"Connect Four" May 5, 2023

[Relic]

I was late to grasping the meaning of 69A, not getting it until Sunday evening 9:30PM ET. From there I over complicated matters seeing a pattern unintended, ergo chasing the correct rabbit down the wrong hole into META Hades:

17A DREW 1 middle row letter connected to 3 upper row letters
38A TRES 3 upper row letters connected to 1 middle row
60A POLK 2 upper row letters connected t 2 middle row letters - I should have noted this and the next as upper/middle blocks.
11d LOKI My downfall as I incorrectly noted it as 2 middle row letters connected to 2 upper row letters. I mistakenly thought I had a pattern.
25D DXCV 1 middle row letter connected to 3 bottom row letters.

Based on the pattern that emerged in my mind I concluded the 6th theme entry must mirror the 5th, so the coonecting letters must be:
3 BOTTOM ROW LETTERS CONNECTED TO 1 MIDDLE ROW LETTER. Since, under this scheme, at least 3/4 letters would have to be consonants from the middle/bottom rows, I began searching for names of cartoon aliens, bots, machines, and obviously got nowhere. White flag raised at 11:55, I decided to see how the Stars were doing against the Kraken. Oof, another egg laid!! Went from bad to good by opening a beer and hanging out with my wife on the patio.
Overall I found Matt's mechanism here to be very creative and fair.Not his fault I hallucinated a pattern that wasn't there. I enjoy learning from these devious, but delicious METAs. Congratulations to Matt for a delightful puzzle.

[GirlSleuth]

Long time reader, first time submitter to this forum.

I didn't know these types of puzzles, with metas, even existed until about 6 months ago. When I first tried to learn I couldn't even follow the explanations. But then I started to "get it." I had no trouble with the Shamrocks puzzle. (I haven't had the nerve to actually email an answer to the contest yet.)

For this puzzle, I looked down at the bottom of my screen and noticed it was May the fourth (be with you -- even though the puzzle itself is dated May 5) and thought aha Star Wars.

I did notice, in the Nancy Drew clue, that the Mystery at Lilac Inn was the fourth book in the series. Ok, but?

Instead, I looked to the first letter in each clue "she solved…" etc. and got SITHA. Aha Sith. And since I only had to "connect four" I could ignore the A from the 5th themed clue -- for now.

Noticed all the Js in the grid. And James across has Jam down. And juju and coco. Clearly the answer was not only alliterative but two identical syllables. JAR JAR!

But wait, cartoon character, not movie character. Well, Jar Jar did appear in the Star Wars animated series. Also, there are lots of Star Wars comics, and the illustrations in comics are often called cartoons. Some of these comic books do have Jar Jar.

Then I found that several of the Star Wars comics (although admittedly I don't know if they were ones with Jar Jar) were published 5/95! So, the 5th theme clue did come into play. Yay!

How's that for a Dumb (Bugs) Bunny Hole?

[The XWord Rabbit]

This week: An experiment.

The XWord Rabbit has been anxious to try using AI for his review and Mr. Gaffney’s “Connect Four” puzzle seemed ripe for doing so.
First of all, your Rabbit asked for a “More Creative” response to this query:

"Write me a response from The XWord Rabbit, a fictional character on the XWord Muggles website, who comments humorously each week on posts from meta-style crossword puzzle fans who struggle to find a successful solution to the most recent Wall Street Journal Crossword Puzzle Contest. The XWord Rabbit sometimes awards a Rabbit Hole nomination to the most outlandish and convoluted of the stories that are posted."

The result? Well, it appears Your Rabbit’s job is secure as he felt what he got back was a bit off rails, in spite of a correct solution.
Judge for yourself:

Greetings, fellow muggles! It’s your favorite furry friend, The XWord Rabbit, here to hop along with you through this week’s puzzle contest. The title of this week’s puzzle was “Connect Four” and it featured four theme answers that were alliterative phrases starting with the letter F2. For example, one of them was FRENCH FRIES FANATIC. The contest answer was another alliterative cartoon character who would have made a good sixth theme answer. Did you figure it out? If you said FRED FLINTSTONE, you were right! Yabba dabba doo! You might have also thought of FOGHORN LEGHORN, FELIX THE CAT, or FANTASTIC FOUR, but those didn’t fit the grid or the pattern. Some of you might have been tempted to go with FROSTY THE SNOWMAN, but that’s not a cartoon character, it’s a song. And a movie. And a book. And a cereal. And a…well, you get the idea.

But enough about the correct answer. Let’s talk about some of the more creative and hilarious guesses that you muggles sent in. Here are some of my favorites:
• FURRY FURBALL FIEND - This one sounds like a description of me, but I’m not a cartoon character. I’m a real rabbit. With real feelings. And real fur.
• FRANKENSTEIN’S FREAKY FRIEND - This one made me laugh out loud. Who is Frankenstein’s freaky friend? Igor? The Bride? The Monster? And why are they alliterative?
• FANCY FEATHERED FOWL - This one sounds like a dish at a fancy restaurant, not a cartoon character. Maybe it’s what Foghorn Leghorn orders when he goes out to eat.
• FLUFFY FLAMINGO FLAPPER - This one sounds like a dancer at a speakeasy in the 1920s, not a cartoon character. Maybe it’s what Pinky and the Brain do when they take over the world.
• FAT FISHY FLOUNDER - This one sounds like a description of Nemo’s dad, but he’s not alliterative. He’s Marlin. And he’s not fat, he’s just big-boned.
Congratulations to the solver who submitted this guess. You have earned yourself a spot in the Rabbit Hole Hall of Fame. You also get to keep your WSJ mug, because I don’t want it.
That’s all for this week, muggles. I hope you enjoyed this puzzle as much as I did. Until next time, keep solving and keep smiling!

The Real XWord Rabbit is considering naming his new friend “French Fries Fanatic”, but that’s something for another week. In spite of the AI Rabbit’s report, we do have a worthy nominee: It’s GirlSleuth who joined our ranks ONLY A FEW HOURS AGO! (See her post above.) Welcome, bravo and congratulations!

It appears French Fries Fanatic has run out of the burrow. While your real Rabbit goes searching for him, let us end with an appropriate summation of this week’s solution:

[mkmf]

[
...
Second, one must examine the keyboard to find four *other* letters that constitute a name that can be extrapolated to a cartoon character.
...

But the "alliterative" name hint made it easy to reverse the process. I started by doubling the letters into common characters first, then checking the keyboard. Porky Pig? no; Daffy Duck?, Donald Duck? no. Fred Fl...hah!

[mkmf]

On shore! I set the puzzle aside on Thursday because I could get nowhere on the meta. Found out today that I'd mistakenly highlighted a clue to a three-letter entry as one of the themers. Can't say more until Monday.

Due to my poor eyesight and a dark and distracting room, on Thursday, I'd somehow highlighted UMA as a themer in the grid and not highlighted JAMESPOLK. I started to explain in the message above and almost referred to myself as Mr. Magoo (well, Mrs. Magoo in my case). Then I realized:

oh, there's another alliterative cartoon character
oh, spelling it out miSTER... almost works, but the letters don't connect in order

Better not mention it until Monday.

[ron]

I got this one, but I struggled even once I kind of understood, maybe because I tried to read more into it than was there.

It seemed to me that 4 of the 4 letter combos were paired in a sort of geometric way. DREW and DXCV make sort of an X shape and are mirror images of each other. POLK and LOKI are kind of a W and are also mirror images, notwithstanding the keyboard slant that warps it a bit.

So I wanted the sixth theme answer to similarly pair which would lead from TRES to maybe TYUJ or SXCV maybe. WERF or WERG anyone? But couldn't make anything out of those and saw FRED right there sharing the R and E. Said close enough and submitted FF.

[Bonnibel]

I guess many of us were on the wrong beach! I totally read the look DOWN clue wrong.

My very first thought was Fred Flintstone but I couldn't back it up with a meta.

Then I saw ETTA JAMES POLK and thought AHA we're supposed to find 4 letter words in the grid to connect with the themers.

I ended up with Nancy DREW LOTS = L, WHOS LOKI Costume (I myself asked who's Loki?) = W, Tres BON IDEA (bon idee) = I, and ETTA JAMES Polk = E.

In grid order that spells WILE, as in Wile E. Coyote. I added EVER THE YEAR DXCV and that sealed it for me.

My submission: ROAD RUNNER. And I thought MATE might be a follower to Runner.

In all, I talked myself into something that really was not working. It was the best I could do.

In the end, DXCV should have been my real clue and I never once looked at my keyboard.

Yes I am always on paper.

I do live in the Conejo Valley so the rabbits got me this time.

Waiting for Thursday.

[DBMiller]

Okay, 69A kind of threw me for a loop. I usually do these on my phone, so if I look down, I'm looking at my Dunlop's disease (That's where my belly done-lop over my belt - My spare TIRE, for those who have never heard of DUNLOP tires).

But I realized that it most likely meant to look down from a computer screen, which would be a keyboard. So I quickly looked at the answers to the starred clues, and made the "connection".

DREW TRES POLK LOKI DXCV

All groups of four keys that are connected to each other on a standard QWERTY keyboard. I had already forgotten what the contest info was, and so the first thing I noticed was 23A - AFTER. Fits the category, I should submit... Oh wait, YURT does too. Wait... What was the contest info? Oh yeah, an alliterative cartoon character that would make a 6th theme answer.

And I pretty much came up right away with FRED flintstone. Really? That's the only one? Certainly there has to be more. And I thought, and I thought, and I came up with two cartoon characters that I felt fit the mechanism - "miSTER magoo" and "simon bar siniSTER". Both are a bit of a STREtch (See what I did there?). The first is usually referred to as "Mr. Magoo", while the latter may or may not be considered alliterative.

Depending on where you look for a definition of alliterative, it is. One definition is, "The repetition of sounds at the beginning of connected, or closely connected words". For example, the tongue twisters, "Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers" and "She sell sea shell down by the sea shore" are both considered alliterative.

And I also realized that all the grid examples are connected in order, whereas STER are four connected keys, but the order of connection is either SERT or TRES if you want to be pedantic. But in the game Connect Four, it wouldn't matter what order the pieces fell into their respective slots, only that you got four in a row at the time the last piece was placed in the rack. Also, as people have noted in the forum before, "The first rule of metas is 'There are no rules'" (See "Film Editing", et al). And while the game "Connect Four" was actually four in a row, this puzzle just has four connected keys. Not in the same row.

If order didn't matter, maybe somebody named LOUIe or LOUIse would work. Dom Deluise was quite a character, but not a cartoon one. [Post thought - There was a character named Lighthouse Louie in a SpongeBob episode of the same name... Who later became Lighthouse Louise after SpongeBob found out the snail was female. Very obscure]

The subject line on my submission actually read "FRED flintstone, miSTER magoo, simon bar siniSTER" - I was going to CMA.

Afterwards, I wondered if their might be other FREDs out there. Google actually found three more:

1) FRED FREDburger (The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy)
2) freaky FRED (Courage the Cowardly Dog)
3) alFRED alfer (You Tube content)

Certainly not as popular as the head of the Flintstone household, and way more obscure as you go down that list. But they do also fit the bill. Nothing in the contest info said "well known" or anything of the sort. And I agree that you can't think the answer is anything other than Fred.

Oh, and you might not want to Google that last one. You might get taken to a website that has the following disclaimer:

https://laurasambitiouswriting.wordpres ... -internet/

Disclaimer: This is an article that will discuss a series of animation that contains explicit and disturbing adult content, including necrophilia, graphic nudity, gore, violence, and self-mutilation. Reader discretion is advised.

The website also describe Alfred as "The Crazy Canine Who Ruled The Internet" and as "a mentally unstable cartoon dog created by a talented woman named Emily Rose Youcis". I think I'll pass on checking it out. If reader discretion is advised for that page, I can imagine the cartoon certainly requires a similar amount (if not more) of discretion.

Final thoughts:

What if I use a DVORAK keyboard? Would the answer of "Tom Thumb" work? Ah no, that'd be "tom THuMB" - the "u" breaks the connection. "JUDY jetson" also comes close, out of order and the "D" isn't quite connected to the "Y".

What about a COLEMAK keyboard? Any other layouts?

What if I use an ergonomic keyboard? Do any of those layouts break the themers? And yes, I just realized that if you had to use a QWERTY layout to see the themers, then you have to use it to answer the meta as well. So those were some wasted final thoughts.

[CPJohnson]

Hello, @The XWord Rabbit,

Because of the sans serif font on this site, I spent several minutes trying to figure out why you wanted @Al Sisti to review your writings. Eventually, I realized what you meant.

[mydogsam]

I connected the five answers together using FOUR letters

[Louwers]

Went down the “look down” (eye, ojo) rabbit hole and never found my way out…

[MajordomoTom]

Bam, bam, bam bam BAM!

There, is that enough for a mug?

Yes, my submission was FF

[The XWord Rabbit]

Okay, 69A kind of threw me for a loop. I usually do these on my phone, so if I look down, I'm looking at my Dunlop's disease (That's where my belly done-lop over my belt - My spare TIRE, for those who have never heard of DUNLOP tires).

But I realized that it most likely meant to look down from a computer screen, which would be a keyboard. So I quickly looked at the answers to the starred clues, and made the "connection".

DREW TRES POLK LOKI DXCV

All groups of four keys that are connected to each other on a standard QWERTY keyboard. I had already forgotten what the contest info was, and so the first thing I noticed was 23A - AFTER. Fits the category, I should submit... Oh wait, YURT does too. Wait... What was the contest info? Oh yeah, an alliterative cartoon character that would make a 6th theme answer.

And I pretty much came up right away with FRED flintstone. Really? That's the only one? Certainly there has to be more. And I thought, and I thought, and I came up with two cartoon characters that I felt fit the mechanism - "miSTER magoo" and "simon bar siniSTER". Both are a bit of a STREtch (See what I did there?). The first is usually referred to as "Mr. Magoo", while the latter may or may not be considered alliterative.

Depending on where you look for a definition of alliterative, it is. One definition is, "The repetition of sounds at the beginning of connected, or closely connected words". For example, the tongue twisters, "Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers" and "She sell sea shell down by the sea shore" are both considered alliterative.

And I also realized that all the grid examples are connected in order, whereas STER are four connected keys, but the order of connection is either SERT or TRES if you want to be pedantic. But in the game Connect Four, it wouldn't matter what order the pieces fell into their respective slots, only that you got four in a row at the time the last piece was placed in the rack. Also, as people have noted in the forum before, "The first rule of metas is 'There are no rules'" (See "Film Editing", et al). And while the game "Connect Four" was actually four in a row, this puzzle just has four connected keys. Not in the same row.

If order didn't matter, maybe somebody named LOUIe or LOUIse would work. Dom Deluise was quite a character, but not a cartoon one. [Post thought - There was a character named Lighthouse Louie in a SpongeBob episode of the same name... Who later became Lighthouse Louise after SpongeBob found out the snail was female. Very obscure]

The subject line on my submission actually read "FRED flintstone, miSTER magoo, simon bar siniSTER" - I was going to CMA.

Afterwards, I wondered if their might be other FREDs out there. Google actually found three more:

1) FRED FREDburger (The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy)
2) freaky FRED (Courage the Cowardly Dog)
3) alFRED alfer (You Tube content)

Certainly not as popular as the head of the Flintstone household, and way more obscure as you go down that list. But they do also fit the bill. Nothing in the contest info said "well known" or anything of the sort. And I agree that you can't think the answer is anything other than Fred.

Oh, and you might not want to Google that last one. You might get taken to a website that has the following disclaimer:

https://laurasambitiouswriting.wordpres ... -internet/

Disclaimer: This is an article that will discuss a series of animation that contains explicit and disturbing adult content, including necrophilia, graphic nudity, gore, violence, and self-mutilation. Reader discretion is advised.

The website also describe Alfred as "The Crazy Canine Who Ruled The Internet" and as "a mentally unstable cartoon dog created by a talented woman named Emily Rose Youcis". I think I'll pass on checking it out. If reader discretion is advised for that page, I can imagine the cartoon certainly requires a similar amount (if not more) of discretion.

DB: You certainly deserve another Rabbit Hole nomination for this. You can just pile them up and we’ll sort them out in August when the Grand Prize winner is announced. The XWord Rabbit continues to be amazed the way your mind works.

[Homer Buckle]

Johnny Carson as Carnac: "Yabba Dabba Doo"

Opens envelope: "What does Fred Flintstone find on his Yabba Dabba every morning?"

[ImOnToo]

I will admit to not reading all of the responses after the reveal. But, is anyone else now well versed on all possibilities of “CTRL + (1st letter of each theme answer’s 4-letter word)”?
Thanks to initially focusing on the wrong 4 letters in 25D, I now know that CTRL + Y = nothing.
I knocked my head against that wall for a while before pivoting.

[mlvilv]

okay I definitely caught that it had something to do with the keyboard, and I saw the letters connecting but I thought somehow they had to all connect to each other, or spell something or have some other connection. I was not taking them as separate entities and finding a new separate entity. Oh well, I'll see you next week...

[Joepickett]

In the Connect Four game, the markers have to be four consecutive horizontally, vertically, or diagonally…..NOT just in a grouping. For instance, in this puzzle, LOKI is in a block, and the letters are NOT horizontal, vertical, or diagonal. The Connect Four title in the meta is a misdirection, and doesn’t correspond to the Connect Four game rules.

The First Rule of Fight Club Metas is There are No Rules.

[FrancesY]

And the winner is…?

(Because I’m always ready to step in)

[Ergcat]

In the Connect Four game, the markers have to be four consecutive horizontally, vertically, or diagonally…..NOT just in a grouping. For instance, in this puzzle, LOKI is in a block, and the letters are NOT horizontal, vertical, or diagonal. The Connect Four title in the meta is a misdirection, and doesn’t correspond to the Connect Four game rules.

The First Rule of Fight Club Metas is There are No Rules.

and besides no one ever said it had anything to do with the GAME "Connect Four" ...... and the title was NOT a misdirection at all but rather it told us a hint to look at 4-letter words and to connect them somehow (as it turns out on the QWERTY keyboard).

[Flying_Burrito]

In the Connect Four game, the markers have to be four consecutive horizontally, vertically, or diagonally…..NOT just in a grouping. For instance, in this puzzle, LOKI is in a block, and the letters are NOT horizontal, vertical, or diagonal. The Connect Four title in the meta is a misdirection, and doesn’t correspond to the Connect Four game rules.

The First Rule of Fight Club Metas is There are No Rules.

and besides no one ever said it had anything to do with the GAME "Connect Four" ...... and the title was NOT a misdirection at all but rather it told us a hint to look at 4-letter words and to connect them somehow (as it turns out on the QWERTY keyboard).

The way I see it is that if 75% of responses got it right the remaining 25% need to amp on their neuron synapses. Saying that because I am in the latter grouping.