Battleship corner / FRI 9-20-24 / Lawbreakers, informally / Four-year-old in pig tales? / Apt name for a successful crypto investor? / Philosophy influenced by Aristotle's concept of the Unmoved Mover / Plural form decried by staunch "Star Wars" fans / Windy flight?

• • •

It felt like a trap. Was I ... MISSING THE POINT? Or did I really just rocket across the grid off a single letter in a hypothesized suffix? Turns out, the latter, which was fun. Always fun to get a big whoosh like that.  A similar transgrid experience soon followed.

As you can see, I was slightly less sure about THANKSGIVING DAY, so had to check it with crosses (namely DYADS). I knew the Lions played every Thanksgiving, but I thought maybe there was some wacky name for that game, some kind of portmanteau, like THANKSLIONSBOWL or something. But no, it's simply the date of the game, THANKSGIVING DAY. Anyway, whoosh whoosh, which I usually like, but after this initial rush things slowed back down to normal Friday levels, and the highs just never got very high. I actually like the shorter 11s today better than I like all the 15s—PESCETARIAN paired with HARD AS A ROCK ... a fish-eater with great abs, is what I'm imagining. You might be imagining something racier. Speaking of something racier, did you know Bella THORNE directed an "adult film" called Her & Him? It's true! It won a PornHub Visionary Award, which is a thing that exists, apparently. I seem to have missed THORNE's career almost entirely, what with Disney and porn being things that are generally off my radar these days. She's very famous, I just (generationally) missed her. When I see THORNE, I think of mid-century humor writer THORNE Smith, that's how old I am.
There were a few shorter things that put me off the grid (when your marquee stuff doesn't sizzle, then problems in the short stuff start to stand out). Worst of all was HAVOCS ... as a verb? (33A: Lays waste to). I mean, it's terrible as a plural noun, but it's virtually nonsensical as a verb. I assume this verbal meaning of HAVOCS is dictionary-attested, somewhere, but yikes. Yeah, Google's dictionary source (Oxford Languages) has this verb version of "havoc" as explicitly "Archaic." Merriam-Webster dot com, however, doesn't tag it that way—just has it as a regular word— so ... OK, I guess this is a thing "havoc" means, but literally never, nowhere, by anyone, in any situation have I heard this, so ... fun. I have heard SOPS as a verb, but I'm never gonna like it. I can tolerate SOP in the verb phrase "to sop up," but for me SOPS (on its own) wants to be a plural noun (meaning, roughly, "bribes"). SOPS is, in general, just a wholly unappealing word, right up there with "moist" (which at least has delicious cake connotations). So SOPS / PERPS was a frowny-face from me, as was the clue on EXES, what the hell??? (8D: People for whom a "no contact" rule might apply). I'm not sure exactly what "rule" this clue is referring to, but a "No contact"order is legal means of protecting (primarily) women from abusive partners (frequently EXES). Why would you evoke that with your clue? I'm sure there are other reasons for a "no contact" order, but my one time on jury duty involved a case where a guy violated his "no contact" order and ... he wasn't a nice guy. There are so many nicer, less trauma-adjacent ways to clue EXES. Bizarre cluing choice here. Also bizarre: JEDIS (41D: Plural form decried by staunch "Star Wars" fans). I mean, your clue is basically telling me "yeah, this is a trash plural," so ... treat it that way (i.e. don't use it). 

More things:

• 7A: Four-year-old in pig tales? (PEPPA)— fictional pigs ... I got Wilbur ... I got, I dunno, Piglet? And then I'm out. PEPPA Pig is a phenomenon that I just missed. My daughter would've been about the right age for it when it first hit the States ('05), but she generally did not watch commercial children's TV. She didn't watch TV much at all, though she did have a semi-hilarious addiction to watching DVDs of Sabrina the Teenage Witch (the series starring Melissa Joan Hart that ran '96-'03—which was, to our credit as parents, a very good show). But PEPPA Pig, no. So I needed some crosses to get PEPPA.

• 15A: Members of the family Passeridae (SPARROWS) — knew this was a bird family, and guessed SPARROWS correctly, but I was very aware, as I was writing it in, that SWALLOWS also fit.
• 23A: Pilot productions? (PENS) — Pilot is a company that makes PENS, so that's what that's about.
• 27A: Industry that emerged in the 1970s (GAMING) — wow, "industry" had me thinking something more ... industrial. Interesting / toughish clue.
• 30A: Windy flight? (SPIRAL STAIRCASE) — kind of meh as an answer, but the misdirective clue is kind of fun (not windy like Chicago, but win- (rhymes with "vine") -dy like a winding ... staircase, actually; or a long and winding road, if that's more your thing)

• 34A: Option for a backpacker (HOSTEL)— had the "H" and wanted HIKING. "Option" is not a great option here, as OPT is already in the grid (19D: Elect). 
• 35A: Apt name for a successful crypto investor? (ERICH)— unless he pronounces his name E-RICH (like he's a rapper or something), then no, unapt, boo to this clue. It's only "apt" if it sounds right, and this doesn't sound right.
• 51A: Unwelcome sight in musical stairs (NO SEATS)— very frowny face drawn next to this answer on my print-out. Not a phrase that's strong enough to stand alone.
• 28D: Kind of number represented by the equation M = v/c (MACH) — so ... kind of number represented by "M." So ... "M" ... it's just "M." That's what the "M" stands for. The "M" stands for MACH. Clue could've just been [M, in aeronautics]. (MACH 1 = the speed of sound, represented by the "c" in today's "equation")
• 30A: A "whole" thing (SHEBANG) — Ugh to "A" here. There is no "shebang" that is not preceded by "the" and "whole," so "A" is an absurdity. A SHEBANG implies multiple SHEBANGS, and ... no. Unless you mean this SHEBANGS:

• 32D: Battleship corner (A-ONE) — despite thinking of the "Battleship" game almost immediately, I didn't get this one until I had it down to A-NE, and even then I was like "... who's ANNE and what is she doing in the corner of a battleship?" I haven't looked at a "Battleship" board in forever, so I assume that A1 is somehow a ... corner of that board. OK, yeah, here we go:

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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