Final Jeopardy: French Landmarks (12-22-25)
The Final Jeopardy question (12/22/2025) in the category “French Landmarks” was:
Secularized during the Revolution, this Latin Quarter bldg. has a porch of columns & triangular pediment modeled on an ancient building
Today is the first match of the 2025 Second Chance Tournament (Week 2). These 3 contestants are up first: Rachael Gray, a graduate student from Cuyahoga Falls, OH; Guy Branum, a writer and comedian from West Hollywood, CA; and Jasmine Zhou, an ASIC engineer from Woodland, CA.
The links in their names will take you to each one’s original game, and you can see if their second chance was predicted in the comments.
Round 1 Categories: Let’s Get to the Point – Literary Lodgings – As the Crow Flies – Cut From the Same Cloth – “Hot” Lines – You Seem Tense
Guy found the Jeopardy! round Daily Double in “Literary Lodgings” under the $800 clue on the 5th pick of the round. He was in the lead with $1,400, $600 more than Jasmine in second place. Guy bet it all and he was RIGHT.
Though it sounds possessive, the name of this country estate in an E.M. Forster title has no apostrophe show
Guy finished in the lead with $6,200. Jasmine was second with $6,000 and Rachael was last with $4,600. All clues were shown.
Round 2 Categories: Shedding Some Light on the Dark Ages – Crossword Clues “U” – Nepo Babies – Philosophers – Toxic Creatures – You See Tents
Jasmine found the first Daily Double in “the Dark Ages” under the $1,600 clue on the 2ns pick. She was in the lead with $7,600 now, $1,000 more than Guy in second place. Jasmine bet it all and guessed Luxembourg. That was WRONG.
Around 900 the French king ceded to Rollo the Viking a large northern territory that became known as this Duchy show
Jasmine got the last Daily Double in “Crossword Clues ‘U'” under the $2,000 clue, with a dozen clues left after it. In last place with $6,800, she had $5,800 less than Guy’s lead. Jasmine bet it all again and, after some finger counting, came up with universal. That was WRONG.
All over the place (10 letters) show
Guy finished in the lead with $9,400. Rachael was next with $8,600 and Jasmine was in third place with $4,800. All clues were shown.
TWO of the contestants got Final Jeopardy! right.
WHAT IS THE PANTHÉON?
Louis XV of France believed he was cured of a serious illness through the intercession of St. Geneviève, patron saint of Paris. The grateful king vowed to build a new church in her honor. It took decades and before the church could be finished, the French Revolution broke out. Many Catholic churches were destroyed but St. Geneviève’s church was taken over as a place to honor the country’s heroes. The original architect, Jacques-Germain Soufflot, used the Pantheon in Rome for inspiration. His remains were transferred to the Panthéon in 1829. Click here for a chronological list of Panthéon burials.
What happened to St. Geneviève’s relics? The revolutionaries were so dead serious about destroying Catholic icons, they burned her remains in public and threw her ashes in the Seine. Her few salvaged relics are housed in Saint-Étienne-du-Mont, a church near Le Panthéon. Click here for more on that, but note that the paragraph that starts “Hisrelics” still refers to St. Geneviève. (It’s one of those translation errors that happens in French when ‘ses’ and ‘son’ can mean his or her.)
Jasmine got it right. She bet $4,799 and finished with $9,599.
Rachael had no response. That cost her $7,000 and left her with $1,600.
Guy also got it right, too. He bet $7,801 and won the game with $17,201. Guy Branum is the first finalist for this week.
2 triple stumpers from the last round:
SHEDDING SOME LIGHT ON THE DARK AGES ($2000) The founder of monasticism this saint founded a monastery in Italy and established his rule for the lives of monks circa 530 A.D.
YOU SEE TENTS ($2000) A pavilion with a tent design at this Washington city’s 1974 World’s Fair has been turned into a permanent gathering lace
2 years ago: Only ONE of the players got this FJ in “FAMOUS NAMES IN AMERICA”
The name of this animal that died in 1885 after being struck by a train that subsequently derailed lives on as an adjective show
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Jasmine showed why, well, she’s Second Chance. You gotta take the big shots (yes), but get them right (no).
The most interesting thing was the second DD. Not 8 hours ago, I read an article about the History Channel’s series Vikings, and how accurate or inaccurate it was. So, I knew it!
Otherwise, I was 1/3 on DD and missed FJ. I confidently said “The Louvre”.
Coincidences like that one with DD2 rock!
10 pm start here. Wacky game, to say the least. I knew the first/last DDs (fell into the Luxembourg trap on the 2nd) and guessed right on Final. Vaguely recalled seeing that building in 1971. Too many goofy answers tonight for my liking: Switzerland for the Lindgren/Pippi country (she probably was thinking of Heidi); universal for ubiquitous on that very knowable DD that eventually cost Jasmine the win.
Knew the World’s Fair city. My wife and her two sibs took the train up there in 1974 to see it. Also the vex/defeat clue. Not surprisingly, got only one of the “Hot” songs, the one from my heyday.
If only Jasmine had bet more conservatively on those DDs, she would have won easily.
It was another great game, and Jasmine was quite a competitor. In fact even though she flubbed a couple of difficult DDs, and was left with nothing (both times), she moved on undeterred. Myself, I didn’t do well in the game at all, and missed the FJ.