is it midnight yet? (Solution No. 3,284)

If you want a puzzle typifying Hot and Trazom's cluing, as distinguished from Hex or Patrick Berry or some other constructor, this is the one.  Some misdirection, and rules bent gently but not unfairly.

Solution and annotation below the fold.



Legend: "*" anagram; "~" sounds like; "<" letters reversed; "( )" letters inserted; "_" or lower case: letters deleted; "†" explicit in the clue, “^” first letter or letters, “{“ relocated letter or letters; “§” heteronym, “¶“ letter bank

Across

1a	DR| ILL	DR (“a dentist, perhaps”) + ILL (“evil”)
4a	SEALSKIN	§SEAL’S KIN (“something related to a gasket”)
8a	MASCAR | A	MA’S CAR (“how mother gets around”) + A (†) The “around” could be a misdirection if you weren’t paying attention.
9a	*LUNATIC	*CUT NAIL (anagram indicated by “carelessly”)
11a	*OKLAHO | MAN	MAN (“sooner or later, boy”) following (“chases after”) *LA HOOK (anagram indicated by “perverse”)
12a	<LAGER<	<REGAL< (“fit for a queen,” reversal indicated by “from the Orient”)
13a	TART	Double definition
14a	AV | ANT | *GARDE	AV (“audiovisual”) + ANT (“worker”) + *GRADE (anagram indicated by “bad”)
17a	ELDERBERRY	Pun: Elder [Chuck] Berry
19a	_HINT_	hars_H INT_errogation (hidden word indicated by “yields”)
22a	_OWN UP	_d_OWN UP (“opposites,” omission of first letter indicated by “omitting start”) Not a by-the-book clue, but close enough that solvers shouldn’t have trouble.  Folks, this is a definitive Hozom clue.
23a	PRESERVER	§PRE-SERVER
24a	*KITSC | H | Y	*STICK (anagram indicated by “ugly”) + H (“hits”) + ^Y^ou (first letter indicated by “in the face”)
25a	*ANDIR | ON	*DRAIN (anagram indicated by “malfunctioning”) + ON (“supported by”) Another possible misdirection if you’re napping.  The anagram should have been obvious though, in which case you’d know that the “supported by” was a part of the word instead of an indicator.
26a	*DECLARED	*DEED CARL (anagram indicated by “stupidly”) Devious clue!
27a	WEE | PS	WEE (“tiny”) + PS (“addition to a letter”)

Down

1d	DOME OF THE ROCK	Pun: DOME (“head”) OF THE ROCK (“Dwayne Johnson”: pro wrestler [I figured he was a basketball player: “can you smell what The Rock is cooking?])
2d	*INSULAR	*URINALS (anagram indicated by “out of order”)
3d	LO | AT | HE	LO (“look”) + AT (†) + HE (“this man”)
4d	STAG MOVIE	Double definition, though Bambi was a doe. Then again the “Spuds McKenzie” of the beer commercials was actually a bitch.`
5d	_AL LEN_	bifoc_AL LEN_ses (hidden word indicated by “in”)
6d	~SINOLOGY	~SIGN-OLOGY (homonym indicated by “we hear”)
7d	*INTEGE | R	*TEEING (anagram indicated by “off”) + pa^R^ (last letter indicated by “ultimately”) Another nice bit of misdirection, though I might have chosen a shorter or more generic answer to feint at,
10d	CARP | ENT(E)RANTS	CARP (“fish”) + ENTRANTS (“the ones co5peting”) containing (“to devour”) ^E^verything (first letter indicated by “at first”)
15d	NURSEMAID	¶MIDSUMMER MADNESS (letter bank indicated by “all the ingredients for”) OK, this is a first: an inverted letterbank.  But the indicator is blatantly obvious
16d	<TROP I< CAL	<I PORT< (“I left,” reversal indicated by “traveling north”) + CAL_l_ (“visit,” omission of last letter indicated by “most of”)
18d	*DINETTE	*DIET TEN (anagram indicated by “bananas”)
20d	INVERSE	Visual pun on “in verse”: why the clue was put across two lines
21d	ME(AD)OW	MEOW (“what a cat might say”) containing (“about”) AD (“commercial”)
23d	PA_YER	P_l_AYER (“performer,” omission of L indicated by “forgetting introduction to lyrics”)