New York Times, Thursday, July 1, 2021

Here's hoping this puzzle is a big hit with everyone!

Though not direct inspiration, this puzzle owes a bit of a spiritual debt to Sandy Ganzell's March 23, 2017 puzzle. I'm always excited at puzzles that find a way to use the grid itself as the revealer. It can be risky to construct such a puzzle with so much solving being completed in apps and constrained by the electronic format — hopefully this one translates well.

I originally designed the grid in Excel — normal squares were 15 cells by 15 cells, while the big squares were 17 by 17, about 28% bigger in area. I centered along the middle of each "big" answer, which led to some of the down answers being a bit of a zig-zag. The editorial team's grid is much nicer. I suspect the uniqueness of this grid and deciding what to do electronically is part of why this puzzle spent 20 months in the acceptance queue before its publish date.

With four theme answers of the same length, I recall exploring all 24 permutations of the order the answers appear in this grid to see which gave the best bonus fill.

Favorite clues from the editorial team: 2-Down (how did I miss the opportunity to clue it like that myself?), 6-Down, 17-Across. Favorite of mine that survived: 13-Across.

Check out the pdf file of today's puzzle! (NYT Games Subscription required.) Boxes so BIG they burst out of the grid all crooked? Now that's something you don't see every day!

Such colorful themers, too. ME AND MY (BIG) MOUTH, WHATS THE (BIG) IDEA, YOU OWE ME (BIG) TIME, three home runs. THAT'S A VERY (BIG) IF felt like VERY had been inserted to achieve proper length, but otherwise it's a top-notch phrase as well.

After uncovering the first themer, I thought this was going to be too easy for a Thursday. Surprisingly, it wasn't a no-brainer to fill in the others. I did know that there would be an implied BIG somewhere in the phrases, but that more served as confirmation after I pieced the themers together, rather than a dead giveaway.

Such brilliant wordplay in "… that turns light green?" Like when a kid gets carsick? Like a chameleon in grass? No, it's a way of saying a SOLAR PANEL turns light into a green energy source. It's admittedly tortured, but that didn't take away from my enjoyment.

SOLAR PANEL, along with I'LL ALLOW IT, STAY ON TASK, HOW ON EARTH — you can't ask for much more than four great long bonuses. I did pause for a long, confused moment at STREGIS, but it gave me a lift when I realized it was ST. REGIS.

BEAMER … I'm not beaming at you. Tricky to make a 6x4 corner like the SW work when flanked by a themer and a long bonus. I might have tried a black square at the P of PERK to see if BEAMER could have been massaged out.

Not the tricksiest Thursday, but such a pleasurable solve. Along with being technically well-executed, and a unique visual — it's so rare for me to encounter something I've never seen before in crosswords — this one earns Joe his second POW!