0:08:32
Blah. This wasn't my favorite. It was, like last week, a little harder than some Mondays, but largely because of things that were poor. LEAPER (5A: One jumping to conclusions, say), XOUT (23A: Delete with a cross), OSOS (30A: Spanish bears), ARPS (67A: Some Dadaist pieces), AGEONE (11D: Early toddlerhood)... and how 'bout this line - ONA, ORELSE, TOIT. Even the revealer was broken up into two answers.
I admit, though, that the theme was kind of cool, and there seemed to be a ton of it. Maybe that's why the constructor was forced into so many ugly corners.
On the bright side, I enjoyed the clue for TRACED (43A: Like stencils and missing persons), and ADMONISH (2D: Upbraid) and its clue are both quite nice. And speaking of nice, fancy words, did you also enjoy EXIGENT (19D: Demanding immediate attention)?
I also like seeing mention of 3D: Old TV's Captain ____ (KANGAROO). In all, I enjoyed the downs much more than the acrosses. Especially the somewhat unexpected ROB (59D: ____ blind).
Uneven, but not terrible, I guess.
- Horace
11:24
ReplyDeleteI did, indeed, like EXIGENT. Frannie probably did also. I hadn't noticed the ONA, ORELSE, TOIT line as an actual line until Horace pointed it out (of course, it was filled in correctly), and I'd never heard of ARPS. I thought that all of the theme answers were very easy, though I didn't have any idea what they had in common until I got to the reveal boxes and realized it was pretty clever. AGEONE may have been my least favorite regular answer, but is a TRAPDOOR really considered to be a 38D Hidden exit, or is it a trap? I guess it's both, but I was surprised at that clue/answer. It seemed a bit clunky.