Constructor: Erik Agard
Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium (4-ish)
![]()
THEME: TALK IN CIRCLES (14D: Argue repetitively ... with a hint to this puzzle's theme)— circled squares spell out various verbs meaning roughly "talk":
Theme answers:
![]()
Didn't much care for this one, as a themed puzzle. As a themeless, it's pretty sweet. There are an astonishing number of 8+ entries here—thirteen, to be precise!—and they give the grid a lot of color and pizzazz. But the theme doesn't quite work for me. It is truly impressive that the revealer drives down through Every Single Other Themer (all six of them!?), but this, like the theme itself, is something I noticed only after solving. And while the revealer placement is impressive, the revealer doesn't quite get at what's going on. I get the IN CIRCLES part, but there is no clear reason that I can see for splitting the circled squares. I see that the words meaning "talk" are inside the circles, but why are those circled squares split between beginning and end of the answers in which they appear? Maybe there's something visually thematic going on there, but it's not crystal clear to me.
The grid looks enormous to me, but it is absolutely normal in size (15x15). I think it's soooo choppy that it looks like it has more ... parts to it? It just looked and felt bigger than it is. Lots of black squares / heavy segmentation meant that outside the abundant long answers, there's just very short stuff for miles. The downside of this grid design, I guess. Anyway, none of it bothered me too much except OPDOC, which I maintain is a painfully redundant term (46D: Nonfiction film with a point of view, in brief). I've watched many documentaries with "points of view" and ... they're just called "documentaries" (or "docs," if you want). I don't see how the "op" part is a meaningful distinction. "Harlan County, USA,""Hoop Dreams,""The Thin Blue Line,""Bowling for Columbine," these are all ... docs. They sure as hell have "points of view," but how have I lived nearly half a century on this planet and seen scores of films like these and never once heard the term "OPDOC"? Anyway, clearly the term is used by someone somewhere or it wouldn't be here, but it's a nuisance term. "Op" is not a meaningful distinction. There is no "Best OPDOC" Oscar category. They're just docs. Down with redundancy and the myth of the objective, God's-eye POV.
Laugh syllables are never not terrible (HEE!) and EENY EWW AAHS and TGI (ugh) are not exactly crowd-pleasers either, but like I said, the fill mostly gets by. I got slowed down by not knowing the Spanish word for "light" (I put in the Latin LUX instead of LUZ), and then slowed down less drastically by the new-to-me OMAR (38D: Actor Dorsey of TV's "Queen Sugar") (I know "Queen Sugar," but not this actor's name). OK, TATA (39D: Line out the door?).
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium (4-ish)
Theme answers:
- CHANCE IT (12A: Take the risk)
- "BLACK PANTHER" (23A: 2018 blockbuster film based on a Marvel comic)
- SPRING BREAK (31A: Time for a trip to Cabo San Lucas or Miami Beach)
- ORCHESTRATE (46A: Bring about)
- PLASTIC CRATE (51A: Sturdier alternative to a cardboard box)
- SPINY EEL (66A: Long fish with a row of barbs)
: any of several strikingly colored eel-shaped freshwater fishes (order Opisthomi) of Africa and the East Indies having a long slender snout and an anterior dorsal fin consisting of free spines (merriam-webster.com)
• • •
The grid looks enormous to me, but it is absolutely normal in size (15x15). I think it's soooo choppy that it looks like it has more ... parts to it? It just looked and felt bigger than it is. Lots of black squares / heavy segmentation meant that outside the abundant long answers, there's just very short stuff for miles. The downside of this grid design, I guess. Anyway, none of it bothered me too much except OPDOC, which I maintain is a painfully redundant term (46D: Nonfiction film with a point of view, in brief). I've watched many documentaries with "points of view" and ... they're just called "documentaries" (or "docs," if you want). I don't see how the "op" part is a meaningful distinction. "Harlan County, USA,""Hoop Dreams,""The Thin Blue Line,""Bowling for Columbine," these are all ... docs. They sure as hell have "points of view," but how have I lived nearly half a century on this planet and seen scores of films like these and never once heard the term "OPDOC"? Anyway, clearly the term is used by someone somewhere or it wouldn't be here, but it's a nuisance term. "Op" is not a meaningful distinction. There is no "Best OPDOC" Oscar category. They're just docs. Down with redundancy and the myth of the objective, God's-eye POV.
Laugh syllables are never not terrible (HEE!) and EENY EWW AAHS and TGI (ugh) are not exactly crowd-pleasers either, but like I said, the fill mostly gets by. I got slowed down by not knowing the Spanish word for "light" (I put in the Latin LUX instead of LUZ), and then slowed down less drastically by the new-to-me OMAR (38D: Actor Dorsey of TV's "Queen Sugar") (I know "Queen Sugar," but not this actor's name). OK, TATA (39D: Line out the door?).
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]