Answer the Phone Like Buddy the Elf Day (Holiday Hoopla 2023)
| Answer the Phone Like Buddy the Elf Day | |
|---|---|
| Holiday Hoopla 2023 | |
| Answer | Click to revealCHARLIE BROWN |
| Statistics | |
| No. solves | 78 |
| No. total guesses | 146 |
| Links | |
| Puzzle | Link |
Answer the Phone Like Buddy the Elf Day is a word puzzle from Holiday Hoopla 2023. Its difficulty level is categorized as Medium relative to the other puzzles in the hunt.
The puzzle is presented as a series of grids with emojis above each one.
Solve Path[edit | edit source]
Solvers may notice that each grid contains a number of white boxes, some of which contain punctuation symbols like commas, periods, colons, and question marks. Most of the white boxes are found in groups, with a black gap separating the groups. It would be reasonable to assume that the groups of white boxes represent words, with a single letter occupying each white box.
If solvers are not familiar with Buddy the Elf, Googling the title of the puzzle leads to the quote "Buddy the Elf, what's your favorite color?". It turns out that the flavor text of this puzzle depicts this quote in emojis.
There are 14 grids with emojis above them. Solvers should identify the quote represented by the emojis and fill in the words in the grid. All of the quotes come from the 2003 Christmas film "Elf", and various sites will have these listed.
The last grid doesn't have any emojis above it and is visibly separated from all the others by a horizontal line, so it would make sense to look at that grid later and treat it differently from the others.
| Grid | Emojis | Quote |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 🎅🧝♀️🧝🧝♂️😋4️⃣: 🍬, 🍬🦯, 🍬🌽, 🍁🥞 | We elves try to stick to the four main food gorups: candy, candy canes, candy corns, and syrup. |
| 2 | 🙇🍪🍪🍪🍪🍪🍪🍪🍪🍪🍪🍪➡️📼. | I'm sorry I ruined your lives and crammed eleven cookies into the VCR. |
| 3 | 👍📰… 👀➡️🐶📅. | So, good news… I saw a dog today. |
| 4 | 📸📸📸💅🌏🔃☀️🌍🔃☀️🌎🔃☀️ | The paparazzi have been trying to nail me for years. |
| 5 | 👃🤢! 🫵👃🥩🧀, 🫵❌👃🎅. | You stink! You smell like beef and cheese, you don't smell like Santa. |
| 6 | 🧐🌧🦌🪄✨ | And where do the reindeer get their magic from? |
| 7 | 🎅🧝♀️🧝🧝♂️❤️🗣📖. 🎰🫵🤷. | Elves love to tell stories. I bet you didn't know that about elves. |
| 8 | 👋, 🎅🧝♂️!⛏❄️🫐? | Hey, buddy! Want to pick some snow berries? |
| 9 | 😡🧝♂ | He's an angry elf. |
| 10 | 1️⃣ 👀➡️🍬➡️ 🛣, 🍃. ❌🤑🍬. | First off, you see gum on the street, leave it there. It isn't free candy. |
| 11 | 🤔🍞🏠,🍪🍩➖🥜,⛸️,👉👈👫. | I thought maybe we could make gingerbread houses, and eat cookie dough, and go ice skating, and- maybe even hold hands. |
| 12 | 🥇🎄🥂🧑🎤 📣 🎶👂. | The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear. |
| 13 | 👋🎅🧝♂️!🙏👀👨👦. | Bye, Buddy! I hope you find your dad. |
| 14 | ☝️💓 | My finger has a heartbeat. |
Some of the letters in the grids have a box around them.
| Grid | Boxed Letters |
|---|---|
| 1 | W, H, O, S, A |
| 2 | I, D, I |
| 3 | S, N, T |
| 4 | T, H, E, R, A |
| 5 | N, Y, O, N, E |
| 6 | W, H, O |
| 7 | K, N, O |
| 8 | W, S, W |
| 9 | H, A |
| 10 | T, C |
| 11 | H, R, I, S, T, M, A, S |
| 12 | I, S, A, L, L, A |
| 13 | B, O, U |
| 14 | T |
Solvers may notice that the extracted letters, if read in order, seem to spell English words. The lengths of these words fit the blanks in the final grid (the one without any emojis above it). Placing the extracted letters inside this grid leads to the final cluephrase Click to revealWHO SAID "ISN'T THERE ANYONE WHO KNOWS WHAT CHRISTMAS IS ALL ABOUT?".
This is a quote from another well-known Christmas film, A Charlie Brown Christmas. The final answer is Click to revealCHARLIE BROWN.
Puzzle Elements[edit | edit source]
Film Quotes - Prominent quotes are taken from the movie Elf (2023).
Emoji Sentences - Solvers need to identify the English words represented by a series of emojis.
Marked Elements - The letters to extract from each grid are indicated by a border around them.
Gimmick Repetition - The majority of the solve involves filling in grids where word lengths are enumerated. After extracting letters from those grids, the final grid is filled out the same way. Additionally, the final grid involves identifying a quote from a (albeit different) Christmas film.
