Warning: This page contains spoilers for the December 24, 2025, game of Jeopardy! — please do not scroll down if you wish to avoid being spoiled. Please note that the game airs as early as noon Eastern in some U.S. television markets.
Here’s today’s Final Jeopardy (in the category Holiday Songs) for Wednesday, December 24, 2025 (Season 42, Game 78):
In an early draft, this title line was followed by “it may be your last”, but Judy Garland refused to sing it that way
(correct response beneath the contestants)
Today’s Jeopardy! contestants:
Melanie Hirsch, an attorney from Silver Spring, Maryland
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Andrew Wang, a medical student from Winnetka, Illinois
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Aaron Himmel, a stay-at-home dad originally from Long Island, New York
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Andy’s Pregame Thoughts:
On this Christmas Eve, we have our third semifinal of Week 2 of Second Chance; our returning players today are Aaron Himmel, Andrew Wang, and Melanie Hirsch. The Unified Prediction Model does think Andrew is the favorite, owing to his strong performance against Scott Riccardi back in July, but there’s so much variance in these games, with the Daily Doubles being crucially important. All three players had very strong, albeit non-victorious, debuts on the Alex Trebek Stage; I expect this to be a well-played game regardless.
If you watch the show on an ABC affiliate, tomorrow is not going to be a good day for you, owing to the situation of ABC airing its usual Christmas Day marathon of NBA games. Make sure to check your local listings, or, Matt Carberry’s usual Google sheet of pre-emptions.
(Content continues below)
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Correct response: What is “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas”?
More information about Final Jeopardy:
(The following write-up is original content and is copyright 2025 The Jeopardy! Fan. It may not be copied without linked attribution back to this page.)
Written for the movie musical Meet Me In St. Louis, the song “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” was written for Judy Garland’s character to cheer up her extremely upset younger sister; their family had to move to New York from their hometown of St. Louis because the father had received a job promotion. However, the movie’s cast criticized the song for being too depressing; thus, many of the lyrics were changed, including changing “It may be your last” to “Let your heart be light”.
Unfortunately, this Final Jeopardy clue might be made more difficult simply because it takes extra time to write down such a long song title; I’m hoping that none of our three players run out of time trying to write this one down.
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Game Recap:
In a game that saw the maximum gained on all three Daily Doubles, our three players combined for a Coryat score of over $50,000 and a total score of $57,800. An incorrect response on the final clue of Double Jeopardy meant that Melanie and Andrew were tied for the lead entering Final Jeopardy, and Aaron in a very close third.
Final Jeopardy saw both Andrew and Melanie go all in, but only Melanie was correct (along with Aaron, who bet $0), and she is your third finalist this week! She’ll play against Guy Branum and Michelle Tsai tomorrow and Friday.
Scores going into Final:
Melanie $20,400
Andrew $20,400
Aaron $17,000
Tonight’s results:
Aaron $17,000 + $0 = $17,000 (What is Have yourself a merry little Christmas?)
Andrew $20,400 – $20,400 = $0 (What Have a Holly Jolly Christmas?)
Melanie $20,400 + $20,400 = $40,800 (What is Have Yourself a Merry little Christmas) (Finalist)
Chances of winning Second Chance:
Guy Branum 27.014%
Michelle Tsai 38.837%
Melanie Hirsch 34.149%
Andy’s Thoughts:
- Today’s game felt to me like it was one of the most exciting three-way battles in the history of the show.
- Today’s J!6 clues can be found at the monthly archive.
Final Jeopardy! wagering suggestions:
(Scores: Andrew $20,400 Melanie $20,400 Aaron $17,000)
Aaron: If both Andrew and Melanie make “game theory optimal” bets, any bet than isn’t $17,000 is fine. However, a lot of players don’t make game theory optimal betes. I would say the best defense against the biggest range of suboptimal bets here is anything between $6,801 (in case either player goes really small) and $10,199 (in case either player bets just to cover and are incorrect.) (Actual bet: $0)
Andrew: You have to defend against Melanie. Go all in. (Actual bet: $20,400)
Melanie: You have to defend against Andrew. Go all in. (Actual bet: $20,400)
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