Deadwood
0Loading crowd target
0Loading crowd target
7correct to beat the crowd
49 free Deadwood trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Sep 2026.
Deadwood began as David Milch's pitch about ancient Rome; HBO already had Rome in development, so he moved his study of civilisation rising from chaos to a gold camp in the Black Hills in 1876. What followed was three seasons of Ian McShane's Al Swearengen, Timothy Olyphant's Seth Bullock, a profanity rate of 1.56 per minute and an ending that fans waited thirteen years to see finished. These 49 questions cover the whole run and the 2019 film: Wild Bill Hickok's murder at the No. 10 Saloon, Alma Garret's claim and her laudanum, the smallpox tents, Bullock and Al falling off the Gem balcony, Wolcott and the Chez Amis, Hearst's arrival and Al's severed finger, the election, the Pinkertons, the prostitute Jen and the bloodstain, and the statehood reunion in 1889 with Trixie's wedding and Charlie Utter's land. There are production questions too: the historian whose books Milch bought, the title music's kitchen pots, the two-day-per-episode structure that killed the fourth season, the cast members who died before the movie, the actor who missed it for Bosch, the Golden Globe and the eight Emmys. Easy questions stick to the network, the town and the leads; the hard ones ask about Yankton commissioners, Pinkerton tutors and closing-credit songs. Every answer is cited to a page we checked, with a short explanation so you learn something even when you miss. Play it solo or print it for a prestige-TV quiz night.
30 of 49 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01On which network did Deadwood originally air from 2004 to 2006?
HBO
HBO ended Deadwood after three seasons in 2006, then brought most of the cast back 13 years later for Deadwood: The Movie.
Q 02Who created and largely wrote Deadwood?
David Milch
David Milch read real 1870s Deadwood residents' diaries and used them as reference for the show's characters and events.
Q 03In which present-day US state is Deadwood set?
South Dakota
South Dakota: in 1876 the gold camp sat on Lakota treaty land, so it had no lawful government, and its leaders scheme to be annexed.
Q 04Who plays Al Swearengen?
Ian McShane
Ian McShane's Swearengen starts out as a cutthroat villain, yet he ends up allied with Bullock to defend the camp against outsiders such as Hearst.
Q 05Who plays Seth Bullock?
Timothy Olyphant
Timothy Olyphant's Bullock gives up a Montana marshal's badge for a new life in the gold camp, yet by the season-one finale he is Deadwood's sheriff.
Q 06What is the name of Al Swearengen's establishment?
The Gem
The Gem was real: Al Swearengen's Gem Theater advertised stage and waitressing jobs to young women, then forced those who came into prostitution.
Q 07Which ancient civilisation did Deadwood's creator first want to set his drama in?
Rome
Rome was already taken: the network had its own series Rome in development, so the creator moved his themes to the Old West, with gold replacing the cross.
Q 08Deadwood's creator had already tested broadcast TV's limits with which police drama?
NYPD Blue
NYPD Blue, co-created by the same writer, was so raw for broadcast TV that at least 30 ABC stations refused to air its 1993 premiere.
Q 09Deadwood's first season opens soon after which famous battle?
Little Bighorn
Little Bighorn: the season ends with General Crook's cavalry, out for reprisals over Custer's defeat, riding through the camp.
Q 10What business does Bullock come to Deadwood to establish?
A hardware store
A hardware store: Bullock gets the lot from Al Swearengen himself, then leaves camp to hunt down Hickok's killer.
Q 11Who plays Sol Star, Bullock's business partner?
John Hawkes
John Hawkes' Sol Star, from Vienna, never rises to Swearengen's constant anti-Jewish taunts, and later works to open the camp's first bank with Alma.
Q 12Who plays Wild Bill Hickok?
Keith Carradine
Keith Carradine's Hickok cares more for poker than prospecting, and it costs him: he is shot dead at the card table only four episodes in.
Q 13Where is Wild Bill Hickok murdered?
Tom Nuttall's place
Tom Nuttall's place, the No. 10 Saloon: after cleaning out a drunk at poker there, Hickok tosses him a dollar for breakfast, and the humiliated man returns to shoot him.
Q 21Which disease spreads through the camp in season one, forcing plague tents?
Smallpox
Smallpox: one early victim, a con man dumped in the woods to die by his old partner, is nursed back by a frontierswoman and returns in season two as a preacher.
Q 22Who runs the Bella Union, Al's rival establishment?
Cy Tolliver
Cy Tolliver: the actor who played him died in 2017, so the 2019 movie has Tolliver dead and Joanie Stubbs running the Bella Union.
Q 23Who plays Deadwood's E. B. Farnum, the hotel owner and self-appointed mayor?
William Sanderson
William Sanderson's Farnum, Swearengen's informant, sells his Grand Central Hotel to Hearst for $100,000 and a job managing it.
Q 14Who shoots Hickok in the back of the head?
Jack McCall
Jack McCall is acquitted by a hurried camp jury after Swearengen leans on the judge, but Bullock tracks him down and hauls him to Yankton to face a real trial.
Q 15Which actor plays both Hickok's killer and, in season two, Francis Wolcott?
Garret Dillahunt
He returned again as a background drunk in the 2019 movie, heckling Hearst.
Q 16Who plays Alma Garret?
Molly Parker
Molly Parker's Alma is widowed when Swearengen has her husband killed over a claim the man thinks is worthless, and it proves to be rich.
Q 17What secret habit does Alma Garret nurse when she arrives?
Laudanum
Laudanum: Swearengen orders one of his prostitutes to keep Alma doped, but she helps Alma fake it and quit, then tries to kill herself with opium.
Q 18How does Dan Dority kill Brom Garret on Al's orders?
Throws him off a cliff
Throws him off a cliff: Swearengen wanted it to look like an accident, but a prospector sees it happen and keeps quiet to save his own skin.
Q 19Who plays the hard-drinking frontierswoman who idolises Hickok?
Robin Weigert
Robin Weigert's frontierswoman talks tough, yet when Swearengen comes for the Metz girl in her care, she breaks down in terror.
Q 20Who plays Doc Cochran?
Brad Dourif
Brad Dourif's Doc Cochran, a Civil War veteran, prays in anguish for the dying Reverend Smith's release, haunted by the screams he heard on battlefields.
Q 24How does Al Swearengen end the suffering of the dying Reverend Smith?
Smothers him
Smothers him: by the season-one finale the reverend's brain tumour has left him bedridden, and Al ends his misery himself.
Q 25Who kills Magistrate Clagett on Swearengen's behalf and then becomes his agent?
Silas Adams
Silas Adams, the magistrate's own bagman, cuts Clagett's throat after Clagett squeezes Al over a murder warrant, then becomes Al's man in Yankton.
Q 26What stops Al from cutting the sheriff's throat after the two fall off a balcony into the street?
The arrival of Martha and William
The arrival of Martha and William: Swearengen, knife drawn, looks up at the stagecoach, catches the boy's terrified face, and lowers the blade.
Q 27What ailment leaves Swearengen collapsed behind a locked door in season two?
Kidney stones
Kidney stones: his men leave the door shut for hours until Doc Cochran and Jewel get Dan to break it down, and Al pulls through but has a small stroke.
Q 28Whom does Alma marry to avoid the shame of being pregnant by Bullock?
Whitney Ellsworth
Whitney Ellsworth, a veteran prospector, weds Alma in a hotel ceremony, but Hearst later has him shot dead in his tent on her claim.
Q 29Deadwood actor Jim Beaver named his character after a producer of which TV show?
Adventures of Superman
Adventures of Superman: Beaver was researching a biography of its star George Reeves, so he asked that his prospector share its producer's name.
Q 30What is the name of the brothel Joanie Stubbs opens in season two?
The Chez Amis
The Chez Amis: Joanie's high-class brothel is ruined when a client murders three women there, and she later turns it into a schoolhouse.