Classic comedy figure who sported a bowl cut / THU 7-15-21 / Popular hot-and-sour Thai dish / Low culture disparagingly / Southern newspaper that William Faulkner once contributed to / Cultivars known for their yellow flesh / Quantity that's tied to to one's carbon footprint / Central concept of philosopher Zhuangzi's teachings / What a solver might growl after catching on to this puzzle's theme

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So after you get (YU)M(YU)M (which, for me was just about the first thing that happened), all there was to do was wait for the revealer, the Big HaHa, the "Why is this rebus a thing? Is it YU Darvish's birthday? What is up?" And that revealer ... wow, big mixed feelings. It's a terrible, i.e. great, pun, on the one hand, even if "YOU" (with the "O") is not, in fact, what's made "little" in this puzzle. Very imaginative. Worthy of its revealer status. Y(o)u earned that rebus, for sure. On the OTHER HAND— two things things I don't like. Well, one I don't like, and one that just makes me squirmy. The squirmy one is the weird grammar of the alleged angry question "Why YU little?" I get that the revealer phrase is a common expression of anger or frustration (Homer Simpson says it all the time), but in the context of the puzzle, the phrase is imagined, at least obliquely, as a question, i.e. "why (is) YU little?," which, here, in its verblessness ("Why YU little?"), sounds like it's aping the way any number of immigrant / non-native English speakers (including Asians) might speak, or certainly how they've been *represented* as speaking on TV and in movies. As an imagined question about the puzzle, the revealer gives me mild ethnic caricature vibes. But the more annoying thing for me was the coy "oh, did my puzzle make you angwy?" energy. This is like when people say something they know is unpopular on social media and then write [ducking], as if they were anticipating your throwing a shoe at them or something. Taking pleasure in or flaunting the idea of making a solver (or anyone) "growl" is obnoxious. Don't tell me how I feel. I solved this puzzle with a reasonable amount of enjoyment, actually. It was easyish, as rebuses go. I never growled. "Oooh, did my puzzle trigger you!?" Stop.


The "YU" words were actually really colorful and entertaining, which helped make the puzzle more than merely a "hunt the remaining YUs" exercise. True, there were two "-Y UP" phrases, but that's a tiny repetition, one that's overshadowed and outshined by splashy stuff like TIMES PICA(YU)NE and TOM (YU)M SOUP. Speaking of said soup, I was so (fake) mad when I dropped TOM YUM GAI in there and it turned out to be wrong. I was like "ooooh, I know this! I know the Thai soup name!" And it fit! Buuuut ... no. TOM YUM GAI is a particular kind of TOM (YU)M SOUP (specifically, the chicken version). Anyway, when I say I was (fake) mad, I mean I was excited to crush that answer, and then find out I had not, in fact, crushed it. But it was still the same general dish I thought it was, and it is an Excellent crossword answer. Add TOMYUM to your wordlists, constructors! Hell, add TOMYUMGAI so I can recreate my feeling of excitement at knowing it!

The fill was mostly nice. Very iffy in a few places (IMTOO CAMEA RIAA ALKA), but mostly pleasantly crunchy on the whole.  I like the weirdly quaint OBEISANT, just as I like ON A HUNCH and SPEED TRAP. The MALE LEADS clue is very clever  (6D: Phoenix and Washington, e.g.) (using cities to hide actors—Joaquin / River and Denzel, respectively—nice). I'm weirdly bothered by a stray "YOU" sound in the grid (i.e. YOUTH, 68A: "___ is easily deceived, because it is quick to hope": Aristotle), but I also get weirdly bothered when all the cushions on the couch are not flush with the edge, so I'm not sure an unlittled "YOU" sound counts as a genuine flaw. The main thing about this puzzle is it was weird, and weird is (generally) good. See you tomorrow.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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