My time: 9:54, but this was a tricky one.
Theme: BOUNCE BACK. That is, each of the four themed Across answers starts not in the leftmost square, but in the circled square. You read it from the circle to the end of the answer, then backwards to the leftmost square, where it ends. This means that these answers have a section that is a palindrome.
For example, potato pancake ("fried Hanukkah treat") is displayed as EKACNA(P)OTA. Start at the (P) to read POTA, then bounce back and read backwards, to pancake. The palindrome part is potatop. "Fluffy loaf with moist texture" is DAER(B)ANA, so you read BANA, then go backward to finish: na bread. The palindrome section of this phrase is bananab.
It's a lot of work for something that doesn't have a really fun payoff.
SEIKO has come up before in the puzzle, but not as "watch brand featured in James Bond films."
I knew "Thunder, but not Lightning" referred to some team name. It turns out to be an NBA team, the Oklahoma City Thunder.
It was "home of Whitman College" in the themed answers that first clued me in to what was going on. I knew it couldn't be just "Walla, Washington," but there wasn't enough room for two Wallas. This, combined with solving the capper clue pretty quickly and some very odd letter clusters in the parts of the answer that I'd already got (IHS?), told me there would be some backwards motion. If I'd heard of Whitman College that would have helped too.
I don't understand why 'Soprano's co-star?" has the question mark joke indicator. An ALTO would be a Soprano's co-star. The apostrophe makes it clear that the TV program is not being referred to. Seems very straightforward.
"U, V, or W on the periodic table" is METAL. U is uranium, the radioactive metal; V is vanadium, a corrosion-resistant metal; and W is tungsten, which used to be used for lightbulb filaments but not is used mainly for mining tools.
I have never heard of the documentary Queens & Cowboys, but as soon as I saw that title, I immediately put in GAY RODEO. What else could it be?
I never gave a damn about wrestling, so I have never heard of BAM BAM Bigelow (né Scott Charles) a big guy with a flame tattoo on his head. He died of a drug overdose.
For "glen" I put *DALE but it's VALE. All three terms mean a valley!
"Trident shaped letter" PSI came up in March 2018.
Red Sox slugger David Oritz's nickname Big PAPI appeared in February 2018.
Photographer NAN Goldin was just in the puzzle this August 13.
Clever clues: "Bank security option?" is LEVEE. "Get unionized?" is WED. 'Not quite right?' is ACUTE.
I recognize that today's theme was pretty clever and probably required a lot of work, but it was like working really hard to open a present only to find out it was hand-knitted socks. The giver meant well, but it's just not something to delight in. I look at ELU(S)PACE, and I just think, why? Okay, CIAO.
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