Brett

Didn’t much enjoy this. At all. Incredible concept ruined with too many naticky proper nouns/trivia. Crossing BAUM, MANZANILLA, LAHTI and LOLA is just one example. No puzzling through the clues will lead you to the solution. You either know the answers or you don’t. Solving via crosses can’t help you. This is, to me, what it feels like when crossword puzzles tip over into mere trivia and cease to be puzzles. I know many won’t agree with me. You might argue it’s possible to puzzle your way to LAH-TI as an answer… fair enough. But well, by the time I got there the puzzle had already exhausted me and not in the fun way I come here for. Trivia does have a role in crossword puzzles—solvers should have broad knowledge—but good editing can ensure it remains more of a puzzle than a quiz. Sadly this was just a quiz in many places. DONHO, ONEIL, OSAGE, MEARA is another spot. Just my two cents. And I didn’t even mention AVEr/AVOW… ok, bring on the hate for my comment.

Did not enjoy this puzzle at all.

Great idea ruined with a mountain of trivia and some very poor clues.

A wonderful theme that suffered from very poor clueing. Solved easily enough but I don’t even know where to start with my complaints on the clues… just not great.

Not sure where to begin with this miserable puzzle. The proper nouns and trivia ruined it for me. And that’s without mentioning things like the terrible SE corner … COT, OBELI, and GABE… basically impossible for me. Most of the three letter answers were impossibly clued as well. Sad because there were a few brilliant spots, like ANTEDATED, but the few gems were ruined by the rest, for me. Ok… cue the people who say it was too easy…

Very grateful to the editors for an easier puzzle after the double gut punch that was Thursday and Friday. Also, my best friend became a new dad today, so I appreciated 11 down :)

Good puzzle. But I feel like “fixing to” should have been FINNA. I wonder if that’s ever been in a puzzle?

“Pop in the Midwest” seems to be clued wrong. In the Midwest people do not say SODA, they say “pop”. I’m sure some will disagree—it’s not universally true—but where I come from (Nebraska) nobody says soda.

NE corner was unsolvable for me. Also SOLI crossed with MOUE and TUDE (rUDE anyone?) … that coupled with needing to flyspeck the whole thing left me feeling pretty disappointed.

Fun and easy. Nice after yesterday’s slog.

Didn’t get the theme. Had to flyspeck. Not a lot to love here.

Least favorite puzzle of 2026 so far. Poor clues in a lot of places.

Excellent puzzle

Worst of the year

Tough one. Proud to have finished

I guess a lot of people didn’t like it? Usually when that happens I’m with them… but not today. An enjoyable easy solve for me, which is rare for a Thursday. I guess I was vibing with the constructor. Cheers

Nice puzzle, cheers

Loved it

Mutant puzzle… Tuesday fused with a Thursday/Friday in the SE!

Didn’t much like it. Especially ANS, just to name one.

Challenging. Liked it. Learned quite a bit.

Crunchy for a Monday—I’ll take it.

Proud to have got 1A instantly…. And then proceeded to take an hour to solve the rest!

Came here to complain but it looks like ya’ll beat me to it. I would have been here earlier but well… it took me a whole day to finish! :)

Very hard but was proud to finish. I think a younger me with lesser abilities would have hated it though.

For me very, very hard. But managed to solve it, and really can’t quibble with any of the clues. Well constructed.

Very cool!

Wow. It felt hard but I solved it quickly. Am I getting better… or are the puzzles getting easier? Never can tell… definitely was on the same wavelength as the constructor though. Kudos for an enjoyable solve.

I can’t put my finger on it… but I didn’t like the clueing. That said, I might have just been tired.

Tough. But I won’t complain.

Some truly great clues (“Something in which you might stand for a spell”) weren’t enough to save this hot mess of a puzzle. I was on the fence about it until I ended up stuck flyspecking for longer than the puzzle took to fill.

Tricky little Monday

Loved this puzzle, but the SW corner ruined it for me.

Fast and easy… but I don’t understand why I didn’t like it.

Freaking awesome

Just the right amount of challenge

Very good puzzle, thanks

Wow. Fastest Saturday puzzle ever

I liked it

Everyone’s going to say ARTUR is the proper Polish spelling but well, I still take issue with using it as the answer. I was convinced I was wrong or it was a rebus for a very long time. Not a big fan of clues that go against the grain in this way. Otherwise enjoyed the puzzle.

Puzzles shouldn’t be unsolvable. Thanks anyway

I quite liked it. Challenging but fair

I really loved this puzzle… until ORAJEL crossing with JUL and SCYLLA…. Seriously crummy section that ruined it for me. There happens to be a product called ORASOL which does the same thing and once I had that locked in there was no solving this one given the impossible crosses. Just my two cents. Loved the rest of it but just couldn’t believe anyone could look at that section and find it reasonable.

I really, really liked this but can’t quite put my finger on why. Superb puzzle.

Liked it’ Nice work

Toughie

Excellent!

SW corner took me forever