Tl;dr I think both Stan and Ford have pretty bad insecurities and self-esteem issues that shaped how they respond to the world. This leads to disaster. Ford is probably not malicious at this point, but it's hard to say with the missing 30 years and whatever went on with Bill. However, he is actively causing problems due to his own biases. This will end in disaster.
That's fair. Thanks for sharing your perspective! It's very interesting for me to hear from someone who has direct personal experience with a close sibling relationship. @Petra I really like this meta. It all seems very plausible. Guh, I feel so sad for both of them.
Yeah, basically I feel like a lot of Stan and Ford's issues are rooted in their parents and teachers and how they were treated as kids. This is ALSO why I'm hopeful Dipper and Mabel will turn out okay. We don't know much about their home life, but Dipper and Mabel seem pretty well-adjusted and emotionally healthy. Furthermore, unlike Stan and Ford, they've got a support system outside of each other. Mabel might be better at making friends, but Dipper is hardly alone in Gravity Falls, at least. That being said, I'm pretty sure they're going to have a big fight at some point. I just don't think it'll be omg relationship breaking like some people seem to think. I had PLENTY of screaming fights with my little brother, and I never once stopped loving him. And when I say screaming fights, I mean screaming, crying, wrestling over the remote, calling parents for re-inforcement fights.
Also, I think maybe Ford didn't seek out Stan because he was doing okay-ish without Stan, and assumed that Stan was doing okay without him. I highly doubt he wanted Stan to be destitute, homeless, and depressed. In their childhood, Stan was always brave, capable, and adventurous - perhaps he thought Stan was getting the adventure he'd always wanted.
Ok so I dunno about the second half with Cipher or electroshock therapy but....HEADCANONS INTENSIFY because I am pretty sure they are supposed to be identical twins so it's very likely that if one twin has some kind of brainweird than the other one does too also Stan was probably born in the mid-50's he would be 5-15 during this 60's I know this is a joke not meant to be taken seriously but why do your childhood memories look like an inkblot, Stanley
Yeah, I really want to read them as identical but the 6-fingers keeps throwing me off. Chimerism, maybe?
And see, I'd actually assume fraternal, just with a strong family resemblance. (I've seen resemblances that strong in non-multiple births; it's honestly not THAT big a stretch, especially if you assume Shermy looked similar as well.) Reasoning being that I'm pretty sure twins who are of different genders are always fraternal (assuming they're both cis, anyway), so Dipper and Mabel are almost certainly fraternal twins. Admittedly I know little about heredity regarding multiple births, so I could be wrong, but yeah.
They could very well be fraternal twins instead of identical! Aside from the 6th finger thing, Stanford also has a cleft chin and Stanley does not. Other than that I think their differences in design basically boil down to "Sanford has been running all over the interdimensions, so he is in better shape and aged better." Judging by his hair he may have aged a little more slowly too. If they are identical, It's assume chimerism, or some kind of spontaneous mutation happened early during his development. I try not to read too much into it. I mean aside from the finger thing they are almost identical except Stanford is in better physical shape from his adventures. I think if they were meant to be fraternal twins they'd have more differences. This is also a cartoon with a satanic triangle wearing a top hat, so... I just feel like their designs should be a little more different if they were meant to be fraternal twins. Just going by my family members who are the same sex but are fraternal twins, they look pretty different and just happen to share the same birthday (actually that it kind of a thing that bugs me about Dipper and Mabel looking so similar just different sexes). If we got the whole family together you'd start seeing resemblances, but me and my brother more closely resemble other relatives than each other and with siblings in general it's more "look totally different with a few small similarities" and not "look basically identical with a few small differences" I guess it can go eithr way until it's confirmed one way or the other?
Hmm. I'd guess fraternal, but I've always had people joke about me and my siblings being a clone army. Me and one of my little bros were often mistaken for identical twins until our late teens, even though we're different genders, so it doesn't seem so outlandish to me. But I also have seen some people whose siblings look almost nothing like them. It definitely varies from family to family. With the twins in this show, it could definitely go either way.
Yeah, I've seen some families with a very strong resemblance to each other and they could be fraternal. It just... really bugs me because my family isn't like that and you'd think in a cartoon their designs wouldn't be identical enough to cause this confusion if they were meant to be fraternal. I suppose either way it doesn't affect my INTENSIFYING HEADCANONS too much since they'd share the same chances of developing the same brainweird as normal full siblings, just not as much as identical twins.
Pretty much all of the siblings in my family look very similar no matter what, so I'm not all that weirded out.
The only set of twins I know personally (I think? I can't remember any others right now...) are different genders, and if I ever asked their mom and she told me they *weren't * identical I think I might eat my hat. But that being said, they share a very strong familial resemblance with their two older siblings (who are not twins), so maybe it's just hella dominant genes in all four of them. I dunno. Genetics, man.
I do have to wonder since we are talking so much about Ford's six fingered hands what do you guys think about the younger pines twins being the only characters i am aware of that have only four fingers? Maybe I missed something but? It's never been adressed and yet that design choice is there.
I'd just kind of assumed that Stan and Ford are identical twins that expressed slightly differently over time, but I guess the cleft chin does make that less likely. As for fingers, I think that all children aside from Grenda are drawn with four fingers?
entirely possible i think the episode I noticed it on only had grenda to contrast with dipper and mabel so might be my brain just never noticed beforehand and then decided to latch onto something really unimportant :P edit: i cannot not typo a single post to save my life
Gideon also has 5 fingers. When asked about this Hirsch said it was 'spoilers.' This may have been trolling though.
Some adults have four fingers too. One of the artists has said it's just a stylistic thing, but Hirsch did say it was a spoiler that one time.
it could be like adventure time, where characters are drawn with 4 fingers for the sake of simplicity in animation (which may be the meta reason that Stanford likes to put his hands behind his back all the time though the in-character reason is probably a leftover from his childhood where he'd get made fun of and he'd hide his hand behind his back) but they actually have 5 and you see all 5 fingers during close-ups that focus on their hands.
