Gravity Falls: The Final Chapter

Gravity Falls: Return to the Falls is a Disney XD movie based on the popular animated tv show Gravity Falls and was released in the summer of 2018

The Plot
The movie is set several years after the events of the finale and Dipper and Mabel are now nineteen years old and are both returning to Gravity Falls for the summer. Stan and Ford have both returned to the shack where they have been employed by Soos to run the shack alongside him as co-owners. After the first few weeks of living in the shack, Stan tells Ford that he had been getting hallucinations of Bill Cipher and Ford creates a machine so that he, Dipper and Mabel can see into Stan's mind. The trio makes the horrifying discovery that Bill has managed to resurrect himself with a spell and has managed to implant fragments of himself into a new employee of the Mystery Shack named Lewis.

Once Bill has been able to possess Lewis; Bill plans to meet the elder gods, beings who existed before the creation of the universe and Bill plans to convince them to destroy the universe, so a new one can be born and a new cycle of life can begin.

It's up to Dipper, Mabel, Wendy, Soos, Stan, and Ford to stop Bill and save their very existence.

Motivations and intentions
 Dipper:  Dipper has anxiety about his love life, he's entering university and the final trip to Gravity Falls is the moment where he wants to tie up all loose ends. He came with the intention of confessing his feelings to Wendy so they can become an official couple. However, he has a pep talk with Pacifica and he realises that he may have feelings for Pacifica as well and becomes conflicted about what he wants.

Mabel: Mabel has dreams of Broadway and approached the college to sign up but she's put under pressure from her teacher and she's struck with fear. In Gravity Falls, she's suffering from writer's block and hoped her stay in Gravity Falls would allow her to reconnect with her glory days.

 Wendy:  After starting a new job, Wendy has made enough money to move out and find her own place. She's been feeling upset lately because it's the anniversary of her mother's disappearance and she can't help but worry about her younger brothers. Wendy knows Dipper still has feelings for her but doesn't feel the same way because they practically grew up together. When Dipper tries to confess his feelings to Wendy, the words just don't come out. After a brief talk about Pacifica, Wendy kisses Dipper on the cheek as a test but neither of them feel any chemistry. In the end they both agree that they're better off as friends.

 Soos:  Like Wendy, Soos also moving into a stage of his life. Melody announced she was pregnant to him and Soos is scared of becoming a father since his own dad abandoned him and he's afraid of the responsibilities of parenthood.

 Pacifica:  Pacifica has been working at the diner and has made a lot of money through tips. Through the movie, it's revealed that she never forgave her family for using her to maintain their public image. She matured greatly as the loss of her family wealth has made her more down to earth since she no longer has the safety net of her family to fall back on. Pacifica is conflicted about her relationship with the Pines twins, Mabel reconnects Pacifica to her past as a bully and she has feelings for Dipper but doesn't know how to act on them healthily. She tries put these feelings in a box by talking badly about Dipper but he overhears this and it breaks his heart (especially since he came over to ask her out after talking to Wendy about it).

 Bill Cipher:  Bill broke out of Stan's mind and has possessed Lewis, he travels from place to place to convince the elder gods that the world is too corrupt, broken, and evil to be saved and the world must be destroyed to be rebuilt for the new one. However, Bill is just using this as an excuse so he can reduce the universe into a plaything so he can have as much chaotic fun as possible until he moves onto the next dimension.

The Trials
For each elder god. the heroes must undergo a trial. Each trial is unique and the number of contestants is chosen by the god.

Corpus's Trail
For Corpus's trial; Wendy must fight one of his champions and she is told that he is a ruthless, brutal fighter who won't stop until he succeeds. Wendy and the champion begin to fight and it's revealed that the two are equally matched. Once the two reach a stalemate, Wendy realises the champion never struck first and is only getting stronger the more she fights. She also realises that the champion is only fighting in self-defence; she throws her weapon aside, surrenders and apologises.

The champion stops short of beheading her and reaches his hand out as a gesture of forgiveness and as a peace offering. Corpus comes out clapping his hands and tells Wendy she passed the trial.

Anima's Trail

For Anima's trial; Soos, Dipper, and Mabel have to find a rune to escape a bathhouse but they must avoid the rising the water before they drown in it. As the water begins to rise, the trio starts looking but are eventually forced to run up the stairs to avoid the rising water. When they have nowhere else to go, they decide to climb out a nearby window and forfeit the trial, however, Mabel notices a glowing rune beneath the water but realises she can only see it in shadows.

Learning this from Mabel; Soos and Dipper use their clothes to block the sunlight and the trio dives into the water, they reach the rune and pull it out. This flushes the three out and they are reunited with Wendy and Anima, who tells them they have passed the trial.

Vita's Trail
For Vita's trial; Each hero must go through a trial individually and all four of them must pass.

Soos
For Soos, he is confronted with a boulder rolling towards him down a hill, each time he dives out of the way the room will get smaller. After diving out of the way several times, Soos realises he must grab the boulder and roll it back over the hill and roll it through the doorway on the other side. Soos grabs it and starts rolling it up the hill; as he is rolling it, the boulder starts speaking to him and cursing him in his father's voice and expressing pride for abandoning him.

Soos ignores it at first but realises the boulder cannot fit through the door. After enduring more insults, Soos finds the strength to fight back and starts berating his father for abandoning him and swearing to be a better father than him. By doing this, he successfully shrinks it to the size of a coin. The boulder still insults him but it's too small for Soos to hear and he simply walks through the door with the boulder in his pocket. This allows him to pass the trial.

Wendy
For Wendy, she's stood on the edge of a cliff and sees her 3 brothers who are running towards the edge. She instinctually protects them and gets more and more aggressive as throws them aside, not realising she's actually injuring herself each time she pushes them. When she looks over the cliff edge, she realises the water may not be as shallow as she thinks. She then convinces her brothers to hold her hands and they hug before diving into the water together.

After they land in the water, her brothers disappear into the water and the water level rises. Wendy now sees that she can now swim through the exit, allowing her to pass the trial. Shaken by the trial, Vita reassures her by saying "To grow up is to accept vulnerability... to be alive is be vulnerable."

Dipper
For Dipper, he enters a room and told to solve the puzzle. When Dipper moves the first puzzle piece, a pink gas emerges and floods the entire room. When Dipper starts hallucinating, he sees two figures composed of smoke that begin to attack. One is tall, wields an axe and floats around the arena, while the second is smaller. wields a microphone, and has a sonic scream. The pair speak by using Dipper's insecurities against him but are able to get under his skin by saying "You're not good enough".

Realising he can't fight them hand-to-hand, Dipper resorts to running from them. The pair chase after him but Dipper tricks them into destroying each other with their abilities; the tall one is shouted to pieces, while the little one had the axe embedded in her face. Once the pair disappates, Dipper rips off a piece of his shirt to block his nose.

It not over yet for Dipper though, as he now has to fight a monster that's imitating Stanford voice while hunting Dipper with an axe. Dipper learns that the monster is blind but has extraordinary hearing. Dipper lures it away by throwing rocks in another direction so he can solve the puzzle while the monster is distracted. Once he solves the puzzle, Dipper realises that he needs the monster's axe to complete it. He lures the monster to the puzzle where the creature accidentally puts its axe blade in the slot, shattering it to pieces.

Dipper runs through the door as the monster tries one last time to grab him but loses its hand in the process. Angry about the loss of its hand, the monster imitates Mabel before turning away, saying "Of course you won, you're the best of us." Dipper, shaken by the fight, has passed the trial.

Mabel
For Mabel, she's placed in an arena and forced to run from a giant spider after the spider starts attacking her and covering the area with cobwebs. After dodging web attacks and strikes, the spider tries to end the fight by hanging Mabel with its web but she causes a weight shift in the webbing. Mabel falls while the spider is caught up in its own webbing and is pulled upward to be hung by one its legs. After trying one more attack, the spider goes deeper into the ceiling after Mabel falls down and lands on the ground.

After reaching the end of the trial, Mabel learns that she needs the spider to pass the trial, she goes back and uses her grappling hook so she can reach the spider and cut it free with a knife. Grateful for her help, the spider helps her pass the trial without issue and gives her a vial of webbing that she can use.

Cast

 * Jason Ritter as Dipper
 * Kristen Schaal as Mabel
 * Alex Hirsch as Grunkle Stan, Soos and Bill Cipher
 * Jackie Buscarino as Pacifica
 * Linda Cardellini as Wendy
 * Carl Faruolo as Grenda
 * Niki Yang as Candy
 * J.K. Simmons as Ford
 * Thurop Van Orman as Gideon
 * Seth Green as Lewis
 * Greg Ellis as gate guardian Erimus
 * Clancy Brown as elder god Corpus
 * Ellen McLain as elder goddess Anima
 * Diana Rigg as elder goddess Vita
 * Rick D. Wasserman as chief god Omnes

Quotes
(Mabel enters a room and sees a stage. There are are women performing aerial acrobatics while hanging from a white fabric, Mabel watches in awe until she suddenly hears from a man in a black suit playing on the guitar)

Virgil: Can I help you?

Mabel: Woah, can I ask, what is this?

Virgil: This is the legend of Anansi, a folftale from my home and I wish to reintroduce him to a modern audience. You're not one of mine, who are you?

Mabel: (nervously and stumbling), Oh... I'm Mabel. I enrolled a week ago and I'm hoping for a taster.

(Virgil puts down his guitar and gestures to the dancers to keep practicing. He stands in fronts of Mabel, revealing his cane and he presents his right hand)

Virgil: Ah yes, you must be the one who impressed Ms Rothschild with your stage design... may I see it?

Mabel: (excitedly) of course, BEHOLD!

(Mabel presents the design and Virgil appears interested but his smile slowly fades)

Virgil: A good effort, but needs some work and the work appears disjointed. I'd like you to improve this before you start next term.

Mabel: (dejectedly) Oh... ok.

(Mabel turns away, Virgil stands in front of the stage with 2 dancers appearing over each of his shoulders)

Virgil: And Mabel...

(Mabel turns around)

Virgil: (intimidatingly) Don't expect this to a cakewalk, I expect you to be at your best so don't let me down.

(Mabel nervously keeps walking as Virgil returns to his guitar and keeps playing)

Trivia

 * Wendy mentioning the Weirdness magnetism when the group discovers that the elder gods live in different locations references the fact that the magnet attracts all sorts of weird creatures and beings to Gravity Falls.
 * The names of the elder gods are Latin: Erimus is Latin for "We shall be", Corpus is Latin for "Body", Anima is Latin feminine for "Spirit" or "Intelligence", Vita is Latin for "Life" and Omnes is Latin for "Everything" or "All".
 * Lewis' lack of awareness towards Bill is because of the 'nevermind all that act' which prevents the townsfolk from speaking about weirdmageddon. Lewis is also new to the town and is only hired to work in the shack to fill Wendy's work shifts at the Shack.
 * Soos' trial is in reference to the legend of Sisyphus, a king who was punished for his self-aggrandizing craftiness and deceitfulness by being forced to roll an immense boulder up a hill, only for it to roll down every time it neared the top, repeating this action for all eternity.
 * Anima's trial and Soos' trial were inspired by the Salad Fingers episode "Glass Brother". For Anima's trial, they had to wait until the room was dark so they can complete the puzzle. For Soos' trial; he had to overcome his insecurities to be a better man than his father. He's not free of his past, but he internalised the problem and was able to overcome it and move on to be his own person.
 * Wendy's trial is inspired by The Catcher in the Rye.
 * Dipper's trial was inspired by a few things;
 * The tall figure was inspired by Jude the Dude from Madworld and Kratos's leviathan axe from God of War (PS4)
 * The small figure was inspired by Zed from Lollipop Chainsaw and Sindel from Mortal Kombat.
 * The monster was inspired by The Lotus Root Monster from Sweet Home, Piggsy from Manhunt, and the Minotaur from Greek Mythology.
 * The Monster, The Tall Figure and The Small Figure were designed to represent attributes from Wendy, Pacifica, and Stanford
 * The tall one wield an axe, reflecting Wendy's family history as lumberjacks. Its power to float also reflects how Wendy was always just out of reach of Dipper's affections because while Wendy did find admirable traits in him, Wendy was just too old for him.
 * The Short one is evasive, reflecting how Pacifica avoided the consequences of her actions by using the Northwest wealth. Her sonic scream also reflects her cutting remarks as a bully.
 * The monster's use of Stanford's voice reflects how Stanford nearly lured Dipper away from home by taking him in as an apprentice, which caused an argument that nearly ended the world. The end of the fight also reflects selfishness and the lack of self-awareness from Ford, as he encourages Dipper to leave Mabel despite the act reflecting how Ford and Stan became estranged.
 * When Dipper talks about his trial, Dipper recognises The Monster's belt and Mabel recognises the pink gas as The Visions of Heartbreak Past. The two briefly speculate on how The Monster received such things and come to the conclusion that The Monster must be related to The Love God.