Samsung competitor / MON 8-22-16 / Witches director Nicolas / Like stage after larval / Future atty's hurdle

Constructor: Emily Carroll

Relative difficulty: Monday normal (so, Medium) (2:57)

THEME: TASTE MAKERS (61A: Influential sorts ... or a hint to the starts of 178-, 23-, 39- and 50-Across) — first words of each themer = a taste

Theme answers:

• BITTER ENEMY (17A: Archfoe)
• SALTY LANGUAGE (23A: Profanity)
• SWEETHEART DEALS (39A: Golden parachutes, e.g.) ("Sweet" = word part, not word, but that's permissible)
  
• SOUR PATCH KIDS (50A: Popular movie theater candy)

Word of the Day: ANDREI Sakharov (42A: Peace Nobelist Sakharov) —

Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov (Russian: Андре́й Дми́триевич Са́харов; 21 May 1921 – 14 December 1989) was a Russian nuclear physicist, Soviet dissident, an activist for disarmament, peace and human rights.   // He became renowned as the designer of the Soviet Union's Third Idea, a codename for Soviet development of thermonuclear weapons. Sakharov later became an advocate of civil liberties and civil reforms in the Soviet Union, for which he faced state persecution; these efforts earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in 1975. The Sakharov Prize, which is awarded annually by the European Parliament for people and organizations dedicated to human rights and freedoms, is named in his honour. (wikipedia)

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Where is UMAMI!? Such a crosswordy word, you'd think you could've snuck it in the grid somewhere.

First-Words theme = right over the plate. Perhaps the most common type of crossword theme. This is neither good nor bad, inherently. But it does mean massive sparkle is required to lift such a puzzle out of the realm of generic. Theme answer today are all winners. Vivid, interesting, lively. All the good adjectives. Fill is something of a disaster, however. Northwest corner—in fact, 1-Across itself—set the tone. Fill never got better after that. Honestly, it never does. It is phenomenally rare that cruddy fill at your starting point (for me, almost always, the NW) proves to be an aberration. The puzzle is what it tells you it is. If you're getting a four-letter partial (?) at 1-A, followed hard by ALBA, AFORE, EELY, and YOO, things are not going to get better. You *will* eventually run into a similar small corner crammed with PUPAL, ARLO, LSAT and ELLA. You're probably see both ELI and ELIA along the way, maybe say 'hey' to Nicolas ROEG. You know, the yooge (that's my shortening of "usual"). Expecting your puzzle to change mid-solve is like expecting your *&%^ boyfriend to change. Not happening.


I tripped hard and repeatedly over 1A: ___ above (better than) (ACUT). 1-Acrosses are important. They don't have to be Gold, but they should not suh-uck. Partials and obscurities and ridiculous abbrevs. or Random Roman Numerals (RRNs) are Right Out. ACUT may as well be IRREG. I enjoyed some of the fill today, especially POP OFF (4A: Run one's mouth), and some of the longer Downs (UP TO SPEED, for instance). I did a dumb thing when, with ALL-ET in the grid, I didn't even look at the clue and wrote in ... an "S" (35A: Completely wrong => ALL WET). Sigh. Terrible, stupid move. But even with the NW corner debacle and the ALLSET misstep, my time came out normal. I don't quite get the "MAKERS" part of the revealer. Don't think it works. Does you tongue make the taste? Or do the tastes "make" themselves known ... in your mouth? Might've gone with BITTER FOES / FIRST TASTE for the symmetrical themer layout there. "First" makes more sense than "Makers" ... unless there's some obvious angle I'm missing, which is always possible.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Subatomic particle named for weak force / SUN 8-21-16 / Enigmatic one in Hobbit / Regimen adopted by Bill Clinton in 2010 / Ring around classical column / Jumps higher than in sports slang / Harry's Hogwarts enemy / France's so-called capital of ruins

Constructor: Kathy Matheson and Jeff Chen

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging ?? Or just Medium, maybe

THEME: "Wonder-Ful!" — tribute to the NATIONAL PARKS SERVICE (80A: Federal agency established on August 25, 1916) on its (roughly) 100th anniversary. Features of national parks are spelled out in circled letters that form the shapes of those features. Then there's some other relevant answers like YELLOWSTONE (32A: Home to more than half the world's active geysers) and YOSEMITE (69A: Subject of many Ansel Adams photos).

Theme features:

• DENALI
• OLD FAITHFUL (spouting upward) (10D: Erupter at 32-Across) 
• HALF DOME
• ARCHES
• GRAND CANYON

Word of the Day: Henry W. SLOCUM (14D: Henry W. ___, Union major general during the Civil War) —

Henry Warner Slocum (September 24, 1827 – April 14, 1894), was a Union general during the American Civil War and later served in the United States House of Representatives from New York. During the war, he was one of the youngest major generals in the Army and fought numerous major battles in the Eastern Theater and in Georgia and the Carolinas. While commanding a regiment, a brigade, a division, and a corps in the Army of the Potomac, he saw action at Bull Run, the Peninsula, South Mountain, Antietam, Chancellorsville, and Harpers’ Ferry. At Gettysburg, he was the senior Union General in the Field. During the battle, he held the Union right from Culp’s Hill to across the Baltimore Pike. His successful defense of Culp’s Hill was crucial to the Union victory at Gettysburg. After the fall of Vicksburg, Slocum was appointed military commander of the district. Slocum participated in the Atlanta campaign and was the first commander to enter the city on September 2, 1864. He then served as occupation commander of Atlanta. Slocum was appointed the commander of the left wing of Sherman’s march through Georgia and the Carolinas, commanding the XIV and XX Divisions, comprising the Army of Georgia. During this campaign, he captured the capitol of Georgia, Milledgeville, and the seaport of Savannah. In the Carolinas campaign, Slocum’s army saw victories in the battles of Averasborough and Bentonville, North Carolina. The March to the Sea and the Carolinas campaign were crucial to the overall Union victory in the Civil War. After the surrender of Confederate forces, Slocum was given command of the Department of Mississippi. Slocum declined an appointment in the postwar Army. He was a successful political leader, businessman and railroad developer. (wikipedia)

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Pffffffff ... OK, so ... here's the thing. It's a nice idea. 100th anniversary, sure, tribute puzzle, why not? And I think you've got something there with the names of the parks forming the geographical / topographical features whence they got their names (even though I've definitely seen this done before with hills, mountains, etc.). But there are two main problems. The first is the awkwardness of having to include YOSEMITE and YELLOWSTONE separately. I thought all the geographical features were going to be intersecting their park names in some way ... until I realized DENALI *was* the name of the park. Ditto ARCHES and GRAND CANYON. So there are these two parks just shoved in there and clued pretty straight (albeit with oblique reference to the geographical features in the grid). Something just felt wonky about this whole set-up. But by far the bigger problem here was sheer boringness. There are really only a handful of theme answers, and they're all dreadfully straightforward, and once you see what's going on with the theme, the whole puzzle is just a dull exercise in fill-in-the-parks. The one great moment was spouting OLDFAITHFUL (LUFHTIAFDLO!) shooting right through YELLOWSTONE. Otherwise, none of the wordplay or cleverness that makes crosswords fun.


Between sick pet last week and sick daughter this week, end-of-summer things haven't been so great chez Parker. Don't have the time or energy to go into this puzzle too much. I did appreciate that it was sufficiently hard, for once, although the toughest two sections were a little ... nuts. My tough sections were the NE and dead south. I have never ever heard SKIES as a transitive verb. "I skied you"? I'm sure it's part of the lingo, but I'm not unfamiliar with basketball terminology, so this answer threw me. Also, [Enigmatic one in "The Hobbit"] was bizarre to me. I took "one" as a person, but it's just ... RUNE. One RUNE. I also had TAO for [Life force in Chinese philosophy] and had No Idea who SLOCUM (?) was (14D: Henry W. ___, Union major general during the Civil War), so I actually *needed* the help of the theme / ARCHES to sort all that out. Same thing with GRAND CANYON down below. MIND CANDY? I think I know it as BRAIN CANDY, if I know it at all. SANDP (ampersandwich!) got me (100D: Wall St. "500"). Totally forgot Dick ARMEY existed. Lots of things conspiring to make that section hard for me ... until I realized I could just call in the aid of the theme. GRAND CANYON to the rescue. The rest of this puzzle ... I don't remember at all, and I just solved it. Hope you enjoyed it more than I did.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

P.S. the title is no good. Supposed to be a pun, but it's not nearly Parks-specific enough. Oh, and W. BOSON!? (102A: Subatomic particle named for the weak force)  Oof. Just because you have a giant word list doesn't mean you should let it push you around. May the weak force be with ... someone else.

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