Wednesday, March 4, 2026

AV Club 4:53 (Amy) [2.80 avg; 5 ratings] rate it
LAT 4:53 (Gareth) [2.50 avg; 2 ratings] rate it
NYT untimed (Amy) [4.05 avg; 10 ratings] rate it
The New Yorker 3:01 (Jim Q) [3.50 avg; 5 ratings] rate it
Universal tk (pannonica) [3.50 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
USA Today 8:52 (Emily) [3.50 avg; 4 ratings] rate it
WSJ 9:14 (Eric) [3.50 avg; 4 ratings] rate it

David Alfred Bywaters’ Wall Street Journal Crossword — Eric’s Review

David Alfred Bywaters’ Wall Street Journal Crossword “Two Out of Three” — 3/4/26 (Click to Embiggen)

I forgot my cardinal rule of solving speedily: If the theme isn’t immediately obvious, don’t try to figure while you’re filling in the grid. I forgot to read the title (which might have helped), but I could tell from the clueing of the theme answers that they were somewhat jokey.

The joke is that English is full of homophones, homographs and homonyms:

• 17A [Ribbon for a boyfriend’s archery set?] BEAU BOW BOW
• 23A [Flowers grew, in a carefully laid-out garden?] ROSE ROWS ROSE That one’s sort of channeling the ghost of Gertrude Stein, isn’t it?
• 36A [Weary lumber industry regulators?] BORED BOARD BOARD “Weary” can mean “reluctant to see or experience any more of; tired of,” which is close enough to “bored” for me.
• 46A [Passable funnel cakes or cotton candy?] FAIR FAIR FARE
• 58A [“That accursed mother of a beaver!”?] DAMN DAM DAM I think I’ve seen “dam” in the sense of “mother” only in reference to horses.

These are reasonably amusing constructions. I got many of the letters through the crosses, which is fine, but I didn’t have the experience of a theme suddenly clicking and allowing me to complete theme answers based on the clues. Instead, I spent time fruitlessly trying to figure out where some of the theme answers were going.

Other stuff:

• 1A [Canada’s first national park] BANFF I can’t offhand think of another Canadian national park, so I was lucky my guess was correct.
• 14A [Service that can reach 160 miles per hour] ACELA It seems like I’ve read that Amtrak’s Boston-to-Washington high speed service rarely goes that fast, but I forget whether it’s because the tracks are not maintained for that sort of speed or because there are too many slower trains using them.
• 31A [Moorage structure] PIER I waited until it was obvious that DOCK wouldn’t work.
• 45A [Decapitate] BEHEAD For anyone whose bloodlust isn’t satisfied by the daily news? (I know, it’s just a word.) At least they didn’t get cute with the clue.
• 57A [Low card in pinochle] NINE/2D [High cards in pinochle] ACES My dad tried to teach me how to play pinochle when I was 10 or 12. I wish now I hadn’t given up on it as quickly as I did.
• 1D [Rum-soaked sponge cake] BABA That word commonly shows up in the New York Times Spelling Bee and it is almost always one of the last words I find.
• 4D [F in chemistry?] FLUORINE Cute clue.
• 35D [Fehr of “Star Trek: Starfleet Academy”] ODED It’s nice to see an alternative to “overdosed.” Though we’ve been watching the latest Star Trek series, few of the actors’ names are ingrained. To be fair, Mr. Fehr’s character Fleet Admiral Charles Vance is not a major character. On the other hand, the character was in three seasons of Star Trek: Discovery (which we also watched), so I don’t have much excuse for not remembering the name.
• 55D [Troglodyte’s home] CAVE Admit it: Your first thought was “White House.”

Justin Werfel’s AV Club Classic crossword, “Opening Exercises”–Amy’s recap

AV Club Classic crossword solution, 3/4/26 – Werfel

The theme revealer is the divided entry, JUMPING / JACKS, clued 57a. [With 59-Across, classic warmup activity, or a description of the rows of circled letters in this puzzle]. The circled letters are the last names of guys named Jack, “jumping” across the black squares. Actor Jack QUAID, musician ANTONOFF, animated character Jack SKELLINGTON, and fictional action dude Jack REACHER: two real, two make-believe, that’s balanced.

Fave fill: “NEED A RIDE?”, “SHE’S A LADY,” DEWDROP.

Three more things:

• 5d. [Board game in which players play as farmers], AGRICOLA. I’ve heard of it but have never seen it. Any fun?
• 38d. [Rhinestone], DIAMANTE. Yeah? I know the word better as a 1990s Mitsubishi model.
• 26a. [Parti-colored horse], ROAN. Surprised to see a non-Chappell ROAN clue these days.

3.5 stars from me. ROAN horse, APSE, AOKI, meh.

Wayne Bergman’s New York Times crossword–Amy’s recap

NY Times crossword solution, 3/4/26 – Bergman

The game is in the clues here. Words that are left out of the clues point to the answer phrases:

• 25A. [Persian, ___, Oriental, Navajo], CUT A RUG. Cut one rug out of a list of rugs. Maybe a Turkish one.
• 55A. [Violin, ___, cello, ___], PULL SOME STRINGS. I like to think a harp and a banjo are left out.
• 3D. [Twain, ___, Hamill, Wahlberg], MISS THE MARK. Mark Ronson is omitted, I decree.
• 7D. [Metro, ___, Sports, Lifestyle], SKIP A BEAT. Skip one of the news beats.
• 11D. [Red velvet, ___, Black Forest, angel food], TAKE THE CAKE. Pound cake, please.

Interesting theme angle, fresh.

Fave fill: “EASY, TIGER,” PAPERLESS. Not loving DRIBLET, TOILET LID, OBIS, EDSEL, 10+ abbreviated entries.

3.75 stars from me.

Matthew Luter’s USA Today Crossword, “Journey to the Center of the Earth” — Emily’s write-up

Ready for some heat?

USA Today, March 04, 2026, “Journey to the Center of the Earth” by Matthew Luter

Theme: each themer contains a layer of the Earth

Themers:

• 4d. [Lobster, crab or shrimp], CRUSTACEAN
• 15d. [Yankee great in a 1961 home run race with Roger Maris], MICKEYMANTLE
• 29d. [Low-budget indie film genre named for its often-improvised dialogue], MUMBLECORE

Today’s themer set is a wide range of topics with CRUSTACEAN, MICKEYMANTLE, and MUMBLECORE. The first and second were easy to fill for me, but I needed crossings for the third. A fun theme and we even get them in the correct order, from left to right: CRUST, MANTLE, and CORE.

Favorite fill: BROTHS, UNICEF, and ICEWINES

Stumpers: LINE (needed crossings but great cluing), TUCK (new to me), and APED (also new to me)

A fun puzzle with a stellar grid–love the flow and the expanse the design allows for lengthy bonus fill. Great cluing with fair crossings for those that stumped me a bit. How’d you all do today?

4.0 stars

~Emily

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

Sorry for the delay! Quick post for a great puzzle.

New Yorker • 3/4/26 • Wed • Caitlin Reid Agard • solution • 20260304

FAVE ENTRIES:

• TATAMI MAT
• NATHAN LANE (Soon to be seen as Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman)
• MULLET just for the clue description [“Business in the front, party in the back’…]

Smooth all around. At 3:01 for me, that’s telling. I’m not the speediest solver out there, so anything hovering around the three minute mark is usually an indication of a crudless grid.

4 stars.

Jacob Reed’s LA Times Crossword – Gareth’s theme summary

Between the circles and the final answer, COFFEEBREAK, it should be fairly clear what is going on in Jacob Reed’s puzzle, the four sets of circles spell out ICED, DRIP, INSTANT and IRISH – words that complete “___ coffee” to make coffee variants that aren’t exclusive of each other.

You don’t always get a lot of interesting entries with this style of theme, but Mr. Reed includes ANIMATRONIC, GRINDR and DAIQUIRI within what could be considered theme answers. GRINDR is a nice coffee adjacent bonus entry too.

Gareth