Cryptic crossword No 1,375

Spoilers ...

Remarkable as always, Fez, but you will not be surprised to hear I didn't attempt this. I am utterly incapable of solving this kind of puzzle and, having looked at your Annotations and Spoilers, confirm I would have got nowhere. But I admire your ability to create it.

Despite some initial suspicion at what seemed like a complete spanner in the works to my usual solving approach, trying to spot the extra words become increasingly enjoyable throughout the solve and you've woven some stunning surfaces with your additional constraint. A bloody good puzzle too, and well worth the slightly steeper entry fee, thanks for showcasing another fascinating device Fez! In terms of surface, I particularly liked 1a, 10a, 15a, 24a, 31a, 3d (SurfaceOTD), 6d, 10d, 17d, 19d...

Well I got there, Fez, albeit with a few checks, a little Googling and 3 or 4 unparsed. Tremendous stuff and quite a feat to make it just about accessible (even for me) despite the superfluous words. As sirdakka says, the way in which you've used the additional words to create some great surfaces is a joy; 15a a simple but delightful case in point. Other favourites: 1a, 14a, 24a, 2d, 3d (SPOILER!), 6d, 10d, 17d and 23d (ha!).

Thanks Fez - I am notoriously dreadful at these sorts of puzzles (despite having once set one myself), but actually got about 95% of the way there in the end. I think I completed the gridfill, but got a bit muddled with some of the extraneous words & had never heard of the creator...

Magnificent - I do like this kind of ‘convoluted nonsense’, it’s right up my rue 😁 and some fabulous surfaces too. Some devilishly complicated parsing here and there too, of course (ahem, 27a…). Starting off better with the downs than the acrosses, I stumbled upon ‘the creator’ with the extra letters and a spot of light Googling made the rest of the pennies drop…

Very impressive! Thanks Fez. I approached this with trepidation but the clues consistently fell before I needed help to get over the line. No prior knowledge of the theme but it was fun to unravel everything. Great work to get a Nina into the grid alongside the other thematic content. Favourite clues were 14a, 15a, 24a, 1d, 10d and 23d.