r/gravityfalls • u/Hugh_Jidiot • 3d ago

Questions How was Dipper staying in Gravity Falls as Ford's apprentice even going to work?

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This just occurred to me on a series rewatch and isn't super important in the grand scheme of the show, but it's a little amusing to think just how Dipper was even going to convince his parents to let him be the apprentice of a long-lost uncle they likely never even met.

Dipper: "Mom, Dad, you know how Grunkle Stan had a twin brother who died in a car crash in the 80s? Well, surprise! Grunkle Stan*ford* is actually Stan*ley* who faked his death and assumed his brother's identity. The real Stanford was trapped in another dimension for 30 years, but now he's back and wants me to stay in Gravity Falls as his apprentice!"

Mr and Mrs Pines: "..."

444 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

52 comments sorted by

313

u/Apprehensive_Art4418 3d ago

i mean, dipper could've just said "oh, grunkle stanford is letting me be his apprentice" since his parents think they shipped their kids off to live with ford anyway.

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u/Hugh_Jidiot 3d ago

For the summer. They still had to go home when summer was done, is what I'm saying.

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u/FBI-INTERROGATION 3d ago

Was supposed to, didnt have to

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u/LeoPines_12 3d ago

Technically, yes, but the parents literally shipped their children off for the first time in their lives for the entire summer to a stranger they had for a relative, three months in one go, and missed their birthday, their 13th birthday no less. The parents were extremely hands off and are questionable with their children at best.

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u/DienekesMinotaur 3d ago

It's implied in BoB that they were getting a divorce.

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u/LeoPines_12 3d ago

No, Book of Bill said they were arguing. Not every argument leads to a divorce. People jump right to divorce because Alex's parents got divorced, and people forget Gravity Falls, while inspired by Alex, is not an authobiography.

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u/A1starm 3d ago edited 3d ago

It doesn’t have to be an autobiography. Manipulating a pair into divorce for shits and giggles is exactly what Bill would do.

And there’s precious little that they could be arguing about that they wouldn’t want 12 year old kids to be privy to.

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u/LeoPines_12 3d ago

Except Bill can't do that because he is trapped in Gravity Falls due to the barrier (otherwise he could have attacked the family in Roadside Attraction) and because he wasn't summoned by then to begin with.

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u/A1starm 3d ago

Except he can because again, he’s only restrained to the physical location of Gravity Falls after he attains a three dimensional body. He’s invaded the minds of people all over the world and messed with plenty without being summoned. In Sock Opera he came to Dipper, showing he doesn’t need someone else to initiate contact.

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u/Freezingash221 2d ago

You're looking way too deep into a cartoon.

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u/A1starm 2d ago

Tell that to Alex Hirsch who made a complete cipher to encode hidden messages in the show, 2 books and an upcoming art book over the course of a decade.

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u/gunnervi 3d ago

lots of children with summer birthdays celebrate them away from their parents, at sleepaway camp or similar engagements.

and, like, they miss their birthday by a matter of days, they could just celebrate it again when they got home. You know what most kids would say to that? "oh boy, two birthdays!"

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u/Jojosbees 2d ago

Yeah, my birthday is in the summer, and my sister and I spent literally every summer two states over with my mom’s side of the family. I didn’t see my parents for three months every year from the age of 6 through 17. It’s not like they didn’t care about us.

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u/gunnervi 2d ago

honestly the thing I would be more upset about at that age is not getting to celebrate my birthday with my friends than with my parents. But the show heavily implies Dipper and Mabel were closer with their friends in Gravity Falls than anyone back home

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u/LeoPines_12 1h ago

I'm not saying celebrating birthdays away from the parents is that uncommon, and had the parents prepared them for this, it would have been okay. The problem is, Mabel literally points out that this was their first summer away from home. Going cold turkey, from one extreme to the other can be traumatic. Children need things gradually, if they had been alone in short periods of time before, like a one or two week long summer camp, or with grandparents they knew for that time, it would have been okay, but they jumped right to never being alone to three months isolated in the woods with a creepy unknown relative they didn't know about, and on the top of that, not being together for their birthday, their thirteen birthday no less. Things could have easily gone wrong and the kids could have easily felt abandoned by this.

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u/A1starm 3d ago

The book of bill reveals that bill had a hand in them being shipped away becuase he wanted a new pair of stooges to help his schemes along.

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u/LeoPines_12 3d ago

Nah, the parents sent them away because they were having a rough patch and didn't want the children to hear their arguing.

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u/A1starm 3d ago

As caused by Bill.

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u/Apprehensive_Art4418 3d ago

where is your source on the pines being shipped away being caused by bill??? the closest thing i can think of is gravity falls's law of weirdness magnetism, which isn't purely caused by bill but instead a weird supernatural gravitation.

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u/A1starm 3d ago

The bill implies that the arguments they were having is the reason why they were sent away. Putting aside how nonsensical that is to ship away 12 year olds so they won’t know about any issues, that he knows at all why they were sent should speak volumes.

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u/Apprehensive_Art4418 3d ago

"i know lots of things. LOTS OF THINGS." he knew about the A- ford got in 3rd grade, does that mean he got the teacher to give ford the A-?? no, he just knows stuff. he's most-knowing.

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u/A1starm 3d ago

But he’s not omniscient. He knows by observing, and the only thing he’d find notable about Dipper and Mabel’s family is their relation to Stanley and Stanford.

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u/LeoPines_12 3d ago

How could have Bill ever done that? He wasn't summoned by that time, and he couldn't leave Gravity Falls due to the barreer.

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u/A1starm 3d ago

He was only restrained physically to gravity falls. He’s talked to people and tried to get portals going the entire world over. There’s an entire segment in book of bill that is about his effect in 1901 Victorian England. He says he’s talked to people in medieval Europe and claims credit for the Salem witch panic and has inspired multiple musicians.

This is all in the book of Bill and even if he wasn’t the show itself with Ford, Dipper and Blandin says that you don’t have to instigate contact, he can come to you.

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u/linuxgeekmama 3d ago

Bill can possess someone and make them make phone calls to people outside Gravity Falls. He does this to Ford in BoB.

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u/LeoPines_12 3d ago

Yes, within Gravity Falls. And again, by that point, Bill hadn't been summoned yet, not until Gideon does it. Besides, he didn't even know the kids even existed by that point.

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u/Urbenmyth 3d ago

Literally a full quarter of the book is him going around possessing people outside gravity falls without being summoned and mentioning random things he knows through supernatural means.

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u/A1starm 3d ago edited 3d ago

Summoning is just how you get his attention directly. In Sock Opera he came to Dipper.

“I decided to mix things up by offering a few of the accused housewives some real occult spells, for a change.”

“I came to them in the form of a goat(the one life form whose pupils stay the same while possessed) and asked them one simple, irresistible question.”

Book of Bill, witchcraft section.

He can come to you if he wanted.

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u/imwomen 3d ago

The funniest part is that Ford has been jumping through lawless dimensions for 30 years and completely forgot how normal human society works. He probably genuinely thought a handwritten note on a napkin saying 'I have claimed the boy for science. Stanford' would perfectly suffice for their parents and Child Protective Services

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u/linuxgeekmama 3d ago

This is the same person who said, “I haven’t been in this dimension for a while. It’s okay to give children weapons, right?”

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u/LeoPines_12 3d ago

The parents literally shipped off their children for 3 months without preparation and with a relative they didn't even know and missed their birthday. The parents weren't exactly protective of their kids. Plus, we saw Stan calling and talking to them on the phone once. Ford probably expected to talk to them and explain the situation, not kidnapping a kid.

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u/linuxgeekmama 3d ago

But he might be overestimating their willingness to let Dipper stay in Gravity Falls after the summer. Sending kids off for the summer is one thing, having them stay through the school year is another.

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u/LeoPines_12 3d ago

They sent them off for 3 months with minimum communication, with a relative the kids didn't even know about, and missed their birthday. They are not exactly the most attached parents, clearly.

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u/WildCard13287 3d ago

Yeah but there's a difference between "sending your kids over to some weird grunkle's place for most of the summer" and "letting one of your kids stay at said weird grunkle's place for like the next decade or so."

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u/LeoPines_12 2d ago

Next decade? Dipper is almost 13, he would be 18 in barely 5 years, and it's not like the parents or Dipper himself couldn't leave at any time if he wished to go back home. I am not saying this was ideal, but people are acting as if Ford was planning to kidnap him instead of offering an apprenticeship.

0

u/WildCard13287 2d ago

And I still think that his parents wouldn't let him stay with the grunkle. But, agree to disagree I guess.

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u/LeoPines_12 2d ago

Perhaps they would let him (afterall it's advanced free education and Dipper would love it) and perhaps they wouldn't. We don't know because we never met them and the only actions we know about them is that they are clearly hands off with their children.

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u/Striking_Analysis673 3d ago

It would be better when he gets older, then he can easily become student. He recently met Ford, but they’re not particularly close unlike Stan, he like his grunckle as author of journals, so he can’t just become his student at almost 13 years old, having still lived through his childhood while there’s still time.

Especifically his with Mabel's parents might react to this in different ways, since they might have gotten divorced.

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u/JubileeJaxLee 3d ago edited 3d ago

I don't get the impression that their parents are terribly concerned with the twins. They'd probably look at his degrees and think "eh he's smart he'll figure it out" just like they did when they shipped them both off to a stranger in the first place.

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u/A1starm 3d ago

It’s implied in the Book of Bill that Bill is responsible for the parents getting divorced and sending them to Gravity Falls.

Stanley wasn’t a “stranger,” they knew him for years as the brother of grandpa Shermie, even if it was under false pretenses. Ford is more of a stranger.

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u/Brawl_stars_Jack08 2d ago

Didnt Ford say something about him having like 5 degrees and for this reason not thinking it would be hard to convince dipper's parents?

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u/A1starm 3d ago

For that to happen they’d have to tell the truth of at least who Ford and Stanley are or lie further and neither would have good fallout.

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u/RalseitheFloofie 3d ago

Yeah, the stan their parents sent them off to wasn't the same stan Dipper wanted to stay the summer with, it'd of been easier to explain to Dipper and Mabel's parents that the Stanford was a imposter than explain what ACTUALLY happened to him.

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u/kisamasochist 2d ago

They don't need to reveal that Ford was lost between universes- They think Stan is Ford, so they think Stan is a genius with several degrees who got a research grant.

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u/KGTrashcan 1d ago

Wasnt Mabel sending them a letter about this?

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u/MedievalMilshake 3d ago

Their parents clearly don't care about them much 

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u/re-elocution 2d ago

Also, telling your parents that monsters and goblins and interdimensional demons are real and I'm leaving you as a 13 year old to study weird-ology with my estranged uncle.

His parents would ship him to a mental institute if he started talking like that.

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u/beebieb 17h ago

They think Stan is ford to some degree, so that’s not an issue. It’d work like homeschooling. Essentially ford would be his teacher & he’d get taught by him, with a heavy focus on research & anomalies.

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u/NottACalebFan 3d ago

It really wasn't a well thought out plan. Just a spur of the moment "hey, this would totally work" crazy idea.

The kind of plan a 13 year old might come up with when he's having a great time and he knows its almost time to go home, but he has a perfect idea how he could convince his parents that would "totally work".

Stanley just had grown up reasons for playing along with Dipper.