S02.E10: Game Night, That's Another Story

[Tara Ariano]

Contestants play with celebrities Jenna Elfman, Donald Faison, Bob Harper, Ellie Kemper, Joel Madden, and Molly Shannon.

Yay, Ellie Kemper's back! She was great the first time. 

[Rinaldo]

Donald Faison was good before too, though if memory serves he didn't win the jackpot for his civilian as expected.

Again I realize what a crotchety geezer I'm becoming -- I don't know who Bob Harper and Joel Madden are.

[Tara Ariano]

Bob Harper is a trainer on The Biggest Loser, and I think Joel Madden is a musician of some sort. [Googles] Confirmed! He's the lead singer of Good Charlotte and Nicole Richie's husband.

[bybrandy]

I would have picked Faison for the final round, but I'd forgotten that he hadn't pulled through last time.

He was really invested in the game.

His civilian not knowing Star Wars really through them for a loop, but Wookie is the only one I don't know how to get any other way.   

I got too big of a kick out of the players trying to work out the titles of the autobiographies.   

[Rinaldo]

And that was a new way to lose the final round. Just waste precious seconds on every single name with lots of "Er, um, uh" before getting around to the obvious thing to say. 

And this was, I think, the first time the "will come back to haunt you" threat actually came to pass in that round. He was about to have to try Mitt Romney again when time ran out.

[charlieboo]

I wasn't sure why he passed on Romney in the first place.  He said something like, "He ran for president", and really all he had to do was add "and lost to Obama" and I'm pretty sure the guy would have guessed right.  Seemed like an odd name to pass on.

The contestant was great and was really pulling names out of left field. I'd be pissed if I was him. 

[DkNNy79]

Totally agree with you on Mitt Romney.  Have no idea why he skipped that.  I'm pretty sure the civilian would've gotten that and he would've reached 10.  Joel really messed that up.

 

I would've gone with Donald Faison as well, but we have yet to find a civilian who doesn't pick someone from his own team.  Donald's team was soooo bad on that last round.  I'm not big on star wars, but c'mon now, thas just pop culture. 

[Rinaldo]

we have yet to find a civilian who doesn't pick someone from his own team

[Edited from earlier vague memory:] I checked in WIkipedia, which confirmed my memory that last August, it happened twice: Al Roker and Minnie Driver. And both did poorly when given the chance. (My reply above, that Donald Faison had been picked for the final round in the past, was wrong.)

My guess (and it's purely a guess) is that Joel himself was unsure about Romney, and rather than be embarrassed publicly for such political ignorance, he moved on.

Edited April 4, 2014 by Rinaldo

[Tara Ariano]

Here's my post on the episode.

Maybe Bob would have done better if he'd been describing a Wookiee rather than an Ewok? But in any case, the fix was in: the Star Trek clues were much easier to get without referencing anything to do with Star Trek than the Star Wars ones were. I mean, "future"? And Donald got too much in his own head sticking with Star Wars clues even after Ellie said she knew nothing about Star Wars; how about trying to get her to guess "Revenge" by talking about the concept? Or the show, on ABC, called Revenge?

[charlieboo]

My guess (and it's purely a guess) is that Joel himself was unsure about Romney, and rather than be embarrassed publicly for such political ignorance, he moved on.

 

See, I thought Joel might have had a REALLY strong opinion about Romney and was afraid he might say something that would get him in trouble with fans.

And Donald got too much in his own head sticking with Star Wars clues even after Ellie said she knew nothing about Star Wars; how about trying to get her to guess "Revenge" by talking about the concept? Or the show, on ABC, called Revenge?

 

This! I know nothing about Star Wars and I was completely lost as he rambled on. I immediately thought about the TV show. Can they use rhyming words? I thought Bob could have said "lookie" to try and prompt her.

[Rinaldo]

I just thought that "wookie" was genuinely unfair, as it means nothing outside the movies. Whereas words like "empire," "revenge," "falcon" exist to be described in lots of other ways. (Not that the players always took advantage of that.)

[bybrandy]

Wookie is hard to get any other way, but they never even tried to see if it was something she might know.   When she gave falcon she said she thought it was the ship and she knew it was a bird.  So she didn't know nothing.  Had I been giving clues for Wookie to her I would have said, "Chewbacca the...."  If she got wookie?  Great.   if not pass quickly.       

[purplemouth]

I'm pretty impressed the final round went as well as it did with all of Joel's err, um, passes.

I have really strong feelings about Mitt Romney too, but even under pressure I could have spit out "Mormon presidential loser!" 2012 was not that long ago. That one should have been a gimme.

I don't know Star Wars either, so I would never have gotten Wookie, though I think I know enough pop culture to get other references.

[Kromm]

It's hilarious that Scientologist Jenna Elfman got the job of arranging pictures of ALIENS.

It almost made up for them having her annoying ass on the show in the first place.