Q: In a certain classic film, the protagonist uses two weapons. The name of one of these has 10 letters. If you take its first letter and last six letters, you can rearrange them all to name the other weapon this protagonist uses, in seven letters. What weapons are these?The protagonist uses a different pair of weapons towards the end of the movie.
Edit: [spoiler]Toward the end of the "classic" film, Star Wars, Luke Skywalker fires a pair of proton torpedos into the exhaust port to destroy the Death Star[/spoiler]
A: LIGHTSABER, BLASTER
Superhero movies, another subject I know nothing about. I am informed by Google, though, that there is a particular character who uses these weapons. Rearrange the first four letters of this character’s name, and you get what the weapons might do large-scale.
ReplyDeleteReally? We must have different answers...
DeleteOr Google is wrong, or I am (and I am way too ignorant to gauge the accuracy of the weapon-character link Google brought up).
DeleteI understand where both of you are coming from. There's the picture, and then there's the big picture.
DeleteWell, Google AI informs me that harpoon is a 10 letter weapon. So there is that.
DeleteThis is the fastest and easiest puzzle I've ever solved and I'm hardly a fan of the movie. Be careful when you're entering the name of the ten letter weapon because spell check, or auto correct, or whatever you call it, will mangle your word.
ReplyDeleteYeah, got it after reading "In a certain classic film, the protagonist uses two weapons."
DeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
DeleteHuh, but the first film I thought of that fit the description was made a few years later than the intended one. (The two weapons in the one I thought of don't fit, though.)
DeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Deletei wasn’t the fastest to solve this puzzle, but I solved it without any help.
ReplyDeleteThe protagonist's companion uses two words that could cynically define "classic" to critique the protagonist's use of the first weapon.
ReplyDeleteThis was easy. Just rearrange the words.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteSorry, Blaine.
DeleteIt's nowhere near the answer and is not intended as a clue but the very first thing that popped into my head was:
ReplyDelete"Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition! Our chief weapon is surprise...surprise and fear...fear and surprise.... our two weapons are fear and surprise...and ruthless efficiency.... Our three weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency...and an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope.... Our four...no... amongst our weapons.... amongst our weaponry...are such elements as fear, surprise.... I'll come in again."
One of his best movies.
DeleteI'd forgotten that it was in ANFSCD...
DeleteFirst movie I thought of.
ReplyDeleteGot the answer. Will think about a comment while on the road
ReplyDeleteI did get a hilariously wrong answer from Google’s AI, but it has to wait until Thursday
DeleteTake letters 1,3,4,5 from the second weapon. Rearrange to get a word associated with the first weapon
DeleteI can't even rearrange them to form a word, but I can sort of make this work starting with the first weapon. On an unrelated note, I think one of these weapons is more of an antagonist thing.
DeleteI've been thinking about how unlikely it is for JAWS to make a mistake, so I re-read his post with fresh eyes. I was trying to rearrange the REMAINING letters (2, 6, 7) after "taking letters 1, 3, 4, 5 from the second weapon." I now realize I should have been rearranging the letters taken. I now know the word he intended (and how mystified he must have been by my inability to form any word at all).
DeleteMy apologies for not being clear. It's been extremely busy around here, and I'm finally getting back to comment on this. As I expect you figured out, you take the B,A,S,T from BLASTER, and rearrange to STAB, which Qui-Gon certainly did in the Phantom Menace.
DeleteAs for the funny Google AI result, when I first looked at the puzzle, I thought of Indiana Jones, who carried a bullwhip and pistol, which obviously don't work. I then tried googling "movie where protagonist carries two weapons, or something like that. Interestingly, the AI told me that question was related to a recent NPR puzzle, and the answer is "The Duellists," where Harvey Keitel's character carries a smallsword and a pistol. The AI then said you take the last 6 letters of smallsword, which the AI said is SWORDS (no, I say, it's LSWORD), the AI then said you can rearrange SWORDS to PISTOLS (um, no, not even close). And people at work wonder why I don't trust AI.
Hohum. I have the answer. A puzzle about weapons seems off to me, particularly this week. Well, sadly, any week now.
ReplyDeleteWW: I agree. Not good timing.
DeleteI'm sure he lines these up weeks in advance.
DeleteAnd I am equally sure he does not.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteI had a really good time solving this puzzle.
ReplyDeleteMusical clue: Chopsticks.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteI try to allow some leeway on off-topic discussions, but would prefer if people could mostly stick to puzzle related discussions. AdSense occasionally lowers my ad revenue when a page has controversial topics that advertisers would rather shy away from. It doesn't help that there's a lot of discussion on wea*ons this week too.
DeleteHe was celebrating some opinions being extinguished, so he should understand.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteTwo biblical names come to mind.
ReplyDeleteA prehistoric animal comes to mind
ReplyDeleteContinuing a theme of last week, one of the weapons anagrams to a sort of snake.
ReplyDeleteContinuing the NFL theme, BLASTER anagrams to STABLER. Ken "The Snake" Stabler was an NFL quarterback inducted posthumously into the Hall of Fame.
DeleteLetters 3, 4, 5, and 7 from the second weapon rearrange into a relevant word.
ReplyDeletegreat clue!
DeleteStar, as in Star Wars.
DeleteThis puzzle took me six minutes to solve, but only because I am one of the six Americans who have never seen this movie. I hear it's great though.
ReplyDeleteWho are the other four?
DeleteNever met 'em
DeleteThe protagonist's given name and the director's surname are related to the first weapon.
ReplyDeleteSolved. But ....... how long ago does a film (or book, or album, etc) need to have been released before it's a 'Classic'?
ReplyDeleteThat is a great question, and I have the answer. Sometimes when I am in the library looking at DVD movies that are available for checkout, I will come across one or two that, on the back, will say: "Instant classic!" So now I understand that a film can become a classic before it is even in the can. Isn't that wonderful?
DeleteThat does help, Sky. Thanks. I don't feel as old now Will's clue about Classic Film, and 10 letter weapon ....and all I was coming up with was Water Glass (when Dorothy took out the Wicked Witch) That's the era I think of when thinking of 'classic'.
DeleteOh, Van, I gnu it wood. I understood when I first read the puzzle question the movie it would be, but not wanting it to be so, I thought of broadsword and longbow. What finally took me back to thinking more of today's movies was the passing thought that my Depends would never fit in those green tights were I to have been one of Robin Hood's Merry Men. And that got me to further thinking about what they were so merry about in those tighty greenies. (Please do not read more realism into this post than is true.)
DeleteThis made me think of Mark Chapman.
ReplyDeleteThe first weapon (phonetically) makes me think of a description of a certain athlete.
ReplyDeleteGot it—but if the days of near-constant anagrams ever go away, I won't miss 'em.
ReplyDelete(miss 'em like a Stormtrooper, that is)
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteOne part of the first weapon made me think of a character in Ice Age
ReplyDeleteChatGPT, Claude, DeepSeek, and Gemini all solved this.
ReplyDeleteDid Lex Luthor try to strangle Superman with a tie knot?
ReplyDeleteThink of a recent movie in which the hero CREATES a new weapon, but has philosophical misgivings about the weapon that he, with his team, has built, along with its ramifications on humankind.
ReplyDeleteThe weapon he created was made possible by two new technologies never known before on Earth.
Take the names of those two new technologies and REMOVE GASDFFUSIN from one and REMOVE LUTOIUCO.
Then ADD the letters HEEP and rearrange to get the last name of the movie's hero. Who is it?
This may be the reason why this movie became a classic.
ReplyDeleteRIP ROBERT REDFORD
ReplyDeleteR.I.P.
ReplyDeleteFREEDOM OF SPEECH AND THE FIRST AMENDMENT
LIGHTSABER, BLASTER
ReplyDelete"Hohum. I have the answer. A puzzle about w*apons seems off to me, particularly this week. Well, sadly, any week now." W*apons have been on BLAST this week in the news.
STAR WARS >>> LIGHTSABER & BLASTER
ReplyDeleteLIGHT SABER>>BLASTER
ReplyDeleteMy comment that I solved this puzzle without help was a pointer to it being a solo effort, a reference to Han Solo.
I wrote, “Rearrange the first four letters of this character’s name, and you get what the weapons might do large-scale.” Rightly or wrongly (I am too ignorant about sci-fi to judge), Google told me that the character that uses both weapons is EZRA Bridger. RAZE.
ReplyDeleteWhen I referred to the picture and the Big Picture to explain Splainit's confusion, I was hinting at the fact that Ezra Bridger was not a character from the Star Wars movies, but he was a primary antagonist in the animated spinoffs in the larger Star Wars universe.
DeleteLIGHTSABER, BLASTER
ReplyDeleteHint: (removed) “…the bulb finally lit.” —> light(saber)
Our friend skydiveboy (Mark Scott) is our featured puzzle-maker on this week's edition of Puzzleria!
ReplyDeleteMark's Skydiversionary Appetizer this time is two-puzzle package titled: “E.T. homophone home!”& “Whinnies & Counterclockwisdom!”. His first puzzle involves celestial bodies; his second involves horse-racing. As usual, skydiveboy's puzzles are not only entertaining and challenging... they are also educational.
We shall upload the gems and all of our sparkling puzzles very soon, this very afternoon!
Also on this week's menu:
* a Schpuzzle of the Week titled “Our compliments to the Shift!”
* a “Paging Mythological Metis!” Hors d’Oeuvre titled “Stumped? Implore Metis, Wisdom Goddess!”
* a “Missed it by that much!” Puzzle Slice titled "Breakfast brunch boiled baked,"
* a Druggy Dessert titled "An inclined plane is a slow pup," and
* nine riffs of this week's NPR Puzzle Challenge titled "Lightsaber Blaster Weaponizes Weisz!", including six by Nodd and one from a loyal Puzzleria!n contributor.
So, please stop in for some skydiversionary fun!
LegoWhoBelievesThatYouCanSolveAllThePuzzlesOnPuzzleriaYouMustBeWiserThatMetisThrGreekGoddessOfWisdom!
lightsaber, blaster
ReplyDeleteThe person is Luke Skywalker.
I wrote "This was easy. Just rearrange the words." That was a reference to Yoda, who would have phrased it "Easy, this was."
ReplyDeleteBtw, a little known fact: The reason the Star Wars movies were released out of order was that "in charge of production, Yoda was."
LIGHTSABER, BLASTER. Isn't it amazing how much you can know about a movie that you've never seen?!
ReplyDeleteI would agree with you that it sometimes is, but, for me anyway, it was not the case. I didn't even know who the protagonist is. I solved it rather easily because I knew it was not longbow, but going to be some sci-fi film I would never watch that would have something made up for weapons. Not so difficult to solve it from there. Even though Mauser was on my mind this week, I did not consider it relevant.
DeleteI wrote “This may be the reason why this movie became a classic.” That refers to Tennyson’s poem celebrating (?!) the disastrous charge of the Light Brigade who, wielding their sabers, charged directly into the wrong Russian gun emplacements and were slaughtered. “Theirs not to reason why.”
ReplyDeleteAs a digression “The Reason Why” by Cecil Woodham-Smith is a fine dissection of all of the petty rivalries, class prejudices and incompetent leadership that made this disaster possible. Her book on the Irish famine, “The Great Hunger,” is an equally good history of an even more consequential disaster.
LIGHTSABER, BLASTER
ReplyDelete> The protagonist's companion uses two words that could cynically define "classic" to critique the protagonist's use of the first weapon.
"HOKEYreligions and ANCIENT weapons are no match for a good BLASTER at your side, kid."
(Note that the dead guy wielded a HEAVY SCIMITAR, perhaps the opposite of a LIGHT SABER.)
> Musical clue: Chopsticks.
LIGHTSABER chopsticks bought in Akhibara Electric Town in summer 2015 (several months before the release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
> The protagonist's given name and the director's surname are related to the first weapon.
"Luke" and "Lucas" both relate to LIGHT.
My post - "the first weapon (phonetically) makes me think of a description of a certain athlete" was a reference to a Light (as in underweight) Sabre (as in Buffalo Sabre).
ReplyDeletelightsaber --> blaster
ReplyDeleteI was getting my COVID shot this afternoon so I couldn’t post at the witching hour. Anyway, last Sunday I said, “I had a really good time solving this puzzle.” In other words, I had a “blast.”
LIGHTSABER, BLASTER(used by Luke Skywalker in "Star Wars")
ReplyDeletepjbWondersIfAnyoneElseHereIsn'tTooCrazyAboutTheNew[FCC]HeadEither?
"This made me think of Mark Chapman." Mark David Chapman shot John Lennon, making him a "star killer". "Starkiller" was George Lucas's original name for Luke Skywalker.
ReplyDeleteThis week's challenge comes from Dave Shukan, of San Marino, Calif. Take the phrase EASTERN TIME. Change one letter and rearrange the result to name a place that observes Eastern Time.
ReplyDeleteI got a great answer, but the place observes Atlantic Time, so I'm trying again.
https://www.npr.org/2025/09/21/g-s1-89273/sunday-puzzle
I have an answer, but "place" is sufficiently ambiguous that I'm not certain.
ReplyDelete