Review: Gravity Falls – “Weirdmageddon Part 1”

In order to show just how different everything is, this episode has a brand new opening. Instead of featuring Stan and Dipper and Mabel and the rest of the Gravity Falls gang, the opening features Bill and a few of his monster friends. Well, we do see Dipper…as a skeleton. And the rest of Gravity Falls is on fire. What, exactly, are we in for?

Now that Bill is in reality, his first task is to lock Mabel away in a bubble. Next, he wastes no time ripping the dimensional rift a little wider to allow his monster friends through. They are all weird and scary at the same time. Finally, he allows waves of weirdness to wash over the town. Gompers the goat becomes a giant, Soos’ grandmother becomes a chair, and a bunch of the townspeople are turned into statues. Just another day in Gravity Falls.

Ford and Dipper join forces to try to take down Bill. But when Ford is about to blast Bill with his weapon from his spot in the churchtower, another weird bubble floats through the area. The church bell comes to live, scaring Ford into missing his one shot. Ford gives his journals to Dipper before Bill grabs him. Bill transforms Ford into a backscratcher, leaving Dipper on his own.

When Dipper tries to fight Bill, the triangle burns the journals. With the journals gone, Dipper decides to try to find his family. After all, he has nothing left. Not knowing that Mabel is locked in the bubble, Dipper heads to the mall to find either her or Stan. Surprisingly, Dipper finds Wendy camped out. Yes, Wendy is a survivalist. And it’s a good thing too!

Dipper and Wendy head to the roof to figure out what to do next. Of course, this happens to be a perfect place to see Mabel’s jail bubble, which just happens to have her shooting star emblem on it. They decide to try to save Mabel. The first place they head is the used car lot to get a ride.

This is where they run into Lil Gideon and his prison gang. Yeah, Gompers the goat took a chomp out of the prison, freeing everyone. Now Gideon works for Bill. It’s Gideon’s job to keep Dipper from saving Mabel. Gideon has the key to unlock the bubble so it should be easy, right? Well…no. Wendy kicks Ghost Eyes’ butt, grabs the key from Gideon, and hot wires a car before drop kicking Gideon. As Wendy and Dipper rush off toward Mabel, Gideon and his gang take up the chase.

Wendy, who doesn’t have a driving license, deftly steers around monsters and into weird bubbles. Inside the various bubbles, they turn into birds and anime characters and even live action versions of themselves. They jump a ravine, rolling the car when they land. When Wendy and Dipper crawl out of the car, they find a strange cloaked figure standing above them. It’s Soos, of course. He has, apparently, been roaming the wasteland helping people. But before the three of them can get to the bubble, they are surrounded by Gideon’s gang.

Strangely, Dipper decides to talk his way out of the situation. He asks Gideon what Mabel would want him to do. Gideon finally comes to the conclusion that Mabel wouldn’t want to be locked up forever. So Gideon takes his gang and heads off to face Bill and his monsters while Wendy, Soos, and Dipper try to rescue his love.

But the episode ends just as they unlock the bubble. We’ll have to wait until the next episode to see what happens next.

This was a pretty epic episode. They even managed to get Louis CK to voice one of the (funnier) minor monsters. The monster is just a head with an arm sticking out the top and the poor guy just wants someone to get in his mouth. Is that too much to ask? While the running joke is funny in the episode, it’s even funnier during the credits. That new opening with Bill and his monsters is also rather amazing. The town burns, we see Bigfoot’s actual foot instead of just the print, and the credits run as the monsters’ names instead of the actors. As much as I want to see what happens next, I don’t want this to be the end. I’m not sure if there will be a season three but I’m not sure how there could be if they manage to defeat Bill. Oh, the questions!