Exhibiting a green face, stereotypically / FRI 6-12-26 / Half ass reply? / Obstacle for Odysseus / Children's book title character in a green suit / Home of the world's largest independently owned bookstore (spanning an entire city block) / Cab alternative / Style with spotty coverage? / Pastry with Austrian origins, despite its name

Constructor: Amanda Winters

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: none 

Word of the Day: Empire of the ANTS (19A: "Empire of the ___" (1977 sci-fi film with an approval rating of 5% on Rotten Tomatoes)) —

[Joan Collins!]

Empire of the Ants is a 1977 science fiction horror film co-written and directed by Bert I. Gordon. Based very loosely on the 1905 short story "Empire of the Ants" by H. G. Wells, the film involves a group of prospective land buyers led by a land developer, pitted against large mutated ants.

It is the third and last film released in A.I.P.'s H.G. Wells film cycle, which include The Food of the Gods (1976) and The Island of Dr. Moreau (1977). // The opening narration notes how ants use pheromones to communicate and how this causes an obligatory response. As the opening credits roll, barrels sporting radioactive waste decals are dumped off a boat into the ocean. One of the barrels washes onto a beach and leaks a silvery goo onto the sand.

Meanwhile, shady land developer Marilyn Fryser takes prospective clients on a boat trip to view a beachfront land development in the area of the waste dump. Unbeknownst to the visitors, ants are writhing in the radioactive goo from the leaky barrel. The visitors question the value of the land, but the trip is cut short when some of them are attacked by giant mutated ants. The ants destroy their boat and chase the group through woods. After losing some of their party along the way, the survivors discover a town and gain a promise of help from the local sheriff. Their sense of safety is short-lived as they discover that the queen ant, using pheromones, has put the townsfolk under her control and is making them provide her colony with sugar from the local sugar plant. Joe Morrison, one of the prospective land buyers, kills the queen ant in an explosion, enabling the remaining survivors to escape the area in a speedboat. (wikipedia)

• • •

This was probably "Easy," but I got stupidly bogged down in the NE, so I had to bump it up to "Easy-Medium." Two main problems. First, the term GENETIC LOTTERY just doesn't resonate. Seeing it now, I recognize it as a phrase I've seen or heard before, but I don't really know how or where or why it's used. It's just ... your genes. You get what you get. You have no choice in the matter. It's luck. Is that the idea? You "win the GENETIC LOTTERY" if you live a long and relatively healthy life? Thinking in terms of "winning" or "losing" genes gets you into some pretty creepy, eugenics-adjacent territory. Anyway, the term just isn't on my radar, so even having GENETIC in the grid didn't help me get it. GENETIC ...  MAKEUP? CODE? I was looking for a more neutral and common term. So what should've been my anchor in the NE just wasn't there. Which leads to the second problem: JEALOUS. As in, "I'm JEALOUS of those of you who managed to solve the NE corner without writing in 'JEALOUS' for 5A: Exhibiting a green face, stereotypically." I looked at that clue, looked at the letters I had in place (_EA____) and confidently wrote in JEALOUS. Jealousy is the "green-eyed monster," and you can be "green with envy," which is basically the same as jealousy, so, yeah, JEALOUS. Solid as a rock, I thought. I see now the clues are doing some kind of "green" bit here, with successive "green" clues (this one followed by the BABAR one (12A: Children's book title character in a green suit)). But the clue isn't the problem. I just fell into the pit created by the coincidence of the shared letters in JEALOUS and SEASICK. It also would've helped me if, after I'd ripped out JEALOUS, I could've seen either CHRONIC (10D: Persistent) or KEY WEST (11D: Home of the Ernest Hemingway House). I found my stuckness so perplexing, I took a screenshot.

Now please understand that when I say I got bogged down, I mean "relative to the rest of the puzzle." It actually took me very little time to get out of this mess. It's just that there were no other messes in the puzzle, so this bit stood out. Couldn't parse CHRONIC and wow I really should've seen KEY WEST but my Florida associations with Hemingway are surpassed by my Idaho associations, probably because my family is from Idaho and I've been to Ketchum, ID in the not-too-distant past (that's where Hemingway killed himself). Also, did you know—Ketchum, Idaho also has an Ernest Hemingway House!? It's true. The one in Ketchum is actually called the Ernest and Mary Hemingway House, but still, a house is a house, and a house is not a home, and two houses both alike in dignity divided against itself shall not stand! Or something like that. I'm laughing now at the fact that KETCHUM and KEYWEST, like JEALOUS and SEASICK, share two letters! Anyway, after all this floundering, I was saved by ice cream (9D: Place where customers get their licks in? = ICE CREAM PARLOR). Are there no limits to its magical powers!? Looking forward to hitting the ICE CREAM PARLOR later today—going up to Ithaca to catch a movie (Stop! That! Train!) and then hitting Purity Ice Cream directly afterwards so I can have my vanilla malt (drink of the summer! third-best beverage in the world after hot black coffee and a cold Manhattan). It got hot and humid here all of a sudden yesterday, so a cool theater followed by a cold melt is gonna feel amazing. 

I found this puzzle a little dull for a Friday. Something about the shape of it meant that the longer answers were cut off from each other and everything around them was kinda short. It's a very choppy grid that appears to have very little to offer in the way of marquee fill, though there are six long answers, which is ... reasonable, I guess. I'd like something closer to ten or even a dozen, but six isn't terrible, I suppose. Very few of those answers seemed particularly marquee-worthy. I can see someone liking GENETIC LOTTERY, I guess, but as we've established, I did not. I do love ICE CREAM PARLORs, and BEST-KEPT SECRET is a plucky phrase, but the others are just OK. Not bad. But lacking the kind of zing and oomph that makes for a really bright Friday. The parts I enjoyed most were, again, ICE CREAM PARLOR, and then PORTLAND, OREGON, largely because of the clue (58A: Home of the world's largest independently owned bookstore (spanning an entire city block)) The bookstore in question is Powell's ... I guess putting the name in the clue would've made it too easy? But if you know Powell's, then the clue is already easy, so why not just name the bookstore? You do all this free advertising for Apple and Oreo, you can name an independent bookstore, New York Times, it won't hurt you.

[my Tuesday mug, but maybe I'll break it out today in honor of the puzzle ... oh who am I kidding, I will not do that, the mug schedule is the mug schedule and it changes for no one!] 

Nothing particularly tricky in the grid today, that I can see. I laughed at the clue on ATTIC (7D: Ghost story?). It's almost certainly not original, but it's funny and vivid and clever and everything a "?" should be. I also liked that there was both a "cup" clue (44A: Big name in cups = SOLO) and a "cone" clue (63A: Cone holders = RETINAS) in a puzzle that also contained ICE CREAM PARLOR. Big day for ice cream, at least in my head.

Bullets:

• 1A: Get-up (DUDS) — so, "get-up" as in "clothing." I was thinking "get-up" as in "pep," "vim," "vigor," but maybe that's "get-up-and-go"

• 20A: Velociraptor, e.g., informally (DINO) — yesterday was the 33rd anniversary of the release of Jurassic Park. Spielberg's got a new one in theaters this weekend, Disclosure Day, which sounds ... good, actually. Or promising. The trailers make it seem a little somber / humorless, which has never been true of his great blockbusters (E.T., Close Encounters, Jurassic Park, etc.). But maybe that won't be true. I'm going to see it no matter what, per the Josh O'Connor Rule (which is the rule that says I will see any movie starring Josh O'Connor):

• 29A: Half ass reply? (HEE) — cute. I had HAW at first.
• 35D: Baseball trio (OUTS) — you know you've been doing crossword puzzles way, way too long when you see [Baseball trio] and the letters "OU" and your first thought is ALOUS (brothers Felipe, Matty, and Jesus all played in the Majors, and at one point (1963) made up the entirety of the Giants' outfield)

[Baseball trio]

• 49D: Do business? (SALON) — "Do" as in "hairdo"; I was just just grateful the answer wasn't urination- or defecation-related.
• 51D: Obstacle for Odysseus (SIREN) — there were a lot of obstacles! Scylla Charybdis Cyclops Circe on and on. But of those, only CIRCE fit, and I must've had other letters in place because I never considered her. Odysseus makes his men tie him to the mast when they pass the SIRENs so he can hear their call without being tempted (to his death?) by it. His men plug their ears.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Sailor's bearings, to an ancient Roman? / THU 6-11-26 / TV journalist Spencer / Olympic snowboarder Kim / EGOT-winning composer Menken / People one might meet at a drive / Poker holding of four cards of the same suit / Something you might keep tabs on? / Word before baked or naked / Hair style sported by painter Bob Ross

Constructor: Nikhil Bailey

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: "... to an ancient Roman?" — answers to theme clues must be read aloud—the parts that sound like letters (e.g. "aye" ("I"), "see" ("C"), etc.) must be understood as Roman numerals and then written into the grid as their English equivalent. So:

Theme answers:

• 18A: "Yes, sir!," to an ancient Roman? = "Aye aye, captain" = "I I, captain" = TWO, CAPTAIN
• 25A: Sailor's bearings, to an ancient Roman? = "sea legs" = "C legs" = HUNDRED LEGS
• 43A: Certain Microsoft office files, to an ancient Roman? = "Excel sheets" = "XL sheets" = FORTY SHEETS
• 55A: Prestigious group of schools, to an ancient Roman? = "Ivy League" = "IV League" = FOUR LEAGUE

Word of the Day: ALAN Menken (11D: EGOT-winning composer Menken) —

Alan Irwin Menken (born July 22, 1949) is an American composer and conductor. Over his career he has received numerous accolades including winning eight Academy Awards, a Tony Award, eleven Grammy Awards, seven Golden Globe Awards, a Daytime Emmy Award, and a Golden Raspberry for worst original song. He is one of 22 recipients to have won the competitive EGOT (Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony).

He is best known for his scores and songs for films produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios. Menken's contributions to The Little Mermaid (1989), Beauty and the Beast (1991), Aladdin (1992), and Pocahontas (1995) won him two Academy Awards for each film. He also composed the scores and songs for Little Shop of Horrors (1986), Newsies (1992), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996), Hercules (1997), Home on the Range (2004), Enchanted (2007), Tangled (2010), Disenchanted (2022), and Spellbound (2024), among others.

He is also known for his work in musical theater for Broadway winning the Tony Award for Best Original Score for Newsies (2012). He was Tony-nominated for Beauty and the Beast (1993), The Little Mermaid (2008), Sister Act (2009), and Aladdin (2014). His other stage hits include Little Shop of Horrors (1982), A Christmas Carol (1994), Leap of Faith (2012), and A Bronx Tale (2016). (wikipedia)

• • •

The theme *feels* straightforward, but I kept getting tripped up by it because it has not one layer but two—that is, both the sound of the Roman numeral and the meaning of the Roman numeral matter. My first and biggest mistake was thinking I had it when I did not, in fact, have it. I could see that the answer to 25A: Sailor's bearings, to an ancient Roman? was going to start HUNDRED, so I was like "OK, so the actual answer starts with the letter 'C' ... what are 'Sailor's bearings' that start with 'C' ... 'CL-' ... 'CLE-' ... CLEG- ...  what the hell are 'CLEGS'!" And only then did I realize, "Oh, 'C' = 'SEA'! SEA LEGS!" I also misunderstood "bearings" in that clue, thinking it had to do with directions. So I struggled, then half got it, then all-the-way got it. And yet I kept mentally dropping it after that. I wanted to write in "II CAPTAIN" as the answer for 18A: "Yes, sir!," to an ancient Roman?, forgetting that I had to do yet another conversion: not just words to Roman numerals, but then Roman numerals to their English-language equivalent. I think the phrase "to an ancient Roman?" made me really Really want the actual in-the-grid answer to be a Roman numeral. The whole concept here is pretty silly, in that an ancient Roman would not hear the phrase "Aye aye, captain" and think it meant "TWO, CAPTAIN." "I" would not have sounded like "aye" in ancient Rome, and anyway presumably the ancient Roman couldn't speak English at all (since it didn't exist). But if you just let yourself go with the silliness, the theme is kind of entertaining, and sufficiently tricky, I think, for a Thursday.

["Drowning ... in a hundred of love ..."]

I was less entertained by the non-theme stuff. Two of the longer answers, FLUSH DRAW and OPTIC LOBE, were wasted on me, as I don't really know those terms (4D: Poker holding of four cards of the same suit) (40A: Your mind's eye?). They're niche terms that just left me shrugging. I could infer them, but I didn't enjoy them. I know the term FOUR FLUSHER—a great term for one who talks big but can't back it up (i.e. you're playing like you have a full flush but you've only got four of the five necessary cards). A phony, a fraud, a small-time person who puts up a big-time front. I learned the term from Chandler's "Red Wind." I thought the answer might be something colorful like that. But no, it's just the dull FLUSH DRAW. As for OPTIC LOBE, I assume that's the part of your brain concerned with vision. The only word I know that follows OPTIC is NERVE. Anything besides NERVE, I'll just have to take your word for it. And then two other longer answers, OPERAGOER and SALE ITEMS, are flat-out dull. In short, lots of marquee space is wasted on answers that don't have much pop, and certainly hold no interest for me. But the grid holds up OK otherwise; mostly clean, rarely cringey. 

["Time ... keeps flowing like a river ... to the hundred ..."]

I like that SEA FOG (9D: Ocean mist) crosses "(aye aye) CAPTAIN" and "(sea) LEGS"—I guess I could be mad that "sea" is (kinda sorta) duped, but I'm too busy enjoying the nautical vibes. I think my least favorite themer is FOUR LEAGUE, just because everyone knows the (not really true) story of the "Ivy" part of Ivy League deriving from the fact that the league originally had just four (IV) schools in it. The name for the league actually came from class day ceremonies involving the planting of ivy, starting in the 19th century, but the term "Ivy League" doesn't appear for the first time until the '30s, and it gets used chiefly in relation to athletics. But still: "A common folk etymology attributes the name to the Roman numeral for four (IV), asserting that there was such a sports league originally with four members. The Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins helped to perpetuate this belief. The supposed "IV League" was formed over a century ago and consisted of Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and a fourth school that varies depending on who is telling the story" (wikipedia). Because the Ivy League comes preloaded with this numerical association, I didn't enjoy FOUR LEAGUE as much as the others, because it was far less surprising. 

I struggled with some longer answers—the aforementioned FLUSH DRAW and OPTIC LOBE, but also ACID TRIP (???). I wanted ACID PAPER. I get that acid comes in tabs, but I still think the phrasing [Something you might keep tabs on?] makes no surface-level sense for ACID TRIP. Tabs can set you on your trip, but you do not keep them on your trip. I also didn't really know MASSLESS. I just let crosses take care of it. As for mistakes, there weren't many. I really enjoyed the one mistake I remember making—namely, "confirming" ACMES (5A: Pinnacles) by writing in CATS / MEWS at 6D: Barnyard producers of 7-Down and 7D: Sounds produced by 6-Down (COWS / MOOS). Barn kitties! They're real! Sadly, not what the puzzle was looking for. Otherwise, this puzzle was something less than an ORDEAL. Nothing overly taxing about it. 

Bullets:

• 1A: Word before baked or naked (HALF) — first thought was BARE, but "BARE baked" ... is once letter short of being a thing (wow, don't search "barebacked" unless you're in the mood for porn). HALF Baked is one of the best ice cream flavors ever made as well as one of the worst movies ever made—the only movie I've ever walked out of (I walked out when I realized that "Simpsons" reruns would be on TV shortly and those would be much more fun to watch, true story).

[good]

[no]

• 23A: Sarcastic laugh syllable (HAR) — laugh syllables, always bad, but I appreciated the "Sarcastic," which at least made the answer clear. Or can HEH be sarcastic, too? For some reason, HAR reads to me like the most sarcastic of the laugh syllables (ha, hah, heh, har ... those are your basics ... I guess ho gets involved from time to time, but usually only via Santa).
• 33A: Met someone? (OPERAGOER) — another longer answer where the second part gave me fits. I got the OPERA part easy but went with ... OPERA DIVA. That's really a someone. An OPERAGOER? That's a Met no one. A face in the crowd. Boo. 

• 63A: Gym units (SETS) — oh, I managed to trip over this a little because REPS shares half its letters with SETS.
• 1D: Jon of "Top Gun: Maverick" (HAMM) — early-morning brain: "ugh who is this Jon actor I've never heard of?" This from someone who watched every episode of Mad Men and even watched The Morning Show until finally Reese Witherspoon's character simply became completely unbearable.
• 28D: People one might meet at a drive (DONORS) — think blood drive
• 48D: "There is no love sincerer than the love of ___": George Bernard Shaw ("FOOD") — where crossword clues are concerned, I am a notorious fill-in-the-blank quotation hater, but I did enjoy hacking my way to the answer here. Seemed worth it. Unexpected and ... probably true. Speaking of food ... I need coffee. Is coffee a food? Close enough.

That's all for today. See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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"Howards End" daughter / WED 6-10-26 / Landon who ran against F.D.R. in 1936 / Cousin of a flugelhorn / Notes of appreciation, in online parlance / Motivator, of a sort / ___ House, residence for visiting dignitaries in Washington / Only player on three victorious teams in this puzzle

Constructor: David J. Kahn and Ethan Quigley

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: WORLD CUP WINNERS (7D: Global "club" with only eight members, each of which appears in circled letters with its country code) — just like it says: the country codes for the only eight countries ever to win the World Cup can be found in the eights sets of three circled squares inside today's grid:

Theme answers:

• BRAWL (4A: Big dust-up [1958, 1962, 1970, 1994, 2002]) 🇧🇷
• AFFRAY (18A: Big dust-up [1998, 2018]) 🇫🇷
• WAR GOD (24A: Mars, notably [1978, 1986, 2022]) 🇦🇷
• TAURUS (36A: Cinco de Mayo birth, e.g. [1930, 1950]) 🇺🇾
• GERWIG (43A: "Lady Bird" director Greta [1954, 1974, 1990, 2014]) 🇩🇪
• NARITA (50A: Japan Airlines hub [1934, 1938, 1982, 2006]) 🇮🇹
• AVENGE (61A: Get back for [1966]) 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿
• ESPYS (69A: Awards for Shohei Ohtani and Caitlin Clark [2010]) 🇪🇸
• (bonus answer) PELE (56D: Only player on three victorious teams in this puzzle)

Word of the Day: ALF Landon (1A: Landon who ran against F.D.R. in 1936) —

Alfred Mossman Landon (September 9, 1887 – October 12, 1987) was an American oilman and politician who served as the 26th governor of Kansas from 1933 to 1937. A member of the Republican Party, he was the party's nominee in the 1936 presidential election, and was defeated in a landslide by incumbent president Franklin D. Roosevelt. The margin of victory in the electoral college was the largest of Roosevelt's four elections to the office of president, as Landon won just 8 electoral votes to Roosevelt's 523. Landon died on October 12, 1987, becoming the only presidential candidate from either of the major parties to live to the age of 100 until Jimmy Carter in 2024, and is to date the only Republican candidate to do so. [...] The 1936 Republican National Convention selected Landon as the Republican Party's presidential nominee. He proved to be an ineffective campaigner and carried just two states in the election, neither of which was Kansas despite him being the sitting governor of that state. After the election, he left office as governor and never sought public office again. Later in life, he supported the Marshall Plan and President Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society programs. He gave the first in a series of lectures, now known as the Landon Lecture Series, at Kansas State University. Landon lived to the age of 100 and died in Topeka, Kansas, in 1987. His daughter, Nancy Kassebaum, represented Kansas in the United States Senate from 1978 to 1997. (wikipedia)

• • •

Timely. The 2026 World Cup officially starts tomorrow, all over North America (Canada, US, Mexico). Timeliness is this puzzle's one big virtue. The grid, because of its extremely chopped-up structure, doesn't allow for much in the way of interesting fill (just two answers over six letters long, outside the revealer), and an overwhelming amount of that fill is really short: three and four letters. Also, there are no really interesting theme answers. ESPYS is not interesting. It's crosswordese. See also NARITA. Sometimes circled-letter strings require real ingenuity in the choice of the answers that contain them, but today ... well, ESPYS is not likely to set anyone's heart aflutter. Further, the revealer (WORLD CUP WINNERS) isn't really a great standalone phrase. If you saw it in any other puzzle, where it wasn't an explanatory revealer, you'd think "I dunno..." But I did like this puzzle as a historical curiosity, and I liked learning that in the entire history of the World Cup, there have been only eight winners to date. I did not know that. Seems low. But I guess if you play only once every four years, and Brazil and Germany keep hogging the trophies, then it's kinda hard to grow the "club." So despite the fact that the fill is a little dull and stale in many places (lots of ASTA UTES TET ELY ENC ENC -INE REINA-type stuff), I still had a pretty good time hunting down all the country codes, and thinking about all the football I'm going to watch in the coming weeks (despite not being a regular fan, I always get immediately sucked into World Cup matches, although, I'm pretty sports-susceptible in general—keep anything on screen for more than ten minutes and suddenly I find I am an expert with a vested interest in the outcome. I was very briefly the world's leading expert in Nordic Combined earlier this year, for instance (when will JENS Christian Lurås Oftebro finally get his crossword recognition!?)

The puzzle was easy except for the north, which was also less pleasant than the rest of the grid largely because they decided to get cute with the cluing and double it up ([Big dust-up] for two clues, both in the same tiny section, both themers). The real problem is AFFRAY, a word no one uses ("fray," sure, but "AFFRAY" sounds almost Victorian). I probably wouldn't have gotten AFFRAY with any kind of clue, but somehow I resented struggling to get an answer and having to endure a doubled-up clue. There was something suffocating about it. It's trying to be cute, but it muddies things too much, esp. since you're doing your little cutesy clue-doubling thing with theme answers. You wanna play little duplicate-clue games, use the regular fill, not the themers. This tiny section included not only two themers with duplicate clues (one of which is not an everyday word), it also had two annoyingly ambiguous clues for three-letter answers. I wrote in UMP for REF (5D: One making calls, informally) and DEA for ATF (6D: Antismuggling grp.). So that whole section felt airless and fussy and ultimately not that rewarding. Who wants trouble from three-letter answers? I should add that I wrote in BLAIR at first for 4D: ___ House, residence for visiting dignitaries in Washington, but then pulled it when it ended up clashing with UMP and DEA. Which is to say that clearly I'd heard of BLAIR House, but did not trust that I had it right. Also, LUSTS is something (much) stronger than 22A: Longs (for), and TYS aren't "notes" (15D: Notes of appreciation, in online parlance). You might write "TY" in a "note" (or text) (short for "thank you"), but TYS are not themselves "notes of appreciation." They are, at best, expressions of appreciation. At worst, they're a terrible plural abbr. that you'd never use irl and should never use in your grid.

Bullets:

• 34D: Motivator, of a sort (NUDGER) — what are we doing here? Come on.
• 31A: Little dust-up (SPAT) — still with the "dust-ups"?! Why?!

• 54D: "Howards End" daughter (EVIE) — this is where the puzzle gets whatever difficulty it has: in proper nouns of obscure origins. Kinda dicey to cross a two fictional women at a vowel (EVIE / MIRIAM), but I supposed that "I" was eventually inevitable (I thought maybe Mrs. Maisel was a MARIAM, but I've yet to meet or hear of an EVAE, so "I" it was!
• 50A: Japan airlines hub [1934, 1938, 1982, 2006] (NARITA) — weird to have ITALY hidden in a clue that is explicitly JAPANESE. I think it's better when the country-containing answers have nothing to do with specific countries. These are the minute aesthetic considerations I think about when I look over puzzles. This particular issue may not, in fact, be worth fretting over, but it's something that would irk me a little if this were my puzzle. But what do I know? I'm just a dog (70A: Stereotypical dog's name).

That's all. See you next time. And Happy Almost World Cup!

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

P.S. yesterday I learned that Ricky Martin and Shakira have both recorded official World Cup songs, but Marc Anthony has not. (Thanks, WFMU! Specifically, Tuesday Music Trivia on "Wake N Bake" with Clay Pigeon!).   

[2010!]
[1998!]
[1999! Not a World Cup song, but certainly a better song than the other two ... and hey, any song can be a World Cup song if you want it to be! Just put it on while you watch and bam, instant anthem!]

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Carnivorous cinematic alien / TUE 6-9-26 / Assists, in basketball slang / English soccer star ___ James / Sound of a cartoon hit / Sport in an octagon, for short / Sonic boom generator? / Where employees work on tips and receive tips

Constructor: Rebecca Goldstein

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: steak orders — final words of four theme answers describe various levels of meat doneness:

Theme answers:

• RUBS RAW (21A: Chafes excessively)
• EXCEEDINGLY RARE (28A: Nearly unique)
• HAPPY MEDIUM (47A: Compromise that, ideally, leaves both parties satisfied)
• "THIS WON'T END WELL" (58A: Prediction of a negative outcome that is true of 21-, 28- and 47-Across)

Word of the Day: REECE James (54A: English soccer star ___ James) —

Reece Lewis James (born 8 December 1999) is an English professional footballer who plays as a right-back for Premier League club Chelsea, which he captains, and the England national team.

James joined the Chelsea academy as a youth and turned professional in 2017, a season where he captained the under-18s to victory in the FA Youth Cup and was named Academy Player of the Season. A productive loan spell with Wigan Athletic of the Championship saw him promoted to the Chelsea first team upon his return in 2019. He won the UEFA Champions League, UEFA Super Cup and FIFA Club World Cup with the club in 2021, and was appointed captain in 2023. He led Chelsea to victory at the UEFA Conference League and FIFA Club World Cup in 2025.

After representing England at various youth levels, James made his senior debut in 2020, and went on to appear at UEFA Euro 2020.

• • •

This theme is so straightforward I can't believe it hasn't been done before. Maybe it has. The one thing it has going for it is the somewhat cheeky clue on the last answer, which acts as both a completion of the series (RAW, RARE, MEDIUM, WELL) and a revealer—none of the other answers will "end well" because they end with words that describe different level of meat doneness. Also, the grid has mirror symmetry instead of the typical rotational symmetry, which makes the puzzle visually interesting, and makes room for some colorful long answers in the NW and NE. I don't really have anything to say about the theme. It seems fine. Plain, but fine. As a solver, I never noticed the theme til the very end. Seemed like an afterthought. The puzzle played like a very easy themeless, with "THIS WON'T END WELL" as the one true marquee answer (a wonderful standalone phrase that would look great in any puzzle). As for those longer answers in the NW and NE, it's slightly weird to get a single DNA STRAND, but I don't mind it. It's quirky, and very gettable, so no harm done. I had HAIR SALON before NAIL SALON, which I don't feel too bad about, as ... isn't "tips" a hair term too? (11D: Where employees work on tips and receive tips). Didn't people (mainly women) used to get "frosted tips?" I have no hair, so I am out of my depth, but I really feel like "tips" has some kind of HAIR SALON context. Ah, look, "frosted tips"—still a thing. Good, I feel less crazy. On the other side of the grid, I've been to the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe (a treasure), so NEW MEXICO was a gimme. As for "I MEAN, C'MON!" (3D: "Sheesh, gimme a break!") ... it's weird, but "C'MON" feels like the spelling you'd use if that was all that you were saying, whereas opening with "I MEAN" really seems to call for the full "COME ON." There's something slightly drawn out and dramatic about the expression that the clipped "C'MON" doesn't capture. I think the phrase is OK as is, but my ear is balking a little.

[at the Georgia O'Keefe Museum, 2019]

The few tough spots I had could best be expressed through a two-category Venn diagram: "People with names that sound like 'Reese'" and "Soccer-related things," with REECE James in the overlap. The guy looks / sounds familiar, but I think you really have to follow Premier League to know him. In the "Reese" category with him is Dee REES, whose name is more familiar, but still, I don't know if her name would've come to me right away (actually, she wasn't an actual "tough spot" at all because I never saw her—puzzle was so easy that her name just kinda filled itself in) (21D: Dee who directed 2017's "Mudbound"). Over in the "Soccer-related things" part of the Venn diagram, in addition to REECE we've also got USWNT (50D: Squad captained by Lindsey Horan to win Olympic gold in '24, for short). I find both USWNT and USMNT confusing as neither abbreviation contains a letter that stands for the damned sport that they play! The letters stand for U.S. Women's National Team. So every time I see either abbreviation, I think "... tennis? is the 'T' tennis? Is the 'N' ... netball? oh, I remember now: United Soccer-Winning National Team! That's it."

Bullets:

• 20A: Sport in an octagon, for short (MMA) — this one's a little too timely. (don't click through if you'd rather not think about the US president today)
• 55A: Sonic boom generator? (SEGA) — SEGA is the company behind the popular Sonic the Hedgehog video game, which gave rise to movie franchise and a whole Sonic universe ("boom!")
• 33A: Assists, in basketball slang (DIMES) — this, I knew. Speaking of basketball. Looks like the Knicks lost last night. Too bad. Oh well, at least this happened (again, don't click through if you'd rather not think about the US president today)
• 61A: "We feel the same way" ("US TOO") — reflexively wrote in "ME TOO." "US TOO" doesn't flow off the tongue quite as readily.
• 62A: Airport raced through in "Home Alone," in brief (ORD) — so, Chicago's O'Hare

• 64A: Sound of a cartoon hit (BOINK) — if you watch cartoons or read comics, you know, this could've been anything. SPLAT! THWAP! WHACK! Even with the "K" in place, I wasn't sure. 
• 6D: Carnivorous cinematic alien (BLOB) — That's The BLOB, to you. I don't think I knew that the BLOB was an "alien" (as in, from outer space?). I thought it was just ... a BLOB ... wreaking havoc on Steve McQueen ... somehow. BLOB is part of a really nicely filled little section at the top of the grid where (almost) all the answers seem vaguely related to each other. BLOB ... SPRAWL ... ABSURD! Maybe the government is trying to track it with SONAR, which BLEEPs periodically. And maybe at the end of the movie they case the BLOB back into the ABYSS whence it came (again, to be clear, I have never seen the movie and have no idea what happens besides ... a blob blobbing around town and Steve McQueen somewhere nearby):

That's all for today. See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook and Letterboxd]
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