Cold Open (Meta)

Nice one! I had E for Winter initially, but backsolved for the Y in Wintry to arrive at nets answer

*meta answer

Cool meta (literally)!

Thanks for the fun meta - and for sending some cool thoughts to those of us sweltering in the Northern Hemisphere

Just did not see one thing for a long time! Cold Start in a cryptic or even some standard crossword clues would be “hard c” or just C or CO (as in Colin, etc). No go. Then I thought O (the letter, or zero), and a number of other mech’s until I noticed i-e could be ice, and wintr could be winter… then stuck forever thinking what to do with CHILLE ! Thanks for the puzzle… is it weird to be craving hot cocoa on this hot hot July day? (I suspect it could be CHILLY where YOU are!)

N ice! I too has CHILLE but quickly cooled to it. Took me forever to get IE ADDON because I did not know what a MOKE was. I mean a MOOK yes (I watched The Sopranos), and a Donkey, yes (I always check for Aussie words Ben), but I could not figure out how it tied to MINOR, Anyway, process of elimination got me there. I figured you had not mimicked the other "Cold Open" from a while back but there still had to be a way to make that title work; luckily IE and OAR put me on track quickly. Thanks for a puzzle to celebrate on the 4th! As for a cold open, I am sure it is cold where you are, but we are expecting heat index of 104 or better today (that is 40C to all those on the other scale)

Nice puzzle on a day when it's 86 degrees out there. At first, I had a D from COL(D)IN and rejected the I in HA(I)LCYON since hail can happen in summer as well. Symmetrical location saved the day.

I figured “IE Add-on” and “Win Tron” had to be used in the meta, although was at “C-H-I-?-L-E” for a bit, until I saw SLEET and realized you weren’t looking for WINTER! Fun one, Ben!

i can't do [a construction of a puzzle like] this all on my own, [unlike you] i'm no superman

Nice one! I was terrible at Tron back in the day…

I needed help, but still fun. Thanks, Ben!

Forget the Y. What the hell is the second L you are all taking granted.

Oof. Couldn't see it for the longest time, but kept coming back to WINTRON because it so obviously had to be part of the meta. Finally saw it as WINTER, and then that led me to the other answers, but then had to correct WINTER to WINTRY. Very clever meta! Thanks Ben.

All of a sudden the MOAT froze over and I was able to skate across. The weirdness of 20A seemed to demand that ICE was involved, and then it just took a breather to come back and figure out the mechanism. Like most, I first had WINTER, but after I solved the other letters I went back and made the necessary adjustment. Nice hint from the title that we had to start with the opening letters of the themers.

We may be sweltering here in the US, but WINTRY is certain what the author is experiencing right now Down Under, I expect.

Kept my options open on a couple of the six until I saw where it might be going, and also remembered to take the title at face value. Thanks for the cool down, Ben!

Staying cool here along the Pacific Coast! Cute meta! I got tripped up by INTRO hidden in WINTRON. Thanks for the holiday puzzle.

Needed the nudges, Ben. Thanks for the refreshing puzzle!

Not using the whole entry has gotten me before. Must have said freeze tag and winter warlock to myself dozens of times. Counted the C’s several times. This one was invisible to me. Keeps me humble.

Getting caught up after being under the weather this week.

I think Scrubs also had THE best musical opening!

Thanks for the puzzle, Ben.

Had the idea of WINTR(Y) when I first filled in the grid but couldn't see the others...had to use 4 of the nudges to get me home. Thanks for the puzzle Ben!

Nudge free, the way I likes it.