I’ve Got a Bad Feeling About Thursday Night Trivia!
Yes, we got into the “Star Wars” spirit on May the 4th. In addition to numerous venues choosing a “Star Wars” question to begin the game, we included a final question on the cinematic classic as well! Based on the results, it was a question that challenged true fans, but was open enough to perhaps enable a few teams to come up with a lucky guess. On to the Thursday recaps:
THURSDAY’S STATS AND FACTS (86 teams across ten venues):
–> Highest Overall Score: PC Principals (Fish Market) with 167
–> Highest Score after Round 4: PC Principals with 164
–> Highest First Half Score: PC Principals and Black Irish (Fish Market) with 90
–> Perfect 21 (correct on all wagers and final): PC Principals
** Honorable mention to Lowered Expectations at Quincy’s, who played “over the limit” tonight, but still put up scores of 92 / 166 / 178 and answered all 21 wagering questions correctly. **
–> The halftime page played to an average of 16.8, with 27% of our teams scoring a perfect 20 points.
–> About 18% of our teams earned six points on the 6-4-2 question, by recognizing the title of John Grisham’s latest novel.
TONIGHT’S FINAL QUESTION (21.7% success rate):
–> In the original version of the 1977 film “Star Wars”, what were the only words written in ALL capital letters in the film’s opening text crawl? (you’ll find the answer later in this blog)
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Quincy’s in Gaithersburg, MD
What starts with “Star Wars”, ends with “Star Wars”, and is filled…with… “Star Wars”? I dunno that sounded better in my head. Anyway, the Fourth was with us tonight for our game of Pour House Trivia at Quincy’s!
Highlights of the Night:
In “Anyone-Else-Thinking-It?”: Maybe it’s because I’m a Disney nerd, but when I read the Last Words First Words question, all I could think was “Why didn’t we ask for the song sung by Scar and the Hyenas in the Lion King?” Then we’d have clues from Hamlet and from Hamlet with lions and singing. Seems like a perfect choice to me! What’s that? I’m a doofus? Yes, I’m aware.
In “Unexpected-Spelling-Problems”: On the list of names I never expected to cause spelling problems, Kyra Sedgwick is one of those that I figured everyone was pretty familiar with, and at the very least might only put an extra ‘e’ in her last name. As it happens, very few teams had correct spellings of her FIRST name, let alone her last name. Confused and amused would be how I’d describe that question.
In “Correct-Answers-I-Thought-No-One-Would-Get”: Panda may be the stupidest song I have ever heard. And with the crowd at Quincy’s, I never imagined for a second that anyone would get that song right. Yet there it was on one sole answer slip tonight. No one got all three, but it was something!
After a wild final tonight, it looked like this.
Honorable Mention tonight to Lowered Expectations for the top score overall, though a few too many team members to pick up a prize!
In third place tonight, the Fan Club!
In second place tonight, Breadsticks!
In first place tonight, Captain Awesome and the Wonder Friends! It’s their first win of the season!!
Great game tonight guys! Next week we’ll kick things off with the Assassination of John F. Kennedy! Kinda morbid, but OK! Study up, and we’ll see you next time!
Until then,
~ Ian
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Champion Billiards in Frederick, MD
Coming soon…
Next week’s first category: Mixology
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Bunker Sports Cafe in Leesburg, VA
Here we go! We were back again at Bunker Sports Cafe in Leesburg for our weekly bout of Pour House Trivia. Sorry for the late post, sometimes life just intervenes. Folks did rather well with tonight’s winner’s choice as we went over the prehistoric “expansion” of the Transformers universe with the Dinobots. The first round also featured a trivia question about essentially “trivia questions”, explored Matt LeBlanc’s new TV series, and then mashed up Hamlet with the Boy Scouts of America. We completed round one with three answers which contained countries in their names, included this DreamWorks hit animated film.
Round two’s audio clue was a good one, with three songs whose titles matched an unrelated film, such as Blues Traveler’s “Hook” and the late Robin Williams spin on Peter Pan in the film “Hook”. We also covered one of baseball’s countless statistical categories, the infamous serial killer Jack the Ripper, and the author of the Laws of Planetary Motion: Johannes Kepler. We had three clues for the same state, on of which was this famous battleship which was the setting for the end of World War II in the Pacific.
The third round was a good scoring round for all of the teams, and included John Travolta’s decent film about a brain tumor turning an average guy into a genius with psychokinesis, followed up with the infamous fraudster Charles Ponzi. If you are not familiar with a “ponzi scheme”, just look up “the Federal Reserve” on Wikipedia. We did a little Canadian geography and Britain’s favorite tennis star as of late. Finally there were three answers that all rhymed with each other, a beer called Miller, comedienne Phyllis Diller, and ‘THIS IS….”
The final round went back to music with three top hits of 2016 that all were one word titles, one of which being Justin Bieber’s “Sorry”, which really should have been sung by his parents. We went back to the 70’s with the original cast of Starsky and Hutch, and then examined some bones in our feet. We remembered the leader of the Communist movement in Vietnam, and then went to “the freshmaker” which is a candy that can be easily weaponized.
The final was a tough one unless you are a DIE HARD Star Wars fan, as there have been so many releases and additions, it is hard to remember the actually 1977 release version, so congrats to the two teams that got it correct. Here are the results:
First Place: Thoroughly Screwed
Second Place: Thundercats
Third Place: Indians
Next week’s first category is a nice cheery one: Serial Killers
~ Ronnie
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Lake Linganore in New Market, MD
I had the pleasure of subbing for the legendary Scott this week, and this place is pretty cool! I had fun with you guys and I’m sure someday I’ll see you all again! This week we started the game AND ended it with a “Star Wars” question. The starting question was only about “The Empire Strikes Back”, and we asked about Luke’s visions on Dagobah, where most of the teams got that he saw his own face in Darth Vader’s helmet. The audio question today was a tough one, asking teams to identify songs that shared their titles with (unrelated) films. Mostly everyone got “Message in a Bottle”, but “Hook” by Blues Traveler and “Hero” by Chad Kroeger were much much tougher. The halftime page asked about things with “Ump” in their names, and the tough one was definitely Vanderpump Rules, as well as matching U.S. States to their area/population rankings. Faking Bad jumped out to a pretty strong lead after the first half and it turns out they weren’t done just yet.
In the second half things got off to a great start with a question about John Travolta films. There was a big cheer when that category got announced, and you guys did not disappoint with just about everyone getting the film “Phenomenon”; Kyra Sedgwick as the lead actress was a bit tougher though. Faking Bad built a bigger lead going into the final question and ended up riding that to a victory. The final question, also about Star Wars, asked for the only two words that were in all caps on the opening crawl for A New Hope. Turns out the only team to know this was Faking Bad who knew it was “DEATH STAR”. This led to them taking the win with second going to The Dawson Three, and third went to Yinz Wins! Thanks for playing with me! Next week the opening question will be about Trigonometry (Faking Bad has a math teacher on their squad). So have fun with that and with Scott next week!
Until next time,
~ Chad
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Smoketown Brewing in Brunswick, MD
May the Fourth Be With You as we have our usual awesome nights at Smoketown Brewing in Brunswick. I was hurting from a back injury but you all made me feel a lot better!
Our game ran smoothly through first two rounds, other than the scientist question to close Round 2. Sorry guys – it’s not Copernicus! Only half of our teams earned points here and Multiple Scoregasms was the only team to add a two-point bonus by coming up with Tycho Brahe! The Scoundrels took an early lead as the only team to score a perfect 20 points on the halftime puzzle page. They sat comfortably ahead of teams such as Barley Fields Forever, We Drink and We Know Things, and Natty Boh’s.
The third round did not provide much separation, but the Scoundrels managed to increase their lad on the 6-4-2-, even by picking up just four points. More than half of our teams zeroed out on this question about author John Grisham. The music question to begin the final round also proved to be difficult, with nobody knowing who Desiinger is. Don’t worry, I don’t even know who that is! Appropriately, we ended our game tonight with a question on the original “Star Wars”. Natty Bo’s was the only team to come up with the correct response, which netted them the second place prize tonight. Barley Fields Forever ended in third place, but a 13-point lead after the fourth round meant that the Scoundrels could not be caught. Chalk up another win!
Our first category next week will involve the Master of Suspense… Alfred Hitchcock. See you then!
~ Zach
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Beef ‘O’ Brady’s in Frederick, MD
I had a great time filling in for Chief at Beef ‘O’ Brady’s this week (and I think the teams did too…), as we worked through a set full of those, “AWW, MAN!” moments. From teams forgetting who Andy Murray is, to the sound of only one team getting a bonus, the restaurant was alive all night! After our teams breezed through the first round, the second round prove to be unexpectedly difficult, starting with an audio question in which only two teams earned points. Oddly, those two teams also scored a two-point bonus on that question! Questions on U.S. History and Astronomy also enticed some wrong answers, but the field certainly made up for it on the halftime puzzle page. We saw THREE perfect scores and an overall average of 18 points! One of those perfect scores belonged to Flight Level Awesome, who jumped out to a first half lead with 84 points at the break.
The first stumper of the night came in Round 3 on the aforementioned tennis question. In spite of the miss there, Flight Level Awesome racked up a trio of two-point bonuses in that round, increasing its lead to 17 points after the 6-4-2 question. FLA held that lead over THREE teams that were tied for second, and I’m really glad that we didn’t actually have a three-way tie for second beyond the third round.
And then there was the final question. All of those teams, and no one’s a “Star Wars fan”? Oh well… another stumper meant another win for Flight Level Awesome, whose big lead and small wager helped them find the top of the medal stand after finishing in second place last week. Here are your top three teams:
First Place: Flight Level Awesome
Second Place: Master Haters
Third Place: Incognido’s
Flight Level Awesome takes it down and selects “Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story” as next week’s first category. Study up… and thanks for joining me tonight!
~ Nick
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Rocklands Farm Winery in Poolesville, MD
Tonight at Rockland Farms Winery in Poolesville, we saw a close match up as Six Pack tried to make it two wins in a row. Meanwhile, the Maybe Babies and Bentley’s Buddies were trying to get back to their winning ways and Sanford and son attempted at their first win at Rockland Farms. Sanford ansd Son scored the only perfect 20 on out halftime page, but it was Six Pack who snuck out to the early lead at the break, sitting four points up Maybe Babies and Bentley’s Buddies.
In the second half, Maybe Babies came roaring back to the top of the leader board and stayed there until it was time for the final question. Six Pack, who was in the lead at halftime dropped dramatically to third, barely hanging on to stay in the top three. Since it was “Star Wars” day, our final question dealt with “Star Wars”, and here is how we ended up. Taking home the win tonight and getting back to their winning ways was Maybe Babies, in second place tonight was Bentley’s Buddies, and rounding out the top three was Six Pack.
~ Devan
Next week’s first category: The Washington Post
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Right Around the Corner in St. Petersburg, FL
Six teams rocked some Pour House Trivia at Right Around the Corner in St. Petersburg on Thursday night. We were happy two welcome two new teams to the mix: Butter Bandits and Ewoks Gone Wild.
There were quite a few highlights of the evening:
–> When Them’s answer to the Tunes of 2016 question told a sad life story: “Hello, sorry, drink.” (The correct answer for those chart toppers were “Hello”, “Sorry”, and “Panda”. A much-less nonsensical narrative.)
–> When Ewoks Gone Wild got super excited about the final category: Star Wars. May the Fourth Be With You.
–> When CJ, who typically prides herself on decent pronounciation, stumbled over this mess of a name: ‘Bertholletia excels’
It was a tough night for regulars Better Red Than Dead, as half of the dynamic duo was M.I.A. in the first part of the game, leaving Jessica to fly solo through nine questions. She had a valiant showing, but alas, the deficit was too much for the redheads to overcome. That opening allowed newbies and a transfer team from one of our other Florida bars to duke it out with last week’s champs, Over 140. Ultimately, obscure Star Wars knowledge pushed Them and Butter Bandits to the top. Thanks to all who played tonight. We look forward to seeing you next week! And remember: we’re now starting at 7:30 to better facilitate our teams. Your top teams tonight:
First Place: Them
Second Place: Butter Bandits
Third Place: Over 140
Next week’s first category: Stephen King novels
~ C.J.
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Fish Market in Alexandria, VA
At Fish Market in Alexandria, we saw one of those crazy nights where barely any of my regulars show up but we still have a massive crowd for trivia! Lots of new players tonight, hopefully we’ve converted some of the new folk into wanting to play with us week in and week out! While most teams were definitely winning FUN to nothing, it seemed like the competition at the top was a head-to-head match between PC Principals and Black Irish!
Black Irish had been out of the game for a while, taking a nearly six month hiatus since their last appearance here; tonight was their triumphant return. They were very solid too, up very big on every team in the bar… except PC Principals. We had a time at the half at 90 points between those two squads and no one else was even in striking distance. Round 2 was rough for a lot of our teams creating a 10+ point separation between 2nd and 3rd place. The second half would be devoted to seeing which team would come out on top between PCP and Black Irish, while the other teams attempted to get far enough along to secure the 3rd place spot.
The hardest question tonight was probably the Astronomy question. Over ten teams playing and only three teams picking up points with Johannes Kepler, those three teams also picking up points with Tycho Brahe for the two-point bonus. Team Dogboy was among the teams that made up ground with that Astronomy question but they fell behind after missing their nine point wager early in the 3rd when they elected to put Capone instead of Charles Ponzi. That one hurt, essentially taking them out of the running for a $$ spot.
PC Principals picked up the two-point bonus, coming in early with “foot” when asked where you’d find the tarsus. Black Irish went early as well but failed to convert that one into points and the separation began! A nearly 5 point swing there was capped off with a strong PC Principals finish and they led by 10 points going into the final. It was 164 to 154 and your 3rd place team was sitting at 140 points. A very spread out field of scores; most everything was set in place but the final could still shift some stuff around.
In honor of May 4th, we finished up with a STAR WARS QUESTION! A fun one too, asking which words were written in ALL CAPS in the opening text crawl of the 1977 film “Star Wars”. About half of the teams coming up with DEATH STAR, including our leaders, so we congratulate PC Principals on their victory! Great showing guys! 2nd place to Black Irish, after sticking with Principals all night. A good game for them. 3rd place would’ve went to Thirsty Thursday BUT they were over the team limit so our 3rd place prize went to A Team Has No Name! A correct get on the final for them and well-fought game all ended in a good prize for them! Thanks for coming out, we’re back in a week! Until then 😉
~ Bill
Next week’s first category: Harry Potter Spells
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Guido’s Speakeasy in Frederick, MD
We had a crazy come from behind victory at Guido’s Speakeasy for our Thursday trivia game! Tuna Noodle Casserole jumped out to an early lead with 81 points at the end of the first half. Unathletico Madrid was right behind at 80 points. With a pair of crucial two-point bonuses, Unathletico Madrid managed to sneak into the lead by the end of the third round, despite notching a ZERO on the 6-4-2 question. Their lead dwindled to one point by the end of the fourth round, with Tuna Noodle Casserole right on their tails.
It proved to be the final question that sealed my destiny to embarrass myself for a third week in a row. Finishing in third was Team Yoko, dropping down to second place was Unathletico Madrid, and after being the only team to come up with the correct response on the final question, jumping up into first place for the third week in a row was Tuna Noodle Casserole!
They’ve had me sing Taylor Swift and Lady Gaga for the last two weeks of winner’s choice questions, but for THIS coming week they’re switching it up a little with: Jon Raps Eminem for the winner’s choice category! So study up and come join us on Thursday for another laugh and some trivia at Guido’s!
~ Jon J