Another puzzle to blog this week and this time we have a Twin. We also have today’s Inquisitor to solve and blog.
A couple took us far longer than they should have to parse (1d and 14d). Thankfully there were no problems with 11ac – our village is situated on the banks of the Trent. We looked up Spike Jonze although we guessed that whoever this person was, they had starred in a film called Her.
Thanks Twin – our grey cells had to work hard a few times here.
FIRE (get shot of) FLY (jet)
A reversal (‘about’) of PUT (place) RATS (bother)
Y (unknown) ACHT (8 in German – 8 is 2 x 2 x 2)
G (good) tERMINATE (end) missing first letter or ‘start’
Hidden (‘feature essential to’) and reversed (‘in return’) in parTNER TREVI Rome
TA (thanks) ME (author)
CRESS (herb) around or ‘engulfing’ A
An anagram (‘tweaked’) of TIME by an anagram (‘playing’) of SIDE
A Spoonerism of FUN BITE (pleasant snack)
WAS (used to be) HER (a movie starring Spike Jonze)
SUM (everything) O (nothing)
SS (as in the ship SS Great Britain) round or ‘taking’ PACES (steps) HIP (popular)
A reversal (‘recalled’) of NIL (love) + ET (movie) about AMEN (Let it be)
DIY (home working) round or ‘without’ N G (first letters or ‘originals’ of Netflix Gets)
An anagram (‘up’) of LAD TIED
HOt (passionate) missing last letter or ‘mostly’ RATIO (correspondence)
FoR with O (bagel) changing into RYE (bread). Our last one in which took us far too long to parse despite guessing the answer.
REC (play area) OVER (several balls)
An anagram (‘hairy’) of FRUIT IS CUT
YOUR (solver’s as in solver has) around or ‘drinking’ G followed by T
SERENdipITY (chance) without ‘dip’ (swim)
dAVID (Saint) missing first letter or ‘beheaded’
TEASe (guy) missing last letter or ‘short’ round or ‘stealing’ B (black) AG (silver)
P (quiet) RE (about) TENDER (money)
A (Australian) BASS (fish) inside our ‘eaten by’ MAD (crazy) OR (other ranks – ‘men’)
COB (horse) BA (British Airways – ‘carrier’) around or ‘carrying’ S (second) + LAD (son)
SHE (female) PHD (doctor) around ER (Emergency Room)
A clue as definition. An anagram (‘otherwise’) of In NAMe ONLy – each missing last letter or ‘ultimately not there’
An anagram (‘dodging’) of THE RAIN
Double definition although SCOTCH = SHORT took a while for the penny to drop.
If you SAY (‘announce’) Esso it sounds like S O
MALTa (island) missing last letter or ‘unfinished’
Let it be so; verily clever that bit. Good puzzle, ta both.
When I saw Twin was the setter, I thought this was going to take me longer than usual, and I was right. I’m not normally one to go looking for themes, but when I solved 1a pretty near the end I noticed that the short-lived TV series Firefly seems to be a theme, with FIREFLY, SERENITY and SHEPHERD as entries, and MAL, WASH, COBB, FRYE, RIVER, TAM contained in entries. I suppose SPACESHIPS and FUTURISTIC could also be thematic.
I was pretty surprised to hear that Spike Jonze starred in Her, but apparently provided the voice of the Alien Child. I still think the clue is referring to him being the director of the film, which he also wrote.
Thanks, Bertandjoyce and Twin.
Took ages to parse SERENITY (2005) – It’s based on 1a FIREFLY (2002), a FUTURISTIC theme with SPACESHIPS. — [Edit: a dead heat with Matthew@2] …
… HER (2013) is sci-fi, too: Joaquin Phoenix in love with Scarlett Johansson’s AI voice.
That was quite the workout! I had to reveal a couple to keep moving. FIREFLY – very good; I had assumed the def was “get rid of”, not a “glower” [hmm “glower” itself has potential!]. Then FRYER (I was nowhere near that parse), and COBB SALAD (a nho for me). I’d run out of energy by the time I revealed MALT, though it was clear what we were looking for.
But it was a clever puzzle, and it was good to be put through my paces. I don’t think so straightforward a word as LINEAMENT can be called a jorum, but it was another nho and I was pleased to get it from the wordplay; I guess I’ve seen the fun Let It Be trick before, because it came to me very quickly.
Too much goodness to pick out favourites today. Thanks both
… and the time-travel(l)ing Enterprise-C in Star Trek: The Next Generation is an AMBASSADOR Class Starship.
I might be mis-reading our bloggers’ intentions but I parsed SAY-SO as simply eg = SAY and Esso announced = SO. I interpret the blog as suggesting the SAY is then used as a homophone indicator but I might be over-analysing it.
I found this tough with the nho LINEAMENT and COBB SALAD, the last of which is very tricky. I also found SPACESHIPS difficult and got nowhere trying to parse FRYER. And I’m afraid this is yet another theme subject with which I am unfamiliar. I do sometimes feel I haven’t lived when fessing up to failing to recognise themes! A couple of the short clues really grabbed me today – SUMO and HAIRNET are both very neat along with SCOTCH and DILATED.
Thanks Twin and B&J
PostMark – you are not alone in missing themes. We couldn’t identify Tuesday’s theme and we had no knowledge either of today’s.
We also think you are correct about the parsing for SAY-SO. Your interpretation is a lot smoother than ours.
Hmmm..fun in places. But cobb salad was an nho with an extremely vague definition, as was the definition for fryer. Didn’t really enjoy that.
This was really tough but enjoyable in a masochistic kind of way. As with others nho COBB SALAD, and failed to parse FRYER and SPACESHIPS. Parsed SAY-SO same as @7 PostMark.
My favourite today 5a START-UP, but lots of clever misdirection throughout.
Guessed fryer, knew the bagel=0 trick, but still didn’t parse it, rye very sly!
Another to fail on FRYER. I had pencilled in a very weak buyer or payer, but I knew Twin would do better than that, really. I tried all the wrong ways of love recalled and let it be (af sic, stet) before getting LINEAMENTS, a word I only knew from “LINEAMENTS of gratified desire” William Blake and Gerald Durrell’s interpretation of his brother Lawrence’s initials.
A very good puzzle. FRYER went in with a bit of a shrug believing it to be merely a CD. Should have known it would be a lot smarter than thatm and seems to be an &lit.
I hadn’t heard of COBB SALAD either until coming to N America. Well recognised here, and often large enough to need two sittings to finish it.
I’m sure everyone else has moved on, but Spike Jonze is primarily a director, which is why Her is referred to as his movie here. He’s known for quirky, sideways films; see Being John Malkovich and Adaptation for excellent examples. Both are pretty meta, the latter in particular (in the sense that they’re essentially movies about themselves, in a weird Klein-bottle sort of way.) I haven’t seen Her, though.
I of course completely missed the theme, failed to parse FRYER, and didn’t quite figure out COBB SALAD (a dish I don’t especially enjoy, so at least there’s that).
I don’t often pop into the comments for my puzzles, but just wanted to confirm the theme and also add that AMBASSADOR is part of the set – a more obscure reference to Inara being called ‘the ambassador’ at times.
Thanks for the blog & comments, as ever. And forgive me for COBB SALAD – I watch too much American TV (and don’t eat enough salad).
Twin, thanks for dropping by, and no worries about the salad! All world cuisines are on the menu for crosswords, so American food should be no exception. (For the record, I’m in a restaurant right now (late lunch here in Chicago) that offers a Cobb salad, which I didn’t order–as I said, I’m not a fan.)
Alas, one of those days where I couldn’t get into the puzzle and left it mostly unfinished. A pity, as I was a great fan of FIREFLY – still have the DVDs somewhere.
Thanks to Twin for an enjoyable workout, which I managed to complete despite missing the theme. Just needed the blog for help in parsing COBB SALAD — thanks Bertandjoyce! I think it’s interesting that, as did Spike Jonze, Spike Milligan of the Goons took his professional moniker from the legendary American bandleader and spoofmeister Spike Jones, who thus had at least an indirect influence on the Pythons.