them's crossing words

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Where is everyone?

by Lisa

I really wanted to like today's crossword after peeking its shape. There are three full-length downs and two full-length acrosses in a 9x9 grid, a puzzle packed full of interesting, long words. Unfortunately the other fill is kind of boring and the theme doesn't do much to inspire.

My main problem with this grid is the theme, a kind of wordplay theme that only applies to the clues. Today we're given "Line at the top?" and "Line at the bottom?", two clues that play on one another as references to "line" and oppositions for top/bottom. The actual fill, though, is ITSLONELY and SIGNATURE, two words that have nothing to do with one another, nothing to do with top/bottom, and hardly anything to do with lines. It's a little disappointing.

My favorite aspect of crossword themes is piecing together the themers from their shared elements, either unraveling the theme as I go or using the theme as a map. This crossword has none of that, since the clues are where the theme begins and ends. If you don't know the clues, you don't know the themers. It's just like all of the other fill in the grid.

Speaking of all of the other fill, the full-length downs are great. I plonked GETARAISE immediately and filled GAS and TREE for the other two. TREESTUMP gradually revealed itself as I proceeded through the grid, nicely taking shape with the clue. My main stumbling block was GASRANGES, The R and A being the last two letters that I slotted in the grid.

The rest of the crossword's fill is incredibly forgettable. LILT, ETS, OREO, TATAS, SRA, INES, IAN, ARIA? No thanks. I also struggled with a bunch of the trivia in the grid, references to media that I have not consumed nor heard of ("The Light We Carry", "Seasons of Love", Juana INES de la Cruz) or chocolate substitutes (CAROB).

"Maker of multi-cel-ular creations?" is almost a groan-worthy pun, but it doesn't quite work. The problem is that the pun word is another piece of annoying crosswordese, "cel". Would anyone understand this if they weren't solving the crossword daily?

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