The Outer Limits

Great job, Mikey! Thanks for the boundless joy your puzzles bring.

OMG!!! what a brilliant puzzle. I saw all the EDGEs and it took me a while to come up with an 11-letter adjective to fit.

nice one as usual... spotted the metanism early on but couldn't pin down the exact phrase (i tried double-edged and edge-trimmed first)... then i ran down another rabbit hole seeing other possibilities for the edges (like zone/cruz or sin/bans & din/band)... i feel like theres a recent trend in puzzles that are *suggestive* of the meta instead of pinning it exactly, which makes it harder for a dumdum like me, but i guess i just gotta get good (or at least mediocre, fingers crossed)

"sign of summer?" was so devious... i was like why doesn't LEO fit?! also, the rita ora and ana de armas reference... so true!!

Cutting edge is two words.

Edgy! And I love it! I needed some help, but even with that, it was a very enjoyable solve. Thanks, Mikey! I hope the Cubs make the post-season!

This puzzle is a bit edgy! :P Thanks, Mikey!

Well, I got it, but only with a couple of strong nudges. Nice feat of construction!

ha, ha, ha, ha

I needed some gentle pushing through this one, found the metanism, but only after being told the answer was hyphenated did it come to me (immediately). Guess that will be the final nudge thrown out?! Reminded me of Look Both Ways! Thanks Mikey!

I thought my first guess of "educational" (edge-ucational) wasn't too bad! But I needed nudge #7 to finally get to the correct adjective. None of the 11-letter word lists I was looking at included hyphens...

Great puzzle! I initially had a zillion surplus Es around the edges but it took a bit to notice other letters that fit patterns. The hardest part of the puzzle may have been not realizing that cuttingedge has ever been thought of as one word! LOL. It's a perfect answer, though, given the metanism.

Well that was (1) difficult (2) brilliant. You have no idea how many different combos of E??E I had (lots will ALMOST work). Then I had a mental block because I could not make the three row parts work out until I realized that making the E the last in the row and first in the column satisfied it (as I say. mental block). Even when I had it I submitted the wrong answer because I was sure that it would be, like the puzzle itself, cutting edge. Obviously LEADING edge was better, but cutting edge describes it to a T. I'm not even going to guess how long this took to make. I have an idea how you did it but I am sure I would not have had the patience to. My constructor AND solver hats are both tipped to you sir!

Geesh that was a struggle, but I love the answer.

Brilliant to be able to surround the entire puzzle with the same repeated word. Was close to finding edge after the second set of nudges, knew the first and letter letter had to be E, but couldn't quite find the other two letters. Nudge eight forced me to find the correct positioning of the word, and then I realized that it had to be EDGE, which of course made total sense in retrospect. Not many candidates for an 11-letter adjective after that, and CUTTING seemed the most appropriate beginning based on the title.

Thanks Mikey! I had the metanism of the missing letters around the outside but got stuck trying to use "ET"s everywhere...which of course kept me stuck in a rabbit hole. Need the second set of nudges (not the 3rd) to let me know it was the same 4 letter word in all places to help me find the path to the finish line.

Thanks, Mikey! I had "edge" a long time ago, but I needed all your nudges to get the "cutting" part. I should've figured it out. Great construction!

I figured out EDGE pretty soon after solving the grid, but couldn't get there until the nudges! Nice job, as always.

If anyone can point me to an explanation of the meta, I'd appreciate it!