Italian painter Guido / MON 2-27-23 / Viewer-supported TV network / Maker of instant pictures since 1948 / Surrealist with a trademark mustache / 1815 novel on which Clueless was based / Classic toy with the jingle lyric a spring a spring a marvelous thing

Constructor: David Rockow

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: BEAR WITH ME (32A: "Please be patient" ... or a literal description of 15-, 28-, 39- and 52-Across?) — the letters "ME" and also letters spelling out a type of "bear" are found in the circled squares inside the theme answers:

Theme answers:

• POLAROID CAMERA (15A: Maker of instant pictures since 1948)
• "MEN IN BLACK" (28A: 1997 Will Smith/Tommy Lee Jones blockbuster)
• JAMES BROWN (39A: "The Godfather of Soul")
• MOMENT IN THE SUN (52A: Brief time to shine)

Word of the Day: Sun bear (see 52A) —

The sun bear (Helarctos malayanus) is a species in the family Ursidae (the only species in the genus Helarctos) occurring in the tropical forests of Southeast Asia. It is the smallest bear, standing nearly 70 centimetres (28 inches) at the shoulder and weighing 25–65 kilograms (55–143 pounds). It is stockily built, with large paws, strongly curved claws, small rounded ears and a short snout. The fur is generally jet-black, but can vary from grey to red. Sun bears get their name from the characteristic orange to cream coloured chest patch. Its unique morphology—inward-turned front feet, flattened chest, powerful forelimbs with large claws—suggests adaptations for climbing.

The most arboreal (tree-living) of all bears, the sun bear is an excellent climber and sunbathes or sleeps in trees 2 to 7 metres (7 to 23 feet) above the ground. It is mainly active during the day, though nocturnality might be more common in areas frequented by humans. Sun bears tend to remain solitary but sometimes occur in pairs (such as a mother and her cub). They do not seem to hibernate, possibly because food resources are available the whole year throughout the range. Being omnivores, sun bears have a broad diet including ants, bees, beetles, honey, termites and plant material such as seeds and several kinds of fruits; vertebrates such as birds and deer are also eaten occasionally. They breed throughout the year; individuals become sexually mature at two to four years of age. Litters comprise one or two cubs that remain with their mother for around three years.

The range of the sun bear is bound by northeastern India to the north and extends south to southeast through Bangladesh, Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam in mainland Asia to Brunei, Indonesia and Malaysia to the south. These bears are threatened by heavy deforestation and illegal hunting for food and the wildlife trade; they are also harmed in conflicts with humans when they enter farmlands, plantations and orchards. The global population is estimated to have declined by 35% over the past three decades. The IUCN has listed this species as vulnerable. (wikipedia)

• • •

I feel like the NYTXW is in a bit of a struggle rut right now. The themed stuff just isn't landing. I like the spirit of this one ... that is, I want to like it, and I do like the revealer, but the actual execution of the theme leaves ME a little cold. I guess the "bears" are "with" "ME" in the sense that the letters strings do in fact appear in the same phrase ... so that's something. But I think I want / expect something tighter and/or more surprising. I think the thing that bothers me most is the inconsistency in the execution—specifically, that fact that POLAR is (properly, IMO) buried/hidden in its answer (POLAROID CAMERA), whereas BLACK and BROWN and SUN are just sitting there out in the open, as standalone words. I can see how it would be very hard if not impossible to pull this theme off, given its current parameters, while also burying/hiding BLACK and BROWN and SUN. Probably hard to bury/hide those words under any circumstances. Still, it's grating to my brain to see one answer do the better / harder / more elegant thing and then see the others just bail out. Also, the narrow size of the grid is making me sad, especially since there still seem to be a lot of black squares. It's like I'm doing NYTXW Lite. But the main issue is that the theme is just OK. It's not bad. It's not. But it's not delightful either. If one of the bears had been COCAINE ... it's possible I'd feel different. 

MOMENT IN THE SUN isn't as common as DAY IN THE SUN (to say nothing of PLACE IN THE SUN), but it's a legit phrase. Its greatest virtue is that it's 14 letters long, and thus balances out POLAROID CAMERA; sometimes you just gotta go with what fits. The fill today added to my overall feeling of disappointment. It's pretty tepid and bland. The grid structure means there's lots and lots of short stuff, and it's tough to make short stuff really sing. It's also tough to get excited about an answer like LOANCAP (23A: Borrower's limit). I can't imagine burning one of my few longer answers on something as snore-y as LOANCAP. I also would've redone my entire grid just to get rid of RENI, which is the kind of non-Monday ye-olde short fill that really grates on my brain (42D: Italian painter Guido). The last time RENI appeared in the NYTXW on a day that wasn't Fri / Sat / Sun was in 2002 (!), and even then it was on Thursday. The last time it appeared on Monday was in 1994 (!!). It's tough when you back yourself into a corner by setting up your themers in such a way that you have to make R--I work. That is not a letter combination that wants to work. You can't do much of anything with that, and so you end up with artists you'd never put in a puzzle unless you Absolutely had to ... and on a Monday. Sigh. Nothing else seems outright objectionable, but there's a lot of SMEE-level stuff in there, and not enough longer or stronger fill to mitigate it. In short, this is an OK puzzle, but I haven't done a better-than-OK themed puzzle in the past week and it's getting me down. 

From a Downs-only perspective (which is how I solve all Mondays now), this was very easy. RENI was the one real killer, since I have no idea who that is *and* STANLE- really looked like it wanted to be STANLEY. But then RYNI seemed completely wrong, and was, so I just tore out the middle letters, tried to make other letters work with the Acrosses, and finally saw the possibility of STAN LEE / RENI. Beyond that, the NW and SE corners were a little tough (as banks of 6+-letter answers tend to be when solving Downs-only), but the themers eventually helped me work it all out. I had INN before BAR (4D: Tavern), but I think that's it as far as initially wrong answers go. I like PKS (penalty kicks) as an abbr. (26D: Tie-breaking soccer shots: Abbr.). At least, I like it as much as I can like a 3-letter abbr. MLS season just started, and I've recently decided to start following it, so football stuff is  gonna excite maybe a little more than it used to. Go Loons!

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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