Gravity Falls, S1E9: "The Time Traveler's Pig" (Quick Reaction) · 2:16pm Feb 9th, 2023
In which the very forces of space and time have it out for Dipper.
SPOILERS
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Love this bit.
One more Gravity Falls review for the run. Yes, I've already said this series is "as and when I feel like it", but I still feel a bit bad having gone two months without an update, so this is compensation.
Given how much I've already covered for prior episodes, I might just add the minor details in a separate blog post another time.
Also, I might go back and modify these last three blog posts, mainly to add quick links and a couple of traditional formats I missed the first time around.
So, "The Time Traveler's Pig".
Whilst not a bad episode - it carries over the majority of the series' entertaining points, including the mileage of this week's time travel gimmick, the debut (I think) of the weirdly blasé farmer, Wendy continuing to be cool with Dipper, and Mabel's adorable glee gushing over new friend Waddles the pig - it occurred to me, upon rewatching this, how oddly contrived a lot of the plotting felt.
Last episode, I briefly mentioned how contrived the ending seemed. There, I think it worked within the framework of the episode: the whole business with the woodpecker and the crate-shaped box, for instance, is an unexpected payoff for a running gag, and it has meta-level appreciation in an episode about how crazy is as crazy does, so just go with it. Given how skewed the in-universe legal system clearly is, it also makes it easier to swallow Dipper's invoking of a loophole to put Quentin Trembley's authority over that of Blubbs' boss. It's still all contrived, but it fits naturally into context.
Here, it sort of works with Dipper being fated to accidentally sock Wendy in the eye and subsequently lose her to Robbie, who is gradually becoming more and more of a jerkass across these episodes. Dipper's the designated target practice of the universe, with the laws of causality themselves apparently hating him enough to screw up every attempt he makes to undo his mistake.
I mean, he's already easy to sympathize with; this is (a comedically exaggerated) more of the same. It's when it's exaggerated beyond exaggeration that it starts to feel a tad artificial.
The endgame is obvious: Dipper gets what he wants at the cost of Mabel's happiness, and ends up having to sacrifice his for hers. All well and good, but the steps to get there feel arbitrary. Mabel just happens to suddenly develop a deeper-than-usual bond with Waddles, to the point she's absolutely devastated without him for a whole month afterward. Uh huh. And it's only specifically Mabel that can break the endless loop of failure Dipper's stuck in, despite doing little more than moving half a pipe. Uh huh. And Pacifica "I'm too rich for you losers" Northwest just happens to be at the crummy faire and wants the exact same pig for... reasons. Uh huh.
And all this for an apparently once-in-a-lifetime chance with Wendy, when it's obvious from the start that a bullying douchebag like Robbie is going to be outed and dumped sooner or later, something even Mabel can spot coming a mile away. Uh huh.
At least in my eyes, it's a bit too easy to spot the strings behind a lot of these plot points. What should be a heartwarming intrinsic move on Dipper's part feels more like he's just getting his arm cruelly twisted by outside forces, because Dipper abuse. Combined with the usual causal hiccups when mutable time travel is a plot point, and the general sense of asking too much of the audience's suspended disbelief is what stands out more than the drama. And I haven't even gotten into how often we'll see Dipper forced into this corner again.
It's a bit rickety, is my point.
Yes, but apart from that, did I like it?
Obvi. For the record, there's only one Season One episode I outright dislike, but we'll get there later, because it's not this episode. Grunkle Stan's idea of a faire is hilariously awful from the get-go, with another brilliant cynical speech from him confirming what a tight-fisted git he is. Soos is Soos, getting in a bit of oddball foreshadowing and being incompetent enough to enable the time travel shenanigans in the first place ("Like a hawk!").
Wendy and Dipper continue to be very likeable together, arguably enough to justify going back to the unrequited romance well again. And at least more often than not, Mabel's in full funlover mode, though the funniest bit for me is her saying "stuff it" to the laws of time travel and showing off a calculator to pioneer folk.
Which neatly leads into this week's creative gimmick: time travel police. Forget the hyper-serious Dolph Lundgren - sorry, Lolph and Dundgren - duo who show up near the end. We get Blendin Blandin, voiced by Justin Roiland at his absolute Morty-est, and so grey, pitiful, and incompetent that Mabel and Dipper guess his game within about a minute of meeting him.
Blendin Blandin is sci-fi parody, a technologically advanced operative reduced to scavenging random screwdrivers when fixing his tech. What makes him funny is that he's supposed to be this trained futuristic professional, and he's clearly trying, but there's no hiding what a bumbling sad sack he is. It's like if Toby Determined was given a TARDIS.
The tech itself is part of the joke. Time machines are usually impressive pieces of hardware. As much as the tape measure look kinda works as a means of "measuring out" time (though how does it know whether to go forward or backward?), this lame-looking version fits the letdown nature of Blendin way better.
I won't go into the mix of timezones visited later, not a revisit of the first three episodes, and especially not a brief cameo from a certain younger Pine. Needless to say it's still fun-weird, as only Gravity Falls can deliver (Time Baby's whole thing, for instance).
I've said before that Gravity Falls is far from flawless, and in episodes like this one, it's much more obvious than it is in others. Overall, though, the charms outweigh the slip-ups. I'd be happy to rewatch this one again. And again. And again. And again...
Oh boy, we'll get to the dino ep later...
That's all for now! Impossible Numbers, out!
<<< Gravity Falls, S1E8: "Irrational Treasure" (Quick Reaction)
Also, I may be altering the ep-by-step layout as I go along. I'm working things out.
For one thing, "Quick Reaction" is a bit of a misnomer now, isn't it?
Probably because this is the first time I've seen GF in the actually correct order, I can't help notice yhat the Dipper plot in this one is pretty similar to Double Dipper.
Namely: Dipper finds and uses a bit of weird technology in a complicated plan to impress Wendy, when by the end of the episode it turns out not doing any of that and just going with the flow gets a pretty similar results.
(Admittedly this interpretation/hypothetical episode moral would work better if the time travel on the future attempt showed that Wendy and Robbie ended up dating for a period anyways.)
Yeah, it just seemed there were about eight different ways that Dipper could have gotten what he wanted without sacrificing the pig. That sounds worse on paper.
Eh, I don't think Dipper's thing is as much contrived as it is just showcasing how he unnecessarily and obsessively over-complicates everything. I do agree that Mabel's fixation on Waddles is a bit out of nowhere, even for her, but I've learned with this series that it's important to Trust the Silliness!
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Yeah, part of the problem with this run of Dipper episodes is that sense of repeatedly treading familiar ground (e.g. his getting along with Wendy and handling his own insecurities around her has been the focus of three episodes by now). The next episode, for instance, examines Dipper's concept of manhood and standing his ground instead of doing something horrible just to prove he's not a wuss, which is basically what "Dipper Vs Manliness" was all about.
You make a good point about the way the episode gimmick ends up harming more than helping Dipper's cause, here and back in "Double Dipper". Works quite well too as a subtle reminder that no amount of adventuring is a substitute for making the right call in everyday life. That said, I think the emphasis here is meant to be more on how Dipper handles the conflict when his interests are at cross-purposes with Mabel's... which is also a plot point we're going to see a few more times.
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To be fair, Mabel's instant attachment to Waddles isn't that hard a sell, though one of the ep's time travel gags exaggerates it. I'm more put off by the idea that Pacifica would have any interest in a pig. Literally anyone else could have taken Waddles and the scene would have made more sense (have Grunkle Stan do it and throw in a line about having dinner tonight; heck, throw in another Old Man McGucket cameo).