Evan Birnholzs guide to the Sept. 25 Post Magazine crossword, Show Stoppers

Another year of life, another year of puzzles. I turned 33 today, and I hope I’m still puzzling strong at 34. Here’s to another good year, and many more.

Today’s crossword has a tricky theme, and it has a metapuzzle in it that hides a unique answer, but hopefully the answer becomes apparent once you see how the theme works. So let’s check it out.

The instructions ask solvers the following question: “Which popular TV show is spelled out in this challenging puzzle?” Initially, there doesn’t appear to be much theme material outside of these two cross-referenced TV-related phrases:

• 33A / 108A: [With 108 Across, show stopper?] is SERIES / FINALE.
• 34A / 104A: [With 104 Across, show-stopping phrase?] is WE INTERRUPT / THIS PROGRAM.

The real challenge comes in when you notice that several Across answers don’t appear to fit their clues. And that’s where the answer to the meta can be found. The last letters of these Across answers — one in each row not containing those two cross-referenced TV phrases — are cut off:

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• 1A: [Super Bowl XLIII locale] appears to be TAMP in the grid, but it’s actually TAMP(A).
• 21A: [Classics class subject] is HOME(R).
• 23A: [D.C.’s Muriel Bowser, e.g.] is a MAYO(R).
• 31A: [Where to begin] is STEP ON(E).
• 36A: [Disorderly sorts] are SLOB(S). I had hoped to hide this letter a little better than just turning a plural word into a singular; I think I tried fitting in BRAS(S) or something like that at 38A, but, oh well.
• 42A: [Minimal to the max] is LOWES(T).
• 51A: [Clear off] is ERAS(E).
• 55A: [Take care of] is TEN(D).
• 63A: [Reached first] is SINGLE(D).
• 71A: [Draconian] is SEVER(E). I didn’t plan it this way, but perhaps it’s fitting that the apparent answer SEVER ended up right in the middle of the grid.
• 80A: [Winter Palace dynasty] is ROMANO(V).
• 86A: [Rob of “Wayne’s World"] is Rob LOW(E).
• 89A: [Art who owned the Browns and Ravens] is Art MODEL(L). It may have been tough to spot this one if you’re not into the National Football League, but I’m hoping that if you got the rest of the relevant answers and saw what they were doing, you could infer the missing letter.
• 97A: [Turbo Stroke swimwear brand] is SPEED(O).
• 101A: [Move stealthily] is CREE(P).
• 116A: [Like some journalism] is LONG-FOR(M).
• 118A: [Perform penance] is ATON(E).
• 124A: [Diabolical spirit] is a DEMO(N).
• 127A: [Jokester Bob] is Bob SAGE(T).

The missing letters, in order, spell out ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT. I’m slightly ashamed to say that I’ve watched maybe just 60 to 70 percent of this show’s episodes; I missed most of Season 3 but watched the whole Netflix-based fourth season. I need to get Season 3 under my belt, since I laugh uproariously every time I watch the show. In any case, that’s our meta answer.

This was one of the toughest constructing challenges I’ve ever taken on. I knew beforehand that I wanted all the relevant answers to produce legitimate words when their last letters were removed. Ideally, these words would be markedly different after eliminating the last letter. But fitting in 19 of them — one in each row that didn’t contain SERIES / FINALE and WE INTERRUPT / THIS PROGRAM — gave me fits. It was fortunate that most of my cut-off letters were reasonably common and that I could stack several of the key words on top of each other on the left side, from SLOB(S) to SINGLE(D). Filling the grid, though, took way longer than I had anticipated. Some of those cut-off letters didn’t leave me many good options; there just aren’t many words ending with V that produce another real word when you remove the V besides the names of old popes or Russian czars. And that word with the missing M? It had to be a 6- or 7-letter word without the final M and fit right beneath THIS PROGRAM and FINALE. Yeesh.

Still, I was pretty happy with how this one came out of the oven. It’s my birthday, so I figured, go big or go home.

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Other notable answers and clues:

• 20A: [Politician who quipped, “You win some, you lose some, and then there’s that little-known third category"] is AL GORE. He said that at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.
• 45A: [Stage name of the techno musician Richard D. James] is APHEX TWIN. Now, I realize that might appear to be an alphabet soup for solvers who haven’t heard of him, but he has won a Grammy and has built a reputation as one of the more famous electronic musicians out there. Take a listen to some of his stuff.
• 65A / 50D: [With 50 Down, palindromic greeting] is MADAM / I’M ADAM. Remember how I said this grid was really tough to fill? Here’s Exhibit A of that. I’M ADAM was pretty much the only thing I could fit into that 50D slot without resorting to some much uglier surrounding fill. And once that was set, I said to myself, “You’d better put MADAM somewhere in there too so it’s not just a long partial phrase.” So make that 20 short answers that were basically locked in place, in addition to SERIES / FINALE and WE INTERRUPT / THIS PROGRAM.
• 75A: [Idris of “Pacific Rim"] is Idris ELBA. He’s great in pretty much everything he does, but I recommend this movie. For a sci-fi thriller, it’s funny and doesn’t take itself too seriously.
• 60D: [Merchant in a record store?] is NATALIE. As in, the musician Natalie Merchant.
• 89D: [West who was the subject of the play “Dirty Blonde"] is MAE West. I suppose I could have given you a clue about “Arrested Development” actress Mae Whitman here, but this was more personal for me: My uncle Tom Riis Farrell acted in “Dirty Blonde” many years ago. I’m only now wondering why I didn’t use this clue angle for MAE in earlier puzzles.
• 91D: [Field, for one] is an ACTRESS. That would be Sally Field, if you got tripped up.
• 100D: [Sails force?] is an ARMADA. My favorite clue this week.

On the next episode of the Washington Post Magazine crossword, Tobias realizes that some phrases shouldn’t be parsed incorrectly. Or maybe he doesn’t. See you next week!

**Special thanks to Chris Adams, Erik Agard, Jim Bumgardner, Austin Burns, Eric LeVasseur, Bruce Ryan, and Adam Wilkins for test-solving this puzzle, and to my copy editor Jenny Abella for her thorough fact-checking and proofreading of clues.**

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