Gravity Falls Recap: The Last Mabelcorn
On the last episode of Gravity Falls, the delightful “The Stanchurian Candidate” (which introduced us to Tad Strange, among other things), the central narrative was comparatively light on the deep-dive mythology that serves as the series’ backbone. Instead, it was more of a lark— still deeply fully and intricate but, with the exception of the episode-closing shocker, more about the characters than the ongoing mystery. What makes this week’s episode, “The Last Mabelcorn,” so much fun is that it is almost exclusively about the central mystery conceit while managing weave in some really winning moments, particularly by giving Mabel and the girls an adventure all their own (more on that in a minute).
The episode opens with the inhabitants of the Mystery Shack fast asleep: Mabel is clutching her stuffed unicorn toy, Dipper has fallen asleep reading a boys adventure novel (The Sibling Bros. in: The Telltale Fable of the Unstable Table) and, elsewhere in the house, Ford is having a terrifying dream. The imagery is astounding, both in its complexity and rich symbolism: he’s in the middle of a field when a crop-circle like figure is made; eventually it forms the shape of Bill Cipher. Cipher tells Ford that he’s been “making deals” and “chatting with old friends,” a reference (perhaps) to last episode’s closer, which had Bill colluding with Little Gideon. Bill warns Ford that he’s coming for him; the end of days is near. Bill is seen against a rip in the fabric of the universe. Everything about this sequence is haunting: the dusty field Ford is standing in, the ruined portal behind him, the swing set where Ford and Stan would swing, sitting idle. And of course Bill Cipher, who has emerged as just another piece of Gravity Falls’ weird puzzle into a truly terrifying adversary. Ford is startled away and says, “I have to warn them.”
Cue title sequence.
Dipper and Mabel are looking for a fun board game to occupy their time. In the spider-webbed closet they find Battle Chutes and Ladder Ships, Necronomiconopoly, Connect Forty-Four and, What Could Go Wrong? The Board Game. “The last players who opened this box never made it out alive,” Dipper reads. After a moment he agrees, “Well this should take up the next 21 minutes.” This is a winking reference to the length of an average episode and a total misdirect; the twins put down the board games and shuffle into the living room for a family meeting, called by Ford. Outside, Ford is handing his confederate “Santiago” a barrel full of pug puppies. This is a reference to the last episode, which listed one of Stan’s many criminal offenses as “pug trafficking.”
Ford is issuing a warning about the dangerous nature of Bill, but the twins have already dealt with him and dispatched him (“Once with kittens and once with tickles,” Mabel cheerfully reminds us). When Dipper tries to bring up how Ford knows Bill, he shrugs off his question, instead focusing on the task at hand: making the Mystery Shack “Bill-proof.” The only problem: the last ingredient is unicorn hair. Mabel promptly freaks out. Her first word was unicorn, she is wearing a unicorn sweater and she’s “probably the most pure-of-heart person in this room.” Ford hands her the journal and a crossbow and Mabel calls Wendy, Grenda, and Candy and tells them to “clear the afternoon.” Still, Ford doesn’t believe that Mabel can do it. “If I had to describe unicorns in one word it would be frustrating,” he intones.
When Mabel leaves to go questing, Ford brings Dipper down to his study, “a place where I keep my most ancient and secret knowledge … even Stan doesn’t know about this place.” Ford’s idea? If he can’t Bill-proof the Mystery Shack, then they’ll have to Bill-proof their minds. The situation is dire. Cut to the relentlessly upbeat Mabel, who says, “It’s nice to be out on a mission, just us gals.” They reach the enchanted realm of the unicorn, and the unicorn is a prissy princess, demanding that they all take off their shoes (“I have a thing about shoes” she coos from her light-up horn). When Mabel steps up to accept the lock of the unicorn’s hair, the unicorn informs her that she isn’t pure of heart.
This leads Mabel on a good deed spree, while Dipper and Ford discuss Bill (Ford says, “He’s older than our galaxy and far more twisted”). Ford discloses that Bill is unable to manifest physically but can “project himself through the mindscape.” He wants the tear (the small snow globe of inter-dimensional goo), because it will allow him to enter our world. (Ford went so far as to have a metal plate inserted in an attempt to keep Bill out.) When Dipper brings up Ford’s history with Bill, he again shushes him.
The Mabel-doing-good-deeds montage (scored by an upbeat, ‘80s-style song) is pretty amazing, and includes her giving blood and planting a tree (her to-do list includes “Scratch Waddles,” “Wash Soos,” and “Sponsor Clown”). When they return to the enchanted forest, the unicorn again denies her. This sends Mabel into a spiral of self-doubt. Wendy suggests that they stop trying to be who the unicorn wants them to be and start acting like they are “crazed, angry, sweaty animals; we’re not unicorns, we’re women!”
Wendy, Candy and Grenda enter a gnome bar and ask who can “take down a unicorn.” A grizzled gnome suggests “fairy dust,” since it’s “enough to put a unicorn out cold.” For a jar full of butterflies (“I like they way they tickle my face”), the girls get their fairy dust, but in the middle of the deal, the undercover gnome police spring out and take the grizzled gnome away (our favorite is the deer with the flashing police light on its head). When the grizzled gnome complains, the lead gnome cop says, “Tell it to the adorable owl we’ve dressed as a judge.” As far as insane Gravity Falls tangents go, this is one of the best ever. The girls put the unicorn to sleep and are about to snip a locket of its hair, when Mabel stops them, only to be interrupted by two male unicorns who tell the female unicorn to give up the scam. “Unicorns can’t see into your heart,” he says, “all our dumb horns can do is glow, point towards the nearest rainbow, and play rave music.” That’s when Mabel punches a unicorn in the face and the epic clash between humans and unicorns erupts.
Meanwhile, back at the Mystery Shack, Dipper is hooked up to the machine designed to block his mind from Bill’s trickery. Still, he’s gripped with the mystery of what Ford is thinking, so he puts the mind helmet on Ford to see his thoughts. “Just a little peek,” Dipper says. Then he sees: Ford made an unholy alliance with Bill. When Ford comes to, it looks like he’s possessed. Dipper picks up one of those memory-erasing guns from the Society of the Blind Eye and points it at Ford. After Dipper fires the gun (it ends up shorting out the machine they were using to help safeguard their minds), Ford explains what his relationship with Bill really was. “Bill tricked me,” Ford explains. A long time ago, Bill presented himself as a friend. Bill would help Ford with his investigation of Gravity Falls, and Bill was able to move freely in and out of Ford’s minds (“We were partners”). Bill instructed Ford on how to build the gateway between worlds, while hiding what the portal would do (“When that portal finishes charging, your dimension is going to learn how to party”). Ford had been betrayed and shut down the portal, hiding the instructions in the journal so no one could finish Bill’s work. Ford lays it out clearly: if Bill succeeds, it’s the end of the world.
Still, Mabel returns, covered in unicorn blood, clutching a locket of unicorn hair. (Also, lots of jewels and gold.) In the mid-credits scene, though, Dipper and Ford finish the force field around the Mystery Shack. Then we see Bill, drifting in the cosmic void, who says, “I’m going to have to find my next pawn on the outside.” Inside Bill’s eye flashes glimpses of all sorts of Gravity Falls townsfolk: everyone from the local TV news anchor to the time cops from “Blendin’s Game.” Sadly, there was no Tad Strange.
This was an epic episode, full of startling revelations and really, really good jokes. The stakes have been set up considerably; whatever Bill is playing at, it’s going to be huge. And if Gravity Falls was fundamentally changed with Ford’s arrival, it’s set to really change with these upcoming episodes. And we can’t wait.
