Archenemy of Fantastic Four / TUE 3-4-14 / Rapper with 2002 #1 hit Always on Time / Song girl who's sweet as apple cider /

Constructor: Bruce Haight and Peter A. Collins

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: BENJAMIN / FRANKLIN, who is "often credited" with DISCOVERING / ELECTRICITY — then there's a play on the phrase "GO FLY / A KITE," because that's allegedly what BJ was doing and the kite was hit by lightning and, well, you probably went to grammar school, so you know what's going on here…

But wait, there's more:

Black squares form rough figure of a kite in the NE corner, with the tail running diagonally across the center of the grid. I think the little Tetris-like blocks on either side of the kite tail are supposed to be lightning bolts. Not sure.

Word of the Day: IDA (18A: Song girl who's "sweet as apple cider") —

This was a rare case where examining the grid after I'd filled it in actually added to my overall enjoyment of the puzzle. The physical shape of the grid really matters here—otherwise, it's just a weird, semi-arbitrary puzzle about a persistent American myth (the kite thing's a myth, right?). But with the black squares forming a kite shape, and the theme answers all being balanced two-parters that meet at a 90-degree angle at the kite tail, this puzzle has a cleverness that's hard to resist. It's weird—there was a stretch there a while back where it seemed like every other puzzle was by Peter Collins, and I rarely cared for any of them. Then this year his output seems way down, but his puzzles have been fantastic. Gave him Puzzle of the Week honors earlier in the year, and nearly did so again last week. In general, it seems has game has gone up a notch. This is nothing but good news. I don't mean to give short shrift to Bruce Haight, who for all I know is largely responsible for the good things in this grid. So congrats to him on a fine puzzle, too.

I felt like I was moving through it slowly, but I ended up in the mid/high 3s, which is pretty normal. It helped that the fill was relatively smooth (some roughness, some staleness, but nothing too distracting). The main speed bumps were (as usual) proper nouns. Even though I'm in the middle of teaching my Comics course, I totally blanked on DR. DOOM (1A: Archenemy of the Fantastic Four). Didn't know Buzz was an EDWIN. And nearly got Naticked* at IDA / DARLA, neither of whom I'd ever heard of (Buffy and Bing being both beyond me). I put a "D" there because it was the only letter that made two plausible women's names. I see now that "cider" kinda sorta rhymes with IDA (it *definitely* rhymes with IDA in the song), so maybe I could've gotten it that way, but … from my perspective, it was a guess. But I guessed right, and I don't think there are plausible alternatives to the "D" (maybe "M", but that's a stretch). EDGED IN is not a phrase I'd ever use to describe a comment (31A: Added slyly, as a comment). Someone who doesn't want to be noticed might enter a room that way, maybe, but "I EDGED IN a comment…" sounds weird.

OK time for bed. See you tomorrow.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

*For an explanation of the Natick Principle, go here and scroll down to "Some helpful vocabulary"