Wednesday, February 4, 2026

AV Club 6:52 (Amy) [3.08 avg; 6 ratings] rate it
LAT 3:49 (Gareth) [3.00 avg; 2 ratings] rate it
NYT 3:47 (Amy) [3.10 avg; 10 ratings] rate it
The New Yorker 4:30 (Jim Q) [4.00 avg; 5 ratings] rate it
Universal untimed (pannonica) [3.25 avg; 4 ratings] rate it
USA Today 12:08 (Emily) [2.50 avg; 2 ratings] rate it
WSJ 8:32 (Eric) [2.75 avg; 2 ratings] rate it

Jared Cappel’s Wall Street Journal Crossword “Square Meals” — Eric’s Review

Jared Cappel’s Wall Street Journal Crossword “Square Meals” — 2/4/26 (Click to Embiggen)

The theme is carried by circled letters that form squares spelling typical lunch foods, meaning that both Across and Down answers are involved. For ease (maybe) of understanding, I’ve grouped the first two sets of four answers:

• 17A [Paced aggressively] UPTEMPO That’s a nicely ambiguous clue.
• 6D [Owner of Mallorca and Menorca] ESPAÑA
• 23A [The Band bassist Rick] DANKO His singing always gives me a chill.
• 4D [What might keep a music video from rocking?] STEADICAM

Together, this set holds a tasty EMPANADA.

• 18A [Manhunt target] ESCAPEE
• 16D [Brief visit] CALL
• 25A [Party figure, briefly] POL
• 8D [Lied, in euphemism] MISSPOKE

Here, it’s a delicious meal of SCALLOPS.

You get the idea. The third set of squares holds a yummy FRITTATA and the fourth some comforting MACARONI.

There’s also a revealer: 34A [With 42-Across, collectible carriers, or what the marked squares form]/42A [See 34-Across] LUNCH/BOXES

I can accept an empanada, maybe a frittata and macaroni as packable lunch foods, but a boxed lunch of scallops seems a bit weird.

Other stuff:

• 7A [“___ Boy” (song by the Who)] I’M A A gimme for me; it’s an interesting song when you think about it in the contemporary context in which we hear so much about transgender and nonbinary children.
• 40A [Mar-a-Lago location] PALM BEACH I’d have been much happier with a clue that didn’t make me think of Donald Trump.
• 45A [Baseball’s Ponce and Bellinger] CODYS/45D [Key of Beethoven’s Fifth] C MINOR The C was the last letter I filled in, having never heard of those ballplayers and being perpetually unable to remember the key signature for many pieces of music. I eventually decided it was unlikely that the two jocks are named DODY. (But they could be!)
• 52A [“…And ___ Wrote” (1962 Willie Nelson album)] THEN I Another musical gimme. It’s a fun album, with songs like “Hello Walls,” “Funny How Time Slips Away” and “Crazy.”

Hanh Huynh & Ted Mayer’s New York Times crossword–Amy’s recap

NY Times crossword solution, 2/4/26 – no. 0204

I paid no mind to the theme while solving the puzzle. Before you huff that I lost all the pleasure of doing the crossword, I’ll note that one can still appreciate a theme when making sense of it after the clock has stopped. The revealer is 62A. [“Seinfeld” catchphrase … or, when parsed as three words, how a participant of 17-, 30- or 47-Across might be greeted?]. “HELLO, NEWMAN,” or “hello, new man.” The other three things are rites of passage that might be said to welcome a boy to (new) manhood:

• 17A. [Native American rite of passage], VISION QUEST. You know, I barely read that clue. Got 1a DELHI and started tromping through the Downs, and VISION QUEST filled itself in.
• 30A. [Jewish rite of passage], BAR MITZVAH.
• 47A. [Amish rite of passage], RUMSPRINGA.

I like that the theme entries represent different cultures that don’t all get much play in crosswords.

Fave fill: GIVE ME FIVE, CRATERS clued as a slangy verb, ON THE VERGE, AREPA. The fill felt a tad bit clunky (OATEN!), but the clues were Tuesdayishly easy.

3.75 stars from me.

Brian Callahan’s AV Club Classic crossword, “Super Bowl Shuffle”–Amy’s recap

AV Club Classic crossword solution, “Super Bowl Shuffle” – 2/4/26

Okay, here’s the revealer: 67a. [Team whose only Super Bowl victory 40 years ago was accompanied by the release of the song named in this puzzle’s title (and referenced by its theme)]. BEARS. I was in my teens when the 1985-86 Bears won that Super Bowl, but the circled letters aren’t screaming “Super Bowl Shuffle” at me. Ah, I see: they’re anagrams of “___ bowl” words, the letters are “shuffled.” JAZZ QUINTET contains part of quiz bowl. LAUNCH PARTY has a punch bowl. TRADE BAIT (new phrase for me), a bread bowl. STEVE CARELL‘s got a cereal bowl. And NO LITTERING gives us a toilet bowl. I like that the types of bowls include three that aren’t kitchenware.

Fave fill: WARHOLS, “FAST CAR,” TAKE TWO, HOT LAVA (though there is no cold lava, that’s a rock).

Three clues:

• 31a. [Doggo’s nose (it’s just begging to be booped!)], SNOOT. Boop that pupper’s snoot!
• 52a. [Midwesterner’s “Sorry, almost bumped into you”], OPE. I went a couple years being in denial that I ever said this, and then I caught myself saying a little excusatory “oop” sound and realized it was the same thing. Ope!
• 3d. [Contemporary literary genre that blends absurdism and satire], BIZARRO. Anyone have examples to share with the class?

Four stars from me.

Caitlin Reid’s New Yorker crossword — Jim Q’s write-up

New Yorker • 2/04/26 • Wed • Caitlin Reid • solution • 20260204

FAVE ENTRIES:

• [Strut flamboyantly] SASHAY. Always a fun visual.
• [Go bananas] RUN WILD.
• [“That was awesome!”] I LOVED IT!
• [Two or three] A COUPLE. Sure! Three can be a couple… but can “a few” ever be two?
• [Not just inexpensive] DIRT CHEAP
• [Pinocchio’s pint-size moral guide] JIMINY CRICKET. Love this seed entry!

THOUGHTS / HANG-UPS:

• You know you’ve solved too many “tricky” crosswords when you automatically enter a variation of SEW for [Give a darn]. (correct: CARE)
• [Frozen treat at 7-Eleven] SLURPEE. I entered SLUSHEE
• [Theme-park attraction that often ends with a splash] LOG RIDE. Is that the same as a LOG FLUME? I always call it a LOG FLUME, though I just now realizing I don’t think I’ve used the word FLUME in any other context. Hell, I’m not even sure what it means.
• [On-call employee’s device] PAGER. Yup! They’re still widely used in hospitals especially!
• [Extremely unimpressive, slangily] WEAKSAUCE. Are we still using this term? I feel like it was a flash in the pan.

Somewhat surprised to see the NW / SE corners choked off- they essentially become their own little mini-puzzles.

Natalie Tran and Sean Ziebarth’s Universal crossword, “Breaking Down Barriers” — pannonica’s write-up

Universal • 2/4/26 • Wed • “Breaking Down Barriers” • Tran, Ziebarth • solution • 20260204

The theme entries are among the down entries today. We’re to pay attention to the termini bracketing them.

• 6d. [Lost out on an opportunity] MISSED THE BOAT (moat).
• 9d. [Acts unknowledgeable] FEIGNS IGNORANCE (fence).
• 11d. [Including imperfections] WARTS AND ALL (wall).
• 26d. [Harbored resentment] HELD A GRUDGE (hedge).

I can see why the vertical orientation was chosen—fences, walls, and hedges are generally experienced as being upright, both in real life and architectural elevation drawings—but including a moat among these answers effectively weakens the effect. Which is to say that I wouldn’t have batted an eye were things oriented in the more typical fashion.

• 1a [Fan’s cheer] GO TEAM. Okay but does anyone actually say this? 2d [Chilean fan’s cheer] OLÉ.
• 22a [Kind of snake] GARTER. Nah, a garter snake is a thing, but nobody would call one just a GARTER, no more than you’d call a coral snake a coral. Works for many others though: cobra, adder, mamba, diamondback, sidewinder, boomslang, et al.
• 52a [Apex] VERY TOP. >winces<
• 58a [Corn units] EARS. 61a [Stereotypical sources of corny jokes] DADS.
• 74a [Shade source] TREE.
  
• 21d [Great Lakes people] ERIES. The less common plural form.

That’s all I could find to talk about. Oh, right. The grid’s noticeably asymmetrical. And it was a rather easy solve. Okay, ciao!

Boaz Moser’s USA Today Crossword, “All But One (Freestyle)” — Emily’s write-up

What a puzzle!

USA Today, February 04, 2026, “All But One (Freestyle)” by Boaz Moser

Favorite fill: NERF, WHATSWITHTHAT, and DUTYFREESTORE

Stumpers: GENTLEMANSSWEEP (new to me), HAMS (needed a couple of crossings), and SPARKLERSENDOFF (also new to me)

First, a fantastic grid that opens up so much lengthy fill. Lots of fresh fill, though I found the cluing tougher for me today. Still a fun solve! What did you all think?

4.0 stars

~Emily

Nate Curry & Zhou Zhang’s LA Times Crossword – Gareth’s theme summary

The revealing answer, MOVETHENEEDLE, is a very strong, lively entry, and I’m guessing the starting point of the theme in development. Each of three other entries are machines that work by moving a needle of some sort:

• [Tailor’s tool], SEWINGMACHINE
• [Inker’s tool], TATTOOGUN
• [Intelligence agent’s tool], POLYGRAPH

Gareth