JEOPARDY! fans have gotten their money's worth after a dark horse contestant won out of nowhere.
Hari Parameswaran was a long shot to win the Second Chance Tournament's Week 1 finals so fans were stunned when he did just that.
Jeopardy!'s first week of Season 40 came to a fiery finish on Friday.
27 contestants who initially lost in 2020/2021 and never thought they'd get another chance at greatness are back.
Hari, a hardware engineer from Cupertino, California, faced Jill Tucker, an operations manager from Mulino, Oregon, and David Maybury, a magnetic engineer originally from Richmond, Virginia.
They emerged as the finalists in the first week of the Season 37 Second Chance Tournament, airing instead of regular episodes.
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The special is airing for three weeks and each week, one player will win $35K and a spot in the subsequent Champions Wildcard event airing later this fall.
The winner of that will get a ticket to the next Tournament of Champions, previously won by Amy Schneider.
The scores from the night before were combined to determine the winner.
And going in, Jill boasted $19,600, David $6,728, and Hari just $1,600- so the odds were against him.
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However, in Double Jeopardy!, Hari went into Daily-Double time channeling his inner Mattea Roach during Masters.
Hari got around 26 correct responses and back-to-back Daily Doubles, though he missed one for $5000.
He then landed on the last Daily Double one clue later and bounced back $3000.
Weaponizing his two-handed buzzer style, Hari- a Georgia Institute of Technology 2022 grad- quietly nabbed clue after clue to make up for his low score the night before.
Going into Final Jeopardy, Hari suddenly seemed dangerous with $19,200, David had $14,800, Jill had $7,800
'THIS JUST GOT INTERESTING!'
Under “Astronomy,” Final Jeopardy read: “The only dwarf planet located in the inner Solar System, it’s named for an ancient deity of planting & harvests.”
Jill was wrong but wagered $0, giving her $27,400 combining both games.
David went all-in and was correct with "Ceres" rocketing to $29,600 or $36,328 from both nights and flashed a thumbs up.
Ken Jennings, 49, remarked: “Everything right now is riding on Hari’s response. Was it 'Ceres?'”
It was, to which Ken said: “This just got interesting!”
Hari revealed he wagered a “big” $16,000, giving him $35,200.
Combined with his $1,600, he inched to the top with $36,800, winning by just $472.
David got $20K for second place, and Jill $10K for third place as Hari looked beside himself, now advancing to the next tournament in October.
'THAT COMEBACK WAS INSANE!'
Fans went wild on Reddit because Hari was the underdog going in by a long shot.
One fan wrote: “That comeback was insane!! Congrats to Hari who played soo well today, this competition has been so exciting, can’t wait for next week."
“Such a thriller. In Jeopardy!, anything can happen," wrote another.
“HOORAY for Hari !!! Wow what a game," wrote a third.
“I was not expecting the underdog to come out guns blazing like that, Hari absolutely earned that win, and I'm so happy for him. This is exactly why you should never count anyone out after the first day," wrote a fourth.
Challenger David wrote: “Full congrats to Hari on staging a monster comeback and getting hot when it counted most.
"Jill remains one of my favorite people I’ve gotten to meet, and all of the SCC Week 1 were fantastic, and I love that we’ve gotten to stay in touch, after we gave you guys a week of great TV.”
ALL ABOUT THE SECOND CHANCE TOURNAMENT
Each week, there will be three qualifying matches of contestants from Season 37 instead of new players.
The three winners then face off in a Thursday/Friday final like this one.
All three final winners advance to the next tournament Champions Wildcard.
That will air directly afterward and pit the winners from this series against brief Season 37 and 38 champions- yet to be announced.
The subsequent eight-week tournament's price is a ticket to the currently postponed Tournament of Champions.
This takes fans into December, but given the writer's strikes, what will air after that is unannounced.
EVERYTHING TO KNOW ABOUT SEASON 40
Jeopardy!'s monumental Season 40 will run until July 26, 2024.
Ken, 49, is hosting the entire season solo, and Mayim Bialik is not involved as it stands.
Because of the ongoing WGA and SAG strikes with actors and writers unable to settle fair pay negotiations, co-host Mayim is officially off the board.
She bowed out in solidarity with the strikers, a big shakeup since she and Ken were tapped to split hosting after Alex Trebek's death in 2020.
That's far from the only big change to the highly anticipated new season.
Aside from not having new contestants and no Mayim, the other major change is the clues.
The game show is re-using questions from past seasons while without its writers.
Showrunner Michael Davies explained on the “Inside Jeopardy!” podcast that it “wouldn’t be fair to have new contestants making their first appearance” on the show with material that isn’t original or that was written pre-strike.
"The material that we’re gonna be using is a combination of material that our WGA writers wrote before the strike, which is still in the database and material that is being redeployed from multiple, multiple seasons of the show.”
The 2023 Tournament of Champions will not happen not until the strikes are over.
Several Season 39 champs, including Ray LaLonde, Cris Pannullo, Hannah Wilson, and Ben Chan, said they would not participate in the TOC until the strikes are concluded.
Davies also announced a bump in consolation prizes for the upcoming season (when regular episodes resume) and said that he admires and misses the show’s beloved writers.
The news caused a scathing response from Masters winner James Holzhauer, who took to the platform X, formerly known as Twitter, to call out the show.
“If you don’t have time to listen, here’s the executive summary of today’s announcement,” James, 39, wrote, sharing a link to the podcast episode.
“1:00-2:00: Jeopardy’s writers are invaluable and we couldn’t produce the show without them,” he continued.
“2:00-15:00: Here is how we will produce the upcoming season without them.”
Meanwhile, Ken has faced backlash from some fans and former players for his decision to cross the picket line.
Ken has kept relatively quiet on the subject besides resharing a statement from the show’s executive producer referencing how the late Alex continued hosting during the 2007 to 2008 writers’ strike.
Mayim is also being replaced by Ken on Celebrity Jeopardy! which airs on ABC for the entire next season.
Season 2 of Celebrity Jeopardy! is set to air on September 27 and its first slate of stars was announced on Thursday.
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Her exit marks Ken's first time hosting all programming for Jeopardy!
Fans will meet the next slate of Second Chance contenders hoping to join Hari in the subsequent tournament on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday.
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