Where Gandalf declares "You shall not pass!" / WED 8-24-22 / 1997 horror film with the tagline When you can't breathe, you can't scream

Constructor: Colin Ernst

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium (Easier up top, Mediumer down below)

THEME: REAL ESTATE AGENT (56A: Source of the euphemisms found in the clues for 17-, 23- and 48-Across) — clues are real estate "euphemisms" for the following residences:

Theme answers:

• STUDIO APARTMENT (17A: "It's super-cozy, and a breeze to clean!")
• FIVE FLOOR WALK-UP (23A: "You can cancel that gym membership!")
• MAJOR FIXER-UPPER (48A: "The space has endless possibilities!")

Word of the Day: MORIA (48D: Where Gandalf declares "You shall not pass!") —

In the fictional world of J. R. R. Tolkien, Moria, also named Khazad-dûm, is an ancient subterranean complex in Middle-earth, comprising a vast labyrinthine network of tunnels, chambers, mines and halls under the Misty Mountains, with doors on both the western and the eastern sides of the mountain range. Moria is introduced in Tolkien's novel The Hobbit, and is a major scene of action in The Lord of the Rings.

In much of Middle-earth's fictional history, Moria was the greatest city of the Dwarves. The city's wealth was founded on its mines, which produced mithril, a fictional metal of great beauty and strength, suitable for armour. The Dwarves dug too deep, greedy for mithril, and disturbed a demon of great power: a Balrog, which destroyed their kingdom. By the end of the Third Age, Moria had long been abandoned by the Dwarves, and was a place of evil repute. It was dark, in dangerous disrepair, and in its labyrinths lurked Orcs and the Balrog. (wikipedia)

• • •

Maybe this is supposed to be of particular appeal to New Yorkers? It mostly missed me. Only one of these potential residences sounds like it requires a "euphemism" (the last one). The first two just seem like places one might live in a city. Maybe some people would find them undesirable, I dunno, but presumably you'd have some idea of the kind of apartment you were looking at before you looked at it. And about MAJOR FIXER-UPPER ... a few things. First, the MAJOR part felt a little wobbly. The expression that came to mind for me was "it's a REAL FIXER-UPPER." I needed several crosses to get MAJOR (and one of those crosses was MORIA (!?) ... this is partly why the bottom of this puzzle was more "Medium" than the "Easy" top). Second, MAJOR FIXER-UPPER seems like something you'd say about a house, or something you own, not (like the other two themers) an apartment or something you'd rent. So it's a bit odd-man-out. Third, MAJOR FIXER-UPPER *is* the euphemism here. The other residence types are just ... residence types. This one screams "euphemism." So the puzzle is telling me the *clue* is the euphemism, but the *answer* is actually way more euphemismy. Which brings me to maybe the off-est seeming thing about the theme: I usually (always?) think of "euphemisms" as specific words or phrases, not entire sentences, so that was weird. Here's the explanation of "euphemisms" from Merriam-Webster, and you can see that complete sentences are not really part of the discussion:

Euphemisms can take different forms, but they all involve substituting a word or phrase considered to be less offensive than another. The substituted word might, for example, be viewed as a less coarse choice, as when dang or darn is used instead of damn or damned. Or it might replace a word viewed as insulting to a religious figure, such as the various euphemisms for God (gad, gadzooks, gosh) or Jesus (gee, jeepers, jeez). A euphemism may also consist of an indirect softening phrase that is substituted for the straightforward naming of something unpalatable. Thus, we hear of people being “let go” rather than “fired”; civilians killed in war described as “collateral damage”; or someone who has died having “kicked the bucket,” “passed away, “given up the ghost,” or “joined one’s ancestors.” (emph. mine)

There's a kernel of an interesting idea behind this theme, but I thought the execution here was a bit rough.

The longer Downs add some life to the grid, with the pair in the SE being the real bright spot of the day, fill-wise (SCOOP NECK next to SHAKE ON IT). Sadly, that pairing also results in the gunkiest part of the grid, fill-wise: that tiny section in the far SE—CIVKTSTVS. Actually, TVS is OK, but it adds to the horrid pile-up of abbrs. there. The clues for CIV (62A: ___ engr.) and KTS (65A: Gold stds.) are themselves hard to look at, with [___ engr.] being about as ugly a clue as I can imagine. Elsewhere, the short fill is better but not by much. ASSAM is interesting because it's a real enough place but my brain flags it immediately as crosswordese because, well, it used to be everywhere. One of those geographical terms you'd learn very early on, if you didn't know it already, because you could count on seeing it regularly. Its popularity peaked in 1973—nine appearances in the NYTXW that year. But this is its first appearance this year, so ... especially since it's an actual point-to-able region, I can't really call it "crosswordese" anymore. Like, if ASTA showed up in the puzzle tomorrow ... is he crossworese anymore? Ten ASTAs the first full year I wrote this blog (2007), but just one last year (2021). If the crosswordese unwears out its welcome, is it even crosswordese any more? I realize I've wandered into some thorny existential territory here, but ... think about it. 

ASSAM aside, there seemed to be a lot of stale short words. AHS CLIO EDAM ACER AFTS IOTAS ELL ERM PAH (ERM-PAH!—the sound of the hesitant tuba! ERM-PAH lerm-pah derpity der, I've got some ugly short words for you!). I don't know what to say about MORIA. I've read "The Hobbit" and seen all those boring LOTR movies and somehow MORIA hasn't stuck. Never even appeared in the grid until 2014, but this makes four appearances now. We already have one fictional place down in this corner (AVONLEA), I'm not sure we really need another. I enjoyed seeing AUGHT again (25D: Zero), clued as a fitting retort to everyone who doubted its "Zero" meaning last Thursday. While this puzzle played easyish overall, there was one crossing that felt like a fastball aimed at my head. I could not process the quotation marks in 47A: "Practical" thing (JOKE). I was looking for some colloquial phrase, some ... saying ... or an actual quote or anything that might justify those quotation marks. No idea. [It might be practical] would've tracked, but this clue didn't. Cross that with the "?" clue  at 47D: Form of attachment? and you've got me in a bit of a pickle, esp. since there are contexts where you do indeed "attach" things with "pegs." Me: "What kind of weird bit of hardware am I dealing with here? T-NUT, L-BAR ... what letter goes before a PEG!?" But the "attachment" in question is just an email attachment, and a JPEG is just a run-of-the-mill electronic image. I never got truly stuck there, but I did have to work both words down to the last letter (the "J") before understanding either of them.

See you tomorrow.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]

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Ancient inhabitants of Crete / TUE 8-23-22 / Production company behind Hunger Games and Saw films / Where to find edible ants / Secluded narrow valley / Card game with a spinoff game called Dos / Commotion informally

Constructor: Trey Mendez

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: interstate plane travel — theme answers are about airplanes, and are clued as if they were related to plane travel from the state whose two-letter postal code they begin with to the state whose two-letter postal codes they end with. Thus:

Theme answers:

• VAPOR TRAIL (18A: What follows a plane going from Richmond to Chicago?) (Virginia to Illinois)
• LANDING GEAR (26A: 26A: Part of a plane traveling from New Orleans to Little Rock?) (Louisiana to Arkansas)
• CONTINENTAL (45A: Former airline from Denver to Birmingham?) (Colorado to Alabama)
• FLYING TIME (56A: Duration of air travel from Miami to Bangor?) (Florida to Maine)

Word of the Day: ENOS Strate (65A: Deputy on "The Dukes of Hazzard") —

Enos Strate is a fictional character in the American television series The Dukes of Hazzard. The character of Enos was on from 1979-1980 and then after short break was on 1982-1985. Enos was played by Sonny Shroyer. (dukesofhazzard.fandom.com) // Enos is a short-lived American action-comedy television series and a spin-off of The Dukes of Hazzard. It originally aired on CBS from November 12, 1980, to May 20, 1981. The series focused on the adventures of Enos Strate, a former deputy in rural Hazzard County, after he moved to Los Angeles to join the LAPD. Actor Sonny Shroyer played the character of Enos on both shows. The scene was set for Enos leaving Hazzard to become a Los Angeles lawman in the third season Dukes of Hazzard episode "Enos Strate To The Top". // Each episode of "Enos" featured the title character fighting crime alongside partner Turk Adams. Episodes usually began and ended with Enos writing a letter to "Dukes of Hazzard" character Daisy Duke in which he told her of his adventures in L.A. In an attempt to boost ratings, a number of characters from The Dukes of Hazzard (Daisy, Uncle Jesse and Rosco) were brought in as guest stars, but "Enos" still failed to catch on. It was canceled after one 18-episode season. (wikipedia)

• • •

HOOHA! Quite a month for HOOHA, yes sir. HOOHA yesterday, HOOHA today. Lots of online HOOHA discourse after yesterday's puzzle, and probably again today. If you want to know why, you can just look at the most upvoted definition of HOOHA here. Dictionaries certainly back up the puzzle's definition of the term, but common usage goes a decidedly different way, so I love seeing HOOHA in the puzzle, because I look forward to the semi-startled online responses of people who were Not At All Aware that it meant "commotion," informally or otherwise. Very entertaining to see people learn new things, especially this new thing. 

[first story in MAD Magazine #1]

Also very entertaining: the basic idea of this puzzle. It's trying to do something clever, and I think it mostly gets there. Air travel-related answers that "travel" from one state to another. Yes. The most I think about it, the more I like it. Doesn't matter whether Continental actually flew Denver to Birmingham—the air routes are fanciful, hence the "?"s on the ends of the theme clues (which alert you to the puzzle's secondary thematic content, i.e. the state codes). As far as this theme goes, I have no complaints. Good Tuesday stuff. The fill, however, has some issues. The biggest issue for me is ONALOG, which is a horribly awkward standalone phrase (long prepositional phrases always seem so strange and naked and bereft). It's also easily avoidable. Just change it to ANALOG (a real thing!) and then change GOT UP to GAS UP (also real) and TAP to SAP (really real!). Badda-bing, voilà, no more ants ON A LOG (for those of you somehow not familiar with this foodstuff, the log is celery and the ants are raisins and I think peanut butter is the adhesive, but maybe cream cheese works too? I don't know, never ate it, even as a child).

[cringe]

NEOLOGIC is also strange, for different reasons (36D: Like a recently coined word or phrase). It's not bad so much as esoteric. That is, I know what a "neologism" is, but I've never seen anyone use the term for the inherent quality of a neologism (and it turns out NEOLOGIC is actually the "less common" adjectival form of the word; see "neological," here). I actually thought of "neologism" immediately but couldn't bring myself to write in NEOLOGIC because it didn't seem like a thing. Anyway, it's a very odd word to see hanging around a Tuesday grid. This is only its third appearance of the century, and both the other appearances came on Saturdays. The short fill is OK but a little on the limp and stale side—lots and lots of old friends like OLIO and ITO and ENOS and ESSO ... speaking of ESSO, I was surprised to see that Canada is considered "overseas" now (54D: Exxon, overseas).

A few more things:

• 10A: Woman's name hidden inside "assumed name" (EDNA) — still not understanding why the NYTXW has (of late) steered so hard toward this way of cluing short names. It's oddly childish and patronizing. Makes me want to repost the Bernie meme (courtesy of Christopher Adams, who filled in for me on Sunday):

• 26D: "___ at 'em!" ("LEMME") — I had "LET ME" at first. But of course that would be the more formal "LET ME at them, please."
• 34D: Production company behind "The Hunger Games" and the "Saw" films (LIONSGATE) — bold, original fill. As someone who once put VILLAGE ROADSHOW in a puzzle (because it contained "LAGER"), I approve.

I think this is Trey Mendez's NYTXW debut, so congrats to him.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld 

P.S. EMS make "clay clammy" (44A) because EMS = plural of the letter "M"

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