Rebecca Goldstein’s Saturday debut bursts with buried treasures.
SATURDAY PUZZLE — Rebecca Goldstein has been contributing puzzles to The Times for less than two years; they have all had themes, so far, and they have all been memorable, like a hidden-monster Monday grid and, most recently, a “big shoes to fill” Sunday collaboration with Rafael Musa. This is her themeless debut, and it’s one of those puzzles with long entries so bright and engaging that they form a loose motif of standout terms, most making their first appearance in the Crossword. They’re clued well enough to make for a happy and challenging solve, and many of them are loaded with enough interesting pop culture subtext to be provocative even after you figure them out.
Tricky Clues
1A. I have to admit that this cryptic clue is as clean as a whistle, even though its solution completely surprised me. “No-brainer?” is another well-concealed monster reference, to a ZOMBIE. And it harks back to an earlier conception of the beings: While modern movies and television often depict the undead as voracious brain eaters, for centuries people thought of the ZOMBIE as a hollow-headed corpse, denied its rest and torturously resurrected to do someone’s evil bidding.
34A. I love clues like this for span entries, when I might know the answer with a blank grid in front of me — there’s nothing more satisfying than plopping in all those letters with certainty. A “Statement from someone you should probably respond to with skepticism” is I’M NOT A SCIENTIST, which is usually spoken by a politician trying to avoid answering questions about something like the age of the Earth, say, or whether evolution is real. Ronald Reagan uttered the line in a speech in the 1980s. (I also have a clear memory of someone on a long-ago sitcom speaking this line — I’m thinking Jim Ignatowski from “Taxi,” but I’m not positive. I’m curious if it’s just me.)
44A. The factoid in this clue knocks me out. I didn’t realize that this entry was so esteemed, and it is a fabulous crossword debut. “Oxford English Dictionary’s Word of the Year in 2022, describing an unapologetically self-indulgent state,” is GOBLIN MODE. Some people say that the competition last year was weak and that GOBLIN MODE is already “cringe,” but I bet those people lie in bed eating candy and staring at their phones for a whole day sometimes.
56A. This is car model trivia. “Legacy competitor” is a reference to a Subaru model, alternatives to which include the Hyundai SONATA.
9D. This is the rabbit-hole entry of the day for me. “Cinematic specification” solves to FRAME RATE, the rate at which images are displayed in a moving picture. Commonly, this is 24 f.p.s., or frames per second, and it applies to digital cinematography as well as film. Silent movies had a lower frame rate, 16 f.p.s., but the addition of sound created an issue of synchronicity that was resolved by increasing the rate to 24. More recently, directors like Peter Jackson and Ang Lee have experimented with high frame rates of 48 and 120 frames per second. The human eye doesn’t seem to like this, but some people, notably fighter pilots and video gamers, can perceive very high frame rates, so this may be an acquirable trait.
16D. How I tried to make “curly fries” fit here, having never been to the stadium. The “Top-selling concession item at San Francisco’s Oracle Park” is GARLIC FRIES. If they’re memorable (or worthy of making at home), the secret may be garlic from Gilroy, Calif., where an annual festival attracts hordes of stinking-rose lovers.
27D. I had a little “Shocked reaction” here when my first assumption proved wrong — this is a TRIPLE, not a “double,” TAKE. I should have had that T in TRIPLE already, but I gave up too easily at 26A, “Good name for a gallery owner.” I figured it had to be “Art,” right? “Art” was too short, “Arthur” too long, and ARTIE didn’t occur to me.
Constructor Notes
After dabbling in themeless construction, mostly at AVCX+ and with Rafa Musa at Universal, I’m thrilled to have my first themeless puzzle in The Times. I’m a sucker for a good spanner, and since I am actually a scientist, 34-Across struck me as the perfect seed entry. My favorite clue is at 1-Across; I’d been waiting to use it for a while and was glad to use it to open this puzzle. I hope you enjoy!
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