The M&M's masocts are called 'spokescandies'

Your targets this week:

We won this week (qualifying for some exciting 'playoffs' fun!) but could you have done even better?

The attendees
1) The statistician
2) The doctor

The ones that got away
1) Which actor, who has appeared in the Spiderman movies and Whiplash, also provides the voice of the yellow M&M?
2) Debuting last weekend, what is the name of the spin-off to Breaking Bad?
3) In February last year Shia LaBeouf appeared at the premiere of which movie sporting a brown bag labelled "I am not famous anymore"?
4) 2 point question: Demarchy is the selection of leaders by what method?
5) 2 point question: The rapper Christopher Wallace is better known by what name?
6) 2 point question: Spell the capital of Cambodia

The answers

1) (J. K.) Simmons
2) Better Call Saul
3) Nymphomaniac
4) Random selection from the people ('random' is the key component here)
5) The Notorious B.I.G. (or Biggie, or Biggie Smalls)
6) Phnom Penh

Our excuses

1) This was all on the doctor, who apparently would have got this if he'd known slightly better what the yellow M&M sounds like. Unfortunately, while I did know what the yellow M&M sounds like, I didn't do a good enough impression and we were stuck with Alfred Molina as a better-than-nothing guess (he played Doc Ock in the second movie).
2) Without too much optimism we put down Albuquerque, knowing it was where Breaking Bad was set, and maybe could have been the name of a TV show. Maybe.
3) We only knew about this incident from watching one of Channel 4's Big Fat Quizzes, and we could only identify the Transformers movies from Mr LaBeouf's respected oeuvre. Fun fact: thanks to living in Montreal I keep spelling his name LaBoeuf.
4) We were possibly a little bit drunk by this point, and while I thought our answer of "from the people" seemed far too vague (and a superset of 'democracy'), I didn't push hard enough to add my extra idea of 'randomly'.
5) While we're not terrible at rapper names, we are nevertheless nowhere near the standard required for North American quizzing. Our strategy was to think of a rapper whose real name we didn't know, and that landed us on the (mildly topical) Kanye West. (Real name: Kanye West.)
6) We were definitely a little bit drunk by this point and, before I could think, the doctor had written down Phnomh Pen allowing me to 'correct' it to Phnomh Penh. Oops.

How did you do? Would you have beaten us (1 point or more)? Let the world know with the poll below, then read on for my alternative questions (loosely) inspired by this week's Ones That Got Away!


My alternative questions

Question 2

1) Standard milk chocolate M&M's come in six colours: red, yellow and blue are three. Name the other three for a point.
2) Behold the Breaking Bad title card. Name either of the two elements cunningly highlighted in the name of the show.
3) Prior to his paper bag moment, LaBeouf walked out of a press conference saying "When the seagulls follow the trawler, it is because they think sardines will be thrown into the sea.", thereby quoting the words, and mimicking the actions, of which French footballer?
4) If the next Prime Minister of the UK was picked at random from the current makeup of the House of Commons (as of Friday 13th February, 2015), to the nearest 1% what is the probability that they would be a Liberal Democrat? You get 1 point if you're within 3%, 2 points if you're within 1%.
5) The B.I.G. supposedly stood for 'Business Instead of Game', but following the rapper's death his memorial foundation, which raises money for school equipment and supplies, has changed the acronym's meaning to what instead of what? (1 point for each word.)
6) For one point each, name the country whose national capital comes first alphabetically, and the country whose national capital comes last alphabetically. (Usual Pointless definitions of 'country' apply.)

The answers

1) Orange, Green and Brown
2) Bromine and Barium
3) Eric Cantona
4) 9% (so 1 point if you said 6-12%, 2 points if you said 8%-10% - the actual figure is 56/650, which works out to 8.615%, in case you're interested)
5) Books (instead of) Guns
6) United Arab Emirates (Abu Dhabi) and Croatia (Zagreb)

How did you do on my alternative questions? Have another poll!

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