Ev 1392

[professorplum13]

Lots of confusion on here and on the crossword forum....

Which letters are removed from the 5 unclued answers? Just M and E ? or all letters which occur in top row /bottom row references and /or the song??

[vetuste_ennemi]

I assumed all non-intersecting letters itherwise the final grid is a trivial mess. For instance there isn't an M or an E in lucid.


Mind you, there isn't an "I" in "team", but if you look hard enough I think you'll find there's a "me". Acknowledgement to David Brent.

[vetuste_ennemi]

PS: Christmas gift from my first wife.

[vetuste_ennemi]

{i]Not[i] David Brent, the album.

[vetuste_ennemi]

Not...

[Cloverjo]

Another thread here
https://www.theanswerbank.co.uk/Quizzes-and-Puzzles/Crosswords/Question1667819.html

Who knows?

[vetuste_ennemi]

The italicised full[i makes sense.

But what does the italicised [i]must] mean?

There's possibly something cleverer or more elusive going on.

Only got round to Listener and EV tonight. Both easy in grid fill and get the theme sense.

[vetuste_ennemi]

full[i
and
[i]must]

[vetuste_ennemi]

(Time to admit failure, I think.)

[ProfessorMaisie]

With all the references to 'i', I'll offer another possibility - removing 'I' as a 'me' synonym from the thematic extras.
I might have pursued this if all 5 thematic extras could have been modified in the same way but one of them doesn't contain an 'I' (a pity, because the grid could easily be reconstructed to remove this thematic entry altogether).
I've made the 5 extras disappear as far as possible (given the conditions set out in the preamble) but as they're thematically 'not there' to begin with, this seems like a waste of time to me.
I hope there is a clever endgame to this puzzle - with appropriate adjustments to all 5 entries - otherwise it's just a question of how we are to interpret a rather clumsy preamble.