Happy Haunting!

I really enjoyed your wordplay in the themer clues...thanks Rick!

Boo!

-- but in a good way --

Test solved a while ago, which meant it was like doing it anew. Loved it!

Spooky fun! I had to back-solve a few once I saw where this was heading. Thanks, Rick!

Guessed right the first time...now to really solve.

Had me spooked there for a minute, but I got a plasma infusion, started a new sheet and the answer appeared out of nowhere. However, I ex-spectre there will be a lot of rabbit hole followers! Liked the puzzle Cap as always.

I made a small mistake thinking that ghostrider was a superhero nickname, not a Cowboy legend, but was able to figure out my mistake from the other 5. Thanks!

Bootiful!

Fun one, and appreciated the Dan Aykroyd nudge!

That took me awhile. Loved the AHA moment. Thanks for the Halloween puzzle!

Fun puz, Cap'n!

Very nice! You’re good at this, Cap’n!

Just learned something new about Crosshare. If you have complete the grid but leave to window for a day or so, when you finally solve you will get the data from the time you completed the grid; not the current time. So I completed the grid long before anyone had solved the meta, but couldn't solve, so when I did solve it appeared as though I was first. I needed to reload to see all the current info.

What do you mean no one is on the leaderboard yet?

So a cowboy legend is a Ghost Rider? And not a superhero nickname is a ghost rider? Oh, .... Ghost Rider as in..... I guess I can see that

Another pro level creation.

Well, I got that in the weirdest way.

Writer and Rider made me think of Birds comment how British people think Americans pronounce those the same and I wonder if Rick was making an in-joke. Now I couldn't see anything anything at all and when you can't see anything the tiniest little rabbit holes keep reappearing and bugging you. Okay, so CLAWSAT could sound like CLOSET and the Writer/Rider could be a hint at that. Now obviously that's not it. No one would make such a puzzle but... there's nothing nothing else. Okay, to get it off my chest I wrote to Cap'n Rick and said "That's not it, right?".

Now I've noticed a thing about muggles. It's impossible to write to any muggle, myself, included, and say "Can you answer this question? Yes/No? No nudges. Just answer the question" and not have them give you a nudge. So I was told the center clue was key. Well, okay, I figured that's not really much of a spoiler. After all it was directly about halloween so I figured it'd probably figure. I just couldn't figure how and thought if I'd get a toehold I might figure it out.

But I had nothing so I figure I'd try looking at what EERIE could relate, but it couldn't relate in any way. EER-Like but there were no clues with EER. There weren't even more than two clues with EE. Could it be ER? By weird coincidence there were exactly six entries with ER. So I go through the entries one by one seeing if they could be alternate answers or parallel synonyms of words with ER. Not much luck. I personally have never said buckAroo but always buckEroo so could it be Ero??? That's weak. Is IAN (fleming) a writer? The we had BUSTER. Did Dan Ayckroyd ever have a role as a BUSTER? Go to IMDB....

.... and that's that.

I struggled finding the A.

Anagramming first letters of the key answer clues gives you ABBESS.
A fun Halloween character for those who enjoy risque nun costumes? Thanks as always Cap'n.

We loved how this unfolded! Very satisfying puzzle on multiple levels!

Like many others, I had the wrong idea at first for Ghost Rider -- when I sat down with the puzzle again this morning, I quickly saw my error! Terrific puzzle, Rick!

Great and timely puzzle Cap'n. TY!

You had me stumped for a while with Ghost Rider. Fun puzzle!

Nice! The cluing is all great of course, but the double-duty clue for 25A is inspired!

Great puzzle Cap’n!

Thanks, Cap’n!!

Thanks, Rick!

Even though this one took me far too long, it was most enjoyable. I saw what I needed to do, but struggled over one letter. Glad I came back to it tonight with fresh eyes and new resolve!