EOS is not a brand. Canon is the brand, EOS is a line.
@Andy Yep. But you know...crosswords.
@Andy Thank you. That bugged me too. Not as much as the double OHs though.
@Andy Agreed! I was surprised by that error... "surely they don't mean EOS?!?!" But they did mean EOS, and it's wrong even with a crossword's generous definition latitude. The brand is Canon, period.
@Andy Interesting thought, I wonder where you draw the line. My ex worked for P&G, and if you were the marketer for Tide then you were called the brand manager and Tide would be your brand. Same with Folgers, Pampers, etc. Of course you wouldn’t call the new Tide Evo its own brand. But every article I read about Eos does call it a line, not a brand. Maybe it’s just a size thing and a company culture thing in P&G. But that’s why it didn’t give me pause.
@Andy - As a long-time user of Canon EOS line cameras, I definitely agree. (Currently shooting with a 6D Mark II.)
Hope I'm not the only one who briefly had HAMMER for 1A.
@JMW You are definitely not the only one.
@JMW Yep, for QUITE a while. :) Took me up the down staircase, that one.
@JMW, You were not! 🙋🏻♂️
After two vintage puzzles I thought this was a bit meh. I loved GROUPSELFIE, but some of the clues were not quite right for the answers. I don’t think “What a pity” equates to OHWELL unless you’re especially callous or being ironic. I thought the slangy style of “Likely gonna” suggested an answer in a similar tone, so i think the rather formal APTTO was a bit jarring. And just to pick a nit, i don’t think of TINTIN primarily as an animated character, although i know he has been animated, so the clue is technically right but only grudgingly. Happy weekend, everyone!
@Petrol Right? I, too, perceived many of the clues as tangential rather than smartly misleading. The stylistic disconnect between "Likely gonna" and APTTO seemed like a major departure from the rules of clueing. Also, I share part of your sentiment about the character: I don't think about TINTIN. 🤣
@Petrol one of these aberrations would have been Annette. A whole slew of them is a drawback to enjoyment. I would like to add the suggestion that the following were not very good. The clue for a code could’ve been much simpler and should have had the notion of deception. Oh hell, no it is too obvious when it is included with Satan. Set tail is a phrase. I have never heard
@Petrol Hand up for not liking the APTTO clue as well
I found this was a deadly mix of trivia, slang and random phrases. I did most of it in 30 minutes but then I stopped making any progress. Checking the grid helped a little, but I ended up revealing several entries. This was effectively impossible for me.
@Andrzej I thought this would be rough for you. Please see my comment just after yours, I really wanted to know if BONEUPON meant anything to you.
@Andrzej definitely a slog, but being of a certain age I was able to resurrect Danny KAYE, grudgingly accept the awkward HADASOLO and fill in Y for the win, never knowing that YODEL was also a cake. Previous I had BON early and filled in BONdover which I thought was a (too) clever answer. Eventually ended up with BONdUPON, which seemed to fit the tortured nature of many of the answers. But dES? Doctors of Engineering? Was finally able to see three words and could BONEUPON. Not my favorite Saturday gold star for sure. Especially egregious: APTTO for the slangy cluing
@Andrzej There were several points throughout I didn't get on my own, but the SW corner was especially brutal for me. A lot of proper names and a cake thing I didn't know.
@Andrzej There was a long profile of a Polish movie maker in last week's New Yorker Magazine. Have you seen his films? <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2026/10/05/pawel-pawlikowski-profile" target="_blank">https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2026/10/05/pawel-pawlikowski-profile</a>
Loved the grid and the clues. It went sort of fast for me, but I think that was just luck or being on the same wavelength as the constructor, which is a species of luck. I don't complain when they go fast, and I don't complain when they go slow. This one was lively and fun -- that's all I ask.
Not my kind of puzzle. A lot of trivia I didn't know, and no answers around those clues to help me solve them. I like a puzzle where the random trivia can be solved, or inferred, from other clues. This was not one of them. My biggest gripe has to be 'stripe'. I get that it's technically correct, but it felt obtuse for no good reason. Just a creator trying to be clever. I'll take the blame for not knowing my US trivia, so I'll give this puzzle a B-.
So, it seems it is not, nor was it ever, Maurits Cornelis Hammer Time.
@Josh My first guess too, tripped me up for a while
@Josh, and I never thought of Hammer until I read the comments! Different kind of artist and makes total sense. I love the comments for the very reason.
Call me Mr. Misdirected today. I opened with HAMMER for the M.C. person, was totally thinking along the lines of breaking the ice with a person for [Get to know a little better, say], was thinking “auction” at [It’s a lot for one person to take] … and more. Plus, I’ve never heard of BOOGIE DOWN BRONX, nor ISSA Dee, nor NOTTE, and several others. Thus, just what I want on Saturday – a hill to climb. And as things filled in, delights lit up the path. Reminders of several who brighten my soul, Muhammad Ali, Danny Kaye, ESCHER and TINTIN. Lovely answers THIRSTED, ARE YOU IN, CRATERING, BONE UP ON. And sweet images – baby owls in a nest, Jane Fonda leading a group in a workout, and even, at CRATERING, Wile E. Coyote free-falling down the canyon, landing in a poof and a puff of dust. I loved learning BOOGIE DOWN BRONX, because how colorful, how sing-song sensational, is that? Happy brain, happy soul, happy solve. Thank you for a splendid outing, David!
@Lewis YOu MUST watch "The Zoo"
Started out wrong with MC Hammer, but I figured it out eventually because this Saturday was 2 Legit 2 Quit
No happy music = realizing that hOOdIE DOWN BRONX may not be a thing. Oh well, it’s 4am.
@Sam Lyons I have a friend who lives in the BOOGIE DOWN BRONX who calls it that all the time, so that was a gimme for me!
Puzzle solvers are like Goldilocks. Some find it too soft, others too hard. This one for me was just right.
Filling in ESCHER right away gave me high hopes for this one, but they were soon dashed. Too much trivia I didn’t know crossed with more trivia I didn’t know. OH WELL. Is HAD A SOLO really a thing? That sounded so awkward to me, I was sure it was wrong.
@Heidi Same in general, although I made the dubious choice to start things off with the illustrious MC HAMMER :/
@Heidi Had a similar reaction to HADASOLO, and... ... that was it's first and only appearance in any Times puzzle. ...
@Heidi As a French horn player, I never HAD A SOLO. It was usually trumpet players that had them. But the answer makes perfect sense to me.
@Heidi Choir members might say "I had a solo last Sunday." In musical theater, someone might say that when talking about a previous production they were in.
@Heidi HAD A SOLO is absolutely a thing. Orchestras and bands will often all stop playing while one person plays alone, because they have a solo! Think of a violin or piano concerto where the star performer does their own thing for a bit.
What a Saturday should be: tricky, sticky and fun. It was all there, you just had to be ready to modify or ditch what didn't work, or be patient and let the crosses emerge. OWLSNEST was my first fill, and luckily, I kept it. BOOGIEDOWNBRONX was one of my last, and when I saw it, I thought, OHWELL, why not? GROUPSELFIE was another I could never have come up without the crosses showing me the way. I loved this puzzle. Thank you, David, for some smiles and laugh-out-louds.
Hands up if for the MC clue, you put in HAMMER. 🙋🏾♂️
Crunchy munchy chewy gooey puzzle. I liked it! The puzzle put up a fight but I got it done in the end with Caitlin's help for GROUP SELFIE and BONE UP ON. The crosses weren't helping me. CalvIN before TIN- TIN was a silly mistake. For "Not today, Satan!" I really wanted the answer to be "All Saints' Day" if only it weren't too long. Smug pride came from getting SET BAIL just with the B in place. "Round and round and round?" gave me this earworm: <a href="https://youtu.be/PGNiXGX2nLU?is=bkhvgn7QnRj-D53G" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/PGNiXGX2nLU?is=bkhvgn7QnRj-D53G</a> And, finally, I knew the BRONX was the birthplace of hip-hop, but did not know the colloquialism. But now that I do, I found this "BOOGIE DOWN BRONX" rap, quite unique and not bad at all with its electronica twist: <a href="https://youtu.be/6k0MFB_uDOw?is=FrKxzf1aoYjFat94" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/6k0MFB_uDOw?is=FrKxzf1aoYjFat94</a> And so, the solve started out with a cold sweat, but ended with a smile. Thank you, Mr. Wilk!
I liked the duplicative TIN TIN crossing the semi-duplicative MR MISTER.
This was deceptively challenging. It started out with a gimme for me, ESCHER, and then the NE dropped pretty quickly, so I thought this would go pretty quick. But then the bottom tied me up in knots. It didn’t help that I had Seattle STARS first and BOOGIEDAWN… seemed like a logical name for the start of something… maybe a sequel to “Boogie Nights”? WENTSOLO seemed more likely than HADASOLO and not sure how I would have dug in there if not for my vague recollection of HOY from HIGH school Spanish. A few more thoughts: Andrzej, I really want to hear what you think about BONEUPON for get to know better. Keep it clean! Never heard of a YODEL as a snack but it would have been fun to clue it as “Call from 20 across” (EIGER) A lot of just good tangential clues today in the NW, like Gate for RECEIPTS or Kind for STRIPE and STRAIGHTA for type of student. Even TRAGIC was somehow not obvious. Thanks for the call-out of an old favorite, Danny KAYE. He was a great entertainer and humanitarian. Here’s one of his classic bits: <a href="https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TJ9f2rnjB84&pp=0gcJCY8Co7VqN5tD&ra=m" target="_blank">https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TJ9f2rnjB84&pp=0gcJCY8Co7VqN5tD&ra=m</a> The funniest clue today has gotta be OHHELLNO. Who’s going to complain about that, along with Caitlin’s photo? I expect there will be some complaints about fill like ESTOP, and SUS which maybe should have had an informal marker and some trivia heavy areas; but I had a good WORKOUT (another blast from the past) and quite enjoyed myself.
@SP Yodels and Ring-Dings were NYC after-school staples for latchkey kids in the 70s.
@SP I was just a kid when I watched Danny Kaye as Hans Christian Andersen in the movie by the same name. He made such an impression on me that, to this day, when I think of HCA, it's Danny Kaye's image, with his loving ways, that I get in my mind's eye.
@SP Today I tried the puzzle of yours you linked on Thursday. This is as far as I got on my own: **Spoilers** <a href="https://imgur.com/a/7GQYaLP" target="_blank">https://imgur.com/a/7GQYaLP</a> I'll check the puzzle and resort to reveals to finish now. I appreciate there was less trivia than usual, for a grid by you. The gimmick was cool, but one of the themed entries eludes me.
@SP Here's Danny KAYE also in a biopic of "Hans Christian Anderson." <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0044685" target="_blank">https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0044685</a>/
Nice, mostly comfortable solve, with only an occasional minor scare, in the Y at the corner of HOY and YODEL. I wasn't really sure, but I thought they looked good together. Highlight for me was finding out what M. C. Esher's initials were. (I hope Maurits Cornelis will forgive me for mistaking him for M. C. Hammer. 🙀)
Some Saturdays I think, "hey, maybe I'm getting better at this!" Not today, though
Hard for all the wrong reasons. A second puzzle in a row that I flung against the wall, unfinished. SPLAT. Better than yesterday, I suppose, in that I did have some enjoyment on top, what with the pleasures of STRAIGHT A, RECEIPTS, SIMILES and GROUP SELFIE. Today I quit much later in the process, where STORM (I had STaRs for the team), TINTIN and especially MRMISTER almost made me burst into tears. "Why am I allowing the NYT to put me through these almost daily pop culture WORKOUTS?" I wondered. "Why don't I take up a more dignified and enlightened hobby like, say, underwater basket weaving?" Curiosity is what makes me keep plugging away at a puzzle I'm struggling to solve. Pop culture trivia never triggers the slightest bit of curiosity in me. It just makes me feel deeply annoyed and put upon.
@Nancy It’s all in your mind. Solving with a glass of wine helps me. Or strong coffee?
@Nancy Pop culture? TINTIN is from 1929. From Wikipedia: "The Adventures of Tintin (French: Les Aventures de Tintin [lez‿avɑ̃tyʁ də tɛ̃tɛ̃]) is a series of 24 comic albums written and illustrated by Belgian cartoonist Hergé (pen name of Georges Remi). One of the most popular European comics of the 20th century, Tintin had been published in more than 70 languages with sales of more than 200 million copies[1] by 2007,[2] with the series also having been adapted for radio, television, theatre, and film."
@Nancy I quickly typed in REIGN for Seattle’s team (before I had my first cup of coffee) and then had a pang for that great league the NBA killed off because they didn’t want women competing with men by playing during—you know—basketball season. At the time (three decades ago), seven of the nine Seattle city council members were women, and a Reign game, even though it was played at a beat up old municipal arena, was filled with movers and shakers. Some day—some day!—we will be able to watch women’s professional basketball during—you know—BASKETBALL SEASON.
@Nancy Hang in there. I've been a pretty regular solver for about ten years now. Saturdays were almost never solvable for me in the beginning. Now I look forward to the challenge and almost always finish them.
@Nancy Me too. My own unique set of incorrect crosses told me that Seattle's WNBA team was the SpaRk. I wasn't listening to pop music much in the '80s (serious life business elsewhere), so lots of room for error for me.
Glad I'm not the only one who thought of MC Hammer for 1A. The irony is that I much prefer the work of ESCHER; despite being Gen X, I only recall a couple of songs by the rap artist.
@Pax Ahimsa Gethen That's ok. I believe most only recall a few songs. :)
@Vaer True. I remember the two songs that were in heavy rotation on MTV, and the "Addams Family" theme. Closing credits, I believe. And there were the parachute pants.
Definitely in the 'tough but fair' category
A bit hard for me but not terribly so; things filled in in time. XWStats shows Average and I'd agree. I'm mostly here to join what I expect to be a chorus complaining about the sad crossing of the two OHs. That seems like really poor form. As if the constructor just gave up. :(
@B Did not notice the crossing "OH"s until you pointed it out . You turned it into a negative thing, but my take on it is "who cares?". It was not a pity to me.
@B Falls squarely into "I do not care." The rule is that an entry cannot be repeated. Not small parts of an entry. And geography is totally irrelevant.
@B Yeah, the crossed OHs cost me an extra ~5 minutes…along with having absolutely no clue about BOOGIEDOWNBRONX (a phrase which made sense as soon as I changed the D that I had in EIdER (bleary-eyed morning mixup), but which just did not match the general/grammatical pattern I was trying to match for specifying a location). I guess it’s not “against the rules”, and maybe it was even a deliberate trap for people like me 🤷♂️
Puzzled out the SW despite OHARA, YODEL, and KAYE being stacked against me. Still lost in the end because BOrINGMATCH and rEDOUT seemed like plausible answers to me but were indeed wrong. Sigh.
Interesting puzzle! No lookups on a Saturday! I guess that’s probably a sign it’s on the easier side, but I still enjoyed it. It’s a nice happy medium that lets us have our Saturdays while also providing a way in for new solvers.
I had ESPANA instead of ITALIA for a long time, but it clearly wasn't working, and I couldn't understand, until I realized that in my head I had flipped Spain and France geographically. Doh!
@NanuNanu ESPANA was an automatic for me, until it didn't play nice with the crosses. A good example of trusting your instincts, be being flexible when they're wrong.
Just yesterday a friend and I were talking about our favorite New York novels, and mine is BUtterfield 8 by John O’HARA. I knew the bots are getting really good at listening to us, but I didn’t realize they were *that* good. (Hers is Winter’s Tale by Helprin, and we both gave an honorable mention to The Alienist by Carr.)
Can we please stop with all the random trivia? Three days in a row of this nonsense including about 25 proper nouns today. Boogie/bone/eiger crossing?? Beyond ridiculous and unnecessary. P.S. HAD a solo?? I can't wait for my sub to lapse next month.
@Mark - Why wait until next month? You can just stop doing the puzzles if you're not enjoying them.
I can see how this puzzle would be difficult for some, but this time most of the trivia was right in my wheelhouse; from Escher to the Eiger to Mr. Mister to Yodels and Tintin 😊. Not enough misdirection though. It was fun thinking of all the snack cakes from my youth. I never liked twinkies (nor could I understand why anyone did) but give me anything with chocolate in it: Yodels, Swiss Rolls, Ring Dings, Hohos, Devil Dogs, Hostess Cupcakes, etc. I’m sure that for the ones that are essentially the same (like Yodels and Swiss Rolls) I had a preference but I can’t remember those preferences now. Escher was a gimme at 1a. I didn’t even think of Mr. Hammer. Surely the MC in his moniker stands for master of ceremonies. Wasn’t that employed in a lot of hip hop names at the time? MC this and MC that. I think Mr. Mister would be a great name for a plant sprayer 🤓. Like Mr. Coffee. There’d probably be a trademark issue though. Unless it was marketed by the musician. 😉
@Jeb My Long Island husband had Devil Dogs shipped to our Atlanta home periodically. He would accept no substitute.
@Jeb My mom was an excellent baker so we always had her cakes and pies and cookies, and never the store-bought stuff. But when I lived in Japan once, my dad sent me a case of Snickers candy bars and I nearly cried. It must have cost him a fortune to ship them, and I savored them for a long time. (Finally, I found a quirky little store that sold them.)
Guys I am wheeze laughing right now I read "get to know better" like two people getting to know each other and so I had "BOND UPON" so when I got the puzzle corrected I was so locked into my read of the clue that I thought it was saying the answer was "BONE UPON" and I was like "well that seems like a wildly inappropriate way to phrase that but sure you'd certainly get to know someone that way"
@Zach What is it supposed to be? I'm still staring at it and "BONE UPON" is the only thing I can see.
Always happy to see the classic “Do a bad job of helping?” for ABET (or some variant thereof).
As a native of the best borough in the city of New York and in the world, I approve of today's puzzle. What a thrill to see the answer slowly forming through the cross clues.
Just sayin, as a child of the 80s, 1A really should be “hammer”…
Did not enjoy a Saturday after a long time. Just too difficult. Oh well
Could someone explain why "Such a pity"is Oh, well"
@ojai ninja Because that's the best he could come up with? It's a general sigh of defeat. What a pity, oh well, moving on. Not great.
Enjoyable, challenging Saturday puzzle but I needed help in the end. I had 'boRing match' (you know when two individuals see who can use their awl the fastest) for round and round and round and I crossed it with'Red out' for Struck! Also got stuck in NE corner. High grade? Didn't know E stop was a legal ban. I was disappointed in myself for not coming up with MC Escher since I was very intrigued by his art growing up. No Straight A for me to!
@Jeff B MD I prefer "ESTOPPLE" myself....
@Jeff B MD when i first filled it in i heard like someone who natively speaks spanish saying “stop” with their usual accent! i’ve never heard estoppel, as the other commenter mentioned, but m-w says ESTOP is the archaic version
Enjoyed this…., found it really tough…. Was stuck on boring forever until I had a d’oh! moment with boxing
Confining Kugelman to the Midi appears to be an effective way of limiting the lethal fallout of his dad-joke radiation while still displaying his constructor chops.
I’ve never heard of the phrase “bone up”. Maybe my age (or lack thereof) is showing
So I got KEW. Worth a visit. "Great range of trivia" he says.There's certainly a great range of US snacks that I don't know, with weird names. We had a digestive biscuit after school. And I got KAYE, but not the other names. Oh well. See you tomorrow.
Just my jam. My first pass through the acrosses yielded a distressingly blank grid. The downs helped but had to kick it up a notch to complete. There were for me a number of “Ah,ok” moments, that being one. A nice way to slide into Saturday morning after an hour finishing yesterday’s grueling Spelling Bee.
Quicker than usual but fun! Still don’t get RECEIPTS from “Gate”
Nick, See noun definition 7: <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gate" target="_blank">https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gate</a>
@Nick --- another where you need to go way down the list of meanings fire the word: "7. the total admission receipts or the number of spectators (as at a sports event)" <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gate" target="_blank">https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gate</a>
@Nick Yep, I also was baffled at that one until until I read today's Wordplay. They often give fun explanations to the more cryptic clues, and it's become my first stop after solving if there's something that didn't click for me during my solve. Their explanation for "Meteor shower?" earlier this week was fabulous, turning it from a "Huh?" for me to a favorite from the week.
@Nick It's still common for a suspicious performer to say "check the gate" to see if they're getting paid their fair percentage of the ticket sales. Although I guess that's really used in a different context in film production....
@Nick When I used to usher for local dance concerts, I remember anxious choreographers asking about the gate to see if they could hope to make back their costs.
This one was very difficult for me, even with a few gimmes. The puzzle started off well enough with a gimme at 1A. A few years ago we visited the Hague on a trip to the Netherlands. I highly recommend the Escher museum. It was amazing to see all those well known impossibilities and metamorphoses up close, along with many works I didn't know. The Mauritshuis with its Dutch Masters is nearby, but I wouldn't go to both in the same day.
Good morning! 7D...well all I could hear was Will Smith. "In west Philadelphia born and raised..." Ok I'm still singing it, even though it was nice to see a nod to my long ago Bronx stomping ground. First apartment on my own was 1978, 190th St. & Jerome Ave. YODELs are wayyy better than Hohos! I'd die on that hill! Have a great Saturday.
Today's puzzle was full of gimmies, trivia, and really bad puns. It wasn't a super long solve, but it also wasn't a pleasant one for me.
My favorite kind of Saturday puzzle. At first, and for a long time, I thought I wouldn’t be able to solve it. But then one after another, slowly, sections came together. Finally, success! No look ups and just barely under my average Saturday time. Thanks for this.
Boy, pop music in the 1980's was big into reduplication! Here's Thompson Twins' "Doctor! Doctor!," from 1984--bonus points if you can guess which entry the band's name refers to: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pf0_Be5PPPU&list=RDPf0_Be5PPPU&start_radio=1" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pf0_Be5PPPU&list=RDPf0_Be5PPPU&start_radio=1</a> Here's Duran Duran's "Rio," from 1982--bonus bonus points if you know which *clue* the band's name refers to: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTizYn3-QN0&list=RDnTizYn3-QN0&start_radio=1" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTizYn3-QN0&list=RDnTizYn3-QN0&start_radio=1</a> (I want my MTV!)
@Bill For the game, I wanted it to be 16A, but it's 44A.
@Bill I think @Vaer got them both, despite typos-- Thompson Twins took their name from the characters Thompson and Thomson, in the TIN TIN books (Dupond and Dupont in the original French) Duran Duran took their name from the character Dr. Durand Durand, the antagonist in *Barbarella*, which starred a very young Jane Fonda.
@Bill My Thompson Twins story: Years ago, when I was a sprout departing for a semester abroad program, the Thompson Twins were on my flight. ~200 young adults at the gate, and there was zero recognition / mobbing going on. I found out later they were not very happy about that. At all. Oh, well. *shrug* I saw them at the gate, and I'd heard their big hit, but had never really *seen* them to know what was up with the big hats. Still can't tell you their names...
poem made from words in today’s puzzle a/ upraise the mountain! up up! like that likely butterfly in the garden where it played makes its way in query up to better patches to be a/ free and / you are