[Warning: The following post contains MAJOR spoilers for the Friday, October 19, episode of Jeopardy!]
On Thursday, Spencer Janes de-throned reigning champ TJ Fisher after his five-game win to become the new Jeopardy! champion. With a one-day cash winnings total of $29,000, will the program manager from Longmeadow, Massachusetts, hold on to his title and a chance to join the Tournament of Champions? The Friday match-up saw Janes pitted against Aimée Fluitt, a former national security consultant originally from Kansas City, Missouri, and Dave Francois, a marketing director from Denver, Colorado.
Janes started the game with “One-Word Book Titles” for $600, which offered the clue: “Michelle Obama said that writing this 2018 memoir allowed her to reflect on the ‘unexpected trajectory of my life.’” He answered “Spencer” correctly.
Janes found the first Daily Double of the game in the same category for $400. He wagered $2,000 on the clue, “The opening of this novel describes Castle Caladan, which ‘served the Atreides family as home for twenty-six generations.’” Janes answered “What is Dune?” correctly.
At the first commercial break, Janes was in the lead with $5,400, Francois was in second place with $2,800, and Fluitt came in third with $2,400.
In the second half of the first round, there were two Triple Stumpers, an improvement from yesterday’s game. The first was hiding in the category of “Season of Charade” for $600 with the clue: “This city named for David & not Luther got less than .1″ of the wet stuff during November 2024, part of the L.A. ‘rainy season.’” The answer was Burbank. And second was under $600 in the category of “Chad Roulette,” which asked the contestants: “Mr. Chad is the U.K. equivalent of this figure with a bulbous nose, sketched by World War II-era GIs.” After Francois answered incorrectly, it was revealed that the answer was Kilroy.
By the time the first round was over, Janes was in the lead with $7,600, but Francois was at his heels with $6,200, and Fluitt trailed behind with $3,200.
In Double Jeopardy!, the second clue in the category “The Middle Ages” for $2000 resulted in the first of six Triple Stumpers that plagued the game. None of the contestants could identify “11-year-olds’ favorite medieval saint and patron saint of screens — this woman of Assisi who met St. Francis around 1212.” The answer was, “What is St. Claire of Assisi?”
The next clue in the same category was the Daily Double, which was found by Fluitt. She wagered $3,000 on the clue: “In the final fall of imperial Rome, an emperor who shared this name of one of the city’s legendary founders was deposed in 476 A.D.” She wavered on her answer, “What is Romulus?,” to which Ken Jennings said, “If that was a guess, it paid off.”
The final Daily Double of the game was found in the category “Recent Technology” for $1,600. Found by Francois, he wagered $4,000 on the clue: “The orb is a biometric device that photographs this eye part that is visible, so no special scan needed like with the retina.” He answered correctly with “What is the iris?,” and added $4k to his bank.
By the end of Double Jeopardy!, the game was a nail-biter, with all three contestants separated by only a small margin. Janes, who answered 21 questions correctly without a single miss, held the lead with $17,600. Fluitt followed close behind with $16,600, while Francois rounded out the trio with $15,000.
The Final Jeopardy question was in the category of “Classic Drama” and asked the contestants, “The line ‘Was this the face that launched a thousand ships?’ is asked by this title character in a play written in the 16th century.”
The trio apparently wasn’t well-versed in their classics, as all three missed the Final Jeopardy question. Francois answered incorrectly, “Who Titus Andronicus?,” and with a wager of $12,000, dropped to $3,000. Fluitt responded, “Who is Nope? Hey Anna!,” opting for a shout-out, and risked $12,001, leaving her with a total of $4,599.
Jeopardy! champ Janes incorrectly answered, “Who is Trolius?” And with a wager of $16,000, his new total was now $1,600, placing him in third and crowning Aimée Fluitt as the new Jeopardy! champion.
Fans discussed the outcome on Reddit, where one Redditor wrote, “For the second day in a row, the leader lost on a wrong FJ guess that was entirely reasonable based on the information in the clue. This isn’t the type of TV that I tune in for.”
“It does prove the importance of betting strategy, though,” responded another.
Fans also discussed wagering strategy, where one Redditor stated, “Not going all in on DD1 always seems like a wasted opportunity, doubly so on $400 clue. Then again, wagering was kind of all over the place today.”
“When a contestant casually bets $2,000 on a DD when they have more than that to wager, it often means they haven’t given it a lot of thought as to if it’s an amount that will help them the most. Many times, they choose $2,000 because they’ve seen a lot of other players bet that amount,” responded another.
A Redditor ended the discussion with, “To be blunt, I think that unless a player is clueless about the category, they should always TDD on DD1, especially if it’s early.”
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