Marty

You have to walk into Thursday puzzles like you’re walking into a murder mystery dinner party. Suspect everyone. Trust no one. Keep your wits about you! It’s all in the details…

I came to commiserate about the theme but all I see is crying foul about a rare but perfectly legitimate word. Those complaining about ENISLE should remember that a big part of being a crossword solver is learning new words!

Total slog, unusually so for a Tuesday. Absolute groaner of a theme.

Surprised at the amount of negative feedback! I was so thrilled to finally see a fresh, unique theme.

May this brilliant puzzle be a small step forward in easing up on black-square symmetry requirements!

Well today I learned there’s two meanings of secrete.

This was probably the first puzzle I ever gave up on 3/4 through. Just became a total slog I couldn’t enjoy. I feel bad now understanding the theme, very clever construction!

OREO WITHDRAWAL SATISFIED! 🤤

Maybe time to give this fella a break and some more constructors a chance? absolute dud of a theme for a precious Sunday. I don’t always love themes, but this is the first time I can ever recall audibly saying UGH when figuring one out.

Fantastic theme and well executed, I only wish he had used all the others he had found and made a nice big Sunday out of this!

When I saw 400+ comments so early in the day, I knew this was gonna be a controversial one - ha! To those complaining about the single rebus, I must say, they really gave us the easiest possible clue. There is literally only ONE late night host named Seth - it’s a dead giveaway that it’s a rebus. And cleverly used!

For the first time in 20 years of solving crosswords, I dont understand the theme even after reading the column. Why are the circled words pearls? This was a sad slog from start to finish for me. This “idiom” is such a deep cut from the Bible I can’t believe it was deemed NYT Sunday-worthy. Never heard it myself. Bummer!

Why is “rush uncontrolledly” solving to CAREER? Shouldn’t it be CAREEN ?

Wow, what a strange writeup from Ms. Amlen - she sure isn’t hiding her disdain for this puzzle!

Can’t believe they spent this great puzzle on a random day in March instead of saving for Halloween! Breezed through in about 10 minutes only to then be completely stymied by the lower left side for another 20!

Would have been perfect if the magnetized entries were their own words, (ahem, as the editors have consistently said is required). Having entries like DOGF and ELKN is a bit inelegant BUT I’m just happy to see a fresh theme :)

Why is WOAH clued as “on the internet”?? It’s a normal word, existed well before the web and has no specifically internet connotations… Why is Nancy Drew a cover girl? Wasn’t she a detective/mystery solving character? I think I missed the joke there and haven’t seen it in a comment yet.

This puzzle makes me worry that there’s some kind of grift going on … we see puzzles by game staff so often, (which IMO shouldn’t be allowed) and this absolute snooze of a puzzle with a barely coherent theme troubles me when I see my constructor friends’ really excellent, clever and unique puzzles get constantly rejected. If a staff member has a puzzle published, it should set the bar for the rest of the constructors out there and not be so 46D, and hopefully they are not also paid to maintain integrity to it.

It bothers me that there’s no consistency with noting abbreviations in clues. As in, sometimes, the clue will end with “abbr.” but sometimes it won’t, and then I waste time on STATEREPS because I’m trying to figure out what four letter word could possibly follow state for this clue. That should be marked as an abbreviation if it is one. Also, why the question mark at the end of “brought a case against?” - there’s no play on words or any other funny business here, SUED is the straight-ahead obvious answer.

Ok I’m crying foul on “PULLON” pants 😂😂 What pants are NOT pull on?

While I really do hate to complain when we fiiiinally having something new and different, I thought the trickery of having numbers was totally wasted on a non-theme. What is “magical” about having lots of a particular letter in your puzzle? That’s not difficult to do construction-wise, nor is it clever in any way. I would have appreciated this puzzle a lot more if there were a few of these crossed numbers throughout the grid for common phrases… 2STEP crossed with Y2K and such.

OBOE seems to be encroaching on OREO’s territory lately. CASA NOSTRA will be…displeased…

THIS is how you use rebuses! Nice. However, utterly confused why they ran this one on a Thursday when it’s definitely Tuesday material. Or maybe we’re all just getting better at solving! :)

Wow, I’ve never solved a puzzle - even a Monday - in less than 4 minutes! It was super satisfying to whiz through so fast! Great also to support a young kid like this - congrats to him!

Unless you happen to be well versed in the names of foreign currencies , this was a themeless Thursday. It’s impressive construction, but only after it’s explained to you.

SEZ and GONEAPE are things absolutely no one sez.

The theme itself is cheesy like a Monday or Tuesday, but the clues themselves were definitely Thursday level!

Very disappointingly bland theme for a Wednesday.

I remain (and may perhaps die) on the hill that this theme type is disappointing when real words don’t result from the gimmick. When entries end up as gibberish, I find it to be a real letdown. There’s nothing particularly impressive or clever about replacing random letters with another word. seewREDimean?

But…. The circles are moving FORWARD…. Not back 😩 Darn semantics.

Confused… the column mentions this puzzle using a “very straightforward rebus” but I don’t see any rebus element involved?

I thought the rule was that if the answer is an abbreviation, there needs to be an abbreviation in the clue as well? So I got a bit delayed thinking that REORGS and STATS couldn’t be correct.

BRAVO. Excellent puzzle and a perfect Thursday !

Very curious how many people (who didn’t grow up in one particular part of the country) actually have any idea what a jugband is. Even knowing now, I have only very faint recollections of having seen something like it before. Seems strangely esoteric for any puzzle, let alone a Tuesday. On a separate note, this theme-type (the beginnings of words or phrases belong to a common group) is the single most common theme in NYT crosswords, appearing almost every Monday/Tuesday and even others. It’s very tired and overdone. Can we move on at least a bit??

I guess I’ll be today’s curmudgeon and just point out that the theme doesn’t quite make sense - many different animals have fingers, arms, toes, knuckles - they are not at all uniquely human, so “people food” feels like a stretch. Also odd that they’re all specifically outer appendages which ends up being a red herring for the revealer. Am I overthinking a Monday? Yes :)

Solid Thursday! Very crunchy fill. I will slightly knock FOMO since the clue should have been abbreviated as welll *per the rules, right editors?* But the brilliance of the TSA clue was the big takeaway for me!

Holy moly. Two absolute theme duds in a row. After yesterday’s ridiculously corny theme I was really looking forward to a fun crunchy Thursday… but instead we got… examples of things?? Wow. Brilliant. Read this next part as fast as you possibly can: Myopinionisjustthatanopinionandinnowayreflectsexpectationsofsimilarthoughtsbyothercontributorstothisforumwhospurposeistoelicitdiscussionbothpositiveandnegativethussassyrepliestomyopinionarenotnecessaryhavealovelyday

I was floored by this puzzle and literally gasped, because I saw that the first three down clues made actual words of their own (ARE, GEL, REAK) and I thought that this was an absolutely unreal feat of construction … to make every single down entry a word on its own minus the first two letters and have those words all properly cross with the acrosses. But no… the first three downs are just a happy coincidence I guess! The rest of the downs are NOT actual words on their own and this bugs me. Especially when the editors have rejected some of my own puzzles because “this is a rule” - but one I actually agree should be. Still a great puzzle! Props to the constructor. Just, oh, what could have been!…. *sigh*.

LOVED the theme on this, but there are some issues I cry foul on: 1) court failure needed to have a ? on the clue! 2) I believe prom is short for “promenade”, basically a social display of entry before a party, not sure of any connection to the legal system ? 3) Thor and Iota have been in a lot of puzzles lately!

I cry foul on TEHEE, as it’s technically a valid spelling but virtually never used in lieu of TEEHEE. Should at least have an [alt] in the clue. Another drop in the ocean of “what do the ends of these common phrases have in common” themes. Yawn.