January 2, 2024

Title: MAN OVERBOARD

Constructor: Lindsay Rosenblum

Editor: Anna Gundlach

Theme Answers:

CHARLIE SPRING (4D: "Heartstopper" protagonist)

WALTER WHITE (17D: Role for which Bryan Cranston won six Emmys)

PRESIDENT SNOW (18D: "Hunger Games" villain featured in the 2023 prequel)

Theme synopsis: Each vertical theme answer is the name of a MAN whose last name can be followed with the word BOARD to form a new word. We have a SPRINGBOARD, a WHITEBOARD, and a SNOWBOARD.

Things I learned:

• HIT (5D: Song on Japan's Oricon chart, e.g.) Oricon is a Japanese company that supplies statistics on music. The company produces Oricon charts, similar to Billboard's charts, that monitor music sales.

Random thoughts and interesting things:

• ARCHIE (12A: Redhead in "Betty & Veronica" comics) Betty & Veronica is a comic book series produced by ARCHIE Comics. Like the other comic books published by ARCHIE Comics, the series features teenagers that attend Riverdale High School, including the title characters Betty and Veronica, ARCHIE (the redhead mentioned in the clue), Jughead, Reggie, and their friends.
• IBEX (35A: Goat with curved horns) The IBEX is a species of wild goat found in Eurasia, North Africa, and East Africa. Both male and female IBEX have large horns that curve backwards and have knobby ridges.
• EGGS (36A: "Green ___ and Ham") "I do not like green EGGS and ham. I do not like them, Sam-I-Am. I do not like them in a house. I do not like them with a mouse..." Well, you get the idea. Green EGGS and Ham by Dr. Seuss was first published in 1960. Fun fact: The entire text of Green EGGS and Ham contains only 50 unique words, and only one of those words has more than one syllable. (That word is "anywhere.")
• HOT ONES (44A: Online show where celebrities are interviewed while eating spicy wings) HOT Ones – "the show with HOT questions and even hotter wings" – is a YouTube talk show that began in 2015. Created by Christopher Schonberger and Sean Evans, the show features Sean Evans interviewing guests while they eat increasingly spicy chicken wings (or a vegetarian/vegan alternative). Each season of the show features a different line-up of HOT sauces, though some sauces repeat each year.
• INUIT (47A: Arctic people) The INUIT are a group of indigenous peoples in the Arctic and subarctic regions of northern Canada and Alaska.
• TEA (63A: Beverage made from Camellia sinensis) Camellia sinensis is a species of evergreen shrub. Two of the major varieties of Camellia sinensis are the source of leaves used to make white TEA, yellow TEA, green TEA, oolong, and dark TEA. The leaves are processed differently to attain different levels of oxidation, depending on which type of tea is being made.
• RAPS (1D: Performs like GloRilla) I have previously written about RAP artist GloRilla.
• ACNE (3D: Condition tretinoin might treat) The medication tretinoin is used topically to treat ACNE. It's also known by its trade name, Retin-A. 
• CHARLIE SPRING (4D: "Heartstopper" protagonist) Heartstopper is a Netflix TV series adapted from Alice Oseman's webcomic and graphic novel of the same name. Heartstopper is a coming-of-age series telling the story of CHARLIE SPRING (played by Joe Locke) and Nick Nelson (played by Kit Connor), and their friends.
• SLEDGE (8D: Sister ___ ("We Are Family" band)) "We Are Family" was released in 1979 and became Sister SLEDGE's signature song. Thank you to this clue for the "We Are Family" earworm. "We are family / I got all my sisters with me / We are family / Get up everybody and sing..."
• SHOE (9D: "If the ___ fits...") Although it wasn't clued as a song lyric, this clue led me to start singing a line from the Taylor Swift song, "long story short." "If the SHOE fits, walk in it 'til your / high heels break..."
• LEOS (10D: Some July babies) LEOS are those born between July 22 and August 22.
• WALTER WHITE (17D: Role for which Bryan Cranston won six Emmys) WALTER WHITE is the high school chemistry teacher portrayed by Bryan Cranston in the TV series, Breaking Bad. After receiving a diagnosis of lung cancer, WALTER WHITE begins producing and distributing meth in order to secure his family's financial future.
• PRESIDENT SNOW (18D: "Hunger Games" villain featured in the 2023 prequel) The 2023 movie The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, is a prequel to The Hunger Games. The prequel follows the rise of Coriolanus SNOW as he becomes PRESIDENT SNOW, the tyrannical ruler of the dystopian, war-ravaged country of Panem.
• CARRIE (21D: Stephen King's debut novel) Stephen King's debut novel, CARRIE, was published in 1974. The horror novel was first adapted into a movie of the same name in 1976, with Sissy Spacek playing the title role.
• ANYA (50D: "The Queen's Gambit" star Taylor-Joy) The Queen's Gambit is a 2020 Netflix Original miniseries based on the 1983 book of the same name by Walter Tevis. ANYA Taylor-Joy plays the role of fictional chess prodigy, Beth Harmon.
• OGRE (53D: Creature with onion like layers, according to Shrek) "OGREs are like onions...we both have layers." -Shrek

Geography review:

• ATL (14A: World's busiest airport) ATL is the airport code for Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, located in Georgia. The airport is the primary hub for Delta Airlines, and a main city for Frontier Airlines and Southwest Airlines. By passenger traffic, Hartsfield-Jackson is the busiest airport in the world. In 2022, over 93 million passengers went through the Atlanta airport.
• FRANC (48A: Malian currency) Mali is a landlocked country in West Africa. Mali's currency is the West African CFA FRANC, a currency also used by Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea-Bissau, Niger, Senegal, and Togo. The capital of Mali is Bamako.
• ERIE (Warmest Great Lake) ERIE is the shallowest of the five Great Lakes, a fact that results in it also being the warmest Great Lake. This is the first appearance of our crossword-friend ERIE in 2024. Last year, I asked readers to guess how many times we would see ERIE in the puzzle in 2023. In 2021, we saw ERIE 42 times, and in 2022, ERIE appeared 37 times. Three readers took me up on the challenge, making guesses of 39, 40, and 42. I added my guess, 36. The last time we saw ERIE in 2023 was on December 26, 2023. Drumroll please... In 2023, ERIE made 36 appearances in the USA Today crossword. That means I guessed correctly, and now I am in the position of trying to convince you I had no inside knowledge! Truly, I just got lucky! Shall we play again? How many times do you think we'll see ERIE in 2024? Put your guess in the comments to play along! (Will more than three people play this game with me this year? That remains to be seen!)

• SEDONA (34D: Red Rock State Park city) SEDONA is a city in north-central Arizona. Located within the Coconino National Forest, SEDONA is known for its natural beauty, which includes formations of red sandstone. Red Rock State Park is located just outside of SEDONA.

This is a clever theme! From the title I guessed that the theme answers were vertical and that they would be the names of men, but I wasn't sure how the OVERBOARD part would come into play. There was a nice "Aha!" moment when I uncovered WALTER WHITE and realized that this led to the word WHITEBOARD. Congratulations to Lindsay Rosenblum, making a USA Today debut! Thank you, Lindsay, for this puzzle that was a fantastic way to start my Tuesday.

Remember to drop your guesses about 2024 ERIE appearances in the comments. (If you post your comment anonymously, please put your name or initials in the comment, so I know who you are if you win.)