Monday, September 10, 1984 Game Recap and Discussion (SPOILERS)

[Leander]

I was struck by the gasps from the audience at wrong answers.

Were the game segments shorter? Alex seemed to read the questions at a pretty snappy pace, but there were still a lot of clues left on the board.

[NoWhammies10]

"Martin Luther King" on its own definitely would not fly today.

[talkingaway]

All three contestants took shortcuts in their FJ answers that would be very risky to do today. Two of the candidates wrote bday and the champion left out day or birthday altogether. Can you say you're a hundred percent certain that all three of those responses would fly today?

Caveat sourceum, but here's the first words of the Wiki article:

Martin Luther King Jr. Day (officially Birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr., and sometimes referred to as MLK Day). So, technically, "Martin Luther King's Birthday" isn't the official answer, either, and I've never heard nor seen the official name written anywhere else.

I'd say yea oh "MLK Day" or "Martin Luther King Day", but perhaps nay on "Martin Luther King" alone without the day, since "day" isn't implied in the clue. I think they generally accept JFK and LBJ, so MLK isn't too far behind.

The light pens were not exactly in wide use in 1984, from what I remember as a 7 year-old, and room on the pad was probably limited, so the abbreviations were logical. What you saw was probably the contestant's second or third time ever writing anything electronically - the first time(s) being in their practice rounds, assuming they had those back in '84.

[Bamaman]

I was struck by the gasps from the audience at wrong answers.

Were the game segments shorter? Alex seemed to read the questions at a pretty snappy pace, but there were still a lot of clues left on the board.

Alex took time to explain the rules at the start, which took up time. Then the unnecessary clapping ate up more time as did the players ringing in and not knowing the question.

[Bamaman]

Frank’s LinkedIn profile, which mentions his Jeopardy appearance.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/selevanstravels

An interview with Lois from 2009.


https://www.retromediavision.com/post/a ... -feinstein

I found Greg on Facebook so he is still alive. One of his FB friends has two mutual friends with me. He now lives in Huntsville, Alabama.

[Robert K S]

This re-air had the Audio Daily Double "Volga Boatmen" clip replaced with a royalty-free version, as also heard on the Jeopardy! DVD.

I wonder after the re-air tonight how many correction suggestions we are going to get from people trying to correct the spelling of "fit" in the "Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho" clue. This has to be one of the most frequently incorrectly "corrected" clues in the Archive. (The first to so sin was imperpay!)

[mas3cf]

It gave me a weird case of the goosebumps when Alex said "we have no returning champion today" and again when the first clue was read out of the half million that have come since...

[davey]

The bendiness of the neon (I presume) lights behind the podium are triggering my OCD, particularly to the right of the second contestant.

I got a kick at the glitter scattered around the category names. Somebody dropped by the craft store on the way to work that morning...

Folks are always saying pop culture is a late addition to the show...Michael Jackson?...50s television?...Seems pretty fizzy to me...And I have to admit that, though I personally missed most of the decade, 50s TV was still a cozy category for me...
I don't usually play the resemblance game, but I had a moment of distress wondering if Greg grew up to be Tucker Carlson... Though Alex telling him to relax has to be one of my very favorite moments in the show's history!

[MattKnowles]

They should bring back the awkward walk out. Why'd they get rid of that?

[NoWhammies10]

They should bring back the awkward walk out. Why'd they get rid of that?

ISTR they had planned to get rid of it right around the time that Eddie Timanus was first a contestant in 1999. Certainly his appearance on the show accelerated that timeline.

[opusthepenguin]

Opus was hopeful there would be a discussion thread for these old games coming up, so here it is.

Many thanks! Like Leander, I was struck by the gasping and by the crowd noise in general. I wonder if they were coached to be extra enthusiastic and make a big deal out of everything. Alex introduced categories and read clues at 1 1/2 times his current pace, or at least it seemed that way. And two of the three contestant interviews were pretty zippy as well. Yet between the applause and the up front explanation and the multiple misses, we didn't even come close to clearing the board. Still, Alex and the crew hit the ground running and did a fine job overall. No major embarrassments.

[seaborgium]

Like Leander, I was struck by the gasping and by the crowd noise in general. I wonder if they were coached to be extra enthusiastic and make a big deal out of everything.

Some of those reactions (pretty much everything that wasn't applause) sounded piped in to me. There's a woman's nervous titter at incorrect responses that I heard tonight, and also many times in Elise Beraru's games when they were on Dailymotion.

[trainman]

Anyone notice Inventions for $300 doesn't really have a "this" that it's asking for?

[Bamaman]

Opus was hopeful there would be a discussion thread for these old games coming up, so here it is.

Many thanks! Like Leander, I was struck by the gasping and by the crowd noise in general. I wonder if they were coached to be extra enthusiastic and make a big deal out of everything. Alex introduced categories and read clues at 1 1/2 times his current pace, or at least it seemed that way. And two of the three contestant interviews were pretty zippy as well. Yet between the applause and the up front explanation and the multiple misses, we didn't even come close to clearing the board. Still, Alex and the crew hit the ground running and did a fine job overall. No major embarrassments.

It sounded fast to me as well. I wonder if they sped up non-gameplay parts in order to get the whole show in.

[rockyboy34]

First time that I watched J! since the teacher’s tournament.

This was an excellent show right off the bat.


Also, some extra tingys:
The original end logos shown first airing was plastered w/ the usual CBS/Sony logos.

[jeopardyfan87]

They also left out Alex mentioning Greg’s small FJ wager that said how Greg played it very conservatively that the $300 was all he needed to wager seeing he had a lock going in to the FJ round.

[Charming]

What a hoot! Who else thinks Alex was looking an awfully lot like Tom Berringer in The Big Chill? Reminded me of when Jeopardy had their in person try outs back in the early days, Alex shows up in his leather jacket and jeans! Looking good!

I wonder if they sped up Alex's delivery and then cut things from the original show such as the gift portion to fit current allotted time with commercials? Has anyone come across video from the early shows because Alex sounds like a chipmunk on speed. Not in my area of expertise, and if they did speed up Alex's voice it would be difficult to calculate, has anyone calculated how much time the players were given to clear the board compared to now? I don't remember when, but a number of years back it seems they cut some time from the show. It seemed all of a sudden players were not clearing the board. Now they seem to have adjusted.

Even in the first show Alex is Alex in his responses to players.

I agree about the audience response, much of it was definitely canned.

[Robert K S]

I agree about the audience response, much of it was definitely canned.

I think there was even one point where the transition between the canned applause and the studio applause was audible and obvious.

[AFRET CMS]

And I have to admit that, though I personally missed most of the decade, 50s TV was still a cozy category for me...

.... and it was an interesting thought to realize that the Jeopardy premiere was closer in time to most of 1950s TV, than we are now to the episode. Hope that doesn't make others feel as old as it makes me feel.

[Bamaman]

And I have to admit that, though I personally missed most of the decade, 50s TV was still a cozy category for me...

.... and it was an interesting thought to realize that the Jeopardy premiere was closer in time to most of 1950s TV, than we are now to the episode. Hope that doesn't make others feel as old as it makes me feel.

If you go back 36 years from when this episode aired it is 1948.