| "I ate his liver with some ___ and a nice Chianti": Hannibal Lecter | 77 |
| "When the stars make you drool just like pasta ___ ..." (lyric from "That's Amore") | 107 |
| "Betty, la ___" (telenovela that inspired "Ugly Betty") | 75 |
| NBC reality show that taped contestants drinking donkey semen (it never aired) | 78 |
| Tackle box item turned hair accessory that was one of Yahoo!'s "Worst Trends of 2011" | 99 |
| Gather wealth by exploitation ... as hinted at by this puzzle's circled squares? | 84 |
| Company whose founder first proposed the business concept in a college paper, earning a C | 89 |
| P.T. Barnum hoax The ___ Mermaid (from the old spelling of a Pacific island) | 76 |
| "Freaks and Geeks" creator and "The Office" director Paul | 77 |
| Cartoon character that was the first Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade balloon | 79 |
| Mathematician Pierre whose "last theorem" took 358 years to prove | 75 |
| Chicago-area institution home to the world's most powerful particle accelerator | 83 |
| Geraldine who co-founded the National Organization of Italian American Women | 76 |
| "Speed Dating went really well last night, but I can't make up my mind; the dog catcher was ___..." | 113 |
| Joseph Wapner: "Who won the 1984 Best Actress Oscar?" Bailiff: "___" | 88 |
| Daily crosswords, to puzzle pros (so-called from the number of squares per side) | 80 |
| Useful type of hitch in a pickup truck, or an undesired part of a social circle | 79 |
| “We’ve just learned that two of the graph’s dimensions have been secured by a squadron of ___!” | 111 |
| Bill Moyers speech on income inequality in America, with "The" | 72 |
| Book about some dork with the uncanny ability to create computer documents? | 75 |
| ___ Brunelleschi, Italian Renaissance architect who developed linear perspective | 80 |
| 54 51 32 4 35 18 / 14 5 52 / 59 / 28 1 22 / 44 3 6 16 20 60 61 12 (see notepad) | 127 |
| San Francisco rock venue associated with psychedelic posters, with "The" | 82 |
| "You'd think Band A would hold up, but it's flimsy. Band B wins." | 84 |
| Michael C. ___ (flatware company that provides prizes for many game shows) | 74 |
| "The judges put the names of each ___ ___ for the M.C. to read" | 73 |
| Say "Yes, officer, that's the singer that was using Auto-Tune"? | 77 |
| Worst team's privilege in next year's draft or, with a comma, "premium" | 89 |
| You started out going "50 ___" in a "40-Year-Old Virgin" zone, past the old video store... | 110 |
| "Don't I look fetching in this dress from Warsaw? Huh, huh?" | 74 |
| Has the rear end move side to side ... or a hint to the five asterisked clues | 77 |
| Weather Channel feature (it's the puzzle theme found in a quintet of answers) | 81 |
| They included Chopin's "Prelude in E Minor," in a film title | 74 |
| One set of gifts in "The 12 Days of Christmas" ... as suggested by the circled squares? | 97 |
| "In the Still of the Nite" doo-wop group, with "the" | 72 |
| "Two Weeks" R&B singer whose stage name starts with a three letter acronym | 88 |
| Band whose frontman passes through the audience in a plastic bubble, with "The" | 89 |
| Lame last-minute Halloween costume idea #1: raid the knife drawer, put a gold chain around your neck, and next thing you know you're a ___ | 142 |
| Item in a sealed box, in a famous thought experiment by Erwin Schrödinger | 76 |
| Founding member of Public Enemy known for wearing large clocks around his neck | 78 |
| "And here he is today, the luckiest turkey in America. And for the first time in his life, he's not a ___. Congratulations, Tom." | 143 |
| Manned space mission that gets carried out in the 1984 movie "2010" | 77 |
| Former L.A. Ram who holds the N.F.L. record for most receiving yards in a game (336) | 84 |
| "I'm returning these woods-I beat myself up every time I use them" | 80 |
| Diner owner in the comic strip "Non Sequitur" and wife in the comic strip "Andy Capp" | 105 |
| Compound based on the formula XeF (hey, cut me some slack; this was a tough one to find) | 88 |
| Boston College quarterback with a famous game-ending Hail Mary pass, 11/23/84 | 77 |
| Today, I tried to put a self-effacing three-letter acronym inside each theme entry. Turns out it works in any order except the one I want. ___ | 142 |
| Blueprint spec ... or a '60s-'70s rock group conceding a poker hand? | 76 |
| Poker occasions "you got to know," according to a Kenny Rogers song | 77 |
| It's made with bread at the bottom, bananas and fish in the middle, and potato chips on top | 95 |
| [*cross out* Member of a certain 1990s-2000s rock band] Censor unhappy with "Family Guy" and "Glee," maybe? | 127 |
| Movie title that describes what happened to the five long entries in this puzzle? | 81 |
| Hybrid car that runs a few seconds, then stops, then runs again, then stops again...? | 85 |
| Francis Mulcahy: "What do you shout as a warning in golf?" Radar O'Reilly: "___" | 104 |
| Time leading up to doing whatever you want (as screamed on "Golf Course Braveheart")? | 95 |
| Wooded area mentioned at the start of Longfellow's "Evangeline" | 77 |
| Deadly; understood; take a flat; show-off; drew a blank; New York nickname; pro; director Hartley; 2000 Ethan Hawke role | 120 |
| Impersonal notes ... or what four groups of this puzzle's answers do (totaling 11 words) | 92 |
| "We're constantly attacked" and "the stockades are rotting"? | 84 |
| Douglas Adams' facetious answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything | 98 |
| Disparaging name for someone who wears glasses (and a hint to this puzzle's theme) | 86 |
| TREASURE HUNT STEP 5: Read these (starting east) ... and congratulations! | 73 |
| Potent alcohol + caffeine choices recently forced by the FDA to change their formula, and this puzzle's theme | 113 |
| 1967 hit with the lyric "You know you're a cute little heartbreaker" | 82 |
| "The Conning Tower" writer and Algonquin Round Table member, for short | 80 |
| Display rate unit, in film and animation: Abbr. (hidden in AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PSYCHIATRY) | 90 |
| Composer/humorist who said "Jazz is not dead, it just smells funny" | 77 |
| An orb-weaving spider with black markings resembling a mustache was named after this musician | 93 |
| He wrote "I have the true feeling of myself only when I am unbearably unhappy" | 88 |
| Business model in which only the deluxe version of a product costs money | 72 |
| Frost said writing this was like "playing tennis without a net" | 73 |
| Beverage dispensed from a machine in Lyndon Johnson's Oval Office lounge | 76 |
| "Who are these people, and how are they related?" (highly literal TV title #2) | 88 |
| Feeling literal, the guy with the dead-end fast food job tattooed the word ___ | 78 |
| "Assemble the Fellowship," "Destroy the ring," etc.? | 72 |
| Manson follower and would-be Ford assassin Lynette "Squeaky" ___ | 74 |
| Manson "family" member who attempted to assassinate Gerald Ford | 73 |
| Army post merged with McGuire AFB and Naval Air Engineering Station Lakehurst | 77 |
| Serious software glitch that's certain to cause a crash or even the "blue screen of death" | 104 |
| Shortish documentary program, such as a "behind-the-scenes" or "making-of" segment on a DVD | 111 |
| Homer throws one out the window in the title sequence of "The Simpsons" | 81 |
| Minced oath coined by Norman Mailer in "The Naked and the Dead" | 73 |
| 90's group with the hit "Killing Me Softly," with "the" | 79 |
| Title word in a song that begins, "Some think the world is made for fun and frolic" | 93 |
| Max Bialystock's musical adaptation of "Hamlet," in "The Producers" | 91 |
| Casual, noncompetitive curling tournament (sorry, this might be a local thing, I don't know...) | 99 |
| South Carolina university whose alumni include Amy Grant and Keith Lockhart | 75 |
| Cartoon whose guest voices have included Leonard Nimoy, Al Gore and Beck | 72 |
| Result of "too much change in too short a period of time" (Alvin Toffler) | 83 |
| Approach to arithmetic that emphasizes underlying ideas rather than exact calculations | 86 |
| "I'll just go ahead and throw this out anyway" online abbr. | 73 |
| Texter's "it's a secret" shorthand spelled out by the starts of four puzzle answers | 101 |
| "This is a reminder to also send the email to the head of Big Blue" | 77 |
| Suspected spy's fashionable garb, in Simon and Garfunkel's "America" | 86 |
| "She lost her voice on 'Poker Face' and fell down dancing to 'Bad Romance'"? | 102 |
| "How do I get to Carnegie Hall?" "Practice!" and others? | 76 |
| Event featuring new work, and where the items in the corners might be found | 75 |
| "Who is John ___?" (question asked in "Atlas Shrugged") | 75 |
| "Who is John ___?" (opening line of "Atlas Shrugged") | 73 |