Thursday, July 10, 2025

BEQ 7:57 (Eric) [3.00 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
Fireball untimed (Jenni) [3.33 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
LAT tk (Gareth) [3.17 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
NYT 7:49 (ZDL) [2.82 avg; 14 ratings] rate it
Universal 4:03 (Eric) [2.88 avg; 4 ratings] rate it
USA Today 5:26 (Emily) [3.00 avg; 4 ratings] rate it
WSJ 6:29 (Jim) [2.88 avg; 4 ratings] rate it

Peter Gordon’s Fireball Crossword, “Themeless 180” – Jenni’s write-up

This puzzle started with “what I didn’t know before I did this puzzle.” Peter’s themeless puzzles often have related entries in the NW and SE. This one is no exception and I think it also ties in to the puzzle’s title. Title? It’s a themeless! you say. Indeed.

Fireball, July 9, 2025, Peter Gordon, “Themeless 180,” solution grid

• 1a [Antigram of 68-Across] is ON THE SLY. An antigram is an anagram
  that has an opposite or contradictory meaning to the original word or phrase. (Thanks, online OED!) Themeless 180 has two entries that are opposites…or 180º apart.
• 68a [Antigram of 1-Across] is HONESTLY.
• We have both halves of the doubleheader: NIGHTCAP and OPENER.
• 37d [Pop groupie?] is MOM. If you’re lucky.
• 29d [Progressives, e.g.] is EYEGLASSES. Not politicians.
• 61a [Embiggen, maybe] is RESIZE. Ah, early 2000’s nostalgia

What I didn’t know before I did this puzzle: see above. I also didn’t know that Al Pacino and Burt Reynolds turned down the role of HAN SOLO.

Seb Swann’s Wall Street Journal crossword, “Color Me Gone!”—Jim’s review

Theme entries are straight answers to their clues, however the letters “red” must be removed from each clue for it to make sense. The revealer is GETS THE RED OUT (34a, [Visine slogan, and what a solver does to make sense of the starred clues]).

Wall St Journal crossword solution · “Color Me Gone!” · Seb Swann · Thu., 7.10.25

• 17a. [*Document with lines to be redacted] SCREENPLAY.
• 25a. [*Tapered off] ISOLATE.
• 49a. [*Wavered, big time] TSUNAMI.
• 56a. [*Boredom indicator] BULL MARKET.

I caught on with the first theme answer and a glance at the title, but I still enjoyed sussing out the other entries. I especially liked “boredom” becoming “boom” which are almost opposites in a way. And “redacted” with “red” redacted to make “acted” is so meta.

Aside: In my mind I remember Ben Stein doing Visine commercials in the 90s, but turns out I was completely wrong. He did ads for Clear Eyes. And yet I still hear him saying GETS THE RED OUT.

What else have we got? In the NW we’re called on to MARINATE an OVEN MITT, and in the SE we have an OIL BARON UNMASKED. Pretty good stacks. That crossing of GOURDE [Haiti currency] and SEINES [Herring catchers] is unfair though. Starting the grid off with plural CAMOS is inauspicious as well.

Clues of note:

• 4d. [Handy item in the kitchen?]. OVEN MITT. Good clue. But I’m going to give you my favorite (Saturday-level?) clue that I came up with for this, and we’ll see who gets it: [Hollywood handwear]. Any ideas? I’m sure some of you know immediately and others are picturing walking the red carpet with oven mitts on.
• 10d. [They may take part in counter revolutions]. STOOLS. Excellent clue. I knew something was up before I got the answer, but this was still very satisfying.

Good puzzle. 3.5 stars.

Personal note: As I mentioned on Monday, I’m retiring from blogging the WSJ after nearly 10 years as of today. However, I’ll continue on with other blogging duties around here. Tomorrow I’m off to Costa Rica to hit the beach like Ben Stein. Adios!

Julia Dreyer’s Universal Crossword “One After Another” — Eric’s Review

Julia Dreyer’s Universal Crossword “One After Another” — 7/10/25

Repetition is key to this theme, with words strung together to create an answer that fits the clue only in the solver’s mind (or “visually,” as the theme answer clues describe it):

• 17A [Novelty dance with Afro-Cuban roots, visually?] CONGA CONGA CONGA Conga line
• 37 [What a prankster sprays on Halloween, visually?] SILLY SILLY SILLY Silly String
• 57A [MLB annual championship, visually?] WORLD WORLD WORLD World Series

The conceptual theme answers are all nice, though once you catch on to the repetition, it’s easy to fill a lot of the grid quickly. That’s a flaw or a bonus, depending on your perspective. As themes go, this feels fresh to me and fairly tight given the added constraint of 15-letter theme answers. Without giving it much thought, the only other theme answer option I can thing of is GGGGGGGGGGGGGGG.

Other stuff of note:

• 14A [Sea cell?] BRIG I probably learned that word from Star Trek. The clue’s play on C cell is a little on the cute side.

The brig aboard the USS Enterprise
NCC-1701-D

• 21A [Bricks to avoid stepping on, informally?] LEGOS I like the “informally.” Whenever LEGO is pluralized with an S in The New York Times crossword, some pedant comments that the toy’s manufacturer maintains that the plural of Lego is Lego. So what? People are going to call them Legos and there’s nothing The Lego Group can do about it.
• 33A [It may be peeling in a fixer-upper] WALLPAPER We used to live in an old house in which the walls were originally wallpaper over pine “ship-lap.” In the 1970s or ’80s, the wallpaper was covered by ¼” wallboard. We pulled a lot of that down and saved some scraps of very 1930s wallpaper.
• 42A [Suggestive, or like habaneros] SPICY/43D [Spanish diacritics] TILDES I perpetually have to look up “habanero” because I expect it to be spelled with an eñe. It’s not.
• 2D [One of a holey pair] CROC I don’t get the appeal of those shoes. But the popularity of  lots of things mystifies me.
• 33D [Religion with a pentacle] WICCA I learned recently from a BEQ crossword that WICCA is considered a modern religion, dating back only to the early 20th century.

Emily Biegas and Sala Wanetick’s New York Times crossword — Zachary David Levy’s write-up

Difficulty: Easy (7m49s)

Emily Biegas and Sala Wanetick’s New York Times crossword, 7/10/25, 0710

Today’s theme: “I thought perhaps changing suits had gone out of fashion. Eh, Marge?”

• MASTER GARDENER — A♠
• TIGER WOODS — K♣
• MATCHMAKER — Q♥
• JACKIE ROBINSON — J♦

Relatively straightforward — gardening spades, golf clubs, metaphorical hearts, baseball diamonds.  Slightly unusual grid layout at 14 x 16 in order to accommodate the two 16x grid spanners.

Cracking: ELIO about to blow up crossword fill for the next 20 years

Slacking: I am already done with NO CAP

Sidetracking: a fantabulous night for some Buble

Brendan Emmett Quigley’s Crossword #1799 “Shows with an ‘M-E'” — Eric’s Review

Though it’s an okay pun on the TV award known as an “Emmy,” the title really ought to come with a spoiler alert. As you might expect, we get names of well-known TV shows with an extra M-E thrown in to create wacky answers:

• 17A [Autobiographical title for one who teleports?] THE BEAMER The Bear I wasn’t sure this was a theme answer until I started writing this. Of all the shows in the puzzle, this is the only one I’m at all interested in seeing. But we’re already subscribing to more streaming content than we can consume.
• 24A [Mind-blowing flower cluster?] AMAZING RACEME The Amazing Race
• 41A [Quark-plus-antiquark particles that devolve into total chaos?] MESONS OF ANARCHY Sons of Anarchy I know this title only from crossword puzzles.
• 51A [Hefty reward for a perennial negative Nancy?] BIG DOOMER PRIZE Big Door Prize That show is not at all familiar, though I kinda like the wacky answer.
• 65A [Humiliate grandma?] SHAME NANA Sha Na Na Also not a familiar title for me, though I do remember that band. Their variety series ran in syndication from 1977 to 1981. Frankly, this answer reeks of trying to find a fifth theme answer that could go in a nine-letter slot.

I haven’t watched much TV in the last 30 years, so this theme didn’t do much for me. But knowing that I was sticking M-E in titles did help me solve the puzzle a little quicker than I might have otherwise.

Other stuff:

• 5A [“The Dark at the Top of the Stairs” playwright] William INGE I’ve seen the film version of Inge’s play Picnic, but otherwise, he’s just someone who shows up in crosswords from time to time.
• 9A [TV cook Pinkman] JESSE There’s got to be a word for the gimme that you don’t realize is something you know cold. We watched Breaking Bad twice, but when I saw this clue, I immediately assumed it was about a cooking show that I’d never seen and not the character for which Aaron Paul won three Primetime Emmys.
• 16A [Nebraska city where the 1999 movie “Election” takes place] OMAHA It’s a very funny movie with great performances by Matthew Broderick and Reese Witherspoon. I didn’t remember the city, but a five-letter city in Nebraska is likely to be Omaha.
• 47A [Templeton of “Charlotte’s Web”] RAT It’s been a very long time since I read that book.
• 1D [“Austin ___ Limits”] CITY Despite living in Austin for decades, we managed to score tickets to an ACL taping only twice: Lucinda Williams’ first appearance in 1989, when she was visibly nervous, and Cat Power in 2006, when it took her three attempts to do “House of the Rising Sun.”
• 2D [Ice Cube’s real first name] O’SHEA His real surname is Jackson. Do I know this from crosswords or real life? Does it matter?
• 13D [“___ on Down the Road”] EASE That’s the only song from The Wiz that I know.
• 36D [Skin-removing tool] PARER I lost a few seconds here because I wasn’t thinking about fruit.
• 48D [Day-care diversion] TOY Not NAP.
• 57D [Duo with the 1993 hit “Hey Mr. D.J.”] ZHANE I didn’t know the song or the artist.

Beth Rubin’s USA Today Crossword, “Put a Pin in It” — Emily’s write-up

Hold that thought!

USA Today, July 10, 2025, “Put a Pin in It” by Beth Rubin

Theme: each themer contains –PIN–

Themers:

• 15a. [Coverage for multiple individuals], GROUPINSURANCE
• 37a. [“Don’t be a stranger!”], LETSKEEPINTOUCH
• 61a. [Means of connecting to the web using a telephone line], DIALUPINTERNET

Today’s themer set has a variety with GROUPINSURANCE, LETSKEEPINTOUCH, and DIALUPINTERNET. The first and third filled in right away but the second themer I needed some crossings to complete

Favorite fill: ROCKTUMBLER, THATSSOTRUE, WHITEWINES, and RUHROH

Stumpers: PARTB (needed some crossings), HANES (mis-directed by cluing), and NAN (new to me)

Smooth, fast solve for me today. On the whole, everything clicked and the fresh overall fill made this puzzle even more enjoyable. Also, the grid is lovely and allowed for excellent lengthy bonus fill. Nicely done!

4.5 stars

~Emily