Theoretically Anonymous

And for like the first half of the show, this kind of seemed to be the case, aside from the mystery surrounding whatever Stan was hiding in the basement.

And then the Ford reveal / backstory happens and you see Stan in a completely new light. 

Stan isn’t a con man because he wants to be. He’s a con man out of necessity - first because he was kicked out of his house and forced to make it on his own at 18, and then because it was helping him work to bring his brother back. He doesn’t just run the mystery shack because he likes to lie to people and swindle them out of their money - he does it because he needed a way to make money and keep the shack while trying to figure out a way to reopen the portal. He has a fake identity because he needed to keep people from snooping around looking for Stanford and the easiest way to do that was to take his place.

All the things that make you think he’s selfish and shady throughout the first half of the series are revealed to be because he’s a desperate, heartbroken man who wants to bring his brother back. He isn’t the traditional gruff guy who doesn’t love anyone until some rambunctious kids come into his life at all - he loves his brother so much that literally everything he does is to get him back. And he lies to the kids in an effort to protect them and keep anything bad from happening to them like it did to his brother.

Great twists / mystery reveals don’t just take the story in a new direction - they cast new light on everything that has come before. And Gravity Falls does that so well.

Just look at one of the first episodes in the series where Mabel makes a wax figure of Stan and Stan appears to fall in love with it and mourns it when it melts, going as far to host a funeral for it. Without knowing Stan’s backstory, this whole storyline just feeds into our view of Stan as a self-centered, ridiculous person. It’s ridiculous he would cherish a wax figure of himself. It’s so egotistical that he would host a funeral for it when it died and get honestly choked up about it.

But then you learn that Stan lost his twin brother and that whole storyline doesn’t really feel like the story of a selfish, egotistical man anymore. It’s the story of a man who felt like he got his brother back again momentarily and then had to lose him all over again.

Here are the 10 “eye” messages thus far from Season 1A of The Owl House, listed in their order of appearance! We also have several appearances of runes outside of the main hidden message, listed below:

From Episode 3: a classroom blackboard showing the translations of several runes. The bottom row is R S SH T TH V W Y Z.

From Episode 5: “History Coven”

From Episode 6: “Lunar Magic”

From Episode 7: “Ancient Texts”

From Episode 8: “Hunter’s Mark”

(It should be noted that the R in “mark” looks a little strange here, but no other letters make sense, so it’s presumably just an error.)

And given what we now know about the world of the Boiling Isles, “join the coven or face our wrath” takes on a much more literal and plot-relevant meaning. 

“Between you and me I believe there is an conspiracy of paranormal origin all connected to this town.”

But I’d argue he also sees himself in Mabel’s reluctance to grow up. It’s true that Bill has been around longer than humans can even wrap their minds around, but he’s still immature. He still throws tantrums when he doesn’t get his way — he’s just a big, selfish kid himself, and he doesn’t want to grow up either.

And he’s not entirely wrong when he identifies these similarities in Mabel, but he vastly overestimates the strength of her selfish tendencies while underestimating the strength of her caring nature and her loyalty to her family.

We see it in Sock Opera, where Bill expects her to hand over the Journal rather than make a sacrifice for Dipper’s sake, and we see it again in Weirdmageddon, when Bill has complete faith that Mabeland will prove inescapable — but unlike Bill, Mabel is a good person who loves her family, and both times Bill’s plans are foiled. (Meanwhile, we know Bill had a horrible relationship with his own family, and I think that plays into how he expects Mabel to behave — hence the term “projection” feeling especially apt.)

[ID: The first image shows Bill Cipher floating in a street in Gravity Falls during Weirdmageddon as he says: “This party never stops!” The second image shows Mabel sitting at her brightly colored office desk in Mabeland, gesturing enthusiastically to Dipper, Soos, and Wendy as she says: “Here the sun shines all day, the party never ends…” /end ID.]

Bill is a villain who has never grown up in a show that’s about growing up, and that seems like a very deliberate choice. He offers Mabel an escape from reality that he sees as so tempting, so irresistible, that he thinks it would take “a will of titanium” to overcome, and he completely brushes off the possibility that the Pines might break out of it.

Maybe that’s because Bill knows that an idealistic world like Mabeland, full of nonstop partying and free from any obligation to grow up, is exactly the type of trap that would work on him.

(Some sources/quotes that first sent me down this line of thinking below the cut.)

One of first flashbacks to pre-banishment Zuko in Book 1 shows Zuko as someone who is not only empathetic to his countrymen, but also as someone who is eager to learn how to be a good leader. And when Zuko goes into his angst coma in Book 2, Iroh tells him something along the lines of someday seeing Zuko transform into “the beautiful butterfly prince he was always meant to be” that suggests even Iroh didn’t expect them to be in their Teashop AU forever. Which would make sense since if Zuko didn’t then Azula - the girl whose been groomed to follow in Ozai’s brutal footsteps - and if Azula didn’t or couldn’t then that would leave a power vaccum that could be even more devisive.

Stephen Hillenburg was a marine biologist who created Spongebob as a part of a project to help educate kids on the ocean while working at the orange county marine institute. many of the characters in this educational comic went on to become a part of the series, including the future cartoon’s titular character, then known as Bob the Sponge.

this cartoon revolutionized the industry and in its initial boom was widely adored for its ability to be enjoyed by all ages and all demographics, creating an animated juggernaut for its generation akin to the simpsons or looney tunes, with people of all stripes able to remember its finest moments at the drop of a hat.

hillenburg began his official work on this groundbreaking program 15 years after graduating college. he left his career at the marine institute to study at CalArts. he didnt get his MFA until the early 90s. spongebob squarepants, now considered by many to be nickelodeon’s premier nicktoon, began airing the year he turned 38. his adventure as a professional truly shows the power of pursuing far-flung dreams, and that someone can do something huge long after their supposed “prime.”

this man changed animation, nickelodeon, and the childhoods of millions of people around the world forever in his unfortunately short life. i think it should be known just how much he managed to do in his time here, though, and his work and lofty ambition was something to be admired. 

New and improved design, just in time for Redbubble’s Black Friday sale!

S4 clip showed at the New York ComiCon, confirmed to be from the first episode in the season.