The Book of Bill

Page 48 depicts a diagram of the “horrible” human body, with each part described horrifically, whimsically, or completely incorrectly (such as a stomach with a horrifying face named “Chumbo” who growls sometimes). The caption below informs the viewer that “facts” are dangerous for one’s health, and lies are a much better alternative. The next page details what humans are—namely, creatures meant to reproduce and die. Bill finds humans to be mediocre life-forms with disgusting bodies, pointing out that going outside naked leads to arrest, so beauty can’t really exist. According to a diagram and a description of the human eye, mantis shrimps are the superior lifeform since they can see more colors. Bill helpfully includes a list of colors humans can’t see, including “megagenta” and “brown 2.”

A mock textbook page depicts a breakdown of skin. Bill advocates for tattoos, particularly of himself, since that “bonds” him to the tattooed person. The textbook provides a variety of bad life advice, including shaving one’s entire body and greasing oneself so the TSA can’t catch you, then ends with a cut-off note at the bottom describing a soul trapped inside Bill’s begging for release. The next page has a variety of tattoo designs of Bill, including one of him surfing on a wave of blood and one of him with flushed cheeks and an anime-designed eye.

This section is devoted to the topic of Love. Bill disparages love, insisting humans crave it due to their loneliness, but it is really a “scam” to get people to reproduce. Bill answers some questions about love, implying he is the reader’s father and eventually threatening to light the book on fire. Bill announces that love is important for controlling people and decides to provide dating tips.

Bill tells the reader that nobody will love them for who they are and suggests a makeover, although his tips are absurd and grotesque, including covering oneself in teeth to show calcium richness or wearing a gigantic seduction hat. He advises that the reader cover themself in powerful smells to achieve victory and scream topics at random if silence occurs on a date. If none of this works, he advises pretending to be pathetic to win their pity and entrap them. If that also fails, Bill supplies a variety of Valentines depicting himself, most with triangle puns or existential dread. After insisting he doesn’t have any exes, Bill reminds the reader that if love doesn’t work for them, it doesn’t matter because love always turns to hate.

These pages focus on the topic of death and the afterlife. Page 59 depicts Bill in a tweed suit and holding a scythe. He announces a game show he “just made up” titled “How Will You Die?” while standing in front of a wheel with various numbers and symbols of ways to die. He asks the reader to pick a number between 1 and 22 and turn the page. The next two pages detail 22 ways to die, mostly comical or frightening, with an extra 23rd option—dying peacefully in bed surrounded by loved ones, which Bill insists means the reader cheated. Bill goes on to discuss the afterlife, finally explaining that he set up a curse to avenge his own death and plot his revenge in case he died. He insists he was “too annoying for hell” and says his half-life is better than most people’s actual lives (62).

He then provides the reader several ways to cheat death, including bites from a zombie, vampire, or zompire, or splitting one’s soul into cursed amulets; the other options are partially covered by a gaping, bloody mouth, which Bill says needs more blood for ink. Bill discusses heaven, which he says is real; the next page supposedly contains instructions to get there, but the ink is invisible to anyone who has ever had a perverted thought. The next page is blank.

Bill switches the topic to morality, illustrated by a picture of two versions of himself on a scale over flames: one dressed as a grumpy angel, the other a relaxed devil. He insists morality is just a word and a flexible concept and provides several ways to silence guilt: denial, rationalization, and detachment, all of which he claims to use extensively. The next page illustrates a room full of Bills in lab coats, all of whom are concluding the ultimate decision method is to “do whatever I want” (67). Bill claims karma isn’t real (and promptly gets hit in the eye by the paper airplane he had made from the word “morality” on the previous page), then puts the reader to a moral test: If they turn the page, a cartoonish elf named Grimbles chained to the page will be crushed to death.

After announcing Grimbles’s death, Bill comforts the reader that he is still alive in several other dimensions. He discusses some of these dimensions, including one where the Pines family loses the battle at Weirdmageddon. He shows the reader a picture of Dipper and Mabel asleep on a bus, presumably on their way to Gravity Falls, and explains that countless other dimensions have copies of the protagonists who met unfortunate fates. The next two pages show a spread of copies of Dipper and Mabel trying to attack their happy, sleeping forms, whether they have been turned into zombies, ghosts, melted, or possessed by Bill.

Bill changes the topic to urban legends and cryptids, depicting a horrifying image of a shadowy, realistic version of himself in an alleyway. The cryptids include “Slander Man,” who lives in telephone poles and insults Bill’s improv skills; “Guillermo del Torso,” a hovering, screaming ribcage who wrote the script for National Treasure 4; “The Off-Model,” who imitates cartoon mascots badly and then rips himself in half to devour anyone who trusts him; and “MEEEEEEEEEEEE,” Bill himself, who declares himself to be the superior urban legend.

The next two pages are mirrored and can only be read in a mirror or a reversed photograph. Appropriately, they discuss “The Mirror Realm,” which includes a variety of legends. “Bloody Mary” ruins sleepovers when her name is said three times in the mirror but has blocked Bill’s number. “Flip Horizontal” does exactly the opposite of what he is told; Bill wonders if he has Mary’s number. “Dysmorphio” creates body dysmorphia, which Bill insists is normal because all humans are ugly; he encourages the reader to recite a chant to ward him off and headbutt the mirror. “David Lynch” is the real David Lynch, who dodges Bill’s calls. “The Eye Stealer” steals any eyes when someone blinks while looking into mirrors but is only in one out of 33 mirrors. “The Reflexorcist” breaks mirrors to control all the previously listed ghouls but has a horrifying face. Finally, Bill lists Toby Determined, a character from Gravity Falls, claiming he doesn’t know for sure that he’s a mirror creature but has his suspicions.

Pages 76 and 77 contain pictures of Bill sliding on his collection of silly straws, at the expense of pages about Shermie Pines (the other Pines brother, Mabel and Dipper’s grandfather, who nobody knows anything about). The straws have various codes written along their twisting shapes. Upside down on Page 77 is the answer to choosing not to shake Bill’s hand—you live a purposeless, unfulfilling life and die in a car crash, after which the obituary writer falls asleep on his keyboard from boredom, and nobody notices the typos in your obituary. Pages 78 and 79 are titled “Codes,” including a picture of a tree with branches forming the shapes of numbers and letters. Bill insists that while the world is full of subliminal messaging, this book contains no codes whatsoever. Page 80 depicts Bill’s collection of mutilated heads, including “The Croncher,” “Slicey Dicey,” “Mr. Swirls,” “Hindsight,” “Scremmy,” and “Headwardo.” He invites the reader to write the name of one of their enemies and choose a head to replace their head, which all make horrific noises.

The opening page is titled “Dreams,” with a picture of Bill sitting on a moon playing guitar. Page 82 welcomes the reader to the “Mindscape,” where they can see the dreams of the various characters of Gravity Falls. Stanford Pines dreams of a quiz asking him what he’s attracted to, with him answering “Logic and preparation,” which Bill mocks. Mabel’s dreamscape is artistic, but she dreams about not being able to save her pig, Waddles. Dipper dreams about overhearing a fight between his parents, implying he and Mabel were sent to Gravity Falls due to his parents’ failing marriage. Wendy dreams about her mother. Soos dreams about changing his last name to “Pines,” which Bill jokes his girlfriend will take issue with. Pacifica dreams about never being able to wash the blood off her hands and crushing the town underfoot by accident. Robbie dreams about his original hair color. Stanley Pines dreams about high school, with his brother trapped in a science experiment. Gideon dreams about the sailor suit he secretly loved. Durland and Blubs, the sheriff and deputy from the show, dream only about one another.

The next two pages detail Dipper’s embarrassing thoughts, memories, and situations, which Bill delights in, including situations like leaving his fly down for the entirety of Weirdmageddon, matching with Soos on a website called “Conspiracy Singles,” and constantly getting hit in the face with baseballs. Bill also includes Dipper’s search history, which he left on Soos’s browser (and Mabel subsequently saw); most of the searches relate to embarrassing situations from the show, such as giving CPR/a kiss to a merman or listening to the band “BABBA.” Bill also reveals he projected spoilers of the Author’s (Stanford’s) identity into his dreams, and Dipper fell for all of them.

The next two pages subsequently explore Mabel’s mind. Bill enjoys her love of chaos and unpredictability, but upon leaping into her mind, he discovered her mind was guarded by two minor characters from the show, Craz Zazzler and Xyler Q. Blaze, who he says are “surf himbos with backstories so confusing no one could tell if they were brothers, husbands, or clones” (86). He unwillingly joins them in a bonding montage under disguise to earn their trust. After the montage, they reveal Mabel’s secret fantasy: “Fantasy” by Mariah Carey. Bill, enraged, eventually learns that Mabel listens to it when she thinks about summer ending, so he hatches his plan to offer her more summertime in exchange for his ascension.

Bill then goes into Fiddleford McGucket’s mind but finds it collapsing and chaotic, with missing memories and sprawling emotional wounds. Bill gets hit by one of the memories and feels real pain, which he despises, and leaves quickly. The illustration depicts McGucket with his Memory Gun, shooting himself in the head as fragments of his life whirl around him like a tornado.