L.A.Times Crossword Corner

Aug 9, 2025

Saturday, August 9, 2025, David Karp

Themeless Puzzle by David Karp

David's fun puzzle started out quickly but slowed to a more moderate pace. Here is what he shared with me after I told him that MWAHAHA/RAWR gave me one bad cell.

Hi Gary,

Glad you enjoyed the puzzle! And sorry to trip you up -- I was a bit worried about how that crossing would play out.

This one is a pretty open grid so it was challenging getting clean yet interesting fill throughout -- it went through a few revisions with the editors, particularly in the bottom right corner. But I'm particularly happy that MUSIC BINGO (I enjoy playing it), ZAMBONI RIDE (I'm a Canadian/hockey fan) and EGG MATZOS (my dad's side of the family is Jewish) made it through.

I can't believe it's been a couple years since my last LA Times themeless puzzle. I've had three crosswords in the LA Times since then (including a couple collaborations with friends and family), but they've all been Mondays, funnily enough. I feel most in my element doing challenging themeless puzzles though so it's nice to be back with a themeless.

Not much to update in the way of my current activities; I still work for the provincial government, enjoy making crossword puzzles in my spare time (I recently published my 50th puzzle -- this one is #52) as well as playing ball hockey and soccer.

Across:

1. Rank denied to Anakin Skywalker: JEDI MASTER ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ He never became a Jedi Master. He became a Jedi Knight close to the beginning of the clone wars. Knights were also given padawans to train during the unprecedented times in the final years of the Republic. Even after he became a force ghost he was still known more as the Chosen One than a true Jedi Master.

11. Pollutants phased out by the Montreal Protocol, for short: CFCS - Chlorofluorocarbons were identified as destroying the ozone layer and were outlawed in 1987.

15. "Count me in!": I AM SO THERE.

16. Baseball dynasty name: ALOU - They had a lot of talent and vowels.

17. Game whose object is to get lots of hits: MUSIC BINGO - A fav game of David's. Players receive bingo cards with song titles or artists listed in a grid. The host plays short clips of songs. Players identify the songs and mark them off on their cards. Five in a row, column or diagonal wins.

Sample Card

18. Gamer who lacks game: NOOB.

19. 1971 cult classic: SHAFT - The fabulous Isaac Hayes theme song below has the lyrics start at 1:48

20. Startles: SPOOKS.

22. Celeb gossip site: TMZ - It stands for the Thirty Mile Zone surrounding Los Angeles and the entertainment business. Here's the latest edition

25. Story that may remain unfinished: ATTIC 😀 An unfinished top story ATTIC would get pretty toasty around here.

27. Spine-tingling: EERIE.

28. Treats: HEALS.

30. "What a bore!": SNORE.

32. "Wanna __?": BET - TV's most famous BET!

33. "__ Vep": HBO miniseries: IRMA - An anagram of Vampire More

34. Crispy kosher snack: EGG MATZOS.

36. Clouds of gas and dust: NEBULAE.

38. "They'll never catch me!": MWAHAHA and 31. Noise made while curling one's fingers, perhaps: RAWR the crossing of these two cost me a "got 'er done".

40. Debate figure: MODERATOR.

42. Layered sandwich: OREO.

43. Actor Chaney: LON.

44. Blacksmith garb: APRON.

45. "Paul Bunyan" librettist: AUDEN.

46. __ coffee: IRISH - IRISH is also a beloved member or our community

48. Networks, for short: SYSTS.

50. Fr. holy title: STE - French abbreviation for SAINTE the female form for Saint

51. Some adoptees: STRAYS - God bless those that do this

53. One of the three R's: REUSE - Oh, those 3 R's. I first tried "RITIN'"

55. Duck out early: BAIL - We did BAIL on a Husker FB game once when it looked like they would lose. The cheering we heard on the street told us we made a mistake.

56. Unlikely to show mercy: IRON FISTED - These leap to mind: Stalin, Lenin, Putin in Russia. Idi Amin in Uganda. Fidel Castro in Cuba. Daniel Noriega in Nicaragua. Saddam Hussein in Iraq. Hafez Assad in Syria. Hitler in Germany.

61. "Balladz" poet Sharon: OLDS ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Her bio

62. Tale that may be told with a fire in one's eyes: GHOST STORY 😀

63. On a cruise: ASEA.

64. Easy wins for presidential candidates, often: HOME STATES - Most do but in 1972 George McGovern, among others, even lost his home state of South Dakota in the Nixon landslide.

Down:

1. Actor Parsons: JIM - He was a big reason The Big Bang Theory was a huge hit.

2. Evian, e.g.: EAU.

3. Private convos: DMS - Direct MessageS

4. Mother of Horus: ISIS.

5. Drinks made from two kinds of beans: MOCHAS - A mixture of cocoa and coffee beans

6. Rockie start?: AT BAT - 😀 Their AT BATs have not been very productive as the Colorado Rockies have the worst record in MLB (30 - 85).

7. Takes a turn: SHIFTS GEARS - I really liked this clue as it references a turn in a conversation or strategy not in a car.

8. Part of a nomad's lifestyle, perhaps: TENTING.

9. Work unit: ERG - I love this definition of an ERG: It's the equivalent of an ant doing one push up

10. Some classic cars: REOS - Ransom Eli Oldsmobile invented the Oldsmobile Car and then, after a falling out with a partner, stopped that and started building the REO

11. __ Journey: annual event for Pacific Northwest Indigenous peoples: CANOE.

12. They may be swept under the rug: FLOOR BOARDS - There is a difference between actually doing this and the sense of ignoring a bad topic

13. Need for one who's rolling in dough?: COOKIE SHEET 😀

14. Part of the whole: SUBSET - We crossword solvers are a SUBSET of the general population

21. "The Hunger Games" boy: PEETA ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

22. Scarce: THIN.

23. They're only human: MERE MORTALS.

24. Hockey fan's intermission experience, perhaps: ZAMBONI RIDE.

26. Sound track?: COMMON SENSE 😀

29. Credit: LAUD.

34. Tombstone name: EARP - Despite his adventures in Tombstone, AZ, Wyatt's actual, uh, tombstone, along with his wife's, is in Colma, CA near San Francisco.

35. Dynasty before the Qin: ZHOU.

37. __ Law: human rights measure named for the third-longest-serving U.S. senator: LEAHY.

39. Top-notch: A-ONE.

41. Place for kidding around at home?: TOY ROOM 😀

43. Capital city in Província da Estremadura: LISBOA - Portuguese in clue means the city will be spelled in that language

45. One of 3,234 for Sue Bird: ASSIST.