Will that guy on Jeopardy ever lose?

Alex with the "ALEVE" punchline to the final answer yesterday was some grade A jeopardy comedy

Matt Jackson's jazz hands while answering "What is Cabaret?" tonight was all kinds of adorable.

alex came in with a specific strategy and it worked big time. poor matt looked broken.

what a game, definitely gasped at Alex risking 10k on that daily double and then pulling it out

Double or nothing TWICE! In retrospect, it's the one strategy that was going to work against a player that strong and the chips fell the way he needed them to. If Matt had gotten one of the doubles, it's an open question as to who would've won with a final jeopardy question that no one got right!
... i thought it was man in the iron mask too...

I guessed that too, but the Count of Monte Cristo shows up a lot on Jeopardy. From searching the J! archives, there have been over 50 clues about it in the past.

Just found out Alex used to be a champion poker player, so I guess he knows betting strategies well.

Always assumed The Count of Monte Cristo was a more famous novel than The Man in the Iron Mask. Maybe not in America?

Truly painful for me to learn that an FJ in the finals this season came down to The Count of Monte Cristo, a book I've read probably a dozen times since 9th grade. ;_; So it goes, so it goes!

there's not reasonably any way either Matt or Terry can win at this point, 27k in the hole

Matt Jackson's jazz hands while answering "What is Cabaret?" tonight was all kinds of adorable.

― Fetty Wap Is Strong In Here (cryptosicko), Wednesday, November 18, 2015 9:34 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Adorable? It was mortifying! As was his fist pumping.

Alex is the best.

I like it when the contestants are smart enough to realize the point of the game is to WIN MONEY and not fucking around with bitch bets on daily doubles and final jeopardy

When I went to the in-person audition they told us that you have to pay your own airfare and hotel (often with little advanced notice) so the 2nd and 3rd place prize money vanishes quickly. There's no reason NOT to just go for it bet-wise.

Also I have a DVR for the first in like 8 years which means I'm finally able to watch this regularly - and of course my power went out on Tuesday evening and just came back on this morning so I missed most of the Tournament of Champions semi and final rounds.

So are we just not going to talk about that woman's awful voice?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/the-internet-is-freaking-out-over-this-jeopardy-contestants-voice_565469e1e4b0258edb32d5d1?02kjra4i

This article NOT ON THE MONEY.

This is not uptalk. It's something awful and it hurts my ears but it's not uptalk.

It has been driving us nuts
She sounds normal when she is talking to alex but there is some really weird pseudo valley thing happening in the last two letters of every word she puts a question mark on

This is not uptalk. It's something awful and it hurts my ears but it's not uptalk.

Yeah, nothing uptalky about it; she just stretches out the last syllable. And it's so so annoying.

Gf describes it as "she turns the last syllable into a half note"

Yes! It doesn't sound uptalky/valley girl-esque to me at all. I think stretching out the last syllable is a good description but it's mind boggling. Where does someone pick this up? How does she not hear how weird this sounds? WHY OH WHY DID SHE HAVE TO WIN THEREBY SUBJECTING US TO ANOTHER NIGHT OF THIS?

Really everyone? I feel like her voice is such a non-issue, and while I don't fully agree with it being "uptalk," it does feel a little like policing. There was a male champion with a really exaggerated Boston accent on recently, and nothing was made of it.

Yes, her voice is annoying, but no, it isn't a big deal. Also, a joke Twitter account and some ranting asshole on YouTube do not necessitate an ugly trend that requires think piece-level intervention.

*do not EQUAL an ugly trend...

I do like the Jep twitter account with the pithy descriptions of the contestant's anecdotes:
https://twitter.com/CoolJepStories

Jfc obviously it's not actually a big deal. It was, however, one of the strangest vocal ticks I've ever heard which is why I commented on it. The article was ridiculous.

Wasn't meaning to give you shit, and I sincerely apologize if it came off that way. I was actually relieved, in a "so its not just me" way, when I saw your original post; it was scrolling down further and realizing that this had reached think piece-level proportions well beyond the sphere of a thread where we talk about weird/funny/surprising/annoying things on Jeopardy that I was reacting to.

And besides, all irrelevant now anyway!

Really everyone? I feel like her voice is such a non-issue, and while I don't fully agree with it being "uptalk," it does feel a little like policing. There was a male champion with a really exaggerated Boston accent on recently, and nothing was made of it.

― Michael F Gill, Tuesday, November 24, 2015 7:02 PM (3 days ago)

an accent is not the same thing as this woman is doing.

obviously a lot of the hate she's getting is gendered. that said it does sound excruciating

there's a rapper who does the exact same thing and i can't figure out who it is

https://vine.co/v/ehPEUXZFlAQ

....what was the answer to that??

http://j-archive.com/showgame.php?game_id=4882

http://www.avclub.com/article/three-way-tie-jeopardy-last-night-sends-everyone-h-230928

Don't recall every having seen this happen before, though this was apparently the sixth time.

made me so mad

We're all losers here.

and on such an easy question.

doing the test in three minutes!

good luck!

just finished my test up too

just finished taking it. inevitably, i ended up blanking out on a bunch of questions and then going "oh right!" a couple seconds too late.

I took it Monday, then looked at the clues on their FB page the next day and scored myself a 43/50. A co-worker and I were discussing the questions and one that I missed literally came to me as were were talking about it. If I had remembered that, and gone with instinct on two others, I'd have had a 46/50.

I've made it to in-person auditions twice but never been cast. Third time's a charm!

I never even got to the auditions til my third stab at the online test. Keep those fingers crossed!

I made it to the in-person the first time I took it but not in the ~4 times since so perhaps I'm doomed. Think I only got 45/50 last night.

how did you guys prepare for the test/audition? i found a bunch of study suggestions that basically all said "study everything, also study the hundreds of games on the jeopardy! archive website."

I feel if you watch jeopardy enough, you find out what your weak areas are. I am always surprised by the number of categories involving local lakes and rivers, and how I keep meaning to brush up on that area.

I know a lot of people whose weak areas seem to be sports and religion.

this is my third test. never had an audition. I think i got about 42 or so on this; i think 35 is the cutoff? weak spots are always geography and british history.

The things that come up somewhat frequently that I feel weak about are the bible, British royalty, Shakespeare, African and central Asian national capitols, and damned if I will ever remember the years when US presidents were elected.

When I went to the in person audition i didn't have a smart phone yet and was riding the bus a lot more so I spent time reading a sort of old book called SECRETS OF THE JEOPARDY CHAMPIONS that someone had bought for me.

Oh yeah, I forget about British History/Monarchs/etc. Those catergories always silence me. Shakespeare comes up a lot, and it's rarely an easy question too.

I threw myself into flash-card studying in the month or so between getting "the call" and the taping date. This was sort of just a fight-or-flight reaction and not really a great way to prepare IMHO - much smarter, playing the long odds, would have been to start some kind of regular rotation of study from the moment of the in-person audition. Obviously that kind of thing could drive you crazy in the long run, particularly if you still end up getting thrown by the buzzer, tough competition, or an ugly Final Jeopardy clue. No controlling for any of that. But obviously, trying to cram at the last minute offered me limited options (though maybe it helped me feel more confident/relaxed?). I basically picked a few areas that I thought I could learn - things I had a vague familiarity with, or used to know, that I could turn more to rock-solid areas. State capitals and nicknames, Shakespeare plays, major US and European rivers... kind of a motley list but it made more sense to me than trying to like, suddenly learn Sports Facts after a lifetime of not caring - no context, no anchors for the information.

I also did a ton of cruising through past games on J-archive. Not sure how helpful this was, but it was hard to stop once I started. Maybe reinforced a few miscellaneous things, or made areas of knowledge I haven't thought about in a while fresher to my mind. Maybe good reinforcement of How Jeopardy Thinks, I dunno. I did watch a bunch of The Final Wager's videos, went through the tutorials step by step, and tested myself on J-Archived past games to see if I bet "correctly." I don't think I ever got super great at this - always seemed to miss some step in the process triggered by secondary outcomes along the way - but it did take one "WTF will I do about THAT?" aspect of the game off my mind, so that was something.

Ultimately, though, I stand by the advice that the most important thing is to relax and HAVE FUN with it - I'm certain that that helped me win my one game - so whatever it is that helps you do THAT is probably the best thing for you to do!

http://thejeopardyfan.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/wk27_0314_0318_tiu_lineup-150x150.png

love this guy

i'm convinced his whole kinda bumbling harmless guy shtick is a front. he's shooting all the angles.