Foreign exchange fee / SUN 2-2-25 / Jeans popular in the 1980s / Sony co-founder Morita / Indigenous people's name for Mount Rainier / Your business start-up? / Fictional composer whose first three initials mean "A.S.A.P." / Seasoning brand that dropped the first part of its name in 2020 / Cartoon character inspired by W.C. Fields / Grim Grimm figure

Constructor: Derrick Niederman

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: "Two-For-One Special" — thirteen different boxes contain two letters (instead of one); italicized clues that contain these two-for-one boxes are familiar phrases split in two by a slash; each side of the slash is actually a separate clue—for one of the clues, one of the two-for-one works, and for the other clue, the other letter works; in the crosses, *both* letters work [apparently every letter of the alphabet is used in those two-letter boxes exactly once—an added “achievement” that also explains so much of the awkwardness]:

Theme answers:

• SLIM SWIM (18D: Skinny/dip) / RACHEL WEISZ (22A: Lead actress in "The Lovely Bones" (2009) and "The Bourne Legacy" (2012))
• QUICK BUICK (24A: Fast/car) / PDQ BACH (8D: Fictional composer whose first three initials mean "A.S.A.P.")
• ZANY MANY (25A: Wild/bunch) / DUTCH DITCH (48A: Holland/tunnel) / HAZMAT SUITS (13D: Protective outfits for handling radioactive material)
• COLT VOLT (31D: Horse/power) / MMMDCV (30A: 3,605, in ancient Rome)
• METRODOME METRONOME (61A: Stadium/timekeeper) / ROAD NOISE (45D: Honking or screeching, for example)
• STAGE NAME STATE NAME (77A: Denver/Colorado) / YOUNG TURK (53D: One eager for radical change)
• SIESTA FIESTA (102D: Slumber/party) / US FLAG (101A: Stars and Stripes)
• PAR PAY (74A: Average/income) / FLATTERY (36D: Excessive praise)
• JOKER POKER (117A: Card/game) / JPEG (117D: Digital picture format)
• T-REX TREK (116A: Dino/expedition)/ JAGUAR XKES (79D: Classic British sports cars)
• WORD WARD (111D: Promise/keeper) / TOASTMASTER (118A: Certain emcee)
• PATH PATE (105D: Trail/head) / HERNIA (122A: Risk of heavy lifting)

Word of the Day: AGIO (10D: Foreign exchange fee) —

1. 

a. 

the difference between the nominal and actual values of a currency

b. 

the charge payable for conversion of the less valuable currency

2. 

a percentage payable for the exchange of one currency into another

3. 

an allowance granted to compensate for differences in currency values, as on foreign bills of exchange

4.  an informal word for agiotage (collinsdictionary.com)

 

• • •

[28D: Seasoning brand that dropped
the first part of its name in 2020]

"Make it stop." That was what I was thinking for much of the back half of this. I'd had enough. The sheer volume of these awkward / fussy two-letter squares, which have nothing linking them besides their two-letterness, was just exhausting. It is, to a certain extent, impressive that all the slash clues a. are familiar (or familiarish) phrases, and b. work for two different answers that are just a single letter apart. That does, admittedly, make the theme tighter and therefore more impressive than it would be otherwise. But solving this thing was an exercise in diminishing returns. The initial "oh! OK..." soon gave way to "oh ... there are a lot of these," which gave way to "oh ... is this it?" to "omg how many of these are there when will it end?!" Constructors often try to make up for weak (or one-dimensional) themes with volume, Volume, VOLUME, and that was definitely the case today. And the problem is that with this many 2fer squares ... not all of them work all that well. I mean, are the double-answers phrases supposed to make some kind of wacky sense when taken together. A SLIM SWIM, what is that? A QUICK BUICK is at least something I can imagine, but a PATH PATE is not. DUTCH DITCH really really doesn't work, as [Holland] is a noun and DUTCH is an adjective, and before you go saying "but Holland is functioning adjectivally," please keep in mind that the Holland Tunnel is not, in fact, a DUTCH DITCH, as it's located in New York City. Also, as I say, it's not At All clear that the two answers to the italicized theme clues are supposed to be taken as a single phrase. We have to endure a ridiculously enormous Roman numeral in order for this theme to "work." We have to endure the duplication of TOAST in order for this theme to "work." It's a stunt puzzle that gives no consideration to what it would actually feel like to solve it. You gotta ask yourself, would this be any fun to solve? For me, the answer, by about midway, was a pretty strong "no."

IN A BAR!!? ( Man, EAT A SANDWICH looks like brilliant fill next to IN A BAR (note: I would EAT A SANDWICH IN A BAR). How is IN A BAR any different from IN A BOOKSTORE or IN AN ELEVATOR!? You know you're high on your own ideas when you let junk like that just get by. This is what test-solvers and editors are for! There are some admittedly interesting "solutions" to the double-letter problem today, including the double double-letter feat at HAZMAT SUITS. RACHEL WEISZ and YOUNG TURK are interesting standalone answers, and PDQBACH is a clever way of handling the "QB" situation. But JAGUAR XKES, plural, felt like an awkward way to get "XK" together, not to mention it's one of the few long themers that doesn't break the two letters across two different parts of the cross (see, by contrast, YOUNG TURK, ROAD NOISE, PDQ BACH, RACHEL WEISZ). JAGUAR's just hanging out there, not involved in the double-letter square at all. This flood-the-zone approach to theme execution leaves things an awful mess. Really uneven. Crowded. Fussy. And the fill quality (again, IN A BAR, wtf?) suffered as well. YESM OENO ... AKIO *and* AGIO, neither of which I've seen in a dog's age!? Yeesh and double yeesh.

The hardest part of this puzzle for me was just getting started. I sort of forgot that RACHEL WEISZ existed and definitely forgot that her last name was WEISZ and not WEISS, so encountering her right away, as a themer, before I had any grasp on the theme, was a challenge. I think I figured out the double-letter gimmick at the stupid Roman numeral, since there was absolutely no way to make sense of it in the number of squares provided. After I got the gimmick sorted, the only trouble was the occasional answer that made no sense to me, or that I'd never heard of. Like GLIDE-ON, that was tough. How else would eyeliners work? JAB-ON? SLAP-ON? No idea how GLIDE-ON is different from any other kind of eyeliner. Also, this is a weirdly eye makeup-obsessed puzzle (65D: Sephora purchase = MASCARA). I remembered GITANOS (75A: Jeans popular in the 1980s), but then immediately balked at GITANOS because I thought "nah, those are French cigarettes ... aren't they?" (those are GITANES ... also GAULOISES). AKIO and AGIO went in only because eventually both were vaguely familiar to me. Man, AGIO, feels like it's been a while. Holy cow, look at this chart (from xwordinfo):

[Like GITANOS, AGIO was "popular in the 1980s"]

That's AGIO frequency over time. The blue is where Shortz took over. That little blip way way over on the right? That's us. If you're seeing AGIO eight (!) times a year, as they apparently were in the '80s, then AGIO probably quickly becomes second-nature, but in the year of our lord 2025, heaven help you. Help me. Actually, I at least had the experience of a few of those other blue blips, but as you can see it's been well over a decade. Eliminating crosswordese—great. Bringing it back after a loooong hiatus, when no one really knows it anymore—brutal. AKIO, on the other hand, has appeared solely under Shortz (the earlier administrations were far less tolerant of proper nouns), but even then, it's been about eight years (seven appearances total) (110D: Sony co-founder Morita). Putting AGIO and AKIO in the same grid after something like a combined 25-year absence ... is not a choice I'd make if I had the choice to make. Hey, have you heard this joke? AKIO and AGIO walk IN A BAR ... see, even *that* context doesn't work for IN A BAR. It's "INto A BAR." Bah.

Some notes:

• 4D: Indigenous people's name for Mount Rainier (TAHOMA) — another toughie. I sat there for several seconds trying to figure out a way to make this TACOMA, which at least I've heard of (TACOMA is the "Tac" in "SEA-TAC" airport (I'll let you guess what the "SEA" is).
• 16D: Small entryway receptacle that might also house loose change (KEY DISH) — just stared blankly at this. I had no idea this sort of thing had a name. I have a little bowl near the door where I keep miscellaneous things I might need when leaving the house. Yes, there are keys there. But lots of other stuff too. I would never think to call it a KEY DISH, perhaps because it is a bowl made out of a discarded vinyl record (heated, reshaped ... someone made it for me; great use for unplayable LPs). 
• 56D: Kind of line that no one just stands in (CONGA) — good clue.

• 41D: Major shops (EMPORIA) — I admit this is nitpicky, but it's something I definitely would've thought about had this been my puzzle—not sure EMPORIA and EMP (short for "empress") should share gridspace. But if you're letting two whole TOASTs in, then I'm guessing you don't really have a duplication policy at all, which is a shame. Makes the puzzles seem sloppy.
• 35D: What Hester Prynne wore in a Hawthorne novel (LETTER A) — ask any high school kid (or former high school kid) what Hester Prynne wore in a Hawthorne novel, I guarantee you none of them say "LETTER A!" It's not untrue. But come on.

• 83D: What parallel lines never do (CONVERGE) — weird to know the answer but not know the answer. I could see the lines, but my brain was like "well they don't CROSS ... nope, hmmm ... CONNECT? ... too short ... COLLIDE!?" Etc.
• 70A: Your business start-up? (NONE OF) — NONE OF is truly awful fill, but I have to give at least polite applause to this clue, which is trying so hard to make everything not just OK, but entertaining (the clue refers to the phrase "NONE OF your business"). This is only the second NONEOF in NYTXW history. Kind of mad at the first guy who thought it was OK. Had to be some kind of encouragement to this second guy.
• 91D: Grabbed, as an opportunity (LEAPT ON) — the thing you do with opportunities is you leap at them. "Leap at the chance" is an idiom. "Leap on the chance" is not. Yes, there is a defense to be made for LEAPT ON. But no puzzle should require this many defenses.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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