PUZZLE 172

Puzzle 172 – “What to Watch”

puz here / pdf here / solution here

If you’re a friend of the blog, you know that while I love all sorts of crosswords, my true love is themelesses. Which means I’m pretty stoked that the Universal is doing another full week of themelesses this week, and if you check them out this Friday, you’ll find one by me(!). It’s probably my favorite published newspaper puzzle yet. Have a look here on Friday, or at The Puzzle Society if you’re a subscriber.

This week on the blog: y’know, I’ve posted music-heavy and lit-heavy themelesses here before, but this one’s unusually TV-heavy (hence the title). Favorite clues: 16-Across (because I miss Dave), 26-Across (for the good bit of trivia), and 20-Down (because obviously). To all my fellow LearnedLeague players out there, 47-Across is for you (definitely missed that one last week!).

Also, gotta say, I enjoy the grid shape of this one, thanks to the all-around symmetry.

Hope you enjoy as well, friends. Comments welcomed, as always. Happy solving, yall.

7 Comments

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  1. 47A made me smile! Huge fan of the show, LL instaget, and I love the coincidence of seeing it again here within a week. Another great one – can’t wait to solve your Universal on Friday…

    • Not a coincidence at all, haha, since I clued this one after I thoroughly fouled up that question, having never watched the show. The crosswords giveth, and (sometimes) the LL taketh away…

  2. Wow Matthew, your crossword prowess continues to grow very steadily and I’m so very glad that your puzzles are rock-solid and chock-full of good stuff that solvers between the ages of 20 to 100 can figure out.
    And I’m happy for your success in getting your puzzles published by nationwide distributors.
    “Keep on rockin’ in the free world!”

  3. Also, I didn’t this puzzle or your Friday Universal puzzle until today, so I got to double-down on your crosswords in one day, and they are both very good!

  4. And in the Universal Puzzle, “O Holy Night” was one of the answers. Here’s a link to the version recorded by a music teacher who made his recording to teach his students not to over-emote on the vocals. Hilarious stuff.

    https://youtu.be/Mk4woNRD7NQ

  5. Good one! Thanks!

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