‘Celebrity Jeopardy!’ Kicks Off With a Stunning Last-Minute Victory — Who Won?

[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Celebrity Jeopardy! Season 1, Episode 1, “Quarterfinal #1.”]

Celebrity Jeopardy! has officially kicked off on ABC as Mayim Bialik picks up primetime hosting duties for the special tournament.

The event began with the first of nine Quarterfinal games. There will be 27 total celebrities competing this season, but this episode began with three: Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings‘ Simu Liu, Saturday Night Live‘s Ego Nwodim, and Late Night with Conan O’Brien‘s Andy Richter.

Each week, Quarterfinal winners will face off against each other in three separate Semifinal games to determine the three competitors who will move on to the Finals. In the Finals, the celebrities will have the opportunity to win a million-dollar grand prize for charity.

(Credit: Courtesy of Celebrity Jeopardy)

Breaking format from the syndicated version of the game, Celebrity Jeopardy! featured three rounds of competition including Jeopardy, Double Jeopardy, and for the first time, Triple Jeopardy. Each competitor played for a charity of their choosing, with Richter competing on behalf of the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank, Nwodim playing for God’s Love We Deliver, and Liu representing Stop AAPI Hate.

Entertaining as ever, the game seemed like it was Richter’s to lose as he ran laps around his competitors with quick responses to clues. As the star discussed earlier in the episode, he’d appeared on the previous editions of Celebrity Jeopardy!, even winning a game.

Heading into Final Jeopardy, the prospect of coming out the champion seemed pretty hopeless for Liu and Nwodim, who had $11,600 and $10,000 respectively in winnings next to Richter’s impressive $21,100. Presented with the final category “Landlocked Countries,” the celebrities were given the clue, “It’s the world’s smallest landlocked country in both area and population.”

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It’s a clue that delivered three very different answers from the participating celebrities. Nwodim’s answer, “Togo,” didn’t pay off, and she was left with $0. The competition then came down to Liu and Richter.

When Liu’s answer of “Vatican City” was unveiled as the winning response, his big wager brought his winnings up to $23,200, putting him ahead of Richter. Once Richter’s answer of “Lichtenstein” was shown to be incorrect, Liu was revealed as the surprise victor.

“Oh my god!” the actor exclaimed in surprise. Just as his fellow competitors couldn’t believe it, Liu couldn’t either. So, what did you think of the twist ending? Let us know in the comments section, below, and stay tuned to see Liu compete in the Semifinals and other famous players compete as Celebrity Jeopardy! airs on ABC.

Celebrity Jeopardy!, Sundays, 8/7c, ABC