We talk a lot these days on the editorial team about what makes a good pun, and everyone's mileage varies for me, though, it all comes down to whether or not I can imagine the punny phrase used in a goofy, real-world, outside-of-crosswords context. It took a bunch of imagination on the cluing side to make this a reality in my mind, along with the desire to pack in as much content as possible - wouldn't it be weird if I only had a small selection of -CKET examples? Too much theme tends to cause filling troubles, so I knew what I was getting into … but hey, constructor quirks.** I'd wanted to make a pun theme forever, but the set of examples needed to really sing. It occurred to me one day that there were plenty of words like JACKET, BUCKET, TICKET, etc., and so I simply pursued a way to create punnery around this. Today's puzzle is the result of dialing things back a notch, while still staying true to my quirks. After all, as a constructor, I'll always be most drawn to crosswords in a challenging sense - can I pull off such a crazy theme idea based around this one example? Can I pack a wide-open corner with all this jazzy fill? I wanted every last theme I created to feel unusual, or at least technically intricate. The "letter/phonetic change" pun puzzle has eluded me for too long! As a solver, I grew up delighting in gems like USE THE FORCEPS LUKE and PIZZA RETREAT, but never found myself interested in brainstorming any myself.
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