'Jeopardy!' contestants slammed for 'Wizard of Oz' triple stumper
On Thursday's episode of the long-running game show, contestants Mary Walheim, Alfred Wallace and three-day defending champion Bryce Wargin came up short when presented with a clue in the "Fictional Characters" category.
The prompt read: "Boq is one of these fictional people, 'Not as big as the grown folk… but neither were they very small.'"
Walheim was left with a dollar in total winnings after betting $5,999 of her total $6,000 haul when she incorrectly guessed "What is a Lilliputian?"
"I'm afraid it's not the Lilliputians from 'Gulliver's Travels,'" "Jeopardy!" host Ken Jennings told her.
Walheim's competitors, Wallace and Wargin, also appeared to believe that the clue referred to the 6-inch-tall men living on the island of Lilliput in Jonathan Swift's classic 1726 novel.
Wallace's answer was revealed to be "What are lili?" The contestant, who wagered $10,000 of his $10,600 in winnings, noted that his response was "almost Lilluputian." Jennings agreed, adding that Wallace had likely run out of time to write the characters' full name.
Wargin's first guess was "What are Lilliputians?" before he crossed the answer out and wrote, "dwarves."
Jennings then informed the contestants that "What is a Munchkin?" was the correct answer.
"In the 1939 movie of 'The Wizard of Oz,' the Munchkins are very small, but in the book, the Munchkins are said to be about Dorothy's height," Jennings told them.
Wargin, who was in the lead heading into the final round with $16,000, had bet $5,201, which dropped him down to $10,799.
However, as a four-day "Jeopardy!" champion, Wargin's total winnings were $70,199.
Many fans watching at home had easily guessed the right answer as the character of Boq played a prominent role in the 2024 mega-hit movie musical "Wicked," which was an adaptation of the Tony Award-winning Broadway musical of the same name.
Boq was portrayed by Ethan Slater in "Wicked," which starred Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo.
After the episode ended, fans flocked to social media to share their dumbfounded reactions.
"Read the word "Boq" and SCREAMED "MUNCHKIN!!!!!!!!" How did NO ONE GET THIS??? wrote one social media user on X.
"How did no one get that BOQ answer on jeopardy right," another X user added.
"Everyone who watched Jeopardy and recently watched Wicked was screaming at their TV tonight…," one viewer chimed in.
"No one knew boq is a munchkin on final jeopardy, " a "Jeopardy" fan posted on X, adding crying emojis.
"My entire household was shouting MUNCHKIN!!! Apparently not one of the 3 saw 'Wicked,'" another fan wrote on X.
"Final was so easy. How did they all miss it," a viewer wondered in the show's Reddit discussion thread.
Both the movie and the play "Wicked" were based on Gregory Maguire's 1995 book "The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West."
Maguire's novel is centered on the imagined backstory of Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West and presents an alternate version of events that took place before L. Frank Baum's 1900 children's novel "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz."
Boq is featured in both books, but he was not included in the classic 1939 movie "The Wizard of Oz," which starred Judy Garland.
After "Wicked" was released last November, the film became a major blockbuster, raking in $747.2 million worldwide against a $150 million budget. The movie is now the highest-grossing musical film adaptation of all time. "Wicked" also received 10 nominations at the 2025 Academy Awards, including nods for Erivo as best actress and Grande as best supporting actress.
The movie took home Oscars for best costume design and best production design.
Slater is set to return as Boq, along with Erivo as Elphaba and Grande as Galinda, in part two of "Wicked," titled "Wicked: For Good." It is due out this fall.
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