Is there an AU I missed? Leave it in the replies to this comment! This is part of a series of shorter Gravity Falls analysis videos being released this week, the week of 6/18! Depending on what I finish editing in time, I am expecting a total of 4 or 5 videos to be released this week. Releasing 5 videos in one week is an undertaking, but if you would like to help support my efforts, I have a Patreon: www.patreon.com/hanahyperfixates
It wasn’t that big but I loved gravity rises! (I think it was that one? The one where dipper and Mabel are swapped and it’s winter?) mostly because I was a sucker for mabel getting the spotlight
Immortal pines And... i forgot the name but there was one where dipper was captured by the blind eye society cuz he knew too much about gravity falls and they make him join and mabel tries to get him back.
I think the most interesting AUs/fics I've seen is "The Man Downstairs". Ford doesn't fall through the portal, but instead just gets possessed by Bill, and Ford and Stan, Stan more hesitantly, agree to keep him hidden and in the basement while they both try to find a cure.
I’ve noticed that the teenage fans of The Owl House are kind of creating aus in a similar vein. It’s nice seeing history repeating itself. I’m starting to feel old😅
Out of the AU's that stood out to me, one was titled "Fight Falls". Basically, Dipper and Mabel are. .kinda delinquents. . okay delinquents is a strong word, it'd be more accurate to say they're kinda "problem kids". Basically, Dipper and Mabel in this reality can kick ass and take names, they don't take crap from anyone, and are constantly getting into trouble and kicked out of schools cause of them getting into fights with older kids. They're sent off to Gravity Falls to get them "straightened out", and well the AU is basically "Gravity Falls, but Dipper and Mabel are a lot more willing to throw hands". Like they still share traits from the Dipper and Mabel we love, but they're a lot more willing to snark and bite wit, and throw a punch at the monster of the week. Heck, in this reality, Bill is named "Kill Cipher". . kinda edgy. . okay entirely edgey.
Fight Falls always just felt like a Gravity Falls edition of Underfell (universe where everything is just edgy) and honestly that being the inspiration doesn't seem that out of the realm of possibility because Underfell predates Fight Falls by a bit and the creator is an Undertale fan.
I remember that!! Specific comes that comes to mind is them doing their awkward sibling hug and leaving bloody hand prints on each other's backs and stan being like "O-O"
Thank you for acknowledging how wierd it is that so much reverse falls stuff put Mabel in ''''Sexy'''' type clothes bc that always made me SUPER uncomfortable
Especially because Pacifica doesn’t wear “sexy” clothing or anything like that in the show like how Gideon wears a suit in the show. There was no reversal!
yuuup. tell me why paz and gideon felt aged down/child like but mabel and dipper usually were aged up and sexualized in that au lmao. (i know rev!mabel got it worse with her outfit, but at least from my memory, reverse dipper also got the bipper treatment. aka.. well. you know. all that.)
She's literally 12 too 😭. I get if people want to make the Pines twins this incredibly mysterious and bitchy pair, but as far as I know the bitchy kids that sexualizes themselves often have trauma regarding that sexualization. So either choose to acknowledge that it's fucked up or just don't view Mabel that way at _all._
Ngl in the reverse falls AU i thought theyd make Mabel smarter like Dipper and Dipper confident like Mabel and then the others are just reversed the same 😨 i did not expect to make them evil
came into the comment section to make a “babe wake up” joke only to find out someone beat me to it. this is a lovely display of what the target audience for these videos is lmao
I remember a wild (baseless) fan theory during the hiatus between season 1 and 2. It stated that Mabel and Dipper would explore the fan aus multiverse in an episode of season 2. We really believed anything was possible in this show and Alex was much more aware of fan content than he actually was. It didn’t help that we were desperate for any and all Gravity Falls related theories/fan fics after Gideon Rises.
Something l've noticed is that most of the time, creators are barely aware of the things their fans do. Just because it's a firm belief on your forum doesn't mean the creator has even thought of it, or even thought of visiting a forum for their work!
typing this with my bill cipher mouse cursor, holding my bill cipher plush, glancing at the journal 3 on my desk, sobbing bc i couldnt be in the gravity falls fandom at its peak
I think you’re probably a bit older than me but I feel the same I mean I’m 15 rn so I would have been too young (or too hyperfixated on MLP) to be into gravity falls at its peak or participate in any of the AUs. Shit sucks man but at least you’re here now
I was a little kid watching gravity falls like 8-10 and now I’m 15 years old and rewatched it for the seasons time. I’m now trying to figure out the fandom and just getting into it, because I miss this series a lot and I just love how it’s getting talked about again.
@@2triedforthis830 yeah I watched some of it when I was younger too and again when I was 11, like I’ve seen the fandom before and I’m aware of some stuff but I’m properly like getting into it for the first time
Its funny how you mention “no one is here for grauntie mabel” considering she was one of the biggest pulls for me in this AU! And also seeing how her and dipper’s dynamic would change as adults put into the stan twin’s situation. My favorite was monster falls (I May be a furry) but relativity was a close second Also this video might make me check out drifting stars, its seems interesting and I wasn’t familiar with it
Did I say that no one was there for Grauntie Mabel? If so, I misspoke. I do think that kid Stan and Ford were the biggest draw, but I absolutely ADORE Grauntie Mabel.
@@hanahyperfixatesOh sorry, idk if you used that sentence exactly, I just wanted to point out what I liked about the au personally! I really liked this video btw, I thought I was familiar with most popular aus but there were a couple here I never even heard of, and even for the ones I knew about there were some new things, so thanks for making it!
Grauntie mabel you will always be famous to me🫶🏽 i love the aus that make the mystery shack like a craft store full of handmade goods and Abuelita is one of the co-workers. (I like this one particular tumblr artist but i cant remember who:( )
I was into Undertale while it was developing AUs in the era just after Gravity Falls had finished airing and it's interesting to hear how some of the AUs in Gravity falls left fingerprints all over Undertale ones, even though I didn't see this unfold. I think it's awesome that you documented this!
One AU that I recall fondly was called the Antigravity AU, which despite the ominous title was essentially similar to Relativity Falls. The gist of Antigravity is essentially that the teen characters (like Wendy and Soos) swapped ages with the kids (the Twins and Pacifica/Gideon). There was never many fics or fanart of this, mostly a few impeccable works by 'becca draws stuff' on Tumblr which I became attached to quickly. Maybe it's just my fascinations with kid characters getting to act older (especially cause GF never did any kind of 'flash-forward'), and seeing the ramifications of a more mature Dipper dealing with a childish Wendy was a fun twist on one of GF's less well-liked plot strands. Sailorleo's Reunion Falls has also stuck in my memory, mainly for how well developed the alternate plots for each episode were. The premise was that Dipper grew up in the Falls separate from Mabel and they eventually reunite during the events of what would have been the show's first episode. Essentially it was a role swap, with Mabel discovering the journal and being the more proactive of the twins, while Dipper was familiar with the town and had pre-existing relationships with Stan and Wendy primarily. There were dozens of short comics showing AU possibilities for the canon episodes. I found it really cool how little the AU actually changed plotwise while still having a huge effect on the way events felt from a character POV. One other thing that's not quite an AU that sprung up with an incredible amount of fanart was the numerous crossovers with Steven Universe right after that show ended. The 'Steven moves Gravity Falls post-Future and gets a job at the Mystery Shack' became its own micro-genre for a few months back in 2020 before fizzling out. That was quite a fascinating melding of two shows with overlapping aesthetics, one of the more compelling crossovers I've witnessed. I suppose it's not technically an AU, but it was developed more than most simple mashups of characters. Edit: Also someone else might have mentioned this, but Clucks as mentioned in the Relativity Falls section probably comes from the chicken Pacifica is seen taking with her from the fair in The Time Traveller's Pig. I've seen at least one non-AU fic feature the chicken as her pet. Edit 2: I'd never learnt much about Transcendence AU, but I find it funny how I also used the Mizar/Alcor connection in a fic of my own for an unrelated character tangentially related to Dipper. Must be something about the constellation that appeals to GF fans looking for obscure connections to expand the universe.
my personal favorite is Reverse Portal au, because of how Ford's role in it is pretty damn angsty, but he stays in character for the most part? i mean, from the fact that in canon Ford gets angry at Stan for bringing him back, we can assume that he wouldn't do the same for Stan. Ford would sacrifice his brother for the greater good of the universe, and he would feel so bad and guilty, but he would also have a hero complex about it. HE made that sacrifice and it was the "right thing to do" and now he has to live with it. so many complex and conflicting thoughts stewing in his head. and then Stan comes back and he wants to know why he was stuck in there for thirty fucking years!! what is Ford gonna say. sorry Stanley you were on the wrong end of the trolley problem! i wasn't planning to bring you back, these kids did it without my permission! cool arm though!
The transcendence au is basically an entire series in and of itself. Sure gravity falls is a base, but once you actually get into the plot? There's so much more thats just!!! Ugh!! Its so good. One of my favorite TAU fics is "so you want to be a demonologist" - its legitimately my favorite piece of written media ever and like thats saying alot but uh fuck off i love it. Its not even just about the reincarnation and family,, its about some random fucking kid who wants to learn about demons and got stuck in a class with Tyrone fucking evergreen. It's about the lore of the au and the world the community has built. Its about so much and i adore it!!!! Its!! Ugh!!!!! I love it so much im so glad it was mentioned
I honestly feel like the creators could re-work the AU into an original story and it would still stand on its own. It could make for a great book series or something along those lines.
Same I saw it during the pandemic and I loved it. Deep dives are so good in fandoms when you were not their for the original surge of fans when it came out
I was too young to participate in a lot of the more involved AU aspects of the fandom, however I have been a fan of the show since 2014… I did know a bit about Reverse falls tho. So even OG fans can learn and catch up with a few things lol
relativity falls sounds like, actually so much fun?? i'm not the kind of fandom person to get into this type of AUs, but i CAN get behind that one... the idea of auntie mabel is genuinely great, and the stan twins just vibing in gravity falls sounds amazing. thanks for introducing me to it, hana! :)
Also fun fact about Relativity Falls it’s ending is different than the main series. Where in the main universe Mabel and Dipper get sent back home to their loving parents; Relativity Falls Stan and Ford are loving kidnapped/actually adopted by their cool Great Aunt and Uncle (obviously the officialness of them living w/Dipper and Mabel varies across individual stories, everyone universally agrees that those boys need to be kept far far away from their “father”)
As one of the Transcendence AU mods, it was really cool to watch you talk about your experience with TAU and the GF AUs in general! ("Who's Henry?" had me cackling, because half of us in the TAU fandom regularly forget that he isn't a GF canon character XD). The age of GF AUs has been such a special and important time in a lot of people's lives and I don't really see people talking about it in this kind of way! Great video!
The wiki was instrumental to my research - thank YOU for the work and love that obviously went into it. There was a lot of the AU that I couldn't cover, and I was worried I wouldn't be able to do it justice (as an outsider looking in), but I hope I didn't mess up anything big and I got the gist of it correct!
@@hanahyperfixates I think you did a great job explaining it from an outsider's perspective! There's a lot of complexities to it that are hard to get into (as you said, it's very dense) but the important stuff came across well! I love that you commented on how it's not just all angst and that a big part of the AU is about finding family and love over and over again throughout time, because that's one of the things I love the most about TAU. One thing -- I can understand how the cult stuff is hard to make much sense of. Originally (as you probably saw in Zoey's post), Alcor and Mizar were going to do "mystery twin" stuff together, so stuff similar to the kinds of adventures they did during the series canon, but on a bigger scale. The cult stuff came about partially because of Society of the Blind Eye, which really put this image of evil cults into peoples' heads. People figured "there's probably bad people in the world who want to take advantage of demon deals in order to do evil things. and then Alcor and Mizar can jump in to save the day!" Which is an understandable story premise, but we did sort of get to a state where that kind of premise got over-saturated, to the extent that we suddenly weren't even explaining it anymore. I'm so glad the wiki was helpful to you, too! We put in a lot of effort to spruce it up but like I never imagined that someone would end up citing it for a deep dive video! (I also have to say that seeing "this page needs work in order to conform to the style guide" in your screenshots was so funny to me. You can blame me personally for that XD).
As another TAU mod, I second this! It is definitely a dense AU, and I think a lot of material gets made for it with the assumption that you're already familiar with a lot of concepts that weren't in Gravity Falls. My favourite part of TAU is far into the future, where Dipper is hardly recognisable from the original show and is instead more of a Doctor Who character who finds people living their ordinary lives and takes them on as companions. I haven't been in another fandom that really explores that concept in the way TAU does, and I do enjoy that rather than being alone in immortality forever, he finds people who love him again and again throughout the ages - it's a story of hope. I checked the wiki edit log and it was me who wrote that super vague summary of cults - whoops haha. This video is a great explainer and is a really good look into what someone might stumble on when trying to get into this AU! Thank you!
"One of these names is not like the others" well when Hank was born he was originally named "Forrest" but Dipper went to give the three of them extra names for protection from supernatural creatures and decided that name would just get him teased, and so swapped his first and middle names such that he was "Henry Forrest" rather than "Forrest Henry" but of course since his father'snameisHenryeveryonejustcallshimHankand------ ...........You have dredged up ancient memories. I have not read Transcendence AU fanfic in nearly five years. I should... I should re-read some of that. Oh man, I *adored* that AU in college and I still remember so much of it. I cosplayed as Alcor at a major con. Teeny little butt-wings and all. There is video evidence of me in a dance-off in that costume (I was terrible). It was such a major part of my fandom experience, it really is its own thing (and the *art*, dang, some of my favorite animatics are for that AU) even though it is also still based on so many of the original themes of family found in Gravity Falls. This really is astoundingly well-researched! You describe all of these so clearly and it's a real blast from the past going back through them. Awesome work.
Reverse Falls is definitely my favorite of the AUs. Taking Dipper and Mabel and turning them into villains is just such a fun concept that you can really run with. I've read some really good fanfics and comics that take place in that AU and just love it.
Talking about the Reverse Falls AU, I've commonly seen Dipper's name changed from Mason to Tyrone in this AU. It's because it's the name he's wanted (mentioned in Double Dipper) and I think it's really creative despite the fact that he's still just called Dipper in this AU.
If the names are the opposite, shouldn't Pacifica Northwest become Atlantica Southeast? Good opportunity to make her the member of the duo with a nickname like Dipper
If I recall correctly, Reverse Falls was the first AU I was exposed to, followed soon thereafter by Monster Falls. I had heard of Transcendence, but I didn’t have much interest in it. And I honestly haven’t heard of most of the other AUs in this video. My favorite AU used to be Gravity Rises, which switches Dipper and Mabel’s personalities, but now I’d say it’s Reunion Falls, in which Dipper was raised in Gravity Falls.
Reunion falls was so cool i really liked the concept i rediscovered the page through the GF fan's tumblr ask leading it to sailorleo's account. It felt like i traveled back in time to the early gravity falls days as I saw their work on pinterest occasionally (i didnt have tumblr as a kid). I really like the dynamic of the twins and how they get closer to each other over all, REUNION FALLS🎉🎉🎉🎉
HELL YEAH!! this was such a wonderful walk down memory lane. It wasn't just going "hey remember this? Wasn't that cool?" (I see you disney), but rather a real critical look at these significant fan works. A look at what the fandom culture at the time which lead to the creation to these aus. Honestly this is a great way for new fans to learn about fun content that already exists and could be to their tastes, allowing them to fall in love with the show all over again. Just like I did watching this.
This seems like a good place to tell the world that in the first D and D campaign I ever DMed the final boss was a Bill Cipher inspired creation called “Alcor,” obviously after this AU, even though I had only passing familiarity with Transcendence. My players, who had not watched Gravity Falls, took to calling the demon “Al Gore.” Great video as always!
44:22 Hearing “the big shot au” made me instantly think of Spamton from Deltarune. Then that made me think of what if Stan pines got business help from a mysterious person like Spamton but it’s Bill who made a deal with Stan to give him riches and fame after he’s kicked out and traveling across the country trying to make money. Imagine if Stan made a deal with Bill when he’s at his lowest point before Ford ever even meets Bill, imagine Stan going off the deep edge into borderline or total villainy by being offered everything he’s ever wanted by a manipulative dream demon after he’s lost every support system he had. Did this video of gravity falls au just cause me to create my own au? I wonder if someone else has already done it before, I feel like I’m probably not the first to have this idea but man is it interesting.
With monster au it did create some interesting angst. my favourite was Wendy becoming a werewolf, and since Dipper is a deer it started this "nature vs nurture" thing where she has this wild instinct to attack but they're also friends... And also I loved the idea of Pacifica being a medusa monster. it gave her arc much angstier depth I enjoyed.
i remember one that i really loved when i was younger (forgot the name tho) was one where dipper was sent to live w stan as a baby for vague, custody-related reasons (the age they were separated varied, i saw anywhere from basically at birth to like 5ish maybe?). it also usually included trans dipper, and that was sometimes the reason for the custody issues. then, mabel comes up to visit for the first time during the summer of the show. you get dipper growing up w all the gravity falls kids, stan as a full-time parent, mabel and dipper either instantly bonding or having conflicts when they re-unite, etc.
jokes aside I think it's super fun to see you making these deep dives in these fandom niches. it's so weird and fun to see what the collective fandom hive mind can come up with.
5 Minutes Older was a huge inspiration for me to write some of my early (pretty bad, lol) fanfics for GF. Snadger's work was a real motivator back then alongside Keleficent's work and Marehami's mentoring with Adoption. I'll always love Timestuck for that fic and just how adorable that AU was. It left 2017 me in a wreck for several days :'P Also so glad that old timeline me and some old friends made years ago helped out in your video. It was a really long time ago (like 2018 when I was a GFA blog writer level old) and I can't believe it's still around. That hunt really helped inspire future hunts I went on for lost GF content. I just hope Alex Hirsch never figures out that this was the origin point that led to his Letterman appearance resurfacing ;)
I remember as a kid loving the concept of monster falls, especially when bill was made into a human in it. BUT REVERSE FALLS- That au SHAPED ME! Will single handedly unlocked and created one of my types, "sad pathetic meow meow (bonus if villain)" I remember after learning about wattpad one of the first things I did was look for x reader with Will, but all I could find was Bildip...which I thought was toxic and hated it for said toxicity.
You did an amazing job of summarizing the Transcendence AU from an outsider's perspective given the crazy amount of content it has (I think its approaching 900 fics on AO3 alone). Also great to see the wiki serving its purpose, since a few people put a good amount of effort into overhauling it over the COVID-19 pandemic (we had a pretty major resurgence in activity during 2020 and 2021, like I'd imagine most fandoms did). Also a fun trivia bit I think you'll enjoy- One of the funnier consequences of Ford being revealed after a lot of the Transcendence AU had already been established, is that Grunkle Stan named the shack(which was repurposed into a library) into "The Stanley Pines Memorial Library of the Supernatural," after his twin brother "Stanley". After Fords reveal, it was retconned into Stan naming the shack after himself.
I love how you always put a lot of care into matching your outfit/makeup and BG objects to whatever you're talking about! Tbh a major thing I wondered was why people used [specific name] AU to refer to both general fandom trends where everyone there's some fixed points but everyone has their own take (e.g., Relativity Falls) and to one person making their own specific story/set of designs/series of headcanon posts. But it seems like a lot of the general trend ones *also* started with just one person, and some of the very specific ones *had* more fanworks that are now deleted/hard to find... The mystery of why you're required to give every iteration a specific title remains, but I guess we used to -stuck too, so it's just kind of a fandom thing. Still kind of overwhelming if you're suddenly trying to memorize a whole bunch of new terms, so I really appreciate the overview!
I think it's just to make talking about it easier. Like, imagine if instead of these aus having names, they were all just referred to like "Gravity Falls but they're monsters" or "Gravity Falls but Mabel and/or Dipper get sent back to the past and team up with a homeless Stan to travel to Oregon so they can get Ford to fix the time travel device and also reunite their grunkles". I agree it can get kind of hard to memorize all these names at times though, especially if the names are really similar like Drifting Stars and Grifting Stars.
@@alyssumowo Yeah! Fandom generates a lot of shorthand, so there’s def a bunch of non-fandom-specific AU terms too (roleswap, peggy sue, fusion, etc.). Plus I mentioned Homestuck, which had general terms like lyricstuck and sadstuck plus specific AU names like Cultstuck, Hemostuck, Ke$hastuck, Promstuck/Marchingstuck… Off the top of my head, SU and Undertale fandoms also have some specific AU names (Inverted, Gone Wrong, Bad Prediction; Underfell, Errortale). But I do feel like GF fandom is REALLY into having super specific labels for these things, moreso than other fandoms. I think the thing that really got me kind of thinking this was when I looked in the comments on an ongoing (like, updating now in 2023) fic I was reading and people were encouraging the author to come up with a specific name for their take on a “characters time traveling to meet up with future/past versions of themselves” story and listing out the other variations that already existed. Like, it isn’t enough to call it Timestuck as a general term; there has to be a taxonomy of specific labels depending on who exactly time travels and which exact character they hang out with. And just using the fic title is NOT an option, it has to match with the established AU name style. And to be clear I’m not hating on this concept or anything! It’s obtuse if you stumble on it without knowing the vocab, but once you know, it makes it way easier to find exactly what you’re looking for at a glance.
I liked reverse falls a lot as a kid but damn was the sexualization of the twins so fucking awful. I remember going into comment section and having people berate me for saying that viewing Mabel as sexual was weird 💀. Unrelated but another AU I really liked that you didn’t discuss was demonic guardian au. I’m really into any au with heavy familial focuses so I ate that shit up.
man. everything i learn about the fandom while the show was running really makes me wish i was there. Not to sound like one of those tiktok teens who wish they could be in 2010 to experience the peak of one direction fandom but i was a ten year old who wasn't allowed online and didn't even have cable to watch the show and by the time i got around to watching it and entering the fandom in 2019 all the exiting theory posts, new au's and excitement about the show were buried too deep in tumbler and peoples memories for me to find them. Anyways Im happy people (like you!) are still making theory videos and deep dives about the series in general and about the fandom as well. And that the Book of Bill is doing a lot to make me feel like a real part of the fandom too. those two hours of password guessing and finding before I looked online was very fun.
Transcendence AU changed my brain chemistry. I was in on it pretty early but I can totally get how its sheer density is overwhelming. We love and support the wiki editors! Part of the fun was that no one had control over the canon, anyone could add stuff and that'd be canon if people wanted it. It's loose but also capable of being deep as people keep building on each other's work. It did mean we got A Lot of stuff though! For me, I loved the small niches it allowed. I spent a lot of my creative effort for the AU on Hank Pines' Portland adventures with his Accidental Supernatural Mafia, which usually features approximately zero canon Gravity Falls content except for Dipper sometimes being there as a diabolos ex machina. If I wasn't thinking about that niche, it was the reincarnations of a rando demon summoner always named Cassie who trades ice cream for math help or post-universe-end next-universe-world-building because this AU's timeline is ridiculous. Deep lore gives so many little pockets to play in! Honestly great job summarising TAU. It's about finding your family, coming to terms with yourself and the world, having phenomenal cosmic horrors on your side, immortal angst, and also beating up a never-ending stream of unnamed cultists with nail-infused baseball bats. ❤TAU, my beloved ❤
Thank you so much for this video! I have always been kinda bummed out that I never got be there in the peak of the gravity falls fandom. I always loved gravity falls but I was just a bit too young (and with limited access to the internet) during its run (and also didn’t speak English lmao). So seeing these videos is like discovering some hidden lore and finally understanding ancient scriptures. Glad to have some context on cool fanart I saw back then!
You can still engage with these AUs now! GF has a very active fanbase on tumblr , and lots of newer fans after the 10 yr anniversary! Just create what you like and find your people ^_^
God the one of us au REALLY upset 11 year old me. I really liked Ford and got sad at the idea of him being evil. It is very funny looking back, just a kid crying because of fanart of their favorite old man.
Haha, I get it. Ford's the best - I will say, though, a lot of One of Us is Ford actually joining Bill to protect his family, or as a ruse to keep Bill distracted, etc. A demon with a heart of gold!
I always thought Gravity Falls should have had a third season--but like, it's just extending the story. The s2 finale would be Not What He Seems, and the 3rd season is the latter half of what is s2. I get why they did it the way they did, I think they moved the reveal up because fans were guessing it for a while now, but I DO think s2 is kinda rushed in areas, and so many plot points had to be covered in Journal 3. I think they would have genuinely benefited from a third season.
AAAA I'M ONLY AT THE END OF THE TRANSCENDENCE AU PART BUT I HAVE TO COMMENT NOW first of all hearing you speak about it made me so happy, i've been so nostalgic about this au for a while. i'd say you got the description spot on!! but also like you acknowledged, it's so insanely expansive and has a lot more interesting angles as well. if you're at all interested here's some interesting stuff i remember: 1. first of all, the cults - you cracked my up so bad with your confusion because yeah, suddenly cults!! but this ties in to other demons that are also roaming the mindscape now and are free to make deals with mortals. dipper is a good guy basically only because he was human first, and the rest of the demons are way more down with fucking people over and causing misery. and basically there just are cults for every possible demon and they do big no no's like human sacrifice and stuff. because of course. some of the demon ocs were hilarious though. like Brian the Organ Duck alcor even has his own cult in the far future! but it's portrayed as way more chill and more or less like a regular demon worshipping (no murder involved) church 2. but also springing from that demons = bad point, a big part of the au was also about dipper struggling with his demon nature and with maintaing his human side. which was *my shit*. basically, with his powers also came demon instincts, which are all about tricking people and causing death and destruction. as the timeline goes on and he faces losing his human family, this side can take over him, causing violent outbursts or even decades long periods where he basically dissassociates away from him past and human self and fully embraces being a destructive, evil force of nature. in the lore, alcor the demon was known for having fluctuating phases between being very friendly and fair with humans, particularly kids, to being an absolute nightmare and danger to everyone. one infamous even in the lore was the Destruction of California - yes, all of it. he sank it into the sea. yes, this killed countless innocent people. but yeah, this added so much angst fuel that teenage me could not get enough of 3. Bill Cipher also had another reincarnation at some point, a kid named Toby, that Dipper actually ended up adopting while he was pretending to be a human. he did that sometimes (actually, one of my favorite fics ever was "Return, Rewind, Rewrite", where Dipper has wiped his own memories and locked away his powers to once again grow up as a normal human human kid with his reincarnated sister. just so he could be human again. achk) 4. A Fun Tidbit: Since this AU was also first thought of in Gravity Falls' early days, some lore and fics have the Pines family turn the Mystery Shack into "The Stanley Pines Memorial Library of the Supernatural," named after Grunkle Stans' mysterious lost twin brother, uh, Stanley... 😂 5. This Au also had its own AUs, like Drift(?) AU (the dark one, where Dipper can't contanct Mabel after the Transcendence, everyone assumes he's dead and he becomes more unhinged much more quickly), an AU where Mable becomes the demon, and AU where both twins become demons ect i'm so sorry this became such a wall of text, thank you for reading if you did and if you didn't, it's ok i don't blame you in the slightest
Oh my god. I knew about the library but did NOT know it was talking about pre-reveal Ford. That is DEFINITELY going in my Mystery Trio video (I have a section planned on pre-reveal-Ford "Lee" characterizations).
This was so fun to watch. Something I’ve noticed about your style of delivery in particular: you’re a phenomenal storyteller. I had never heard of the Blind Faith AU before watching this video, and I found myself on the edge of my seat while you were explaining the storyline. Really wonderful narration.
It’s so funny seeing the call to bring the One of Us AU back a week after it’s making a small comeback on tumblr and Twitter in the aftermath of Book of Bill lol
I can't fully express how grateful I am that this video was made from a Tumblr point of view. You clearly have such a vast knowledge of internet culture, and that's so important when talking about series/headcanons! I've seen many video essays on GF but this one just feels detailed and thorough. Thank you so much, I loved it!!
ME TOOOOOOO- i just remember being a kid and loving those slideshow videos of Monster Falls artwork with some sort of song in the background thinking, “wow this is so cool!” i just thought it was the same story but just with the main characters as monsters, like how fandoms humanize animal/monster characters lol
Man hearing all these aus were a blast from the past. The Mystery Trio au was always my favorite, but I also really loved the Grim au and frankenstan aus. One that I don't think was mentioned was the various werewolf!stan aus, because I always really enjoyed them. The one that I specifically remember liking (or maybe it was just my au at this point i don't remember) was a werewolf!stan that turned into a mystery trio au because Stan for whatever reason ends up in gravity falls so it's Stan, Ford, and Fiddleford dealing with their shit but also Stan is secretly a werewolf.
I WAS QUITE YOUNG WHEN GRAVITY FALLS HAD A CRAZY ACTIVE COMMUNITY BUT I VIVIDLY REMEMBER MONSTER FALLS, AND WATCHING SLIDESHOWS WITH “EVERYTIME WE TOUCH” PLAYING IN THE BG FOR MONSTER FALLS LMFAO
Saved this video like a fine wine to watch in my greatest time of need- finally got to it during a hard shift last night and it's SO fascinating! I was a Deviantart kid during the show's run and wasn't allowed to have a tumblr, so barring a few users who were more Infamous than famous I checked up on most tumblr fandom for the show just did not appear in my fandom experience. Case in point I had never even heard of the One Of Us AU before now, and having been spending the last few months fixated on writing an AU with a similar premise(figuring out what it would Take for the Pines family to all turn to the dark side as a Family bc that pitch in the penthouse calls to me) I am now obsessed with it. More One Of Us content forever please. Thank you yet again for the wonderful video!
I remember as a kid seeing a ton of really cool fanart and AMVs of Reverse Falls and thinking it seemed so awesome but I didn't know what fanfiction was so I never able to get into it
man I only knew of the monster falls au before this (and a bit of reverse falls against my will via sibling) but MAN does the blind faith au suddenly have it's hooks in me beckoning me to create art all of the sudden
This was such a trip down memory lane. I'm glad a lot of these AUs are still quite popular. I still get comments on my Stanswap AU fic to this day and I finished it back in 2018. I will never be tired of Timestuck or Blind Faith, although I agree the latter can get kinda ableist if we're not careful, and I've probably unintentionally been guilty of that at times. I get the excitement over the One of Us AU. Those designs do slap. (I'm especially a fan of that design where he comes out of the Journal and is made out of pages) But I think part of the reason it died down is because it feels antithetical to Ford's characterization once all the haters died down. That's why I couldn't ever really get into it. I was on the Ford Defense Squad back in the day and I can't see it without thinking "my boy would NEVER"
A fellow Ford Pines Defense Squad Member - I was there in the trenches! Lemme say - I always adored the interpretations where he joins Bill's side to buy time for his fam to escape, or as a ruse, or as part of a deal where Bill spares the kids or something. But there's something so comical about the "eh, sure, if you can't beat 'em" interpretation - it was nonesensical, but a fun excuse to draw a demon boi
WAIT. Omg you wrote stanswitch?? I literally just finished reading it, like I binged it over two days lmao I’ve just been getting into AUs and it was so good!! Definitely one of my favourite fanfics!!
This is the most coherent explanation of the Transcendence AU I've ever heard. I knew some of these details, demon Dipper, Mabel with Henry and triplets, but other tidbits were completely new to me. "Cultbasher" took me totally of guard lol. And wow, it's been so long time since I've seen any One of Us content that I legitimately forgot that was the name of the "Ford joining Bill" AU. Love seeing the Demon!Ford art, that shit is rad. A great look back into the past of the Gravity Falls fandom, even if the whippersnappers don't know anything about it and my dear Grifting Stars is the least favorite. Gotta keep that history alive I guess XD Congrats on making a wonderful video, and my condolences for all the deep diving you had to do to put this all together. Combing through Tumblr archives is no easy feat, so kudos!
When I was younger Monster falls, Reverse Falls, Immortal Pines, Fight Falls, and especially the one about each of the characters having their own dream demons au, were my shit back in the day! I was about 3 years late and only on Pinterest, Wattpad, and RUclips, but I was obsessed with AUs more than the actual show 😭😭😭
Great video, I remember so many of these AUs just consumed my life back in the day. Especially timestuck (which I’m still kinda obsessed with honestly.) I remember I read a timestuck fic where Mabel just straight up dies in Stan and Fords arms and it messed me up for weeks. I’m a little sad you couldn’t talk about some of my favorite aus, but also I totally get it, I wouldn’t want to make a 6 hour video either. Can’t wait to see what else you post in the next few days :P
@@hanahyperfixates I think the biggest ones you missed that I like are Reunion Falls, Gravity Rises, and Fight Falls. But my overall fav is Flat Dreams. I know it isn’t the biggest one, but it is to me ok?
love your stuff! i've never been that into gravity falls (watched it as a kid when it came out and loved it, not much besides that) but watching people talk about art that's important to them is one of my favorite things ever. makes me feel all cozy.
Gravity Falls aus are fun but something to note, and I was there in the tumblr trenches back then, is how much of it came form and trying to suck up to and get noticed by BNFs, and how those BNFs often ignored everyone but their clique of popular friends 7:04 that's why the same people come up over and over. They were the GF fandom big name fans and everyone was writing/drawing their AUS to try and get in with the popular crowd.
I remember being absolutely OBSESSED with Monster Falls when I was younger. The art made my little brain go brrrrrr. The very first fanfic I ever read was a Monster Falls fic. Even today Deerper is a fascinating concept to me
relativity falls has to be a homestuck inspired thing. "the protagonist children trade places with their parents/guardians" is literally a thing that happened in homestuck in 2011 and would have been fresh in tumblr's mind since that story arc went on for…the entire time gravity falls was on air lol
When I joined the fandom in like 2015-ish (between not what he seems and tale of two stans) the Reverse Falls AU TOOK OVER MY BRAINNNNN (as much as gravity falls itself, which tbh is impressive cuz my gravity falls phase was INTENSE) I legit think I have seen at least 85 to 90% of all reverse fanart available, (which is probably my weirdest flex) because I just kept looking it up nonstop on the platforms I had access to as a 13 year old because I could never get enough I daydreamed so much with these characters I ended up just making my OCs based on them, which are still my babies to this day I'm still very attached to it as you can tell
Honestly, growing up reverse falls and monster falls were the only AU's I was really that aware of and saw the most, but god I was so obsessed with reverse falls lol. My english skills were very limited at the time still, because I was at a point where I had just started to actually understand english (which funnily enough was hugely because of gravity falls), and I (thankfully) wasn't on tumblr yet, so I just didn't really run to any other au content than those two lol.
I actually remember watching a few very specific reverse falls speedpaints and being obsessed with them (because for some reason I was obsessed with speedpaints at the time, might be the autism) and I'm kinda tempted to try and find them again
wether they have costumes, lighting, and all that stuff or not, I still love these videos ^^ as a long time Gravity Falls fan I know most AU's but I still need to catch up on some so this video might be pretty helpful lol
See, as someone who never heard of Blind Faith, when you said eye trauma at the beginning I thought you were referencing the Death Arising videos (and maybe fics, but I didn't really read fics) where Reverse Ford and Fids basically disected Will in the 80s and ripped his eye out, haha. Found out about a lot of new aus in this video I missed the first time around. Good job!
Ah yes, twenty minute video… But seriously I loved every moment of this. It was such a trip revisiting these AUs. I remember the drifting stars AU being my favorite because I was also desperate for some Ford and Mabel bonding
such a genuine and heart warming video essay! I remember when I was a kid, one of the first nice comments I received on my writing was from someone with a monster falls Wendy pfp. going through these aus with my bestie when we were both 11 and hyperfixated was such a treat. AND WILL...just that name throws me back
There is one AU I remember from that period, that I don't think ever picked up traction, where Dipper was a changeling. Dipper died from the nuchal chord and was replaced with a faerie infant, and grew up believing he was a human until his powers began surfacing once in Gravity Falls. I think Stan was a changeling too, but that could have been a spin-off. I mostly remember art from it, where Dipper's eyes were glowing and he was panicking over it, and Stan was calming him down.
i watched gravity falls from when it premiered, but i was, like, 9 when i first watched it so i never had the chance to interact with most of the fandom. i watched *some* stuff from a distance, but i was never on the tumblrs or reddits or what have you. as someone who LOVES fandom today, i can not thank you enough! this genuinely let me kind of live out an experience i never got for a show i fell in love with and you are genuinely one of the best creators on all of youtube! thank you so so much
long time reverse falls au fan (seeing that original reverse gideon art SENT ME) and this is SUCH a cool deep dive! amazingly well-researched and fun and I LOOOVE that you themes your outfits and backgrounds to match each au :D I will clarify for history's sake (THOUGH NOT DEFENDING!) that a big part of the reason some artists drew rev!mabel in more revealing outfits was that some iterations of the au also reversed the ages of some characters too (mabel and mason aka dipper, and sometitmes paz aka pacifica and gideon, were made teenagers like Wendy and Robby, while Wendy and Robby were pre-teens). was it just an excuse for horny jail fans to make mabel and dipper hot and consenting age? Yes, almost definitely. But it did have SOME narrative reason to it as well (mabel wanting to sell more tickets to the telepathy tent so she dresses like the old fashioned magicians assistants, as well as seducing guys to get what she wants as a sort of twist on canon mabel's boy craze and the fact that gideon's first appearance is about his crush on mabel, the reverse is often true in rev!au). Again, not justifying or defending, just explaining Why That Happened for folks who weren't that deep in the sub-fandom. In hindsight, terrible idea because that's sadly the main thing rev falls is remembered for. Overall it's my favorite au of any fandom ever, and the COSPLAYS and ANIMATICS absolutely blow me away to this day (shout out to diaphorotes here on yt!). The changed dynamics between reversed characters are really intense and cool, and I'm a sucker for "cute thing turned into spooky thing". And when Ford got introduced being able to be like "haha you know how *Evil* mabel and dipper are? yeah that's largely because Ford is *Even More Evil*, and he regularly makes them look like amateurs with his increased knowledge of magic!" You also hit the nail on the head with the rev!stan secretly not caring about his niece and nephew - my favorite characterization of rev!stan tbh (even though it gets hella angsty).I genuinely also feel like the vibe/designs of amity's twin siblings in the owl house are loosely inspired by the rev!au mabel and mason... just a film theory!
As a warning, the rest of the videos released this week, included the one I posted this morning, should be shorter (or at least I hope they are for my sleep schedules' sake - I'm still editing).
you've become my comfort youtuber. when i've had a bad day the last few months, i'll binge-watch gravity falls then watch your videos. i'm so happy to have another video to watch over and over again. i hope you have a fantastic day.
Went back to link this video to a friend only realize I was somehow STILL not subscribed. Shame on me. Your videos are immaculate, continue being the creative person you are (and remember to take breaks!)
This video may have just given me the strength to actually write my own fanfiction! (...eventually) Please never stop. These videos are great. Also can someone explain the Flat Pines AU? I'm hearing so many good things but getting no details. Update: I have now started making my own GF fanfiction! Follow your dreams, people!
holy cow people are creative that thing with stanford losing his glasses so the demons that caused mcguckets madness would be blurry to him so he woudn't be affected is what I wouldn't have noticed. But now i love that idea so much although that fact they travel through the multiverse in the comics so easy makes ford look unnecessary, but maybe the nightmare realm was that terrifying
AUs have always been a fascinating part of fandom and fan made works for me. It’s great seeing a deeper dive into the category, even if it’s exclusively Gravity Falls ones.
This video made me so happy, thank you so much!! My Gravity Falls fixation has been going strong ever since i watched it in 2015 and the Show just means the world to me
I noticed that real time fandub reference lol. Fr tho ur videos are honesty some of my favorites on RUclips it's so great to be able to look back at this fandom I hold so dearly to my heart and to learn about things I never even got to see during the high of the fandom. Can't wait for more!!
Oh man, I remember scrolling through Monster Falls art back in the day on Pinterest because I didn't even have a Tumblr account yet. This really takes me back
This video series has inspired me to completely rewatch the show and start writing fan-fiction again (something I haven’t don’t since middle school) thank you for re-instating my hyperfixation
I was gonna look for a video like this, I’ve always wanted to learn a bit more about these AU’s besides looking at awesome art these community make! Doin’ good work for this fandom, Hana!
Is there an AU I missed? Leave it in the replies to this comment!
This is part of a series of shorter Gravity Falls analysis videos being released this week, the week of 6/18! Depending on what I finish editing in time, I am expecting a total of 4 or 5 videos to be released this week.
Releasing 5 videos in one week is an undertaking, but if you would like to help support my efforts, I have a Patreon: www.patreon.com/hanahyperfixates
It wasn’t that big but I loved gravity rises! (I think it was that one? The one where dipper and Mabel are swapped and it’s winter?) mostly because I was a sucker for mabel getting the spotlight
@@Ash-rr8vn
oh yeah! I forgot about that one, i really liked the fact that they switched summer for winter.
Immortal pines
And... i forgot the name but there was one where dipper was captured by the blind eye society cuz he knew too much about gravity falls and they make him join and mabel tries to get him back.
@@Ash-rr8vnYeah, that's the one! I read it on Wattpad 6 months ago. But, I don't remember if the storyline was finished or if it's still ongoing.
I think the most interesting AUs/fics I've seen is "The Man Downstairs". Ford doesn't fall through the portal, but instead just gets possessed by Bill, and Ford and Stan, Stan more hesitantly, agree to keep him hidden and in the basement while they both try to find a cure.
"Will Cipher is Bill Cipher if he was crying in a therapy room"
... WELL, RECENTLY-
What happened recently?
@@noodleydoo2862in the Book of Bill, it is revealed that the Axolotl placed Bill to therapy via the Theraprism for an indefinite period of time
@@noodleydoo2862 they are referring to something that happens in The Book Of Bill
@@bee_the_fox_ oh gotcha
Ooh hey I know you
I’ve noticed that the teenage fans of The Owl House are kind of creating aus in a similar vein. It’s nice seeing history repeating itself.
I’m starting to feel old😅
I can't wait for some poor RUclipsr ten years from now trying to explain that month were everything was worms.
shhhh. it's a canon event.
When you’re in the right age to have been a child fan of gravity falls and also a teenage fan of TOH 😭
Toh is definitely the 2020s gravity falls and I'm so down for it, those people are having so much fun it's really nostalgic lol
@@L0rdOfThePiesme oh my goddd hah
Out of the AU's that stood out to me, one was titled "Fight Falls". Basically, Dipper and Mabel are. .kinda delinquents. . okay delinquents is a strong word, it'd be more accurate to say they're kinda "problem kids". Basically, Dipper and Mabel in this reality can kick ass and take names, they don't take crap from anyone, and are constantly getting into trouble and kicked out of schools cause of them getting into fights with older kids. They're sent off to Gravity Falls to get them "straightened out", and well the AU is basically "Gravity Falls, but Dipper and Mabel are a lot more willing to throw hands". Like they still share traits from the Dipper and Mabel we love, but they're a lot more willing to snark and bite wit, and throw a punch at the monster of the week. Heck, in this reality, Bill is named "Kill Cipher". . kinda edgy. . okay entirely edgey.
omg u opened up a box in my mind that had stayed locked for years, fight falls was my shit back in high school
Fight Falls always just felt like a Gravity Falls edition of Underfell (universe where everything is just edgy) and honestly that being the inspiration doesn't seem that out of the realm of possibility because Underfell predates Fight Falls by a bit and the creator is an Undertale fan.
I remember that!! Specific comes that comes to mind is them doing their awkward sibling hug and leaving bloody hand prints on each other's backs and stan being like "O-O"
DUDE OH MY GOD i feel like a sleeper agent whos just been awakened LMAO
Fight Falls was my LIFEBLOOD omg! Especially their crossovers with Zero Gravity. I followed their tumblrs religiously
"William, the opposite of Billiam" made me laugh out loud
Thank you for acknowledging how wierd it is that so much reverse falls stuff put Mabel in ''''Sexy'''' type clothes bc that always made me SUPER uncomfortable
Especially because Pacifica doesn’t wear “sexy” clothing or anything like that in the show like how Gideon wears a suit in the show. There was no reversal!
yuuup. tell me why paz and gideon felt aged down/child like but mabel and dipper usually were aged up and sexualized in that au lmao. (i know rev!mabel got it worse with her outfit, but at least from my memory, reverse dipper also got the bipper treatment. aka.. well. you know. all that.)
It's a fucking leotard? If you think a leotard is "Sexy" clothing for a 12 year old you are weird as shit actually.
She's literally 12 too 😭. I get if people want to make the Pines twins this incredibly mysterious and bitchy pair, but as far as I know the bitchy kids that sexualizes themselves often have trauma regarding that sexualization. So either choose to acknowledge that it's fucked up or just don't view Mabel that way at _all._
Ngl in the reverse falls AU i thought theyd make Mabel smarter like Dipper and Dipper confident like Mabel and then the others are just reversed the same 😨 i did not expect to make them evil
"(long ass explanation) mabel dies, and then the plot finally starts." *t h e W H A T*
WHAT!?
HUH
babe wake up, hana hyperfixates just posted another gravity falls deepdive
“Men will literally get sucked into a different dimension rather than going to therapy.”
-Hana Hyperfixates, They/Them, 51:51
came into the comment section to make a “babe wake up” joke only to find out someone beat me to it. this is a lovely display of what the target audience for these videos is lmao
HAHAHAH IM SO SORRY
babe wake up new babe wake up comment dropped
@@heelturn2babe wake up new babe wake up babe wake up comment dropped
@@NoButIGotCheezWhiz babe wake up new babe wake up babe wake up babe wake up comment dropped
their comment is Right Below You on my screen and it’s frying me 😭
Not hearing a mention of the 1920s AU hurt me. That Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing AMV (slideshow) was a huge core memory.
You're right and I should feel bad - the 1920s AU was solid!
You just unlock the memory i didn't know i had
SHUT UP I WAS LOOKING FOR THIS COMMENT. This AU was my favorite
I've heard of this but cant find it anywhere. I heard the original artist deleted it or something but I might be wrong about that.
YESSS, that one and the amv where Stan gets possessed by Bill were my favorites!!!
Love how AU’s where Mabel is taken care of by one of the Stan twins is just the last of us with more steps
I remember a wild (baseless) fan theory during the hiatus between season 1 and 2. It stated that Mabel and Dipper would explore the fan aus multiverse in an episode of season 2. We really believed anything was possible in this show and Alex was much more aware of fan content than he actually was. It didn’t help that we were desperate for any and all Gravity Falls related theories/fan fics after Gideon Rises.
Something l've noticed is that most of the time, creators are barely aware of the things their fans do. Just because it's a firm belief on your forum doesn't mean the creator has even thought of it, or even thought of visiting a forum for their work!
typing this with my bill cipher mouse cursor, holding my bill cipher plush, glancing at the journal 3 on my desk, sobbing bc i couldnt be in the gravity falls fandom at its peak
I think you’re probably a bit older than me but I feel the same I mean I’m 15 rn so I would have been too young (or too hyperfixated on MLP) to be into gravity falls at its peak or participate in any of the AUs. Shit sucks man but at least you’re here now
@@WatchfulEntity I'm 14 😭
I was a little kid watching gravity falls like 8-10 and now I’m 15 years old and rewatched it for the seasons time. I’m now trying to figure out the fandom and just getting into it, because I miss this series a lot and I just love how it’s getting talked about again.
@@Mightbe_appa yeah dawg I was jus too into MLP to care unfortunately
@@2triedforthis830 yeah I watched some of it when I was younger too and again when I was 11, like I’ve seen the fandom before and I’m aware of some stuff but I’m properly like getting into it for the first time
Its funny how you mention “no one is here for grauntie mabel” considering she was one of the biggest pulls for me in this AU! And also seeing how her and dipper’s dynamic would change as adults put into the stan twin’s situation. My favorite was monster falls (I May be a furry) but relativity was a close second
Also this video might make me check out drifting stars, its seems interesting and I wasn’t familiar with it
Did I say that no one was there for Grauntie Mabel? If so, I misspoke. I do think that kid Stan and Ford were the biggest draw, but I absolutely ADORE Grauntie Mabel.
@@hanahyperfixatesOh sorry, idk if you used that sentence exactly, I just wanted to point out what I liked about the au personally! I really liked this video btw, I thought I was familiar with most popular aus but there were a couple here I never even heard of, and even for the ones I knew about there were some new things, so thanks for making it!
Grauntie mabel you will always be famous to me🫶🏽 i love the aus that make the mystery shack like a craft store full of handmade goods and Abuelita is one of the co-workers. (I like this one particular tumblr artist but i cant remember who:( )
I was into Undertale while it was developing AUs in the era just after Gravity Falls had finished airing and it's interesting to hear how some of the AUs in Gravity falls left fingerprints all over Undertale ones, even though I didn't see this unfold. I think it's awesome that you documented this!
@wewillwut7055Uderfell comes across as the undertale reverse falls.
@@BarakonWell that was around before gravity falls too. I remember hetalia had their version. People like to make things edgy lol
One AU that I recall fondly was called the Antigravity AU, which despite the ominous title was essentially similar to Relativity Falls. The gist of Antigravity is essentially that the teen characters (like Wendy and Soos) swapped ages with the kids (the Twins and Pacifica/Gideon). There was never many fics or fanart of this, mostly a few impeccable works by 'becca draws stuff' on Tumblr which I became attached to quickly. Maybe it's just my fascinations with kid characters getting to act older (especially cause GF never did any kind of 'flash-forward'), and seeing the ramifications of a more mature Dipper dealing with a childish Wendy was a fun twist on one of GF's less well-liked plot strands.
Sailorleo's Reunion Falls has also stuck in my memory, mainly for how well developed the alternate plots for each episode were. The premise was that Dipper grew up in the Falls separate from Mabel and they eventually reunite during the events of what would have been the show's first episode. Essentially it was a role swap, with Mabel discovering the journal and being the more proactive of the twins, while Dipper was familiar with the town and had pre-existing relationships with Stan and Wendy primarily. There were dozens of short comics showing AU possibilities for the canon episodes. I found it really cool how little the AU actually changed plotwise while still having a huge effect on the way events felt from a character POV.
One other thing that's not quite an AU that sprung up with an incredible amount of fanart was the numerous crossovers with Steven Universe right after that show ended. The 'Steven moves Gravity Falls post-Future and gets a job at the Mystery Shack' became its own micro-genre for a few months back in 2020 before fizzling out. That was quite a fascinating melding of two shows with overlapping aesthetics, one of the more compelling crossovers I've witnessed. I suppose it's not technically an AU, but it was developed more than most simple mashups of characters.
Edit: Also someone else might have mentioned this, but Clucks as mentioned in the Relativity Falls section probably comes from the chicken Pacifica is seen taking with her from the fair in The Time Traveller's Pig. I've seen at least one non-AU fic feature the chicken as her pet.
Edit 2: I'd never learnt much about Transcendence AU, but I find it funny how I also used the Mizar/Alcor connection in a fic of my own for an unrelated character tangentially related to Dipper. Must be something about the constellation that appeals to GF fans looking for obscure connections to expand the universe.
my personal favorite is Reverse Portal au, because of how Ford's role in it is pretty damn angsty, but he stays in character for the most part? i mean, from the fact that in canon Ford gets angry at Stan for bringing him back, we can assume that he wouldn't do the same for Stan. Ford would sacrifice his brother for the greater good of the universe, and he would feel so bad and guilty, but he would also have a hero complex about it. HE made that sacrifice and it was the "right thing to do" and now he has to live with it. so many complex and conflicting thoughts stewing in his head. and then Stan comes back and he wants to know why he was stuck in there for thirty fucking years!! what is Ford gonna say. sorry Stanley you were on the wrong end of the trolley problem! i wasn't planning to bring you back, these kids did it without my permission! cool arm though!
“Cool arm tho” 😭 how can it be cool when it’s gone? Jkjk
@@morganmarie6339 oh right i misremembered. i thought Stan returned with a prosthetic arm already
Reverse Falls AU is basically, what if the twins slayed, like, super hard.
LOOKING BACK AT IT, IT TOTALLY IS LMAOOO-
Embarrassing grandma Mabel instantly sold me on Relativity Falls
I heard the concept's first sentence and was like 'I need to search this au'
The transcendence au is basically an entire series in and of itself. Sure gravity falls is a base, but once you actually get into the plot? There's so much more thats just!!! Ugh!! Its so good. One of my favorite TAU fics is "so you want to be a demonologist" - its legitimately my favorite piece of written media ever and like thats saying alot but uh fuck off i love it. Its not even just about the reincarnation and family,, its about some random fucking kid who wants to learn about demons and got stuck in a class with Tyrone fucking evergreen. It's about the lore of the au and the world the community has built. Its about so much and i adore it!!!! Its!! Ugh!!!!! I love it so much im so glad it was mentioned
Yes I love this fic so much! I was so excited when I saw this video included TAU cus I feel like I never see it anywhere else and it’s so good
I honestly feel like the creators could re-work the AU into an original story and it would still stand on its own. It could make for a great book series or something along those lines.
I love all of their TAU drabbles and their ocs
As a Newbie of 3-4 years to the fandom, this is so cool to watch and learn about the fandom more
Same I saw it during the pandemic and I loved it. Deep dives are so good in fandoms when you were not their for the original surge of fans when it came out
@@kyradavis8194rust me man between the fall of ‘13 to summer of ‘14 was a crazy time of theorizing and fan creations
I was too young to participate in a lot of the more involved AU aspects of the fandom, however I have been a fan of the show since 2014… I did know a bit about Reverse falls tho. So even OG fans can learn and catch up with a few things lol
“Oh? you think i like stories about people summoning demons? What about people *becoming* demons??”
Finally someone gets it
relativity falls sounds like, actually so much fun?? i'm not the kind of fandom person to get into this type of AUs, but i CAN get behind that one... the idea of auntie mabel is genuinely great, and the stan twins just vibing in gravity falls sounds amazing. thanks for introducing me to it, hana! :)
Also fun fact about Relativity Falls it’s ending is different than the main series. Where in the main universe Mabel and Dipper get sent back home to their loving parents; Relativity Falls Stan and Ford are loving kidnapped/actually adopted by their cool Great Aunt and Uncle (obviously the officialness of them living w/Dipper and Mabel varies across individual stories, everyone universally agrees that those boys need to be kept far far away from their “father”)
Relativity Falls is so dear to me,it's so much creativity and sweetness all around,it just sparks joy
As one of the Transcendence AU mods, it was really cool to watch you talk about your experience with TAU and the GF AUs in general! ("Who's Henry?" had me cackling, because half of us in the TAU fandom regularly forget that he isn't a GF canon character XD). The age of GF AUs has been such a special and important time in a lot of people's lives and I don't really see people talking about it in this kind of way! Great video!
The wiki was instrumental to my research - thank YOU for the work and love that obviously went into it. There was a lot of the AU that I couldn't cover, and I was worried I wouldn't be able to do it justice (as an outsider looking in), but I hope I didn't mess up anything big and I got the gist of it correct!
@@hanahyperfixates I think you did a great job explaining it from an outsider's perspective! There's a lot of complexities to it that are hard to get into (as you said, it's very dense) but the important stuff came across well! I love that you commented on how it's not just all angst and that a big part of the AU is about finding family and love over and over again throughout time, because that's one of the things I love the most about TAU.
One thing -- I can understand how the cult stuff is hard to make much sense of. Originally (as you probably saw in Zoey's post), Alcor and Mizar were going to do "mystery twin" stuff together, so stuff similar to the kinds of adventures they did during the series canon, but on a bigger scale. The cult stuff came about partially because of Society of the Blind Eye, which really put this image of evil cults into peoples' heads. People figured "there's probably bad people in the world who want to take advantage of demon deals in order to do evil things. and then Alcor and Mizar can jump in to save the day!" Which is an understandable story premise, but we did sort of get to a state where that kind of premise got over-saturated, to the extent that we suddenly weren't even explaining it anymore.
I'm so glad the wiki was helpful to you, too! We put in a lot of effort to spruce it up but like I never imagined that someone would end up citing it for a deep dive video! (I also have to say that seeing "this page needs work in order to conform to the style guide" in your screenshots was so funny to me. You can blame me personally for that XD).
As another TAU mod, I second this! It is definitely a dense AU, and I think a lot of material gets made for it with the assumption that you're already familiar with a lot of concepts that weren't in Gravity Falls. My favourite part of TAU is far into the future, where Dipper is hardly recognisable from the original show and is instead more of a Doctor Who character who finds people living their ordinary lives and takes them on as companions. I haven't been in another fandom that really explores that concept in the way TAU does, and I do enjoy that rather than being alone in immortality forever, he finds people who love him again and again throughout the ages - it's a story of hope.
I checked the wiki edit log and it was me who wrote that super vague summary of cults - whoops haha. This video is a great explainer and is a really good look into what someone might stumble on when trying to get into this AU! Thank you!
"One of these names is not like the others" well when Hank was born he was originally named "Forrest" but Dipper went to give the three of them extra names for protection from supernatural creatures and decided that name would just get him teased, and so swapped his first and middle names such that he was "Henry Forrest" rather than "Forrest Henry" but of course since his father'snameisHenryeveryonejustcallshimHankand------
...........You have dredged up ancient memories. I have not read Transcendence AU fanfic in nearly five years. I should... I should re-read some of that. Oh man, I *adored* that AU in college and I still remember so much of it. I cosplayed as Alcor at a major con. Teeny little butt-wings and all. There is video evidence of me in a dance-off in that costume (I was terrible). It was such a major part of my fandom experience, it really is its own thing (and the *art*, dang, some of my favorite animatics are for that AU) even though it is also still based on so many of the original themes of family found in Gravity Falls.
This really is astoundingly well-researched! You describe all of these so clearly and it's a real blast from the past going back through them. Awesome work.
The wiki didn't mention Hank's full name (at least not that I saw) so this is helpful, thank you!
Reverse Falls is definitely my favorite of the AUs. Taking Dipper and Mabel and turning them into villains is just such a fun concept that you can really run with. I've read some really good fanfics and comics that take place in that AU and just love it.
Talking about the Reverse Falls AU, I've commonly seen Dipper's name changed from Mason to Tyrone in this AU. It's because it's the name he's wanted (mentioned in Double Dipper) and I think it's really creative despite the fact that he's still just called Dipper in this AU.
If the names are the opposite, shouldn't Pacifica Northwest become Atlantica Southeast?
Good opportunity to make her the member of the duo with a nickname like Dipper
If I recall correctly, Reverse Falls was the first AU I was exposed to, followed soon thereafter by Monster Falls. I had heard of Transcendence, but I didn’t have much interest in it. And I honestly haven’t heard of most of the other AUs in this video.
My favorite AU used to be Gravity Rises, which switches Dipper and Mabel’s personalities, but now I’d say it’s Reunion Falls, in which Dipper was raised in Gravity Falls.
Reunion falls was so cool i really liked the concept i rediscovered the page through the GF fan's tumblr ask leading it to sailorleo's account. It felt like i traveled back in time to the early gravity falls days as I saw their work on pinterest occasionally (i didnt have tumblr as a kid). I really like the dynamic of the twins and how they get closer to each other over all, REUNION FALLS🎉🎉🎉🎉
HELL YEAH!!
this was such a wonderful walk down memory lane. It wasn't just going "hey remember this? Wasn't that cool?" (I see you disney), but rather a real critical look at these significant fan works. A look at what the fandom culture at the time which lead to the creation to these aus. Honestly this is a great way for new fans to learn about fun content that already exists and could be to their tastes, allowing them to fall in love with the show all over again.
Just like I did watching this.
This seems like a good place to tell the world that in the first D and D campaign I ever DMed the final boss was a Bill Cipher inspired creation called “Alcor,” obviously after this AU, even though I had only passing familiarity with Transcendence.
My players, who had not watched Gravity Falls, took to calling the demon “Al Gore.”
Great video as always!
The idea of Dipper naming his future child "Grunkle Stan Grunkle Ford Pines" made me laugh so hard i had an asthma attack
I wish I was old enough, and actually in the fandom when this stuff was going on. It seems like it was just so fun to vibe and read all these aus
44:22 Hearing “the big shot au” made me instantly think of Spamton from Deltarune. Then that made me think of what if Stan pines got business help from a mysterious person like Spamton but it’s Bill who made a deal with Stan to give him riches and fame after he’s kicked out and traveling across the country trying to make money. Imagine if Stan made a deal with Bill when he’s at his lowest point before Ford ever even meets Bill, imagine Stan going off the deep edge into borderline or total villainy by being offered everything he’s ever wanted by a manipulative dream demon after he’s lost every support system he had. Did this video of gravity falls au just cause me to create my own au? I wonder if someone else has already done it before, I feel like I’m probably not the first to have this idea but man is it interesting.
I LIKE THE WAY YOU THINK
With monster au it did create some interesting angst. my favourite was Wendy becoming a werewolf, and since Dipper is a deer it started this "nature vs nurture" thing where she has this wild instinct to attack but they're also friends... And also I loved the idea of Pacifica being a medusa monster. it gave her arc much angstier depth I enjoyed.
i remember one that i really loved when i was younger (forgot the name tho) was one where dipper was sent to live w stan as a baby for vague, custody-related reasons (the age they were separated varied, i saw anywhere from basically at birth to like 5ish maybe?). it also usually included trans dipper, and that was sometimes the reason for the custody issues. then, mabel comes up to visit for the first time during the summer of the show. you get dipper growing up w all the gravity falls kids, stan as a full-time parent, mabel and dipper either instantly bonding or having conflicts when they re-unite, etc.
That sounds like a variation on Reunion Falls
jokes aside I think it's super fun to see you making these deep dives in these fandom niches. it's so weird and fun to see what the collective fandom hive mind can come up with.
I love how many times she called this 1 hour video "dinky" and "short"
5 Minutes Older was a huge inspiration for me to write some of my early (pretty bad, lol) fanfics for GF. Snadger's work was a real motivator back then alongside Keleficent's work and Marehami's mentoring with Adoption. I'll always love Timestuck for that fic and just how adorable that AU was. It left 2017 me in a wreck for several days :'P
Also so glad that old timeline me and some old friends made years ago helped out in your video. It was a really long time ago (like 2018 when I was a GFA blog writer level old) and I can't believe it's still around. That hunt really helped inspire future hunts I went on for lost GF content. I just hope Alex Hirsch never figures out that this was the origin point that led to his Letterman appearance resurfacing ;)
I remember as a kid loving the concept of monster falls, especially when bill was made into a human in it. BUT REVERSE FALLS-
That au SHAPED ME! Will single handedly unlocked and created one of my types, "sad pathetic meow meow (bonus if villain)" I remember after learning about wattpad one of the first things I did was look for x reader with Will, but all I could find was Bildip...which I thought was toxic and hated it for said toxicity.
You did an amazing job of summarizing the Transcendence AU from an outsider's perspective given the crazy amount of content it has (I think its approaching 900 fics on AO3 alone).
Also great to see the wiki serving its purpose, since a few people put a good amount of effort into overhauling it over the COVID-19 pandemic (we had a pretty major resurgence in activity during 2020 and 2021, like I'd imagine most fandoms did).
Also a fun trivia bit I think you'll enjoy- One of the funnier consequences of Ford being revealed after a lot of the Transcendence AU had already been established, is that Grunkle Stan named the shack(which was repurposed into a library) into "The Stanley Pines Memorial Library of the Supernatural," after his twin brother "Stanley". After Fords reveal, it was retconned into Stan naming the shack after himself.
I love how you always put a lot of care into matching your outfit/makeup and BG objects to whatever you're talking about!
Tbh a major thing I wondered was why people used [specific name] AU to refer to both general fandom trends where everyone there's some fixed points but everyone has their own take (e.g., Relativity Falls) and to one person making their own specific story/set of designs/series of headcanon posts. But it seems like a lot of the general trend ones *also* started with just one person, and some of the very specific ones *had* more fanworks that are now deleted/hard to find...
The mystery of why you're required to give every iteration a specific title remains, but I guess we used to -stuck too, so it's just kind of a fandom thing. Still kind of overwhelming if you're suddenly trying to memorize a whole bunch of new terms, so I really appreciate the overview!
I think it's just to make talking about it easier. Like, imagine if instead of these aus having names, they were all just referred to like "Gravity Falls but they're monsters" or "Gravity Falls but Mabel and/or Dipper get sent back to the past and team up with a homeless Stan to travel to Oregon so they can get Ford to fix the time travel device and also reunite their grunkles".
I agree it can get kind of hard to memorize all these names at times though, especially if the names are really similar like Drifting Stars and Grifting Stars.
@@alyssumowo Yeah! Fandom generates a lot of shorthand, so there’s def a bunch of non-fandom-specific AU terms too (roleswap, peggy sue, fusion, etc.). Plus I mentioned Homestuck, which had general terms like lyricstuck and sadstuck plus specific AU names like Cultstuck, Hemostuck, Ke$hastuck, Promstuck/Marchingstuck… Off the top of my head, SU and Undertale fandoms also have some specific AU names (Inverted, Gone Wrong, Bad Prediction; Underfell, Errortale). But I do feel like GF fandom is REALLY into having super specific labels for these things, moreso than other fandoms.
I think the thing that really got me kind of thinking this was when I looked in the comments on an ongoing (like, updating now in 2023) fic I was reading and people were encouraging the author to come up with a specific name for their take on a “characters time traveling to meet up with future/past versions of themselves” story and listing out the other variations that already existed. Like, it isn’t enough to call it Timestuck as a general term; there has to be a taxonomy of specific labels depending on who exactly time travels and which exact character they hang out with. And just using the fic title is NOT an option, it has to match with the established AU name style.
And to be clear I’m not hating on this concept or anything! It’s obtuse if you stumble on it without knowing the vocab, but once you know, it makes it way easier to find exactly what you’re looking for at a glance.
I liked reverse falls a lot as a kid but damn was the sexualization of the twins so fucking awful. I remember going into comment section and having people berate me for saying that viewing Mabel as sexual was weird 💀.
Unrelated but another AU I really liked that you didn’t discuss was demonic guardian au. I’m really into any au with heavy familial focuses so I ate that shit up.
Lmao
man. everything i learn about the fandom while the show was running really makes me wish i was there. Not to sound like one of those tiktok teens who wish they could be in 2010 to experience the peak of one direction fandom but i was a ten year old who wasn't allowed online and didn't even have cable to watch the show and by the time i got around to watching it and entering the fandom in 2019 all the exiting theory posts, new au's and excitement about the show were buried too deep in tumbler and peoples memories for me to find them.
Anyways Im happy people (like you!) are still making theory videos and deep dives about the series in general and about the fandom as well. And that the Book of Bill is doing a lot to make me feel like a real part of the fandom too. those two hours of password guessing and finding before I looked online was very fun.
Transcendence AU changed my brain chemistry. I was in on it pretty early but I can totally get how its sheer density is overwhelming. We love and support the wiki editors! Part of the fun was that no one had control over the canon, anyone could add stuff and that'd be canon if people wanted it. It's loose but also capable of being deep as people keep building on each other's work. It did mean we got A Lot of stuff though!
For me, I loved the small niches it allowed. I spent a lot of my creative effort for the AU on Hank Pines' Portland adventures with his Accidental Supernatural Mafia, which usually features approximately zero canon Gravity Falls content except for Dipper sometimes being there as a diabolos ex machina. If I wasn't thinking about that niche, it was the reincarnations of a rando demon summoner always named Cassie who trades ice cream for math help or post-universe-end next-universe-world-building because this AU's timeline is ridiculous. Deep lore gives so many little pockets to play in!
Honestly great job summarising TAU. It's about finding your family, coming to terms with yourself and the world, having phenomenal cosmic horrors on your side, immortal angst, and also beating up a never-ending stream of unnamed cultists with nail-infused baseball bats. ❤TAU, my beloved ❤
Thank you so much for this video! I have always been kinda bummed out that I never got be there in the peak of the gravity falls fandom. I always loved gravity falls but I was just a bit too young (and with limited access to the internet) during its run (and also didn’t speak English lmao). So seeing these videos is like discovering some hidden lore and finally understanding ancient scriptures. Glad to have some context on cool fanart I saw back then!
You can still engage with these AUs now! GF has a very active fanbase on tumblr , and lots of newer fans after the 10 yr anniversary! Just create what you like and find your people ^_^
God the one of us au REALLY upset 11 year old me. I really liked Ford and got sad at the idea of him being evil. It is very funny looking back, just a kid crying because of fanart of their favorite old man.
Haha, I get it. Ford's the best - I will say, though, a lot of One of Us is Ford actually joining Bill to protect his family, or as a ruse to keep Bill distracted, etc. A demon with a heart of gold!
I always thought Gravity Falls should have had a third season--but like, it's just extending the story. The s2 finale would be Not What He Seems, and the 3rd season is the latter half of what is s2. I get why they did it the way they did, I think they moved the reveal up because fans were guessing it for a while now, but I DO think s2 is kinda rushed in areas, and so many plot points had to be covered in Journal 3. I think they would have genuinely benefited from a third season.
AAAA I'M ONLY AT THE END OF THE TRANSCENDENCE AU PART BUT I HAVE TO COMMENT NOW first of all hearing you speak about it made me so happy, i've been so nostalgic about this au for a while. i'd say you got the description spot on!! but also like you acknowledged, it's so insanely expansive and has a lot more interesting angles as well. if you're at all interested here's some interesting stuff i remember:
1. first of all, the cults - you cracked my up so bad with your confusion because yeah, suddenly cults!! but this ties in to other demons that are also roaming the mindscape now and are free to make deals with mortals. dipper is a good guy basically only because he was human first, and the rest of the demons are way more down with fucking people over and causing misery. and basically there just are cults for every possible demon and they do big no no's like human sacrifice and stuff. because of course. some of the demon ocs were hilarious though. like Brian the Organ Duck
alcor even has his own cult in the far future! but it's portrayed as way more chill and more or less like a regular demon worshipping (no murder involved) church
2. but also springing from that demons = bad point, a big part of the au was also about dipper struggling with his demon nature and with maintaing his human side. which was *my shit*. basically, with his powers also came demon instincts, which are all about tricking people and causing death and destruction. as the timeline goes on and he faces losing his human family, this side can take over him, causing violent outbursts or even decades long periods where he basically dissassociates away from him past and human self and fully embraces being a destructive, evil force of nature. in the lore, alcor the demon was known for having fluctuating phases between being very friendly and fair with humans, particularly kids, to being an absolute nightmare and danger to everyone. one infamous even in the lore was the Destruction of California - yes, all of it. he sank it into the sea. yes, this killed countless innocent people. but yeah, this added so much angst fuel that teenage me could not get enough of
3. Bill Cipher also had another reincarnation at some point, a kid named Toby, that Dipper actually ended up adopting while he was pretending to be a human. he did that sometimes
(actually, one of my favorite fics ever was "Return, Rewind, Rewrite", where Dipper has wiped his own memories and locked away his powers to once again grow up as a normal human human kid with his reincarnated sister. just so he could be human again. achk)
4. A Fun Tidbit: Since this AU was also first thought of in Gravity Falls' early days, some lore and fics have the Pines family turn the Mystery Shack into "The Stanley Pines Memorial Library of the Supernatural," named after Grunkle Stans' mysterious lost twin brother, uh, Stanley... 😂
5. This Au also had its own AUs, like Drift(?) AU (the dark one, where Dipper can't contanct Mabel after the Transcendence, everyone assumes he's dead and he becomes more unhinged much more quickly), an AU where Mable becomes the demon, and AU where both twins become demons ect
i'm so sorry this became such a wall of text, thank you for reading if you did and if you didn't, it's ok i don't blame you in the slightest
Oh my god. I knew about the library but did NOT know it was talking about pre-reveal Ford. That is DEFINITELY going in my Mystery Trio video (I have a section planned on pre-reveal-Ford "Lee" characterizations).
This was so fun to watch. Something I’ve noticed about your style of delivery in particular: you’re a phenomenal storyteller. I had never heard of the Blind Faith AU before watching this video, and I found myself on the edge of my seat while you were explaining the storyline. Really wonderful narration.
It’s so funny seeing the call to bring the One of Us AU back a week after it’s making a small comeback on tumblr and Twitter in the aftermath of Book of Bill lol
I can't fully express how grateful I am that this video was made from a Tumblr point of view. You clearly have such a vast knowledge of internet culture, and that's so important when talking about series/headcanons! I've seen many video essays on GF but this one just feels detailed and thorough. Thank you so much, I loved it!!
had no idea monster falls had a plot. i thought we were just having fun drawing characters as creatures
Same 😅
ME TOOOOOOO- i just remember being a kid and loving those slideshow videos of Monster Falls artwork with some sort of song in the background thinking, “wow this is so cool!”
i just thought it was the same story but just with the main characters as monsters, like how fandoms humanize animal/monster characters lol
Man hearing all these aus were a blast from the past. The Mystery Trio au was always my favorite, but I also really loved the Grim au and frankenstan aus. One that I don't think was mentioned was the various werewolf!stan aus, because I always really enjoyed them. The one that I specifically remember liking (or maybe it was just my au at this point i don't remember) was a werewolf!stan that turned into a mystery trio au because Stan for whatever reason ends up in gravity falls so it's Stan, Ford, and Fiddleford dealing with their shit but also Stan is secretly a werewolf.
I WAS QUITE YOUNG WHEN GRAVITY FALLS HAD A CRAZY ACTIVE COMMUNITY BUT I VIVIDLY REMEMBER MONSTER FALLS, AND WATCHING SLIDESHOWS WITH “EVERYTIME WE TOUCH” PLAYING IN THE BG FOR MONSTER FALLS LMFAO
58:11 "ALEX!!!! DRAW FORD AS A DEMON AND MY LIFE IS YOURS"
Saved this video like a fine wine to watch in my greatest time of need- finally got to it during a hard shift last night and it's SO fascinating! I was a Deviantart kid during the show's run and wasn't allowed to have a tumblr, so barring a few users who were more Infamous than famous I checked up on most tumblr fandom for the show just did not appear in my fandom experience.
Case in point I had never even heard of the One Of Us AU before now, and having been spending the last few months fixated on writing an AU with a similar premise(figuring out what it would Take for the Pines family to all turn to the dark side as a Family bc that pitch in the penthouse calls to me) I am now obsessed with it. More One Of Us content forever please.
Thank you yet again for the wonderful video!
thesnadger is literally iconic in the fanfiction area of the fandom, glad to see they got the publicity they deserved
NEW VID AAAA
oooooh was it Reverse Falls Open Project?
@@hanahyperfixates Ooooh searched it up and yes i believe so thanks!! Cant believe it was like five years ago :,)
gravity rises is one of my favorites i feel like its underrated ajfhjkhsjk (it's basically mabel dipper swap places, gideon and pacifica swap places)
You know... I might be working on a follow up video with some other AUs...
I remember as a kid seeing a ton of really cool fanart and AMVs of Reverse Falls and thinking it seemed so awesome but I didn't know what fanfiction was so I never able to get into it
Never disappointed with this content! Gravity Falls is my life, and the way you talk about these topics is so unique and interesting!
man I only knew of the monster falls au before this (and a bit of reverse falls against my will via sibling)
but MAN does the blind faith au suddenly have it's hooks in me beckoning me to create art all of the sudden
This was such a trip down memory lane. I'm glad a lot of these AUs are still quite popular. I still get comments on my Stanswap AU fic to this day and I finished it back in 2018.
I will never be tired of Timestuck or Blind Faith, although I agree the latter can get kinda ableist if we're not careful, and I've probably unintentionally been guilty of that at times.
I get the excitement over the One of Us AU. Those designs do slap. (I'm especially a fan of that design where he comes out of the Journal and is made out of pages) But I think part of the reason it died down is because it feels antithetical to Ford's characterization once all the haters died down. That's why I couldn't ever really get into it. I was on the Ford Defense Squad back in the day and I can't see it without thinking "my boy would NEVER"
A fellow Ford Pines Defense Squad Member - I was there in the trenches! Lemme say - I always adored the interpretations where he joins Bill's side to buy time for his fam to escape, or as a ruse, or as part of a deal where Bill spares the kids or something. But there's something so comical about the "eh, sure, if you can't beat 'em" interpretation - it was nonesensical, but a fun excuse to draw a demon boi
WAIT. Omg you wrote stanswitch?? I literally just finished reading it, like I binged it over two days lmao I’ve just been getting into AUs and it was so good!! Definitely one of my favourite fanfics!!
This is the most coherent explanation of the Transcendence AU I've ever heard. I knew some of these details, demon Dipper, Mabel with Henry and triplets, but other tidbits were completely new to me. "Cultbasher" took me totally of guard lol. And wow, it's been so long time since I've seen any One of Us content that I legitimately forgot that was the name of the "Ford joining Bill" AU. Love seeing the Demon!Ford art, that shit is rad.
A great look back into the past of the Gravity Falls fandom, even if the whippersnappers don't know anything about it and my dear Grifting Stars is the least favorite. Gotta keep that history alive I guess XD Congrats on making a wonderful video, and my condolences for all the deep diving you had to do to put this all together. Combing through Tumblr archives is no easy feat, so kudos!
When I was younger Monster falls, Reverse Falls, Immortal Pines, Fight Falls, and especially the one about each of the characters having their own dream demons au, were my shit back in the day! I was about 3 years late and only on Pinterest, Wattpad, and RUclips, but I was obsessed with AUs more than the actual show 😭😭😭
Great video, I remember so many of these AUs just consumed my life back in the day. Especially timestuck (which I’m still kinda obsessed with honestly.) I remember I read a timestuck fic where Mabel just straight up dies in Stan and Fords arms and it messed me up for weeks. I’m a little sad you couldn’t talk about some of my favorite aus, but also I totally get it, I wouldn’t want to make a 6 hour video either. Can’t wait to see what else you post in the next few days :P
I know there were some big ones I missed. Which were your favorite? I might do another one of these next year
@@hanahyperfixates I think the biggest ones you missed that I like are Reunion Falls, Gravity Rises, and Fight Falls. But my overall fav is Flat Dreams. I know it isn’t the biggest one, but it is to me ok?
@@Jewls2 i completely understand (that's how i feel about One of Us AU)! I'll look into it 🙂
love your stuff! i've never been that into gravity falls (watched it as a kid when it came out and loved it, not much besides that) but watching people talk about art that's important to them is one of my favorite things ever. makes me feel all cozy.
Gravity Falls aus are fun but something to note, and I was there in the tumblr trenches back then, is how much of it came form and trying to suck up to and get noticed by BNFs, and how those BNFs often ignored everyone but their clique of popular friends
7:04 that's why the same people come up over and over. They were the GF fandom big name fans and everyone was writing/drawing their AUS to try and get in with the popular crowd.
I remember being absolutely OBSESSED with Monster Falls when I was younger. The art made my little brain go brrrrrr. The very first fanfic I ever read was a Monster Falls fic. Even today Deerper is a fascinating concept to me
relativity falls has to be a homestuck inspired thing. "the protagonist children trade places with their parents/guardians" is literally a thing that happened in homestuck in 2011 and would have been fresh in tumblr's mind since that story arc went on for…the entire time gravity falls was on air lol
When I joined the fandom in like 2015-ish (between not what he seems and tale of two stans) the Reverse Falls AU TOOK OVER MY BRAINNNNN (as much as gravity falls itself, which tbh is impressive cuz my gravity falls phase was INTENSE) I legit think I have seen at least 85 to 90% of all reverse fanart available, (which is probably my weirdest flex) because I just kept looking it up nonstop on the platforms I had access to as a 13 year old because I could never get enough
I daydreamed so much with these characters I ended up just making my OCs based on them, which are still my babies to this day
I'm still very attached to it as you can tell
Honestly, growing up reverse falls and monster falls were the only AU's I was really that aware of and saw the most, but god I was so obsessed with reverse falls lol.
My english skills were very limited at the time still, because I was at a point where I had just started to actually understand english (which funnily enough was hugely because of gravity falls), and I (thankfully) wasn't on tumblr yet, so I just didn't really run to any other au content than those two lol.
I actually remember watching a few very specific reverse falls speedpaints and being obsessed with them (because for some reason I was obsessed with speedpaints at the time, might be the autism) and I'm kinda tempted to try and find them again
wether they have costumes, lighting, and all that stuff or not, I still love these videos ^^ as a long time Gravity Falls fan I know most AU's but I still need to catch up on some so this video might be pretty helpful lol
See, as someone who never heard of Blind Faith, when you said eye trauma at the beginning I thought you were referencing the Death Arising videos (and maybe fics, but I didn't really read fics) where Reverse Ford and Fids basically disected Will in the 80s and ripped his eye out, haha. Found out about a lot of new aus in this video I missed the first time around. Good job!
Oh my gosh the Death Arising videos were my first experience with cosplay and I was OBSESSED
Reverse Falls was my Life for Years after I found it, I Loved that AU so much. AMVs, CMVs, fanfics, fanart, I consumed all of it.
Ah yes, twenty minute video…
But seriously I loved every moment of this. It was such a trip revisiting these AUs. I remember the drifting stars AU being my favorite because I was also desperate for some Ford and Mabel bonding
Drifting Stars is my favorite too!! We were ROBBED!
such a genuine and heart warming video essay! I remember when I was a kid, one of the first nice comments I received on my writing was from someone with a monster falls Wendy pfp. going through these aus with my bestie when we were both 11 and hyperfixated was such a treat. AND WILL...just that name throws me back
There is one AU I remember from that period, that I don't think ever picked up traction, where Dipper was a changeling. Dipper died from the nuchal chord and was replaced with a faerie infant, and grew up believing he was a human until his powers began surfacing once in Gravity Falls. I think Stan was a changeling too, but that could have been a spin-off. I mostly remember art from it, where Dipper's eyes were glowing and he was panicking over it, and Stan was calming him down.
"you know what yeah good point, why not, i'm kind of a bad boy now" killed me
i watched gravity falls from when it premiered, but i was, like, 9 when i first watched it so i never had the chance to interact with most of the fandom. i watched *some* stuff from a distance, but i was never on the tumblrs or reddits or what have you.
as someone who LOVES fandom today, i can not thank you enough! this genuinely let me kind of live out an experience i never got for a show i fell in love with and you are genuinely one of the best creators on all of youtube! thank you so so much
Monster falls was always one of my favourite aus, I didn't care about the story, the monster designs were just always top teir! Awesome video 😍💖
long time reverse falls au fan (seeing that original reverse gideon art SENT ME) and this is SUCH a cool deep dive! amazingly well-researched and fun and I LOOOVE that you themes your outfits and backgrounds to match each au :D
I will clarify for history's sake (THOUGH NOT DEFENDING!) that a big part of the reason some artists drew rev!mabel in more revealing outfits was that some iterations of the au also reversed the ages of some characters too (mabel and mason aka dipper, and sometitmes paz aka pacifica and gideon, were made teenagers like Wendy and Robby, while Wendy and Robby were pre-teens). was it just an excuse for horny jail fans to make mabel and dipper hot and consenting age? Yes, almost definitely. But it did have SOME narrative reason to it as well (mabel wanting to sell more tickets to the telepathy tent so she dresses like the old fashioned magicians assistants, as well as seducing guys to get what she wants as a sort of twist on canon mabel's boy craze and the fact that gideon's first appearance is about his crush on mabel, the reverse is often true in rev!au). Again, not justifying or defending, just explaining Why That Happened for folks who weren't that deep in the sub-fandom. In hindsight, terrible idea because that's sadly the main thing rev falls is remembered for. Overall it's my favorite au of any fandom ever, and the COSPLAYS and ANIMATICS absolutely blow me away to this day (shout out to diaphorotes here on yt!). The changed dynamics between reversed characters are really intense and cool, and I'm a sucker for "cute thing turned into spooky thing". And when Ford got introduced being able to be like "haha you know how *Evil* mabel and dipper are? yeah that's largely because Ford is *Even More Evil*, and he regularly makes them look like amateurs with his increased knowledge of magic!" You also hit the nail on the head with the rev!stan secretly not caring about his niece and nephew - my favorite characterization of rev!stan tbh (even though it gets hella angsty).I genuinely also feel like the vibe/designs of amity's twin siblings in the owl house are loosely inspired by the rev!au mabel and mason... just a film theory!
"Grunkle Stan Grunkle Ford Pines"
When I tell you I laughed-
personally i am SO happy this video didn’t end up being 20 minutes lolll thank you so much for all the work you put into these videos!!!
As a warning, the rest of the videos released this week, included the one I posted this morning, should be shorter (or at least I hope they are for my sleep schedules' sake - I'm still editing).
I used to absolutely eat up the transcendence au, there was a point in time where I had read every single fic under the transcendence au tag on ao3
reverse falls on the other hand? never been a fan
I remember seeing AU fanart when I was in 6th grade but I didn't know English back then so I was really confused 😭😭🤌
you've become my comfort youtuber. when i've had a bad day the last few months, i'll binge-watch gravity falls then watch your videos. i'm so happy to have another video to watch over and over again. i hope you have a fantastic day.
Went back to link this video to a friend only realize I was somehow STILL not subscribed. Shame on me. Your videos are immaculate, continue being the creative person you are (and remember to take breaks!)
This video may have just given me the strength to actually write my own fanfiction! (...eventually) Please never stop. These videos are great.
Also can someone explain the Flat Pines AU? I'm hearing so many good things but getting no details.
Update: I have now started making my own GF fanfiction! Follow your dreams, people!
holy cow people are creative that thing with stanford losing his glasses so the demons that caused mcguckets madness would be blurry to him so he woudn't be affected is what I wouldn't have noticed. But now i love that idea so much although that fact they travel through the multiverse in the comics so easy makes ford look unnecessary, but maybe the nightmare realm was that terrifying
AUs have always been a fascinating part of fandom and fan made works for me. It’s great seeing a deeper dive into the category, even if it’s exclusively Gravity Falls ones.
I love how hard you commit to the looks lol
This video made me so happy, thank you so much!! My Gravity Falls fixation has been going strong ever since i watched it in 2015 and the Show just means the world to me
I noticed that real time fandub reference lol. Fr tho ur videos are honesty some of my favorites on RUclips it's so great to be able to look back at this fandom I hold so dearly to my heart and to learn about things I never even got to see during the high of the fandom. Can't wait for more!!
Oh man, I remember scrolling through Monster Falls art back in the day on Pinterest because I didn't even have a Tumblr account yet. This really takes me back
This video series has inspired me to completely rewatch the show and start writing fan-fiction again (something I haven’t don’t since middle school) thank you for re-instating my hyperfixation
I was gonna look for a video like this, I’ve always wanted to learn a bit more about these AU’s besides looking at awesome art these community make! Doin’ good work for this fandom, Hana!