Stan’s Eyepatch Was a Secret Hint to His Gravity Falls Backstory

Gravity Falls’ Grunkle Stan is known for his eyepatch that he doesn’t need, and now fans know exactly why he wears one at the start of every episode.

In the opening title sequence of every episode of Gravity Falls, Grunkle Stan is shown wearing an eyepatch even though it is well established that he isn’t blind in one eye. While it was always assumed he wore the patch to add to his mysterious persona for the sake of his ‘tourist trap’ business, one Gravity Falls continuation comic reveals that Stan wearing an eyepatch is actually a secret hint to his backstory.

Gravity Falls is a cult-classic animated series that follows the adventures of twelve-year-old twin siblings Dipper and Mabel as they stay with their great uncle Stan in Gravity Falls, Oregon. During their summer at Grunkle Stan’s house, Dipper and Mabel are forced to work in his ‘tourist trap’ known as the Mystery Shack, which is an attraction filled with made-up oddities and overpriced merchandise. Though the Mystery Shack is fake, however, there are some legitimate mysteries lurking under the surface of Gravity Falls. Dipper and Mabel experience a number of strange occurrences and have loads of paranormal encounters. Thankfully, in the first episode of the series, Dipper finds a mysterious journal that contains information on the general weirdness of Gravity Falls, so they are well-prepared for anything they might encounter. While Grunkle Stan pretends to not know anything about the journal Dipper found, it is later revealed that the original author of the journal was Stan’s brother, Ford, who fell through a portal into the vast multiverse and had been lost there for decades–a tragic event that happened right in front of Stan’s very eyes.

Related: Gravity Falls’ Most Important Journal Wasn’t in the Show

Gravity Falls: Lost Legends–written by series creator Alex Hirsch with art by Joe Pitt, Ian Worrel, Asaf Hanuka, Dana Terrace, Jacob Chabot, Jim Campbell, Kyle Smeallie, Meredith Gran, Mike Holmes, Priscilla Tang, Serina Hernandez, Stephanie Ramirez, and Valerie Halla–is a collection of Gravity Falls stories told in the form of a graphic novel that continue the adventures of the show. In the story titled “The Pines Boys in: The Jersey Devil’s in the Details”, fans are taken back to when Stan and Ford Pines were children who solved mysteries and went on adventures together–and in the opening page of this story, Stan is wearing an eyepatch as the two pretend to be adventuring pirates.

Stan’s Eyepatch Reminds Him of His Lost Brother, Ford

This comic is the only other time fans see Grunkle Stan wearing an eyepatch outside his Mystery Shack, and given the other established elements of his character, that fact is incredibly telling. Grunkle Stan and Ford had a pact as children to get a boat and sail around the world together, which is something Stan held onto going into adulthood until they finally did it at the end of the series. Unfortunately, the two couldn’t do that after Ford fell into a portal through the multiverse and was lost for decades–something that Stan witnessed, and something that was kind of his fault. After Ford was gone, seemingly forever, Stan opened his Mystery Shack in the very house where Ford conducted his experiments–and every day, Stan put on that eyepatch, seemingly as a grim reminder of the brother he lost and the life he could have had by his side.

While all of this is speculative, it does explain a subtle detail present in both the show and the comic that goes beyond ‘he just wanted to wear an eyepatch’. If fans know anything about Gravity Falls, it’s that nothing is a coincidence and everything has a deeper meaning, and that is why Grunke Stan’s eyepatch was a secret hint to his Gravity Falls backstory all along.

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