15D PALM OIL was a wheelhouse gimme for me because I spend a lot of my time on conservation issues and have a passion for orangutans, who are particularly affected by unsustainable palm oil plantations. Palm oil is in about half of the household products in the U.S., including foods like crackers, ice cream, and candies and toiletry items like soaps, lotions, and cosmetics. The good thing about palm oil is that it is a very efficient crop, yielding much more oil per acre with less water and chemicals than other oil crops. This means that banning palm oil isn't the solution. Furthermore, it is often impossible to determine if palm oil is in a product because there are dozens of substances derived from it and, in the U.S., it can be simply labeled vegetable oil. The best approach that I know is to press for certified sustainable palm oil made by producers committed to ending deforestation. You can use the free PalmOil Scan App, created by the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums with the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, to scan or type in products as you shop. See <a href="https://wazapalmoil.org" target="_blank">https://wazapalmoil.org</a>/ and <a href="https://www.zoo.org/palmoil" target="_blank">https://www.zoo.org/palmoil</a> for more information. If you’re buying candy for Halloween, take a look at the list on the latter site. Thank you for reading this. It means a lot to me.
@Cindy Thank you, Cindy. What you have written is enlightening on many different levels, and it can mean a lot to us as well..
@Cindy Here’s another good resource on PALMOIL: <a href="https://www.worldwildlife.org/pages/which-everyday-products-contain-palm-oil" target="_blank">https://www.worldwildlife.org/pages/which-everyday-products-contain-palm-oil</a>
@Cindy Good points, and palm oil is an unhealthy product with lots of saturated fat.
Wired. Wired!!! I had to lookup the marble.
@Chris. Yeah, me too. I too had TAT and TIRED, took forever to find the pesky error.
@Chris Went straight here to see how many others were hung up there!
@Chris - I don't do look-ups, but I did have to run the alphabet to get that cross.
@Chris I took me a while too. But I knew Tired Sleepers sounded wrong. If you are asleep, you are not tired. But then we pry could quibble with Wired Sleepers too. Insomniacs are not sleeping! As I am not right now. Lol
A movie buff's favorite cereal is cinema toast crunch. (I did a pour job with that one.)
@Mike Served at film school canteen: Grape-Nuts of Wrath - the rough cut.
@Mike I think you're waffling again.
Wow, finding examples that combine three movie titles to totally encapsulate a fourth movie title is quite impressive. I love MANHATTAN HOOK UP for Sex and the City. Great clues for ITCHY (“Having had a few bites, say”) and EMAILER (“Person with attachment issues, perhaps”). Final flyspeck…..there is no movie entitled tIRED. Nicely done, Jerry. FINIS
@Anita Your comment encapsulates everything I wanted to say about this puzzle. Loved MANHATTAN HOOK UP and I too was left to endless flyspecking until I tried replacing the T in tIRED. I always love your comments and your sly sense of humour!
High props to Jerry for coming up with this theme set – Each theme answer with three movie titles that meld into a promo for *another* movie – wow! – plus, it's an answer set broken into three pairs, each with the same number of letters – double wow! I did notice two things about the non-theme answer set: • It’s a schwa-ender-fest: KAPPA, ABBA, KAFKA, ERA, SARA, RIA, ORCA, TUNA, ALGA, AGENDA, CRAYLOLA, IKEBANA. • As a serendipitous theme echo, many answers are movie titles: ORCA (1977), AGENDA (2007), MAZE (2000), BRUTAL (2007, 2012), EPIC (2013), BALI (2007), CLUE (1985), EULOGY (2004), SARA (1997, 2019), SEEDS (2018, 2020). I’m guessing there are more. I don’t know why, but I love movie titles with exclamation points, like “Airplane!” and “Mars Attacks!” So, I started looking through the grid for more such titles that will never happen, but, to me at least, would be funny to see: “ALGA!”, “ENIAC!”, “BAES!”, “UKE!”, “PILAF!”. Thus, Jerry, your impressively-themed puzzle gave me smiles along with a satisfying fill-in. Thank you so much for making this!
Who knew there were so many movies with single word titles? Some additional future blockbusters hidden in the puzzle: ITCHY PEST TYPE: A documentary comparing Scotland’s midges with Maine’s black flies. EPIC KAFKA AGENDA: A horror film taking place entirely during a staff meeting run by a large cockroach. CHURN TASK UPSET: A newly discovered Buster Keaton in which the hapless hero has hilarious mishaps making butter.
@Cat Lady Margaret *loud bombastic music crashes through the TV as the King of Queens segment segues to an ad break with a new movie promo* ******* *huge words fill the screen* EPIC KAFKA AGENDA A horror film This new outing by Sam Raimi takes place entirely during a staff meeting run by a large cockroach *fade-in to an office boardroom* *deep testosterone-saturated voice intones/shouts* "It was Gregor's worst nightmare. His new job had seemed so promising. But now all it promised was terror!" *music, a cross between Jaws and Psycho, swells and crescendos* *camera zooms in slowly on a bored-looking 30-something man sitting at a boardroom table restlessly tapping his pencil on a doodle-infested legal pad* *voiceover guy, now more muted* "As Gregor Samsa stirred one morning from uneasy listless boardroom ennui, he found himself transformed in his seat into a gigantic myrmidon. He was sipping on his bitter, as it was 2-day-old, coffee and when he lifted his head a little he could see his Godzilla-like insectoid boss gesticulating with six stiff hairy appendages, one of which clumsily grasped a laser pointer that it could hardly keep in position and which edified the projected chart not at all. Gregor's numerous doodles, which were pitifully awkward and puerile, grew helplessly on the pad before his eyes. What has happened to me? he thought. It was no dream." *music swells agitatedly* ONLY IN THEATRES ********* The idea is positively Margaretesque
Decent puzzle, but including "KOYAANISQATSI" in an answer would have kicked it up a notch.
Good to see TAW in this puzzle, but made doubly pleasurable by the appearance of AGGIE; a game of marbles would be much the lesser without aggies. A triple feature, of sorts, would have been cat's eyes (another kind of marble). MANHATTAN HOOKUP. What a gem. Azure blue seemed a little redundant, but the more I thought of it, the more I withdrew my original objection. There's banana yellow, after all, and navy blue is a common term, and I bought a sweater last year on Amazon that was "available in Trump orange." But I haven't seen a color associated with his running mate. Perhaps that mutable hue, chameleon? Hillbilly Lily? Giant (1956) is a really good movie, with a standout performance by the mesmerizing James Dean, and made from a surprisingly good novel by Edna Ferber, recording the generations of turmoil in a Texas family spanning the 1920s to the 1950s. The constructor sounds like a nice guy, a good life, writing plays, volunteering for NASA (the program sounds like a delegation to greet ETs if and when they arrive. Indeed, if I was on the delegation I'd be thinking about what people should wear to such an event, go casual? wear a tux? pack heat? Not to mention catering, a good dj, maybe an open bar, you think they might be orthodox ETs or just galaxy surfers looking to party? So many questions!) and this is a swell puzzle. He's a bit coy about what was left out of his 2017 puzzle but restored here: can anyone clue me in?
I've clued myself in, thanks to Barry Ancona's link to the original puzzle referenced in constructor's notes. The original version of "Double Feature" which appeared in 2017, like this one, had as clues the titles of movies and the answers were titles, too (two films then, three films now). Shortz took out the film clues and replaced them with non-movie-title clues, which reduced by half the original cleverness of the idea. Thus, TITANIC SKYFALL was clued as [baseball-sized hail?] when the original clue was a movie: [ARMAGEDDON]. Jeff Chen was upset about it, too, and his notes took issue with what Shortz had done. Shortz was right to apologize for this, and the constructor was more gracious in accepting the apology than many would have been. The appearance of this puzzle, in all its cleverness, is indeed a righting of a wrong.
@john ezra navy in ‘navy blue’ originally refers to the colour of (royal?) navy uniforms IIRC, so it’s not redundant. The shortened version is ‘navy’ thanks to time. Azure, though, has always been a standalone word hasn’t it? 🧐🤔
A little over 3 years ago, commenter “Mr Mark” and I arrived at simultaneous 1000 day streaks. I haven’t spent much time here of late, but I was reminded of that when I finished this puzzle this morning and reached my streak’s 6th anniversary. I hope Mr Mark is still puzzling out there somewhere too!
@bratschegirl, Well done! I do remember when that happened, how amazing! I also hope Mr. Mark is continuing his streak right along with you. Thanks for the reminder.
@bratschegirl Amazing achievement! I hope you're out here enjoying them after another six years, too.
As someone who isn't a movie guy, I didn't find the theme to be fun enough to justify some of the mediocre fill required to enable it. I thought the idea was a very cool concept, and I'm impressed that the constructor managed to actually achieve it, but I didn't have that much fun actually solving it. But that's okay, since I assume this was a real treat for movie fans. Today I just wasn't the main audience, and I at least got to come away having learned a few new things. Nicely done.
@Jackson This post could serve as a template for how to give a negative criticism without being a jerk about it. Congratulations! I hope you enjoy the next ones more than enough to make up for this one. That's not a wish I extend to everyone here.
@Jackson honestly, I am a movie fan and I knew all of these titles, I am the target audience and I feel the same way about this puzzle. Oh well.
Loved it. Felt like a lazy Sunday morning in puzzle form. Fun answers, silly clues, clever theme. Have only seen a few of the movies. Maybe, I’ll stay under this blanket on my cozy couch, with two pups sleeping on my legs and have hubby make me a second cuppa (pups on lap, universally rule out having to get up- house rule) and watch a movie. Or three. Thank you Jerry for this motivating gem! I’m gonna stick to the plan!
Sometimes I can tell that my brain does not work in the same way that the puzzle creator’s brain works. This Sunday puzzle was like that :/
I don't know if everyone in the world already knows this, but I only learned it recently: If you want to comment on something you think is wrong in the puzzle, you can search the previous comments to see if it's been discussed already. On my android tablet, I can tap the three dots in the lower right corner of my screen, and it allows me to do a search. For example, you could search for 2012, and you will be brought right to the conversation discussing 120A and find that you are correct and the puzzle was wrong. You could then just add on to that thread. If you've been shown to be wrong, you could simply not post your comment. It seems that 99% of the posts about something being wrong in the puzzle are incorrect, so it would save you from making an erroneous "correction".
@Nancy J. I admire your helpful comment, but it's really not that hard to read or skim all the comments if you want to check, but many people just want to post what they want to post and don't care that their observations have already been posted or might be wrong.
@Nancy J. Totally agree, but, and I don't know if this has been pointed out, many people just want to post what they want to post and don't care that their observations have already been posted or might be wrong.
@Nancy J. I'm with you. Searching the comments can cut down on repetitive and unnecessary comments. On a PC, the CTRL-F is how you do that, but know that you must first load all the comments into memory, and to do that you must scroll/page down to the end of all the comments. One other caveat, I don't think the search will find comments that can only be viewed with the "View All Comments" button when a thread has more than 3 comments, but that is usually immaterial anyway. On an iphone you can search by selecting the middle icon at the bottom of the screen (the one that is a box with an arrow pointing up from the middle of it), and then swiping up until you see the "Find on Page" option.
@Nancy J. Then what's BA going to do all day? 🤣
@Nancy J., it doesn’t work on iPad. “Find on page” shows a number of results but won’t navigate to them with the arrows. Page focus just stays at the top of the comments. I wish the NYT would simply add a search function on the comments!
@Nancy J. There's no option to search for comments on the Android mobile app, at least I didn't see one.
Japanese paper cutting crossing OBES was a problem for me but I don’t mind going off to Google to learn new things. The puzzle would be kind of a waste of time if I weren’t always learning new things.
@Justin I mean floral arrangement not paper cutting haha. But I learned about both today, case in point.
The Pulitzer in fiction was not awarded in 2012. Adam Johnson's book was published in 2012, but won the 2013 Pulitzer in fiction
Good constructor notes and best wishes to Will.
Not a fan of this one, but I also don’t watch movies. Bleh, totally slog
@Sarah I’ve watched almost every movie referenced in this puzzle but I also think it was a slog. Sacrifices everything in service of the theme.
@Sarah “I don’t watch movies”? That’s a little like saying “I don’t read books” or “I don’t eat food.”
Clever theme, but I didn’t love a lot of the fill required to make the theme work - lots of obscure words and obscure proper names! (TAW and TALI to make WIRED, RAIMI crossing RILL and LAINE, ERA detergent crossing ERNO Rubik…) I solved without any lookups in the end, but lots of crossings required pure guesswork. Not too fun.
For 120 - across: should the clue be the 2013 winner?
Will, It seems it should be (unlike the Academy Awards clues, where the 2012 Best Picture is awarded in 2013, causing great confusion). The novel was published in 2012 but it was awarded the Pulitzer in 2013. There was no award for fiction in 2012. <a href="https://www.pulitzer.org/prize-winners-by-year/2013" target="_blank">https://www.pulitzer.org/prize-winners-by-year/2013</a>
Yahoo! I get to be first! Very smooth Sunday puzzle. Only it’s Saturday here. Enjoy, everyone!
I loved this clever one! By the time I reached 37A I knew the theme even though I have not seen the majority of films mentioned. I appreciate the care that went into the construction of this puzzle, one that never resorts to iffy entries, that is, not one groaner. Kudos to Jerry for his highly entertaining crossword!
This was not a good puzzle. Still don’t get the theme. 👎🏼
@Eva H. I think the NYT puzzle is only worth anything if it can occasionally stump me. I too have completed entire puzzles without ever deciphering the theme. But that is part of the fun. I then read the column, usually followed by a head smack and an "of course!"
The prompt / answer to 120A is incorrect. No one won the Pulitzer for fiction in 2012. Adam Johnson won in 2013. That’s a very easy one to confirm with a quick google search, so it’s rather annoying that the editors didn’t catch it.
@Jenna Often there's a discrepancy between the year the work was done vs. the year when the award was given. Why does everyone hate the editors?
The theme answers baffled me so I ignored them and had a wonderful time solving the puzzle without them. More fun seeing what they were when the puzzle was FINIS. Not a difficult solve, but solid and enjoyable. Thank you Jerry Miccolis. You cannot know how much you brightened my otherwise dismal day.
Besides ikebana being crossed with obes, neither of which i knew, I thought this was a fair and enjoyable Sunday puzzle.
@David OBEs - Order of the British Empire. Sort of a lesser version of a knighthood, followed by CBE (Commander of the…) and a few more before full knighthood
@David Oh… OFFICER of the BE, actually, don’t know my own honours system lol
Great, fun, puzzle. Suggestion for a future theme: In 1968 I saw a theater marquee double bill of two new movies: The Odd Couple Romeo and Juliet Unfortunately, it was decades before we all had cameras in our pockets.
@Mark Abe Funny! And you're right, for some things it was unfortunate that we didn't have a phone camera at the ready decades ago. OTOH, I'm sooo glad my every move wasn't being recorded and posted online when I was young and appropriately reckless!
The workday's o'er, the icing done/ Back to the puzzle, this morning begun/ Alleluia! I have oft been complimented on the quality of my script, especially when writing in chocolate. "Thank you! Yes, but I have a vocabulary of exactly four words (in alphabetical order): Anniversary, Birthday, Congratulations, and Happy."
I liked this puzzle a lot. Had heard of most of the films, even though I've only seen a handful of them. For me, like many others, TAW/tIRED/WIRED was the last corner to fall… though actually I then got it right, looked around the grid and saw that 99D/99A had a [deliberate, non-typo] 'Q' there, for qAYS and qABO— seemed right to me, what can I say, I may live a 3-minute walk from gorgeous Lake Michigan but it ain't an ocean— tried a "K" and then a "C" there, and got the golden statue🏆! So honored! I'd like to thank my grocer, my Instacart app, my WiFi hotspot, my— um I mean I got the congrats page. Delightful concept, Mr M, very well done. Kudos! ~ I scribbled these 'themers' yesterday, no inclination to refine 'em to be better/ funnier or give 'em clues, gonna slap 'em on here anyway: ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 📽 2001 GREMLINS WALK THE LINE 📽 MEATBALLS DAMAGED MY DINNER WITH ANDRE 📽 CLUELESS INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS STOP MAKING SENSE 📽 12 MONKEYS CRASH THE PARTY 📽 FOOTLOOSE FRANKENSTEIN IN BRUGES 📽 M*A*S*H FRIED GREEN TOMATOES IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT [or a special Halloween triple feature 📽 M*A*S*H FRIED GREEN TOMATOES IN COLD BLOOD] 📽 ALMOST FAMOUS CLERKS EATING RAOUL 📽 GUESS WHO'S COMING TO DINNER IT'S PAT GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK 📽 LOVE! VALOR! COMPASSION! OH, GOD! AIRPLANE! ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Dishonorable Mentions: 🎬 BEYOND THE FOREST WHAT LIES BENEATH THE BIG TREES 🎬 HELLO DOLLY WALL-E PAULIE ~ ~ ~ Thank you and good night 🐠
@Becca PS I hope people noticed my little FIN at the end there emus have no fins, no scales, they are SOOO not kosher
Enjoyed the humor of the clue Independence Day? Answer being Hancock Signs The Paper as the Movie Independence Day and Hancock both star Will Smith. Not sure if that was deliberate or not though.
@Megan I also thought this was very funny. I struggled to fill it in for a long time, but got a nice chuckle, when I finally did.
For those looking for more detail on the TODO over the constructor's prior submission (referenced in the Constructor Notes), I recommend reading the comments -- oldest to newest -- for the Wordplay blog for that puzzle: <a href="https://archive.nytimes.com/wordplay.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/07/16/double-features" target="_blank">https://archive.nytimes.com/wordplay.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/07/16/double-features</a>/ Nice to have you back, Jerry.
@Barry Ancona Thanks for posting that. I was wondering. .
@Barry Ancona I read the original column and blog, but it didn't really answer the question I had, but it did reference Jeff Chen's comments on the puzzle in xword info... The original version, like this one, had as clues the names of films and the answers were the names of films, too (two films then, three films now). Shortz took out the film clues and replaced them with non-movie-titles. Thus, TITANIC SKYFALL was clued as [baseball-sized hail?] when the original clue was a movie title: [ARMAGEDDON]. Jeff Chen was very upset about it, too, and his notes really took issue with what Shortz had done. It's always a trip down memory lane to see what Deb's column was like in 2017 and the names and nature of the commenters back then. There are some, like you Barry, that are still around, but so many names I used to see regularly are no longer commenting. It's a shame.
It seems like the trio of titles just describes the title in the clue, not the actual film. If there is a movie called Independence Day that is about the dawn of America and not an alien invasion, I don’t know it, and that stopped me from figuring this clue out. Without it, I could never get RILL or LAINE. Also didn’t like that this answer was 4 words; despite still being three movies, it felt like it broke the pattern. The rest of the theme clues were very clever even though I didn’t understand without the column.
"Jai alai" -- be still my old heart. Now one with "raree show". Thank you!
Caitlin says. "We all know that pop culture makes for great, crowd-pleasing puzzle fodder" Well, not all of we. It's a SORE SPOT for some. But I guess that's why we keeping seeing it. It made for a lively, tightly woven puzzle this morning. Thanks, Jerry. I did finish, I haven't lost all my TAWs. Emus, watch you don't lose your jobs to the NANOBOTs.
Was there a movie named Blah Blah Blah?
It was fine, but I really think the puzzle suffers by NOT repeating the prefix "marquee at the tri-plex mistaken as a promo for" at the begining of EACH theme clue. Why would I merely assume it applied for the ones after the first one. I wouldn't, and didn't. Clues are presumed to stand on their own unless there is SOME indication they are connected. Even then I personally found it all a little underwhelming. As I said, it was fine, okay for an easy lazy Saturday night / Sunday. Just didn't really float my boat. ____________________ Jesse Goldberg 8/28/2024 for Puzzle of the Decade (I do this instead of emuing)
@B You would assume it, if you were me, by the title of the puzzle, "Triple Feature," which suggests three movies. The puzzle floated my boat just fine, for the record.
B, Not sure what your platform offered, but in the Magazine the themer clues all start with the same [...} as in the first themer clue (23A), so it was quite clear (to me, anyway). You can see it here: <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/svc/crosswords/v2/puzzle/print/Oct2024.pdf" target="_blank">https://www.nytimes.com/svc/crosswords/v2/puzzle/print/Oct2024.pdf</a>
@B Without looking at the puzzle title, you could assume the existence of the introductory clause due to the ellipsis at the beginning of each subsequent theme clue.
I had to reorient my thinking after BIG GIANT MONSTER because I thought each themer would have 3 words that could be used interchangeably. I realized that was incorrect with the next one. Movies are not my thing, so I never heard of most of them, but no complaints. It added another layer of challenge, which is always a good thing. The film Caitlin linked to in her column was just the saddest thing and left me with a lump in my throat. When my neighbor's cat shows up on my deck for treats and playtime today, I'll give her an extra hug.
@Nancy J. Sort of the same for BIG GIANT MONSTER. I thought big giant was either redundant or, more generously, emphatic. Maybe something like BIG JAWS MONSTER would have worked? I'm not going to say you're wrong to feel what you feel about the cat video, but I thought it was hilarious. I guess I saw that it was made with love for the kitty-cat, by someone who spends a lot of time thinking about what a cat sees and thinks and experiences. So yeah, you're wrong to feel what you feel.
Meh, I broke my streak on this puzzle because I don't watch movies or play marbles. I hate when a Sunday doesn't go well for me. Really sets a tone for the rest of the day.
Perhaps I’m being picky, but it seems that the answer to 54A has nothing to do with the movie “Independence Day”? It certainly threw me. I was looking for alien references. Perhaps “1776” or even “Hamilton” have been more appropriate (and consistent with the rest of the theme)?
@Richard Perhaps if you think of the signer as John Hancock and "The Paper" as the Declaration of Independence?
@sibelia understood - my point is that neither of those things are in the movie Independence Day. On the other hand, there is a big monster in Godzilla and a “wired” person in Insomnia, etc.
@Richard. The tricky thing about this puzzle is keeping in mind that the three movies (the triple feature) may not on their own have anything to do with the movie in the clue. So, “Hancock,” “Signs,” and “The Paper” are all movies, each may have nothing to do with Independence Day, but together, Hancock Signs The Paper is Hancock signing the Declaration. The idea was simply to come up with three films that could relate to the film in the clue.
When Frog pointed out the same thing earlier, I wasn't sure what he was talking about, but then I looked at all the theme answers, and lo and behold, the answers themselves seem to relate to the content in the movie mentioned in the clue, whereas for "Independence Day" that did not seem to be the case.
@Richard Totally agree. I checked IMDB to see if there was another "Independence Day" film that was actually about *John* Hancock and a signing. No dice. I also searched my memory to see if Will Smith signed a treaty or declaration of war or even enlistment papers... pretty sure not. I think that clever answer belongs on the cutting room floor.
had to look at the column but eventually got the gold star. didn't particularly enjoy the fill here
Well, IKEBANA crossing with OBES meant that I would never finish this puzzle because it also kept me from figuring out FINIS (which I though was FINal as in "... and that's final!"). Which kept me from figuring out SERENA, even though I knew Venus couldn't be the planet. Oh well, ya can't win 'em all. A bit embarrassing considering that I worked for Leona Lewis back in 2016.
I really struggled with three clues with Taw and Tali crossing with Wired. Maybe it's just me but I had never heard of either Tali or Taw (Talus was rolling around in my mind somewhere, but not something I would have ever come up with enough to then change it to the irregular plural). And Wired is an extremely esoteric movie. It could have easily been "tired" or "cured" or probably a few others. The combination of all three made it an impossible corner for me. I liked the clues for the movies, but like another commenter, I was confused by it being about the titles rather than about the movie itself. I am not fond of "unsafe" being a clue for "out". It kind of reminds me of someone using a thesaurus and not understanding the nuance of the word. It just doesn't quite fit the way "not safe" would. Maybe that's just me being a little too pedantic though :) Overall a really good, fun puzzle
@Jim I think the "not safe" and "out" is a baseball reference. If a runner is not safe, he's out.
@Francis I think he's saying "not safe" would be better than "unsafe"
The year in 20a is incorrect; it is actually 2013
Fun puzzle today. This one went very smoothly, although I don't watch as many movies as most people, so some of the themers took me a while. My biggest hangup comes from the fact that playing marbles wasn't really a part of kid culture when and where I grew up (northern New Jersey, 1960's), so after I confidently entered tIRED (I'd never seen it but it made sense to me) I had an alphabet run until TAW sounded vaguely familiar. If Jerry continues with this theme, can we expect to see Maynard G. Krebs's favorite quadruple feature, the one that starts with The Monster that Devoured Cleveland (followed by The Son of . . ., The Bride of . . ., and the Return of . . .)?
@Jack McCullough I played so many games of marbles when I was a kid in the 60s in Massachusetts. We had steelies, clearies, boulders, and cat's eyes, but never did we ever have taws. Those were just marbles. I learned "taw" from crossword puzzles.
@Jack McCullough I had a T in that square, too. Seemed plausible for both clues!
@Jack McCullough Are you sure it wasn't The Cockroach that Ate Cincinnati? (That was a novelty song about monster movies.) Coming soon: The Emu that Ate Kookaburra.
Thank you for the Henri le Chat Noir video! Henri was the best cat ever.
A fun puzzle. It's even fun if you don't know all the movies, which I didn't. The ones I didn't know: ARRIVAL; HANCOCK; SIGNS; TANGLED; WIRED; HOOKUP. But all the surrounding fill was easy enough that I never struggled. Nor was I ever able to guess any of the movies ahead of time, except "Rush hour". I didn't know TANGLED, never thought of the absolutely wonderful FROZEN, and thought it was going to be some sort of TAXI TRAFFIC. Now I'm thinking that the name of that movie is TAXI DRIVER. Is there a just plain TAXI? Anyhow, it's a nice Sunday outing when the impulse behind a puzzle is amusing the solvers rather than creating some sort of intricate grid design. Pleasant and diverting -- with just the right amount of silliness.
@Nancy Not hookup, it's the movies HOOK and UP.
@Nancy - ARRIVAL is a great movie; I highly recommend it. TANGLED is pretty good too.
Great puzzle. Loved the cat video. As a life-long "childless cat lady," it actually had me laughing out loud. Thanks for a great way to start the day.
@Janis I LOVED that video. An excellent dramatization of Weltschmeowrz (exhisstential dread) emeow > emu
Nice, fun puzzle, and seeing Cleo Laine is just the cherry on my Charlotte Russe! Enjoy!
OK puzzlers, what are your "games within the game"? By this I mean what added level of frustration do you inflict on yourself as you wend your way through the week's grid? One of the obvious ones (I believe) is to solve only using the down or across clues. Or to avoid the "theme" clues and see if you can figure out the pattern from the rest of the fill. For today's, I attempted to solve by both avoiding the theme entries, and also keeping a contiguous solve going, meaning I didn't skip to an empty section. All answers had a "neighbouring" square filled in as I proceeded. And I also attempted to go from the NW corner to the SE corner doing this. I know, as my wife says, I obviously have way too much time on my hands! Curious to know what others do.
@Jim I often try to keep answers connected and not skip to blank squares. This sometimes looks like a random walk as the solve progresses. That didn't work for me today so I started cycling through all across and then all down clues until there was enough completed to start figuring out answers based on crosses.
@Jim Usual suspects - up, down - then a BINGO approach - four corners? Solve bottom third, then upwards, or vice versa? Fill in center rows, or work from a corner out? Like you, the"don't move until area is full" is challenging, daunting, elusive at times, yet always entertaining! Helps to pass the time, waiting for rain to cheer up the vegetable patch 😉
@Jim It depends. Being a movie buff, with this one, I tried (with little success) to get the theme answers with as few crosses as possible. I would never subject myself to a rule like "Each answer must begin in or cross an existing answer." If the puzzle is tough enough, I'll grab at whatever toeholds I can find. Probably 40 or 50% of my solving process is pattern identification, and it's hard to recognize a pattern in a bunch of empty squares.
@Jim Mondays’ on paper but without a pen. Only after you’re sure you’re done do you fill it in. That way it takes a little longer and works the synapses.
Sometimes I try to do all the 3 letter answers, then the 4 letter and so forth. Test your power of observation to see only the grid. I like the Minis that have no black squares. I'll do an "around the horn" solve. Top clue, then right, then bottom etc.
@Jim I’m totally nerding out over your question. Monday and Tuesday- I pick a game. Mix it up. Like- SE corner. Bottom right square backwards and up, ending in NW (first square) Or, downs only. Or close eyes and tap on screen. Solve without moving cursor once. Wednesday and Thursday, just top to bottom, left to right. (Never look at any revealer clue until it appears, in turn.) Friday and Saturday, try to stick to Wed/Thurs rule, if possible. Sunday- don’t read title, same as Wed/Thursday, but with less rigidity. Whew! I feel like a just went to confession and the priest fell asleep from sheer boredom. I’m not catholic, but think if I was, that would have happened at least once, IRL.