Constructor: Daniel Bodily and Jeff Chen
Relative difficulty: Medium
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THEME:"To Be Continued" — Theme answers are broken across what look like three successive Across entries—you have to read the clues to those three entries as one clue in order to understand the full answer. The central such answer is also supposed to be a clue as to how to understand the theme answers themselves, i.e. you need to read BET / WEE / NTH / ELI / NES (63-67A: Read / Here / To / Understand / 23 answers in today's puzzle that don't seem to match their clues):
Theme answers:
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The gimmick is clever, but this was no fun to solve. Once you see what the hell is going on, the only interesting thing about the puzzle is laid bare, and all you're left with is an absolute ocean of short fill to slog your way through. Perhaps there's something vaguely entertaining about seeing exactly how the parsing is going to go on those theme answers—the fact that each answer part could also pass as a standalone answer is definitely a bonus feature—but that's the only mystery left to untangle. Is it interesting that MARTHA STEWART breaks down into MART + HASTE + WART? Sure, kinda. But it's the constructor showing off—I don't really discover anything myself. I just figure out that the answer is MARTHA STEWART and then watch as the letters go in. I feel like the puzzle really wants me to clap, but the fact that is that I was only engaged in the puzzle up until I discovered the gimmick, and after that the solve felt rote. The nature of the theme meant that there was So Much Short Fill, which made for an overall dull grid. There's not an Across answer longer than seven letters, and only two of those (yes, the theme answers are, taken in total, longer than that, but even if so, this puzzle is absolutely awash in 3-4-5-letter stuff). There are some nice longer Downs, but only one that made me sit up and take notice—the excellent "I'M NOT A ROBOT" (4D: Captcha confirmation). What I dislike most about this grid is that it completely misunderstands how solving happens, at least online solving ... at least as I practice it, i.e. I never ever look at successive Across clues. Solving online, I can't even really see them as a block. I mostly look at the clue for the answer where my cursor is, which appears above the grid as I'm solving. If you solve on paper, you can look at the bank of Acrosses and see pretty clearly that the successive Across clues make sense as a unit, but that's not anything I can see clearly as a digital solver (and lots and lots of solvers are digital solvers). I still got an "aha" out of this thing, but it was a one-time thing, a single jolt of puzzle adrenaline in an otherwise listless grid.
A few more things:
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Relative difficulty: Medium
Theme answers:
- ANTI / QUE ST / ORES (1, 5, 10A: Shops / Peddling / Collectibles)
- MIRA / CLEO / NICE (35-37A: Historic / Hockey / Upset)
- GARB / AGED / UMPS (54-56A: Waste / Disposal / Locations)
- KALE / IDOS / COPE (76-78A: Dazzling / Pattern / Generator)
- DRAM / A LES / SONS (92-95A: Classes / For / Actors)
- MART / HASTE / WART (115-17A: Home / Decorating / Guru)
Enoch [...] is a biblical figure and patriarch prior to Noah's flood and the son of Jared and father of Methuselah. He was of the Antediluvian period in the Hebrew Bible. [...] Enoch is the subject of many Jewish and Christian traditions. He was considered the author of the Book of Enoch and also called the scribe of judgment. In the New Testament, Enoch is referenced in the Gospel of Luke, the Epistle to the Hebrews, and in the Epistle of Jude, the last of which also quotes from it. In the Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodoxy, and Oriental Orthodoxy, he is venerated as a saint. (wikipedia)
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I also don't think reading BET / WEE / NTH / ELI / NES really gets at what's going on here. I'm not reading "between" anything. I have to read *across* a series of clues, and then *across* some black squares, but there are no lines between which I am reading. Maybe I'm supposed to understand that phrase only in the most metaphorical of ways, i.e. I have to read non-literally. OK. But that revealer still feels less than spot-on. The only real difficulty I had today involved the theme, particularly before I figured out what was happening. "How does [Shops] mean ANTI" I wondered, as did probably most solvers in the early solving stages. It took longer than it should have, probably, for the penny to drop (again, I blame the whole puzzle lay-out issue, the expectation that I could see successive Across clues or that I would ever look at them in order—no, never). Then there was one time after I understood the theme where I just got caught unawares by a themer that didn't begin flush left, specifically KALE / IDOS / COPE. I puzzled over [Dazzling] = KALE way, way longer than I should have. I think before that moment all the themers I had started on the far left of the grid. But that was just a hiccup. The journey from 'aha' to the end was mostly just a chore, an exercise in dutifully and methodically filling in boxes, without much in the way of excitement or surprise to brighten the journey.
- 30D: Sound of shear terror (MAA)— this is both bizarre and horrific. You're asking me to imagine the shorn animal screaming out in terror ... and you're asking me to imagine that that animal is a goat? Goats say MAA, right? Sheeps BAA, goats MAA. I feel like these are the rules of American animal sounds. Anyway, the "terror" part of this clue is disturbing and mildly sadistic. I get that you want the "shear terror" pun, but sheesh.
- 38A: ___ Toy Barn (where Emperor Zurg chases Buzz Lightyear) (AL'S)— wow you have vastly overestimated how much I remember about the "Toy Story" universe. The only AL'S I know is from "Happy Days" ... which I know was actually "Arnold's" but I really thought that it got renamed at some point after Al Delvecchio took over as owner ... sigh, 8-year-old me would be so disappointed at middle-aged me's poor memory of this obviously important show.
- 43D: Fourth man to walk on the moon (ALAN BEAN) — wow this answer would've killed me if I hadn't (eventually) figured out the BET part of BET / WEE / NTH / ELI / NES. I had ALAN -EAN and could easily have been convinced that he was ALAN DEAN. I feel like maybe (certainly) people knew all those '60s/'70s astronauts a lot better in and around the '60s and '70s. I think I know an Orson Bean? He's an actor, right? Alan ... I probably heard of him at one point, but it clearly didn't stick.
- 47D: A charismatic person has one (AURA) — ??? This feels like some weird New Age-y nonsense to me. Do you mean "allure?" Because I've known a bunch of charismatic people, but I would never (ever) have said they had an AURA.
- 65D: Makes beloved (ENDEARS)— I had ENAMORS, which is wrong for the clue, but close enough to the clue's universe that it felt right. I didn't have any other missteps in this puzzle that I can remember.
- 95A: Get off berth control? (UNDOCK) — this is only the second NYTXW appearance ever for UNDOCK, possibly because it's a singularly unappealing word. The pun in the clue is good, the answer ... sigh. [Berth control devices?] would be a good clue for MOORING (which has appeared seven times, but not once in the past 20 years) (MOORINGS has appeared only once ever, and that was in 1950 (!?))
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