Naval threats, according to an old saying / WED 3-27-24 / Release following the GameCube / T that comes before Y / Characteristic sound of Yoko Ono? / Chum, in Champagne

Constructor: Rich Katz

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: Instructions for turning SCREWDRIVERS (54A: Toolbox tools): RIGHTY TIGHTY / LEFTY LOOSEY (19A: With 36-Across, mnemonic device for turning 54-Across ... or a hint to the answers to the starred clues)  — you must mentally supply "tight" on the right side of the grid three times (following, or to the "right" of, three answers), and "loose" on the left side of the grid three times (before, or to the "left" of, three answers)

Theme answers:

• SKIN tight (9A: *Closefitting)
• "HANG tight!" (35A: *"Don't go anywhere!")
• "SLEEP tight" (64A: *Rhyming partner of "Good night")
• Loose TOOTH (13A: *Wiggler in a child's mouth)
• Loose LEAF (39A: *Like some paper and tea)
• Loose LIPS (65A: *Naval threats, according to an old saying) 

Word of the Day: "Loose LIPS Sink Ships" (65A) —

Loose lips sink ships is an American English idiom meaning "beware of unguarded talk". The phrase originated on propaganda posters during World War II, with the earliest version using the wording loose lips might sink ships. The phrase was created by the War Advertising Council and used on posters by the United States Office of War Information.

This type of poster was part of a general campaign to advise servicemen and other citizens to avoid careless talk that might undermine the war effort. There were many similar such slogans, but "Loose lips sink ships" remained in the American idiom for the remainder of the century and into the next, usually as an admonition to avoid careless talk in general. (The British equivalent used "Careless Talk Costs Lives", and variations on the phrase "Keep mum", while in neutral Sweden the State Information Board promoted the wordplay "En svensk tiger" ("A Swedish tiger" or "A Swede keeps silent": the Swedish word "tiger" means both "tiger" and "keeps silent"), and Germany used "Schäm Dich, Schwätzer!" (English: "Shame on you, blabbermouth!").

However, propaganda experts at the time and historians since have argued the main goal of these and similar posters was to actually frighten people into not spreading rumors, even true ones, containing bad news that might hurt morale or create tension between groups of Americans, since the Federal Bureau of Investigation (in charge of dealing with enemy spies) had rounded up the key agents in June 1941, so that the nation "entered the war with confidence that there was no major German espionage network hidden in U.S. society." [...] 

Historian D'Ann Campbell argues that the purpose of the wartime posters, propaganda, and censorship of soldiers' letters was not to foil spies but "to clamp as tight a lid as possible on rumors that might lead to discouragement, frustration, strikes, or anything that would cut back military production." (wikipedia)

• • •

This theme grew on me as I circled the grid and realized how many layers it had, but I cannot tell you what a corrosive effect bad fill has on my initial mood and impression when solving a puzzle. I went "uh oh" at the very first answer I entered (IROC) and then "you must be joking" when the very next answer I got was OTOH. Junk, junk, right out of the box. I took a screenshot right there, but had no idea that things would actually get worse before I'd ever even left the NW corner (I threw that first screenshot away and took this one instead):

[note: doubling OTOH with IMHO later on did not, I repeat not, make things better]

Only-for-the-vowels IONIAN, the dreaded ON TOE ... this is the kind of tiresome short stuff that longtime solvers will have become inured to over the years, but I think a lot about people who aren't longtime solvers and how crummy this fill must seem. Plus, there's no reason to accept bad fill as a standard in the most high-profile crossword in the country. Again, it's a matter of density here—no one answer in particular, but a concatenation, a barrage. True, the NW is the worst of it, but the olden/boring fill is everywhere, as if the puzzle is barely holding itself together to accommodate the theme ... only the theme isn't really that demanding. Yes, you have not just three longer answers, but the six short ones that are more or less fixed in place. That does put stress on the grid. But it's your job to make the effects of that stress near invisible, particularly in a grid that doesn't actually hold any good fill at all beyond the instructions / revealer. It is fun (in a way) to discover the right/left gimmick, so you don't necessarily need sparkly fill today. But you do need it all to groan a little less.

Another issue with the puzzle—an inevitable one—is that the entirety of RIGHTY TIGHTY / LEFTY LOOSEY goes in in one whoosh. True, you don't know the gimmick that's awaiting you, so the solve is nowhere close to over, but it's odd to give away that much real estate at once, especially since (as I say) there  is not another really interesting answer in the entire grid. The rest of the solve is just gunk and gimmick. Luckily, the gimmick is a good one. Didn't feel that way at first, but the theme ended up developing in an interesting way, with multiple ahas to be had. Firstly, I had TOOTH and had no idea anything was "missing" from the answer. Seemed right—a TOOTH can often be found wriggling in a child's mouth. Correct on its face. Mentally-supplied "Loose" not required. I could see that that clue was starred (*) but the answer seemed literal so I didn't think much about why and moved on. I got the long instructions right after that and didn't really read the clue all that closely (I tend not to with paragraph-long clues), so I thought the only thing left to discover was the last long answer, which turned out to be SCREWDRIVERS, which was ... disappointing. I mean, on-the-nose, obvious. Of course that's what RIGHTY TIGHTY / LEFTY LOOSEY refers to (that, or screw-top caps, jar lids, etc.). Nothing new there. Thud. Then I got LEAF and thought "that sounds wrong ... LEAF tea? LEAF paper? ... are those the terms?" But ... close enough, I thought, and kept going. I think it was only when I finally hit bottom, where LIPS made no sense without "loose," that I saw the gimmick. Or part of it—it was fun to realize a little later that missing "loose" was accompanied by missing "tight," and that each missing-word answer was appropriately oriented in the grid ("tight" answers on the right, "loose" answers on the left — RIGHTY TIGHTY / LEFTY LOOSEY, ta da!

I liked also that the missing-word answers varied in terms of how hard they were to pick up, and that SLEEP, for instance, really played on the missing word (forcing some solvers, undoubtedly, to wonder how in the hell SLEEP rhymes with "Good night"). Then there was the ambiguity trap at 35A: *"Don't go anywhere!," which, if you didn't fall into it, you probably didn't know existed. But I fell in. I came up from below, had the "H," and wrote in not "HANG" but "HOLD." The whole puzzle promptly seized up as every short cross over there failed, though even with "HANG" in place, ZIG was hard (why not ZAG?) (26D: Veer quickly) and TIN was hard (why not CAN?) (25D: Recyclable material). So that tiny area was a thorny mess for me. Otherwise, largely because the long theme stuff was so easy, this one played on the easy side, for sure. 

Explainers:

• 21A: T that comes before a Y (TAU) — not sure what the "Y" is, so I'm gonna look it up now ... OK, it's upsilon (or ypsilon), the twentieth letter of the Greek alphabet, and yup, it follows TAU directly. "Y" is what upsilon looks like in capital form (in lowercase, it's just a regular old "u").
• 61A: Characteristic sound of Yoko Ono? (LONG "O") — a "letteral" clue, asking you to consider "Yoko Ono" not as a musician but solely as a name—a name containing four LONG "O"s. Yesterday, SILENT "B," today LONG "O," tomorrow who knows?
• 34D: Name found when reading between the lines? (ELI) — this is some cryptic crossword-type cluing: ELI is a buried word that you can find if you literally read between "thE LInes." Cute.

That's it. Enjoy your day. See you tomorrow (Opening Day!). Take care.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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