezia Borgia.

I don't know why Eric said Madagascar. Maybe he wasn't looking at the picture.

I like Mason and hope he sticks around for a while.

[Katy M]

16 minutes ago, peeayebee said:

I don't know why Eric said Madagascar. Maybe he wasn't looking at the picture.

Because he's as bad at geography as I am?

 

17 minutes ago, peeayebee said:

So is Gitche Gumee the Native American name for the lake called Superior?

I would say so because Superior is the only great lake that doesn't currently have a native name.  Right?

[MrAtoz]

"Gitche Gumee" (as Longfellow spelled it--the preferred spelling these days is gichi-gami) is the Ojibwe name for Lake Superior.  The 1855 poem the clue refers to is Longfellow's "Song of Hiawatha."

I agree it was a little hard to parse, but I got it pretty quickly.  It's one of those clues where you need to look at what follows the word this:  "this Native American name."  That's the hint that they didn't want the English name "Superior."

[saber5055]

19 minutes ago, peeayebee said:

I don't know why Eric said Madagascar. Maybe he wasn't looking at the picture.

I said Madagascar too, and knew I was wrong because I was looking at the picture and know Madagascar is bigger. But I had no other answer to grasp out of the air.

I live in the Midwest, nowhere near California, and if you asked me what state Auburn University is in, I might guess Maryland or Delaware or maybe New York. Geesh, maybe it is in California. But no way in h*ll would I ever guess Alabama. So don't blame where someone lives for how smart or not smart that person is. That, plus I still have never heard of Task Rabbit and have no clue what it is.

One of the most infamous categories in Jeopardy! history is that football one when not a single player buzzed in. And those contestants were from SeaTac, Washington; Cheyenne, Wyoming; and Washington, D.C., not California. Maybe a Californian could have answered at least one of the clues.

As Mr. Trebek has said, “The toughest trivia question is one you don’t know the answer to.”

[ams1001]

41 minutes ago, peeayebee said:

Thanks for posting this. I struggled with it and actually paused my DVR so I could read and reread it. I said Superior and thought that was way too easy. So is Gitche Gumee the Native American name for the lake called Superior?

Yep.

https://www.lakesuperior.com/the-lake/lake-superior/281almanac/

I've heard the name but I don't know that I knew it was Lake Superior.

[853fisher]

30 minutes ago, saber5055 said:

So don't blame where someone lives for how smart or not smart that person is.

Sorry, but I did no such thing.  Suggesting that there are often broad-stroke differences in general knowledge, what one may be exposed to, sensibility and taste, etc between regions is not "blaming where someone lives for how smart or not smart that person is."

I am hardly the first one to say they have perceived a difference between having all folks from Greater LA and the broader pool.  I love living in urban California but I will be glad to see a mix of players again when possible.  I stand by my respectful opinion that certain questions this season might have been more easily answered by other contestants.

[proserpina65]

20 hours ago, illdoc said:

I thought they wanted the name of a real lake. You know, my brain tried to help me---it made the title "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" pop into my head, but before it started the song, I said "No, brain. That's not helpful". Silly me!

I misread the clue and thought they wanted the current name of the "big lake they called Gitche Gumee", so I said Lake Superior.  Of course, they wanted the native name, so I was wrong.  Right lake, wrong name.  And yes, I only know it because of The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.  Although the poem referenced was Hiawatha, so the new champ was on the right track.

19 hours ago, Katy M said:

The only TS I got was Lucrezia Borgia, but there weren't that many in the first place, so I don't feel that bad about it.

I was a little surprised none of them got it.

19 hours ago, Prevailing Wind said:

And since the clue was shown, "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" has been running through my head.

Mine too.

19 hours ago, M. Darcy said:

Yeah, that was a poorly worded clue. I thought they wanted the name of one of the Great Lakes. (I kept going through HOMES in my head). 

I don't think it was poorly worded just because we misread it.

[M. Darcy]

Jeopardy actually sent out a message on twitter and Facebook about FJ.  Which means everyone was confused. 

Quote

Regarding yesterday's Final Jeopardy!: Please note the clue asked for “…this Native American name…” of the lake, so we couldn't accept Lake Superior as a correct response.

 

[Katy M]

6 minutes ago, proserpina65 said:

I don't think it was poorly worded just because we misread it.

I agree, but I feel like they could have made it slightly easier to understand.  It's not like a lot of times where only one or two people think it was poorly worded.  A lot of us misunderstood, and though I don't know for sure, I feel like the contestant who answered Superior also misunderstood. However, he may just not have known and taken a wild shot.  So, in conclusion, I feel like they could have maybe reworded a bit to make it more obvious what they wanted.

[proserpina65]

2 hours ago, peeayebee said:

got Pavlova, pearl, and Lucrezia Borgia.

I got all of those, but I use alexandrite as my birth stone (the modern alternative) because I don't like pearls.

14 minutes ago, Katy M said:

I agree, but I feel like they could have made it slightly easier to understand.  It's not like a lot of times where only one or two people think it was poorly worded.  A lot of us misunderstood, and though I don't know for sure, I feel like the contestant who answered Superior also misunderstood. However, he may just not have known and taken a wild shot.  So, in conclusion, I feel like they could have maybe reworded a bit to make it more obvious what they wanted.

Eh, they always want whatever is immediately after the "this" - I've been caught by that before (they wanted Heart - "this band" not Ann & Nancy Wilson which was my answer).  Jeopardy is supposed to be tough, imo.

[Bastet]

12 minutes ago, proserpina65 said:

Eh, they always want whatever is immediately after the "this" - I've been caught by that before (they wanted Heart - "this band" not Ann & Nancy Wilson which was my answer).  Jeopardy is supposed to be tough, imo.

Yeah, I don't have a problem with paying attention being part of the challenge on this show.

[illdoc]

Everyone, sing with me!:

The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they called Gitche Gumee
The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead
When the skies of November turn gloomy…

[saber5055]

8 hours ago, WI GIRL56 said:

Going back a few shows.

Thanks for the pic! I've been to Wausau but didn't know I could have gotten a commemorative coin while there. That would almost be as cool as getting one of those 45th Parallel snow globes in Maine. You know, the one @Prevailing Wind wasn't able to purchase. I do love me some snow globes.

I wonder if judges would have accepted Gitchey Goomee.

Edited September 30, 2020 by saber5055

[helpmerhonda]

3 hours ago, saber5055 said:

I live in the Midwest, nowhere near California, and if you asked me what state Auburn University is in, I might guess Maryland or Delaware or maybe New York. Geesh, maybe it is in California. But no way in h*ll would I ever guess Alabama.

Stop. You're killing me!!!!!!

 

[Browncoat]

Just catching up with last night's show.  I first said Superior for FJ, then re-read the clue, and immediately came up with Gitche Gumee in plenty of time to write it down.  I don't think it was a poorly worded clue, but I did have to pay attention.  

For TS, I only got pavlova and pearl.  

[ams1001]

As a child of the 80s/90s...I can't believe I didn't get Grunge. 🤦🏻‍♀️

[saber5055]

1 hour ago, helpmerhonda said:

Stop. You're killing me!!!!!!

LOL because I definitely thought of you after I posted that. I was sorta hoping you wouldn't notice ... But trust me when I say I do respect your avatar, and have been thoroughly schooled in the location of your alma mater.

41 minutes ago, Browncoat said:

but I did have to pay attention.

This is most certainly a problem with me.

[dgpolo]

2 minutes ago, ams1001 said:

As a child of the 80s/90s...I can't believe I didn't get Grunge

I'm a child of the 50s/60s and, surprisingly, I got it. Did pretty bad over all, some categories I thought I would run but didn't. I think having to read them instead of watching does something that makes it worse for me. Did not get FJ, guessed McKinley even though I was pretty sure I was wrong. I was sad no one got George Takei ☹️, I think that was the only TS that I got.

[Katy M]

I got FJ.  

I got the TS of inflation, time share and WC Handy.

I got the entire categories of 3 vowels, troubles, and names right.

I'm glad Katrina got eliminated because that's my name and I found it distracting:)

I went to Defiance College, so I got Defiance and was surprised one of the contestants did.  Not exactly a sprawling metropolis.

[Driad]

Yay, Defiance College! A relative of mine went there, around 1900 when an 8th grade education was often considered plenty. Defiance had a program that let him work his way through high school and college.

[Browncoat]

19 minutes ago, dgpolo said:

I was sad no one got George Takei ☹️,

I was particularly sad that the one guy said DeForest Kelley instead.  I knew George as well as inflation and timeshare.  But I completely blanked for FJ.  And I even paid attention to the clue.

[M. Darcy]

I got FJ immediately!   Heh I thought I knew it from Assassins but it’s FDR the show has a song about.  I just know my attempted assassination history. 

No one knew George Takei?! So wrong. 

[saber5055]

Got a kick out of the carburetor photo. The carburetor from my Oldsmobile 442 looked just like that one when it sat on my kitchen table while I rebuilt it.

High point of the show for Mr. Trebek: The writers gave him one GENRE!

Katrina really lacked confidence in her FJ bet, as did Kamal on that DD wager. He should have wagered at least 3,000 as he was doing so well in the category. (Easy for me to say, sitting here, no cameras or lights on me.)

I guessed McKinley for FJ. I didn't remember that about Teddy Roosevelt getting shot, but when I read up on the event, his speech blocking most of the bullet's damage was familiar.

High point of this episode for me was this:

[Katy M]

Just now, saber5055 said:

Katrina really lacked confidence in her FJ bet

OTOH, she did get it wrong.

[ams1001]

'k, I finally set up a little scorecard for myself in Excel so I could keep track of how many clues I get right. Though I did it during the first round so I couldn't keep track and build it at the same time. In DJ I would have won $17,200 (just counting DDs at their clue value, though I did get them both right). We'll see how tomorrow goes.

(Yes, I am a bit of an Excel nerd as well a Jeopardy nerd but I feel like that's probably not uncommon here. 😉)

[secnarf]

My initial thought was McKinley but I knew that he was shot in 1901 (no idea why that fact has stuck with me). Then pondered Garfield but was pretty sure he was earlier, and then for reasons I don't fully understand, I guessed Teddy Roosevelt.

I was very sad nobody got George Takei.

[GrannySmith]

FJ was an instaget. I just finished reading “The President is Dead”.  Interesting and helpful book. 

[Bastet]

Another archive night for me (NBA playoffs).

WIN = Whip the Vote Now?  Interesting answer.

I joined the contestants in being stumped by Lord High Chancellor, but I got everything else in the first round (a couple of which rather surprised me when they popped out of my mouth).  In DJ, I didn't know Ft. Defiance, the brain injury research dude, one of the artists, Regina King, or - sorry, folks - George Takei.  And I got FJ (I thought I'd learned he was shot during a speech, and the year made me confident I was remembering correctly), so it was a very good game for me.

 

[secnarf]

12 minutes ago, GrannySmith said:

FJ was an instaget. I just finished reading “The President is Dead”.  Interesting and helpful book. 

I am just over halfway through! Hopefully it comes in handy in the future too.

[Driad]

For FJ I thought of a few possibilities but the "Look, I'm indestructible!" attitude said Teddy Roosevelt to me.

[Grundoon59]

The assassination buff section of my brain recognized the clue as part of the story of the Bull Moose presidential run so I knew instantly that it was TR.  But I recognize that what seems obvious to me is incomprehensible to someone else and vice versa.

And now that M. Darcy mentioned Assasins, I will have that cast album playing in my head for awhile (a Sondheim category would definately be on my dream Jeopardy board).

[Prevailing Wind]

I knew it couldn't have been McKinley, but unable to think of anyone else...

I've been to WC Handy's birthplace - it's in Florence, Alabama, not far from a Frank Lloyd Wright house.  I was there on a Monday, so only got a pic of the outside because - GASP! - it's closed on Mondays.  I really miss going on a Road Trip this year.

 

[Cotypubby]

2 hours ago, Bastet said:

WIN = Whip the Vote Now?  Interesting answer.

I think he got stuck on the word “Whip” and connected it to getting votes. My brain kept reading that clue as if the word WHIP was the anagram and I was trying to figure out what “HI” stood for. 🙄

I knew FJ wasn’t McKinley because he was in 1901 (at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, thanks Sondheim!) but could not come up with TR.