Spoilers for Friday 15 July 2022

[Gavin Chipper]

Are there any words other than MINUTE that have a superlative listed but not a comparative or vice versa? MINUTER is in separately so it doesn't really matter but it's still weird.

[Gavin Chipper]

There's an explanation in Collins.

Minute does not have a comparative form. The superlative form minutest is used to emphasize how small something is, rather than in comparisons.

[samir pilica]

Mere …….merest ?

[Gavin Chipper]

The problem with that is that "mere" is one syllable so the comparative and superlative come free. Though I doubt anyone says "merer".

[Gavin Chipper]

Maybe it's slightly more complicated than that though. MERE is listed as an attributive adjective and I think there has been some debate in the past as to whether you can have a comparative and superlative with them. MERER and MEREST are both valid on Apterous but only MEREST finds the entry for MERE in the Lexico search box (known to be an unreliable measure though).

[Philip A]

I think this is only the second time in 7085 shows that a contestant has read a cue card, after Chris Philpot.

[Toby McDonald]

RENEGADO in R11

[Howie Myers]

r4 REPLATED
r11 alt: KNEADER