New York Times, Wednesday, December 22, 2021

NOKI: I retired to Portugal over six years ago, thinking it would be easy enough to hop back to see DC family and friends while shaving off significant flight time to visit relatives in Thailand. That was true for the first five years. But last year's waves of lockdowns have thwarted many travel attempts and have certainly intensified the sense of distance.

Throughout all of this, my dad & I kept our connection by solving crosswords online together. Last year, we seized on the idea of making puzzles together: We kicked around ideas, made some awkward puzzles, and unsurprisingly, got several rejections.

Finally, Robyn Weintraub kindly volunteered to mentor me via the Crossword Puzzle Collaboration Directory. She helped tighten our themes and raise our standard for fill. We took 30+ stabs at this puzzle before finding one good enough to submit. Even so, we still needed a final assist from Wyna Liu & the NYT puzzle editors to get it over the finish line. We have a lot of people to thank for this debut.

The idea for this specific puzzle arrived in my brain as NASA's Perseverance made its landing back in February. Something about seeing that little rover land so far from home hit home for me. Given the theme, I tried to evoke Space Invaders in the grid. It may show up better if you squint.

Whether you and your loved ones are near or far, we wish you health, happy solving, and a very merry holiday.

LAWRENCE: I have been a fan of crosswords from an early age. When my daughter was in grade school, she was interested in what I was doing while eating breakfast, and I can remember doing half of a puzzle, including partial answers, and helping her finish the puzzle. I think this kindled an interest for her, and that interest took hold during the pandemic, and led to a shared interest in learning how to make a puzzle.

I can trace the origins of this NASA theme to my first job as a junior engineer working for IBM on the Instrument Unit (IU) for the Saturn Apollo program.

Kudos to Robyn Weintraub for her help and encouragement on our early attempts, and thanks to the NYT puzzle crew to get this one into print.

I loved Andy Weir's latest book, Project Hail Mary. It's so inspiring to imagine humankind achieving the impossible.

Also inspiring: today's fantastic theme phrases! I would never have guessed that OPPORTUNITY, CURIOSITY, and INGENUITY could be incorporated into sizzling phrases (SPIRIT is easier). MORBID CURIOSITY is incredible.

I wasn't as wild about the revealer, as MARTIAN MISSIONS felt clunky; not nearly as strong as MARS MISSIONS or MARS LANDERS.

More importantly, the revealer gave away the game much too quickly. I love the moonshot at grid art (although I squinted so hard my glasses broke), and using left-right symmetry can easily allow for the revealer to go at the end of the puzzle, where it's supposed to. Singular MARS MISSION or plural MARS LANDERS in row 12 would have been perfect.

Dreaming big is admirable. It gets people thinking beyond their limits. Trying to build around five grid-spanners with only 72 words, though … there must be a balance between dreams and reality. The bottom corners show the most strain, not a surprise given how many Down answers had to weave through two themers.

As with space missions, continuous improvement is critical, and another 10 or 20 revisions could have turned this into a tremendous lift-off puzzle for two new constructors.

Even with the rickety elements, though, the quality of the theme phrases + the inspirational nature of the concept + Lawrence's space exploration background added up to win me over. Can't wait to see what Noki, Lawrence, and Andy Weir put out next.