In the midst of this discussion on the current “no spoilers” climate, I keep remembering what happened when the Gravity Falls fandom predicted the existence and importance of Ford’s character. You know what Alex Hirsch and the show’s creative team did? They bumped Ford’s introduction up by a few episodes (mid-S2 as opposed to the planned season finale), but what they didn’t do was trash his entire character and thereby waste 30 episodes of buildup.
And when Ford walked on screen for the first time and revealed who he was, I remember the fandom losing our minds. Because we had picked up on the foreshadowing! All our theories had been proven right! And now we were getting the catharsis of payoff. Anyone who was there can testify that Alex Hirsch did troll us with fake spoilers, but he wasn’t upset whenever we put together the clues he was leaving for us. In fact, he actively encouraged it! And that’s what I don’t get about writers like the Russos and D&D - if you’re going to punish your fans for interacting with your work, why are you in the business of creating?
