Since I Wrote An Analysis Looking Into Bill's View Of And Relationship With Ford A While Ago, I Thought

Since I wrote an analysis looking into Bill's view of and relationship with Ford a while ago, I thought I'd do the same with Bill and Mabel, especially since the other analysis is partially supported with points about those two.

Comparing these posts, while the one about Bill and Ford is like "I believe Ford is very important to Bill and here's why", this one's more the reverse, as in "it's confirmed that Bill is fond of Mabel and I'm gonna look at their interactions and relevant episodes through that lense"

Bringing up the points of confirmation first, "Dipper's and Mabel's Guide to Mystery and Nonstop Fun" has Bill bringing up that he likes Mabel

and in the DVD commentary for Sock Opera, Alex Hirsch says the following:

“Bill genuinely believes that Mabel’s kinda like him. He sees Mabel as a chaos agent. Like, Mabel has got a little bit of a seed of anarchy in her, she’s a little bit selfish, she likes to have fun at whatever cost. And Bill is all those things times a billion. So he thinks when he lays it all out for her like: ‘How about instead of being lame, you do something fun! And crush whoever you want in the process!’. He thinks that’s gonna go over. And he’s not wrong in seeing that side in Mabel but Mabel is a better person than Bill Cipher.”

Which are just really interesting to me, especially since the show doesn't make it very obvious that Bill has this view on Mabel. But it certainly does put their dynamic into a new perspective.

For instance, there's the scene in Sock Opera where Bill tries to convince Dipper to make a deal with him by "calling out" Mabel:

which I'm tempted to compare to the bit in Journal 3 where Ford mentions that Bill "warned" him that Fiddleford may not be dedicated to the portal project.

To be exact there's two ways I'd compare these interactions. For one, in both cases Bill is putting a wedge between two people via manipulation to further his own goals. Second, you could argue that Bill himself genuinely believes what he's saying here.

I mean, this is the episode with the commentary basically telling us that Bill believes Mabel to be as selfish as himself. The examples he gives Dipper of the so-called sacrifices he made for Mabel aren't even that strong? One is Dipper just rescuing Mabel, one is Dipper fixing a situation that he messed with in the first place and caused Mabel to loose something, and the one where he did make a sacrifice but just so Mabel can help a third party, rather than for her own personal interest.

But of course Bill would view these as sacrifices that Mabel would owe Dipper for. Bill wouldn't give anything up for someone else if he's not getting something out of it.

As for the Ford and Fiddleford situation, if you haven't read my other post my thoughts on Bill's views on Ford basically boil down to "Bill defenetly started out bullshitting Ford when he told him he was special and they were friends, but these feelings became genuine".

And while you can make a strong case that it hasn't gotten to that point until shortly after the betrayal, considering Bill was gloating when Ford confronted him, I still want to put the idea out there that Bill started to believe Ford was actually outstanding and Bill may be able to let him in on his full intentions eventually while Fiddleford had far less potential to go through with everything.

But anyway all this really goes back to Bill possibly genuinely thinking Mabel "owed" Dipper something (because helping someone and expecting something in return is something he would do) and using that to manipulate Dipper, and him also thinking Mabel was seizing the opportunity all those times without ever returning anything to Dipper and as a result starting to see himself in her because that is something he would do.

But the reality is that while every party has to put effort into a relationship, relationships aren't transactional and Mabel wouldn't leave Dipper in the dust when it comes down to it, which this episode builds up to.

Now, I do want to say here that Sock Opera is about addressing Mabel's selfishness and that she was in the wrong here, but do not take this as me hating her or anything. Mabel is a twelve and will make poor choices in her own interest sometimes. And the point of comparing her selfishness to Bill's is that she's willing to own up to it and clearly has her limits because she cares about other people whereas Bill doesn't own up to anything and has no concern about how his actions affect anyone else.

Also, assuming Bill did take a liking to Mabel at this point, I think it's intruiging to think about the above dialouge as Bill wanting to "help" Mabel. To convince her to ditch Dipper in favor of her own self-interest because it'll be freeing. Because Bill's own reckless, selfish choices have only made him feel less restricted and absolutely never ever caused him any regret at all.

Well anyway let's skip forwards to Weirdmageddon.

The build-up towards Weirdmageddon concerning Mabel comes with her gaining more and more reason to be afraid of the future and the struggles that she expects to come with it until everything just boils over and Bill manipulates her into handing him the rift by posing as Blendin and promising to let her have a bit more time in Gravity Falls. And, in a way, he keeps that promise.

Despite Mabel and Bill not at all interacting between the rift breaking and the climax of the finale, I think the whole Mabel Land situation is sooo interesting in terms of showcasing the ways Mabel and Bill are similar but yet so different.

Now, the section of the Axolotl poem I put just a bit above in this post carries some very intruiging implications with it. Like you're telling me Bill regrets burning his dimension yet frames it as a positive thing and even plans to do it again with another dimension? And despite his silly jokester demeanor he's actually unhappy?

Perhaps being afraid of acknowledging his mistake and growing past it and accepting that life will always come with difficulties?

being so very deep in denial about it and his own feelings about it?

and drowning all that out by reveling in the chaos of the Nightmare Realm and throwing parties even though none of that will really be fulfilling?

You can also probably say something about how both Mabel Land and the Nightmare Realm are pictured as literal bubbles.

and how Bill thought it was basically impossible to escape Mabel Land and was pretty confident in that to the point where he seemed to just stop paying attention to it and not notice it bursting despite it being placed in the most notable location in the town, near the Fearamid.

And to go back to "despite their similarities, Mabel and Bill are very different", part of the reason Mabel escapes her literal and metaphorical bubble and Bill doesn't is because she has a support system. Mabel has people who look out and care for her because she has looked out and cared for them.

Bill on the other hand? His relationship with the Henchmaniacs doesn't go much deeper than party buddies who are also his lackeys who are also his punching bags if he's upset.

And while he's shown to be willing to be vulnerable with Ford, he's still way too deep in his own denial to open up a wound that deep, on top of Ford having every reason in the world to want to have nothing to do with Bill. The man has tried to kill him several times and was entirely justified in that.

-

Moving on to a point that's more about Bill being fond of Mabel rather than similarities and that I also brought up about Ford, the fact that Bill spares their lives during Weirdmageddon.

Like, the Bipper note and Bill telling his henchmen they can go eat Dipper tells me he's very much down to kill anyone who's a threat to him. And once you take the Quantum Destabilizer out of the picture, the only apparent threat is the zodiac wheel. Meaning every member of the zodiac has a target on their back.

Note that the only zodiacs Bill has contact with during Weirdmageddon, prior to the climax, are Dipper, Ford, Mabel and Gideon.

Dipper, again, he attempted to get killed even before Weirdmageddon. Gideon temporarily served as his henchman as part of a deal and was possibly only kept alive afterwards for the sake of being punshed.

Mabel and Ford meanwhile? Got their lives spared for no apparent reason other than Bill simply wanted to.

I guess you can argue that the whole Mabel Land business was part of the deal with Gideon but I always assumed the deal was just for Bill to break him out and put him in a good place during the apocalypse, plus Gideon didn't seem to care much about Mabel's well-being at this point. Still, it does help Bill if he can hold Mabel in front of Gideon but I do like to think he also spared her just out of having grown a liking to her.

The more it strikes me then that the scene at the start of Weirdmageddon where Bill could've easily taken out Mabel but just snapped her unconscious instead,

seems to mirror the scene near the end of Weirdmageddon where he's about to snap out her life.

This and Bill seemingly being done with Ford at this point as well almost feels like Bill is dissapointed by the fact that Mabel and Ford both proved to be more different from him than he thought - Mabel by getting out of the manifestation of escapism and Ford by refusing to accept Bill's offer no matter what - and lashed out at them for it.