Well I've made a fantastic gaffe à la Oscars 2017 and announced the wrong winner for the contest last month. Very sorry to have given you the "La La Land" treatment. Still a fantastic puzzle though, only separated by one vote!
Captain who totally should've learned to speak whale (seriously, where's Dory when you need her?)
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Across
1A
Captain who totally should've learned to speak whale (seriously, where's Dory when you need her?)
5A
Counterfeit, bogus
9A
Implement used in schools when paper wasn't a thing
10A
One of the three legs in the Sphinx's riddle
11A
"Ugh, I HATE geography, especially having to memorize all of these place names. Seriously, ____ is this stuff?"
13A
Pink Floyd's "____ You Were Here"
14A
Bird perches such as birches
15A
Bug
16A
Sticker for school children?
18A
"Math isn't my strong suit either, but if you take the time to explain things to me, then ____"
23A
____ bloomer (...no, it's not "OKAY")
24A
Org. within "keep away smog"
25A
Part of a baseball cap
28A
Metal in blood
29A
"Chemistry, on the other hand - especially when we do experiments in the lab... that's when I truly am ____!"
32A
How your voice is meant to sound WHEN YOU TYPE IN ALL CAPS LIKE THIS!!!
33A
Just like ewe
34A
Tolkien creatures who most likely have no idea of what an otorhinolaryngologist is
35A
Unit of cell data? (or the protagonist of the Emoji Movie, but I'd rather not bring up the Emoji Movie)
Down
1D
Cold state
2D
Owneth Shakespeare's wife, with "away"?
3D
___ Z (like the dictionary)
4D
Big ___ (world-famous bell tower) (cue "it's not the tower at all" comments)
5D
Like Luigi in "Luigi's Mansion", pretty much all the time
6D
Animal that's beyond cross?
7D
Poker term that's Latin for "before"
8D
"It's OK... I guess" interjections (or 35-Across35AUnit of cell data? (or the protagonist of the Emoji Movie, but I'd rather not bring up the Emoji Movie)[----] and others in the Emoji Movie, but I'd rather not bring up the Emoji Movie)
9D
Word sometimes implied to follow "tee"
11D
Abbr. in a Call of Duty game title
12D
Piano exercise (or something pupils do at any normal école) (I think, I don't know my French that well)
16D
It makes people stone-faced
17D
Value measured in degrees from the equator (abbr.)
19D
British insurance giant
20D
At peace
21D
A point ahead
22D
What pupils may do after (or during) an intense gym class
25D
Like a demon, even when you move the last letter to the start