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University Challenge 2019/20

Started by Twit 2, July 16, 2019, 11:57:26 PM

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Twit 2


marquis_de_sad

Yeah that was impressive. Must be difficult to get through the sinking feeling when you start off losing.

Twit 2

Imperial were stonking there. Nice.

Norton Canes

Looks like UC '20 has its first star.

bgmnts

Watched for the first time in ages and played the Karl Pilmington game. My chosen answer was 'Caravaggio'.

I won't lie, when Caravaggio came up on the last question of the Renaissance art bonus round I went FUCKING APESHIT.

It's better than playing it properly.

Twit 2


Rich Uncle Skeleton

Yeah that was great, I often find myself rooting for the losing team (unless they have a complete tit that I want to lose but claws it back just to annoy me) so that was a very fun watch despite them being beaten right at the end.

Also the most questions I've ever got right watching an episode, though whenever I get more than 2 right I feel like it must be an easy episode by their standards and they're asking questions from the stupid people deck. :(

bgmnts

Seriously dont even bother with properly playing just play the Pilkington game, the thrill is unrivalled.

Although you are right, I got about 6 or 7 right which is very troubling.

Why are they all posh southern cunts as well? Is that just a uni thing?

Chollis

southern people are more intelligent, yes

touchingcloth

What's the Pilkington game? Picking an answer which you think will come up during the show at some point? If so, "Prokofiev" is what I always shout during classical music questions, and it's right a lot more often than pure chance.

BlodwynPig


bgmnts

Quote from: touchingcloth on November 05, 2019, 05:24:06 PM
What's the Pilkington game? Picking an answer which you think will come up during the show at some point?

Yeah, it's fucking brilliant to be fair.


Attila

My go-to is Turner and/or Constable whenever an English art question comes up.

touchingcloth

Also Sickert for English artists. The pre-Raphaeleites.

Norton Canes

Quote from: touchingcloth on November 05, 2019, 05:24:06 PM
What's the Pilkington game? Picking an answer which you think will come up during the show at some point? If so, "Prokofiev" is what I always shout during classical music questions, and it's right a lot more often than pure chance

When it comes to the music round, every time for the past I don't know how many years as soon as Paxo says "You're about to hear a piece of popular music..." I've shouted out "Blur!". And the other week we got the first few bars of Girls And Boys.

"Shostakovich" has always been my Pilkington answer if it's classical.

'Zero' and 'Vienna' are also good bets.

touchingcloth

Also Sibelius for classical if I sounds slightly less Ruskie than would make me shout Prokofiev.

It's quite a middle brow quiz. More high brow than The Chase or your usual pub quiz or whatever, but low brow enough that they're within the grasp of a team of generalists. I can usually have a stab at an answer by naming a thing that I'm aware is slightly more obscure within the topic (so composers other than yer Mozarts), and the only ones which leave me completely in the dark even after hearing the answer are the really specific natural science or maths questions where you need to know quite detailed specifics. I don't know the formula for converting between kWh and Einstein-Rosen bridges.

Bingo Fury

John Singer Sargent for artists. Brahms or Schumann for the music round.

a duncandisorderly

norman mailer if it's an author, unless he has a beard, then it's hemingway. if it's a woman with a pointy nose, it's virginia woolf. normal nose.... don't know.

touchingcloth

If the music sounds modern, then it'll be Britten, Glass or Stockhausen depending on just how modern it sounds.

Rich Uncle Skeleton

Ta, three I'll keep in the back pocket.

touchingcloth

What's interesting is that I don't think the music of Sullivan - certainly not alongside Gilbert - has ever appeared as an answer. Given that to the lay audience - and even to a classical one - it's probably as obscure as most of the classical music answers are, I can only chalk that up to a bit of inverse snobbery on the part of the question setters.

Quote from: Norton Canes on July 18, 2019, 11:26:34 AM
Just looking at the series results page on Sean Blanchflower's indispensable UC site. I see last year's Edinburgh victory broke a series of five Oxbridge finals (four of which saw Cambridge defeating Oxford).

It helps when Oxford & Cambridge get several bites at the cherry by fielding teams from lots of different colleges.

University Challenge should introduce an Inter-City Fairs Cup type of knockout - one team per university.

Norton Canes

The trouble is that if Oxford and Cambridge distilled their talent into two teams of four, I'm not sure any other institution would stand a chance.

It would certainly be better if the Oxbridge colleges had to fight it out among themselves to see which of their teams would compete.

I would watch 'Oxbridge Challenge' as a qualifying series.

touchingcloth

Quote from: Norton Canes on November 10, 2019, 10:23:32 PM
The trouble is that if Oxford and Cambridge distilled their talent into two teams of four, I'm not sure any other institution would stand a chance.

It would certainly be better if the Oxbridge colleges had to fight it out among themselves to see which of their teams would compete.

That. The colleges are technically different bodies anyway, so having the universities compete instead would be bad for everyone else.

Attila

Paxman: Your bonuses are on the artist Jean-Léon Gérôme.

Mr Attila: ???

Me: Bring it on, Paxman!

[I include JLG in a couple of my Roman lectures, so was pleasantly surprised that he turned up as a category last night.] I usually do ok with the history questions, especially Classical and medieval stuff, and enjoy shouting out nonsense answers with anything to do with science.

Norton Canes

Ours is a collegiate college, so I've wondered if the rules about submitting multiple teams apply beyond Oxbridge. Although given our performance in this series it's probably as well we didn't further limit our field.

Twit 2

Brilliant episode this week. Very science-heavy, mind.

Amazed they couldn't name Caspar David Friedrich, even with a long explanation of his style in the question, or Charles Lyell (I mean, come on, name a famous geologist).

Anyway, normal likeable contestants, very close match. Thought Birmingham had it near the end there.

dissolute ocelot

Quote from: Twit 2 on November 21, 2019, 07:15:11 AM
Amazed they couldn't name Caspar David Friedrich

In my day everyone knew Friedrich from the classic covers he designed for Nietzsche's Penguin Classics. These days Nietzsche books seem indistinguishable from business management texts.

lankyguy95

Alice In Chains coming up in the music round was a highlight.