Gravity Falls: Lost Legends

Four new short, illustrated stories from the Gravity Falls universe explode from the page in this exciting graphic novel! Shmebulock, the gnome who is cursed to only speak his name—except for one night every 1,000 years—spills the beans on four thrilling new stories! After each story, he presents a witty joke or a brief epilogue, concluding each story in a satisfying manner. 

In Face It, Pacifica Northwest comes to her friends, Mabel and Dipper Pines, hoping for some magic to make her ageless. Against their wishes, she summons the monster Mr. What’s-His-Face, who steals Mabel’s face! Dipper and Pacifica must travel to an underground monster market to get it back. Pacifica overcomes her vanity when she realizes that beauty is not the most important aspect of a person. 

In Comix Up!, Stanley Pines (Dipper and Mabel’s grand-uncle) accidently curses a comic book and then gets sucked into it. Dipper, Mabel, their friends Soos and Wendy, and their other grand-uncle Stanford, all must travel through various comic book styles to save him. Stanley Pines initially makes fun of comic books but later reveals that he actually loves comic books and is jealous because his comic book series never took off. 

In Don’t Dimension It, Mabel gets transported to an alternate dimension where everyone is another version of her! As her grand-uncles try to save her, she must work together with her other selves and learn a valuable lesson about the dangers of selfishness.  

Finally, in The Jersey Devil’s in the Details, Stanley and Stanford Pines flashback to when they were kids, solving the mystery of who stole their dad’s gold chain. They encounter a rival set of mystery-solving twins, as well as the Jersey Devil itself. Then they confront their relationship difficulties with their father and each other.  

The graphic novel format of this book will appeal to many readers because of how bright and vibrant the illustrations are. Each story has a new illustrator, meaning the styles slightly change depending on the story—for example, Don’t Dimension It, which is about Mabel, is drawn in a slightly more cutesy style. Furthermore, Comix Up! uses comic book illustration style in an incredibly fun way—the style of illustration regularly changes from manga to Peanuts-influenced to superhero-esque! Each page of each story has numerous speech and thought bubbles, so readers get lots of chances to read real dialogue rather than only looking at pictures. 

The main characters of each story are humorous and entertaining, but also often overcome a flaw in an admirable fashion. Because the characters learn more about themselves and how to be kinder people, their journeys are truly charming, and it is easy to fall in love with them. Furthermore, highlighting each characters’ flaws portrays them as realistic, three-dimensional characters rather than perfect heroes.  

Despite the light-hearted tone of the book, the stories deal with serious topics such as vanity, self-esteem, selfishness, and more. Pacifica’s aforementioned issues with vanity are one, but Stanley Pines’ self-consciousness as the “dumb twin” is also addressed in The Jersey Devil’s in the Details. Furthermore, Mabel must confront how, despite her intentions, she can be unwittingly self-centered and not think about what anyone else wants. She learns a valuable lesson about being more aware of others. These lessons are articulated quite gracefully, without feeling out-of-place or preachy. 

The graphic novel is a lot of fun, but it might not be very fulfilling for readers who have not seen the original show Gravity Falls. Gravity Falls is a cartoon on Disney Channel about twins Dipper and Mabel moving to the supernatural town of Gravity Falls and discovering its mysteries. There are numerous references to the show, and readers unfamiliar with it will likely be confused. However, for readers who are familiar with the show, this book is a fantastic addition because it further develops the characters’ traits while maintaining the same tone as the source material. 

Gravity Falls: Lost Legends is a fantastic addition to the original show Gravity Falls, and a truly entertaining comic book in its own right. The illustrations are vibrant and entertaining, and the book boasts a surprising depth, as it develops the characters into full-fledged individuals and empathetically addresses their flaws. The quality of this book and the richness of its storytelling raise the bar for TV show novelizations. You can find more humorous, action-packed fun by reading the Hilo Series by Judd Winick and the InvestiGators Series by John Patrick Green. 

Sexual Content  

• In Face It, it is revealed that Stanford Pines dated a siren.  

• Pacific insults Dipper by saying, “Just like how you care about kissing aliens or whatever!” Dipper responds, “I’ve never kissed an alien! I’ve never kissed anyone!” 

• Pacifica gives Dipper a hug. Later, she texts him, claiming that the hug wasn’t on purpose and that Dipper shouldn’t “get the wrong idea or anything.” Unfortunately, she accidentally texts Mabel, who gets excited and thinks Pacifica likes Dipper romantically. Mabel asks, “WHEN’S THE WEDDING LOLLLLLL” and sends kissy emojis.  

• In Comix Up, there’s a brief visual gag where the characters are illustrated in a romantic manga style. Mabel is attracted to many of the characters, including an attractively-drawn sink, and a boy named Gideon, who tells Mabel, “Help me collect the seven crystal sailor angel capture cards, and then we can finally kiss!” Mabel refuses. 

Violence  

• In Face It, a vendor in the underground monster market, called the Crawlspace, sells, “Severed hands! Straight from a wet cave!” 

• When Dipper and Pacifica trespass, monsters capture them in a net, sell them, and then put them in a sack. “Sold! Hope you like burlap!” declares a monster vendor. 

• To protect Dipper and Mabel, Pacifica sets Mr. What’s-His-Face on fire using some magic pills. Mr. What’s-His-Face yells, “Aughh!! My face! My beautiful flesh-tornado of a face!”  

• Mr. What’s-His-Face threatens to kill Pacifica, Dipper, and Mabel. Mr. What’s-His-Face yells, “When I get my hands on you, they’ll never find your faceless bodies!” 

• Dipper and Mabel’s grand-uncle Stanford uses a sci-fi ray gun to freeze Mr. What’s-His-Face in a block of ice. “Prepare to be destroy—ack!” 

• In Comix Up, there is an extensive amount of humorous, comic violence. The characters dodge obstacles such as anvils, dynamite, and swinging logs, which make comedic sounds like “Zoip!” “Poomp!” or “Brak!”  

• There is a zombie who rises from the grave. He has an eyeball hanging out of his skull. He is only in one panel. There is no dialogue about his decomposed state, but the zombie says, “Nyaaaaaargh.”  

• Mabel breaks the fourth wall, grabbing the speech bubble and attacking a superhero with it. When she does, the comic superhero cries, “Augh!! My one weakness!”  

• The characters all gain comic superpowers and defeat the superheroes—their powers include “Telekinervousness,” “Cutting blades and cutting sarcasm,” “Growing bigger every time [Soos] says ‘dude,’” and using a rainbow as a weapon. 

• Out of frustration and resentment, Stanley Pines threatens to poison a character’s food. Stanley Pines says, “I’ll poison your lasagna, Sarcasti-pup!” after Sarcasti-pup makes fun of him. 

• In Don’t Dimension It, Mabel travels to the Nightmare Realm and a giant hand with a mouth in the palm tries to eat her but fails. She cries, “This can’t be happening! I’m too adorable to die!”  

• A Cthulhu-esque monster tries to eat Stanley’s head. Stanley emerges from another dimension with the monster on top of him. Stanley says, “Keep looking.”  

• All of the Mabel versions wield grappling hooks.  

• An evil version of Mabel sticks Stanley and Stanford to the floor with a sticky gun and attempts to throw them out of the spaceship they’re in. The evil Mabel says, “Sounds like you two need some space. Endless space!” 

• The good versions of Mabel have a comical fight with the evil version of Mabel. Evil Mabel glues a bunch of Mabels to the ground and severely wounds Military Mabel (who ultimately survives). Good Mabel punches Evil Mabel and sends her into space. “This is for Military Mabel,” declares Good Mabel. 

• In The Jersey Devil’s in the Details, Stanley ties a knife to a possum in hopes of turning him into a violent, protective pet. Stanley tells his brother, “Say hello to my associate . . . Shanklin the Stab Possum!”  

• Stanley pushes two rival twins off a small hill after they make fun of him and his brother. Stanley shouts, “Oh my god! We killed the Sibling Brothers!” They are fine and just passed out. 

• The Jersey Devil, some sort of dinosaur-esque monster, attempts to eat all of the twins, and also breathes fire. It does not harm anyone. Stanford yells, “I think this is the end!”  

Drugs and Alcohol  

• In Face It, Pacifica purchases pills “guaranteed to cure your wrinkles and make you a stunning queen, girl.” 

Language    

• In Face It, Pacifica refers to homeless people as hobos.  

• Pacifica refers to the monster Mr. What’s-His-Face as a “freak show.” 

• In Comix Up, it is revealed that, as a kid, Stanley wrote a comic book with swear words in it. Later, a boy picks it up and says, “A book for kids that has swears in it! Cool!” 

• In Don’t Dimension It, Evil Mabel calls Good Mabel an idiot. When Stanley and Stanford discover Evil Mabel is pretending to be Good Mabel, Stanford exclaims, “Dang it, Stan! You got the wrong one!” 

• Evil Mabel calls Good Mabel a “giggling punch line” as an insult.  

• In The Jersey Devil’s in the Details, Stanford and Stanley debate the existence of ghosts’ crotches. Stanford says, “I’m not sure ghosts have crotches.” 

• After being accused of stealing, Stanley exclaims, “Darn, Pa!”  

• The circus performers insult Stanford and Stanley for being normal. “Yeah, we ain’t got time for average jacks in freak-town!” says a heavily-tattooed circus player.

Supernatural  

• This book is almost entirely supernatural. Each story involves the main characters interacting with a supernatural world or element. 

• In Face It, Pacifica, Dipper, and Mabel encounter a monster called Mr. What’s-His-Face who steals people’s faces. Mr. What’s-His-Face refers to himself in the third-person, declaring, “Mr. What’s-His-Face can fix anything you don’t like about your face for a price.” 

• Pacifica and Dipper travel to the Crawlspace, an underground paranormal market for monster vendors. Humans are not allowed. Dipper exclaims, “It’s a paranormal black market under the town!”  

• In Comix Up, Stanley puts a bunch of comic books in a treasure chest, which turns out to be cursed and sentient. “Stan, that chest is cursed!” Stanford cries in horror. 

• The characters jump into the comic book world, often breaking the fourth wall and experiencing different styles of comic illustration. Stanford warns the group about the dangers of the world, saying, “This world is subjective and unstable and could change styles at any moment!”  

• In Don’t Dimension It, Dipper, Mabel, Stanford, and Stanley are in the woods trying to clean up damage from a past event that was almost apocalyptic. “We’re searching for leftover multidimensional rips from Weirdmaggedon to patch with aliens adhesive,” explains Stanford. 

• Mabel gets transported to the Mabel dimension. “Razzle my dazzle, it’s a Mabel bonanza! There’s every possible version of me…” Mabel says in wonder. 

• In The Jersey Devil’s in the Details, Stanley and Stanford encounter the Jersey Devil, a flying dragon-dinosaur type monster that breathes fire. “Legend has it that this cloven-hooved weirdo of the night hides by the boardwalk and pilfers gold and jewels to add to its collection,” Stanford informs Stanley. 

Spiritual Content  

• None