It's been a weird and crazy summer for Dipper and Mabel Pines, but their whirlwind adventure in Gravity Falls is finally coming to a close this Monday. To mark the occasion, IGN joined series creator Alex Hirsch, voice stars Jason Ritter ("Dipper") and Kristen Schaal ("Mabel") and composer Brad Joseph Breeck at a special press event this week, featuring a table read of the pilot (which you can now watch online ) and a Q&A to discuss the highly anticipated series finale and whether Gravity Falls could return at some point...

This Is the End

From "Weirdmageddon 3: Take Back the Falls"

“ I'd say the hardest thing to write in television is a pilot, and the second-hardest thing to write is a finale.

Appealing to Kids and Adults

Breeck, Schaal, Hirsch and Ritter at the Gravity Falls press event

“ If you make something worthy of [kids'] intelligence, they will show that intelligence in ways that will sometimes shock you.

From "Weirdmageddon 3: Take Back the Falls"

Nailing the Gravity Falls Sound

Gravity Falls cast and crew at the press table read

“ In my gut I knew what this show was. It was nostalgic, but it was also present. I knew that it was scary, but it was also silly.

Previously on Gravity Falls, the nefarious Bill Cypher opened up a portal from his dimension to Gravity Falls, thus kicking off the end of the world, aka "Weirdmageddon." But when we last left our heroes at the end of "Weirdmageddon 2," Dipper, Soos and Wendy freed Mabel from her mind-bubble and reunited with Grunkle Stan at the Mystery Shack. Now, in "Weirdmageddon 3: Take Back the Falls," the Pines family begins a final confrontation with Bill that will lead to their ultimate fate and greatest sacrifice.Of course, the great thing about Gravity Falls is that it isn't being canceled; it's ending on its own terms, which is a rarity in animation. Unlike some shows that go on forever, Gravity Falls was always meant to be a limited series with a clear beginning, middle and end. In fact, Hirsch even pitched the show that way to Disney, and "the craziest thing is that they let me do it," he said."I think no matter what we do, it's going to be hard for fans, because they love the show. I'd say one thing to keep in mind is that I did this because I love the show... I'm so grateful for the fan community that does exist. I'm grateful for their fan work. Every time I see it, it makes me smile. So as long as they're making it, I will be seeing it, and I will be appreciating it. I will be their fan now, if that's any kind of consolation."Reminiscing about the show's early days, Hirsch said he never expected Gravity Falls to take off the way it did and thought kids wouldn't really connect with it. "What I was trying to do with this show was make something that would appeal to people in my own age bracket," he said. "I honestly thought it would go over kids' heads. It's not that I wasn't anticipating their intelligence, but I don't think I was anticipating the scope of their passion. I was so pleasantly surprised."Going off that, most Gravity Falls fans picked up on the distinct tonal shift between Seasons 1 and 2. Rather than sticking with the traditional freak-of-the-week format, Hirsch and company doubled down on the mystery elements and pushed the boundaries even further when it came to scares.The characters were another great example of that. Dipper, for example, is a "full character," as Ritter put it. "I feel like there are a lot of shows that can do an idea of a 12-year-old or something like that -- and like Alex was saying, kids are much smarter than we remember ourselves to be at the time. They can handle a lot and process a lot. They can process more than we can in some ways... But there was a lot of Dipper that was just me, so it felt perfectly suited to me."Schaal agreed. "Of all the characters I've played, Mabel is the most like me," she said. "Every time I went into the booth, no matter what mood I was in, to record Mabel, as soon as I said the first line... it was just instant access to a well of joy -- that I guess I always have but don't have an excuse to tap into. Mabel, that was where she came from, and I would always leave in such a good mood."Another thing Gravity Falls is known for is its catchy theme music. But that aspect, like most others on the show, "wasn't easy to crack.""We were on sort of a theme hunt at the beginning," Hirsch recalled. "It was very difficult, and this was sort of a perfect microcosm for the difficulty of the tone of the television show, because in my gut I knew what this show was. It was nostalgic, but it was also present. I knew that it was scary, but it was also silly.

Breeck explained, "We just kind of stumbled onto some sounds in the theme song. There's a little bit of 8-bit stuff in there and some of the 'whistly' sounds, and we just used those throughout the series. Most of the cues, I would try to sprinkle a little bit of that to create some continuity." When I think of the palette that you identify as the Gravity Falls palette, it's there in the theme. I just kind of stuck to that, and it had some cohesion."

Continued on Page 2, as Hirsch talks about a possible continuation of the show, and Schaal and Ritter speculate on the future of their characters...