LAT tk (Gareth) 
[3.50 avg; 1 rating] rate it
NYT 24:37 (Eric) 
[2.57 avg; 15 ratings] rate it
USA Today tk (Darby) 
[1.50 avg; 1 rating] rate it
Universal (Sunday) 12:13 (Jim) [3.50 avg; 2 ratings] rate it
Universal tk (Norah) 
[4.00 avg; 1 rating] rate it
WaPo 6:35 (Matt G) [3.88 avg; 8 ratings] rate it
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Brendan Emmett Quigley’s New York Times Crossword “Power Grid” — Eric’s review
Brendan Emmett Quigley’s New York Times Crossword “Power Grid” — 5/11/25
This is one of the few themeless Sunday puzzles that the New York Times offers each year, and it’s a bit challenging. The most striking thing about the grid is the low number of black squares — 54, which according to xwordinfo.com sets a new record for the NYT Sunday puzzles. The clueing is more vague than tricky. It’s the kind of puzzle that I needed to chip away at, bit by bit, and work every cross as much as possible.
There’s lots of sports, a bit of biology, a bit of music, a bit of literature, a bit of TV — something for everyone.
Notable stuff:
- 24A [Step on a scale?] MUSICAL NOTE Nice bit of misdirection there.
- 34A [“Council,” in Russian] SOVIET Once I had a few crosses, I remembered learning that at some point.
- 50A [Fish that passes the “mirror test” of self-recognition] MANTA RAY
- 54A [“I’ve Been Everywhere” singer in the Country Music Hall of Fame] HANK SNOW I’ve been listening to a fair amount of country music in the last few years, but the only Hank Snow song I really know is “I’m Moving On,” so I needed a few crosses for this one.
- 56A [“Whoever did this has it coming!”] SOMEONE IS GETTING FIRED It’s certainly a colorful phrase, if a bit depressing as the marquee entry in the grid.
- 59A [Lynn ___, Super Bowl X M.V.P.] SWANN The rare football answer I could fill in without thinking, thanks mostly to the fact that there probably haven’t been too many Super Bowl M.V.P.s named Lynn.
- 64A [Cornmeal dish at a trattoria] POLENTA We top polenta with Parmesan cheese and a couple of fried eggs for an easy and tasty dinner.
- 76A [___ Fring, “Breaking Bad” antagonist] GUS Giancarlo Esposito is fantastic in that role.
- 79A [Spots for lavalier mics] LAPELS Every once in a while, I get to use my undergrad degree in Radio-TV-Film production while solving a crossword.
- 83A [1999 Maeve Binchy novel] TARA ROAD I didn’t know this title and originally had TERA ROAD, because the also new-to-me 84D [___ Crown Theater (downtown Chicago landmark)] ARIE could just have easily been ERIE.
- 97A [“Network” co-star, 1976] NED BEATTY It’s a great movie, full of great performances.
- 2D [Home of the Italian soccer club Juventus] TORINO I know enough about Serie A (the top Italian league) to recognize a few team names. I could remember that Juventus means “youth” in Italian, but needed the crosses to fill in the city. Luckily, Roma and Milano didn’t fit.
- 11D [Uninteresting game, perhaps] ROUT I tried ROMP first.
- 12D [Word with a commonly misapplied apostrophe] ITS I love how autocorrect invariably assumes that however I’ve typed it, it’s wrong.
- 38D [Shopgirl in a Paris boutique] MIDINETTE I don’t remember ever seeing this word before.
- 76D [Chess opening] GAMBIT I knew this one only because of having watched The Queen’s Gambit, which is interesting even if, like me, you know almost nothing about chess.
- 92D [Setting for Jacques-Louis David’s painting “The Death of Marat”] TUB In a puzzle like this one, even a three-letter gimme helps.
Evan Birnholz’ Washington Post Crossword “Plot Holes” — Matt’s review
Evan Birnholz’ Washington Post Crossword “Plot Holes” solution, 5/10/2025
Circled squares arranged in, well, squares, catch our eye quickly this week, as does the asymmetric layout. The key insight after a confusing start is to realize that the squares inside of the circled rings are not meant to be filled – they’re the intersection of multi-word entries: ITS FUN / ALL IN in the top left, for example.
It turns out that each ring of circled letters contains the letters SEINFELD, and we have a revealer at 108a [Description of the TV series spelled out in the circled squares (as well as this puzzle’s theme)] A SHOW ABOUT NOTHING. That is, in each of these squares we have SEINFELD “about” nothing (a blank square).
A fun little a-ha moment playing on a line familiar even to this non-Seinfeld knower. And while it’s not necessary to solve the puzzle, each of Jerry (4a), George (74a), Elaine (53d), and Kramer (96d) make cameos in the clues.
It would have been really cool if the theme-relevant multiword entries were the only multiword entries in the grid, but I imagine that’s a constraint too far.
Other highlights: “Wild Shuffle Hands” is a new-to-me UNO card. Or at least it was until we picked up a deck while visiting family over the holidays. It’s a much more chaotic game nowadays // [Spirits often bottled with moth larvae] is certainly image-rich for MEZCALS, but it got me there, even if unpleasant // I like thinking about platinum anniversaries, when a couple has been married for SEVENTY years, regardless of how rare they are // I’ve never been very familiar with Street Fighter or Mortal Kombat, and “Zangief” has certainly never sounded very USSR-ish to me. But the crossings were fine // A little bit of irony in the answer to [Concision] being BRIEFNESS instead of “brevity”
Kinda trivia-heavy run in the downs for a while here, from KALE and ENID through Wes UNSELD to JAMES DEAN. But I think fair. Certainly all entries that have been in puzzles plenty, even if the angles are new. // That’s Rochester, New York that hosts the LILAC Festival. I was momentarily confused, as I know Rochester to be “the Flour City,” but apparently it also uses “the Flower City” nickname
Jonathan Raksin and Jeff Chen’s Universal Sunday crossword, “Self-Starters”—Jim’s review
Theme answers are phrases of the form x IN (A/THE) y where x is a homophone of a letter of the alphabet. Then, there are the circled letters (usually) crossing the theme answer in the shape of the letter in question and spelling out something starting with that letter and found in y. Got it?
Universal Sunday crossword solution · “Self-Starters” · Jonathan Raksin and Jeff Chen · 5.11.25
- 22a. [Have no information, or a phonetic hint to the circled word below this answer] BE IN THE DARK with circled letters spelling out BOGEYMAN.
- 27a. [Spot IRL, or a phonetic hint to the circled word crossing this answer] SEE IN THE FLESH with circled letters spelling out COLLAGEN.
- 65a. [Nearly identical duo, or a phonetic hint to the circled word crossing this answer] TWO PEAS IN A POD with circled letters spelling out PORPOISES.
- 102a. [“For what reason …,” or a phonetic hint to the circled word crossing this answer] WHY IN THE WORLD with circled letters spelling out YUCATAN.
- 107a. [Spy satellite, e.g., or a phonetic hint to the circled word crossing this answer] EYE IN THE SKY with circled letters spelling out IONOSPHERE.
Wow. This is incredibly ambitious with all the layers to the theme answers and all the constraints caused by those circled letters. I enjoyed the wordplay and realizing that the circled words spelled out something starting with the appropriate letter found in the last word of the given theme answer. Nice aha moment there. Kudos to our constructors for managing to pull off a solvable puzzle with everything going on here.
That said, I’m not sure it’s all worth it for a few reasons. First, I wanted the circled B to cross its theme answer like all the others did. Second, BE IN THE DARK and SEE IN THE FLESH are weaker compared to the other three idiomatic phrases. Next, it wasn’t always evident how the letters in the circles should go (mainly looking at YUCATAN here). And lastly, with the constraints, there was some quite challenging fill, especially towards the bottom of the grid. We’re talking a mash-up of TO A HAIR (new to me), NUCLEATE, OCTILE, ODETS, NET TV, and triple-A’d AAAH. Plus KAYOING nearby. *grumble grumble*
I think I would have been fine without all the circled letters and with their words worked into the clues. For example, the first theme entry could be clued [Bogeyman, phonetically?…or have no information]. Yes, it would end up being a much more traditional grid, but it would probably be a smoother solve.
All that said, there are still plenty of highlights to enjoy: BELLAGIO, LICHENS, LONG MARCH, SEX TAPE, TAPS INTO, DUAL ROLES, “AHOY MATEY!”, GO TO SEED, Salman RUSHDIE, and “WELL, YES!” New to me is SPIT BARS and Nickelback frontman KROEGER.
Clue of note: 100d. [Surname that’s an anagram of “dotes”]. ODETS. I’d rather have seen the clue [Playwright Clifford], then at least I would have known that it was a name I didn’t know. If you’re not familiar with him, ODETS doesn’t look like a surname at all.
An ambitious theme, and an overall impressive grid, but it came with some compromises. 3.5 stars from me.
NYT: 83A/84D crossing was absolutely brutal. Made worse by the fact that WOMB was a plausible answer for 83D.
I wondered, too, whether WOMB was a legit alternative, and I got the crossing Ethan mentions wrong. I figured T_RA and _ RIE were just part of names I didn’t know, so nothing to be done. I guessed TERA, figuring maybe named in some town somewhere after TERRA, which would go decently with the land and a road, while ERIE was such common crossword fill that maybe it reached even the midwest.
Overall, the NYT was as hard as they get, and I’d be hard pressed to sustain effort on a themeless that’s Sunday sized even at its best. On top of that, I took a long time indeed to stop hunting for a theme. I kept hoping for a revealer to assure me that a Sunday could be themeless (although I know it’s occurred before), but then I realized that if it had a revealer it would be themed! (Themelessness as a theme? Hmm.)
So a perfectly nice, even excellent construction but no fun at all for me.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 4.5 stars
49A/45D could have been either I or U. I guessed correctly on that one, but missed it on the 83A/84D coin flip. Otherwise great puzzle (but I generally can’t stand themes, so I’m probably in a minority of people who enjoyed this one — give me a great big Fri/Sat and I’m happy).
Yep! I did “womb” first. I actually looked up the book to get that area.
Repeating my note from yesterday’s thread about the WaPo. Ignore scary warning when you load the .puz version.
Or solve it instead on the Post’s website, which handles it exactly the way I wanted, with no warning beforehand.
Puzzle: WaPo; Rating: 1 star
Or just ignore it.
NYT was quite hard to get a foothold, but I got one finally on the eastern edge with STOPSDEAD. After that, doable although not really easy. A good puzzle, IMO.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 2 stars
NYT: A puzzle choked with trivia and often vague stretched cluing made for a not much fun at all solving experience. Felt like getting to the top of a mountain on a day with no visibility.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 1.5 stars
I completely agree.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 2 stars
Agree. I’m glad that some folks enjoyed this puzzle. But this is so NOT what I am looking for in a Sunday morning puzzle.
There is “something for everyone” alright, but also way too much of the things that make me roll my eyes in any crossword puzzle. If PIA MATERS is a POC, that must make WILD OAT an SOC (Singular of Convenience). There’s green paint, pop culture trivia, sports team trivia, foreign-isms, and obsolete scientific units (was there ever a more obscure way to clue GAMMA?). And near-, if not full-on, Naticks: I can already see I’m not the only one who guessed at that “A” at the intersection of TARA ROAD and ARIE.
I’ll grant that all that white space looks impressive, and daunting. But it just goes to show, once again, that because a thing can be done doesn’t mean it should be done.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 1.5 stars
Totally agree. What a slog.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 5 stars
Loved this puzzle so much. It’s a beauty to behold and impressively filled throughout. I ignored my time and savored the puzzle bit by bit as I worked my way through it. Yes, it was tough and a few trouble spots almost did me in, but it all made sense in the end. Given its low block count, I would have expected a lot more clunky fill (starting off with green painty ATARI GAME didn’t bode well), but the vast majority of the grid was quite smooth. Happy to give it full marks.
Just to add a bit more info about a change in the ratings process: If you want to rate a puzzle but don’t want to add a comment or have it show up in the Comments section, just type a period in the Comment field when rating a grid. Dave has worked it out so that a comment with just a period will not show up in the Comments section though the rating will be added to the average above.
What this means is that the Comments section will not be so cluttered with ratings sans comments, and also you can rate semi-anonymously. That is, your rating won’t show up next to your screen name, though it will still be associated with you “behind the scenes” as it were.
Midinette is a cool entry that’s new to the Shortz era, although it first appeared in 1952 in a Farrar-edited puzzle.
It’s a portmanteau of midi (noon) and dinette (small meal), and is evocative of an overworked couturier’s assistant who never has time for lunch. Think Anne Hathaway in The Devil Wears Prada. I’m glad to see it back.
Interesting origin! I was wondering because it seemed an odd-sounding word. Thanks!
Puzzle: WaPo; Rating: 1 star
WaPo: One of the most stupid puzzles ever,
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 1 star
Totally agree, and to show my displeasure I am using the new rating system for the first time. Ridiculous cross at TARAROAD/ARIE (I went for E) – I’m honestly surprised that survived the editing process. Took forever to finish the NW section. MOTORPLEX is not a thing I have heard of, ATARIGAME is stereotypical green paint, and ‘spent’ is a very dubious clue for EXERTED.
MIDINETTE is terrible, ORANGEVODKA is another dose of green paint. I’ve also never heard of GAMMA as a unit of magnetic density, and I’m a physicist (or was). It’s a non-standard and outdated cgs unit, which explains my ignorance.
Oh, and WEARIT for ’embody something proudly’? Gimme a break.
OK, I’ll stop now.
PS But I liked the WaPo. Cute trick.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 3 stars
NYT: When I was younger, I did sow that one wild oat. Now that I am older, I look back fondly on that one salad day.
A challenging puzzle to be sure, but I didn’t feel much satisfaction upon completion.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 2 stars
One oat is not worth it. And that id NOT the idiomatic phrase. That cluck ruined the puzzle for me, not that it was a very good one to begin with.
Puzzle: WaPo; Rating: 5 stars
an astonishing feat of construction that’s also seamlessly fun to solve – i.e., business as usual for Evan
When I was young I sowed every type of oats possible; from instant, rolled, steel-cut, Scottish and more.
Puzzle: WaPo; Rating: 5 stars
I’m with e.a. on Evan’s opus. Ignoring the .puz warning upon opening it, I’d filled almost 85% of the grid before the AHA moment kicked in…utterly fantastic! Thanks, Evan!
Planting Avena fatua rather than Avena sativa. The wild oat looks a lot like the cultivated oat, but yields no profit. It’s a dumb thing to do, but youth is often like that.
The wilder parts of our “landscaping” are showing a lot of wild oats right now. They’re very attractive but entirely self-sown, I assure you.
NYT: Quite a workout, but finished (in about 40 minutes) with no errors. There were some tough crossings and a little bit of green paint (and that single WILD OAT), as others have already mentioned, but give me this quality themeless every Sunday instead of a slog through some insipid theme, and I’ll be a happy camper.
WaPo: I feel like such an idiot. I tried the entire time to figure out the anagram for D-S-E-I-N-F-E-L. Nedslife? Fineleds? And then I got to the revealer. Proves once again I am horrible at anagrams (even when it’s not really an anagram). Thanks a lot!
NYT: if anyone knows how to contact Will Shortz, maybe they can ask him to use bigger type-size for the clues and to make them dark black instead of dark grey.
And maybe do the reverse for the blocks in the grid – make them dark grey instead of dark black to save toner powder/ink.
I print the puzzles and can hardly read the clues because they are so faint. Thank you!
What format do you do the puzzle in? WS isn’t in charge of the many ways the puzzles are presented, like the app, the newspaper print format, syndications, etc. Depending on what version you use, there may be different folks to reach out to.
TY for the reply, Martin, and I do the syndicated version from the Seattle Times newspaper (which is 5 or 6 weeks behind the current puzzles) and it comes in PDF form which I then print onto paper.
Will is pretty far removed from that version, I’m afraid. The Seattle Times embeds an app from a Dutch company, pzzl.com, which gets a data file from the New York Times. All presentation issues are determined by the app.
You might try contacting pzzl.com with your suggestions. A lot of small companies like this are surprisingly responsive to users.
I’ll give your suggestion a shot and let you know if I hear back.
Also, count me in as a major fan of yours for all of the commentary, info and technical help that you provide to this great website to make it so popular!
Puzzle: WaPo; Rating: 4.5 stars
WaPo: fun Sunday! Figured out the squares had to be left empty, then saw that it was SEINFELD in each; really liked the way it worked out. Must have been tricky to put together. The grid also looks to be asymmetric to me? Nice work, Evan!
Puzzle: USA Today; Rating: 1.5 stars
The title of the puzzle is “Gtl” and there is not a revealer. The 3 theme answers end in the words GYM, TAN, and LAUNDRY, which is the meaning of the acronym Gtl.
(For me, puzzles like this alienate solvers — especially us older ones — and constructors would be wise to make their puzzles suitable for all ages — even us senior citizens who probably make up the largest demographic of subscribers.
This is going to make me feel older now too, but I believe GTL entered the lexicon 16 years ago as an acronym, from the Jersey Shore (2009). Still, a good revealer would be great :-)
I need to respond to all the complaints about”Tara Road”. Maeve Binchy’s name should suggest Ireland and the Hill of Tara was the ancient seat of the kings of Ireland. (That was why the O’Haras named their home Tara.)
Those are valid points. We all have gaps in our knowledge, and that crossing hit a couple of mine. (I know Maeve Binchy is a writer, but I didn’t know or remember that she was Irish.)
I do wonder why ARIE wasn’t clued as the singer India ARIE or the race car driver Luyendyk. Both have appeared in the NYT crossword multiple times and either would have been much easier for me. How familiar is the ARIE Crown Theater to people who are not from the Chicago area?