We'll Be Back Right After This Message

🥳 Happy Birthday, me! 🥳 That’s right - just when you thought I was an ethereal being, born of time itself, spawned into this ever-expanding galaxy with the sole purpose of making silly little word puzzles, I break your hopes and dreams by revealing that I am a mortal human just like everyone else. And for my birthday, I give you a gift! A new crossword puzzle, of course :) 🎁 

They say 2025 didn’t really have a Song of the Summer, but I think that’s probably because this song wasn’t charting at the time.

Upon reflection, I could have written a birthday-themed puzzle to tie this together… But I didn’t. Instead, this week’s puzzle is one of my favourite types of theme - the answers don’t quite make sense until you get the “revealer,” so good luck and happy solving!

Discussion (and spoilers!) below the break.

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We'll Be Back Right After This Message by Brandon Cathcart

Discussion

This puzzle’s title was pretty subtle - I was a little worried it wouldn’t click with most people but I did it anyway. It’s a play on "We’ll be right back after these messages,” clearly, but it’s “We’ll be back right after this message”, ie, the theme answers will be correct again after the revealer. Bonus fun that “right back” is switched to “back right,” just like the theme clues. Yeah. It’s got layers. Anyway, speaking of BOPS and TEEN Lizzie McGuire…

Today’s Theme

The answers to the three starred clues are phrases/words - CROWN ROYAL, MASTERMIND, and SIXTY THREE. However, they don’t quite make sense until you get the revealer, 27-Across: [Not working... or how the starred answers should be written]. That’s OUT OF ORDER, so we swap the order of the words to get ROYAL CROWN, MIND MASTER, and THREE SIXTY.

Behind the Clues

10A. I feel like I captured two demographics with [Lizzie McGuire or Hanna Montana, e.g.] but perhaps I could have added more. Any member of the Breakfast Club? Ah, that is a good one. Save it for the next one.

26A. Fun fact - the first album I ever bought myself was N*Sync’s No Strings Attached. And that album, [Like my first N*Sync album], was ON CD. Speaking of N*Sync, everyone talks about the iconic Bye Bye Bye choreography, but no one talks about how they go train hopping in that video? It’s more James Bond than I remember…

37A. One of the benefits of doing crosswords (and making them) is you get to learn interesting things all the time. This crossword, I got to learn and share with you that Turkey is a “transcontinental” country. [Continent that Turkey is part of (in addition to Europe)] is ASIA. Russia is one as well, and other notable ones include Kazakhstan (Europe and Asia), Egypt (Africa and Asia), and Panama (North and South America).

3D. Question marks typically indicate there’s some wordplay going on, and that is the case here. [Con man’s concern?] isn’t the strongest wordplay, but I thought it was fun regardless. A person speaking to the “cons” of an issue might have concerns about a PRO.

20D. Brag alert! [How many times I've ranked #1 in the world on "Flipart" on Puzzmo 😎] is ONCE. I only play a few games on Puzzmo (I tend to like games you can “solve” rather than “find answers until you give up”) and Flipart is one of them. And yeah, one time, I beat everyone else in the world at a particular puzzle. I was dialled in.

32D. I’ve been on a Disney kick recently, so when I had the fill IS A, the first thing that came to mind was ["A Dream ___ Wish Your Heart Makes"] from Cinderella. The animals are so well animated in this movie!

I hope you enjoyed this puzzle!

Until next Friday,

Brandon