Word Wars is a 2004 documentary film directed by Eric Chaikin and Julian Petrillo about competitive Scrabble playing. The film follows four players—Joe Edley, Matt Graham, Marlon Hill, and Joel Sherman—in the nine months leading up to the 2002 National Scrabble Championship, which was held in San Diego.
The film shines a spotlight on the Serious Business nature of high-level competition in Scrabble; few of the players are shown to have any other real hobbies and in most cases, even regular jobs, as the practice and play time needed to be competitive leaves little time for anything else. Considering that the tournament cash prizes aren't really that substantial, it becomes obvious that it's done purely out of love of the game and competition more than anything else.
This film provides examples of:
- Alliterative Title
- "Angry Black Man" Stereotype: Marlon. He openly rails against many of the words in the game, citing cultural oppression and appropriation.
- Black and Nerdy: Marlon again. He's shown that this makes him an odd duck in his neighborhood in the inner city of Baltimore.
- Bowdlerise: Discussed with the decision to remove some foul language and slurs from the Official Scrabble Dictionary. Since the movie, most have been restored, however.
- Crowd Chant: The lively crowd in the park watching the Champ and the amateur was cited as one of the factors that threw off the Champ's game.
- Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: One of the best non-tournament players in New York (who only plays "friendly" local games in the park) once beat the world tournament Scrabble champion in a pick up game.
- Dreaming the Truth: Joe says he often dreams in anagrams due to his constant play. Once in a dream he anagrammed a word into "antipolice" and woke up to see whether it was a real word. It was.
- Hollywood Board Games: The characters, much like the people they are based on, have all kinds of personalities, with their only shared trait being how knowledgeable they are about the English language and the fact they have no other hobbies. They all possess Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness and jumble anagrams like nothing, to the point of making everyone else think they are using Perfectly Cromulent Words when playing Scrabble.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: Marlon gets a few bad hands of tiles, leading to him losing the tournament, walking out before the game is even complete.
- Odd Friendship: Marlon is openly negative toward the other players, especially Matt. However, the movie shows they all have a bond and an odd friendship with each other despite personality differences. Marlon even rooms with Matt after verbally running him down.
- Perfectly Cromulent Word: Many of the words played at this level of Scrabble would appear to be this. Even a lot of advanced players would feel this for some of the words.
- Rage Quit: Marlon, though it's perfectly understandable. He got vowel-hosed.
- Right Under Their Noses: The champion who lost to the street player is described in the movie as having a bingo on his rack that most of the spectators caught but he missed. The bingo may have won him the game.
- Scrabble Babble: Discussed, as one would expect. One instance is shown in an actual tournament, as Matt plays "bemeant" against Marlon, which Marlon decides not to challenge even though he knew it was bull.
- Separated by a Common Language: The guy who's considered one of the best Scrabble players in the world (and one of the best wordsmiths period) loses in the San Diego tournament final to Joel. He had been playing with a handicap in being British; there are many British words not in the U.S. Scrabble dictionary and vice versa. He stated he was having difficulty with this.
- Serious Business: Man oh man, anyone who's only occasionally played Scrabble on game night with their family would be amazed at these guys who dedicate their lives to it.
- Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness: Much needed to compete at this level.
- Shown Their Work: Various scenes at the players' homes show stacks and stacks of dictionaries, word books, and variations of Scrabble. It's very clear it's impossible to compete at the high levels without serious study and memorization.
- Sickly Prodigy: "G.I." Joel Sherman. One of the best players in the circuit, he fights poor health, especially his severe acid reflux problem (hence the "G.I." nickname).
- Significant Anagram:
- Being able to anagram words or even a jumble of random letters is, of course, an extremely important ability in Scrabble.
- The transition screens also anagram words in the different chapters in the spirit of the game.
- Smart People Play Chess: Played with. The film compares the two games and their players.
- Sore Loser: Marlon does not handle losing well at all.
- 10-Minute Retirement: Marlon declares he done with Scrabble tournaments at the end of the movie. The post script text informs the viewer he was in another tournament two weeks later.
- Timed Mission: In tourney play, the player only have 25 minutes overall during their play to study their tiles, the board and place them. The timer stops after they lay down their play and the next player starts his clock.
- Underdogs Never Lose: Averted. The film's centerpiece ends up being the colorful Marlon, who is the lowest ranked person the film focuses on. He finished 9th in the final tournament.
