Alex Hirsch: When I was 12 years old, I was obsessed with codes, consp...

Think about how rare it is that you exist at all. Also think about time this way: If something exists, even for a second, then forever in the future that thing “existed”, and forever in the past that thing “was going to exist”. So to even be conscious for a millisecond is a kind of immortality, but you have more than a millisecond. You have minutes. Hours. Months. A year? Years! This is a gift.

Alex Hirsch

past years thinking

As long as I could hold a pencil, I was drawing and telling stories and making jokes. I've just been lucky that no one ever stopped me, and now I can do that for a living.

Alex Hirsch

drawing lucky long

I feel like the best kids shows aren't just for kids. The best kids shows have something in it for everyone. As you grow up, you're increasingly proud to be a fan of the show, rather than getting to an age where you suddenly become embarrassed that you ever liked it because it's only for seven-year-olds.

Alex Hirsch

growing-up kids years

I'm a very relentless individual and have a lot more insanity coming.

Alex Hirsch

relentless individual insanity

In terms of creative engagement, I just love being able to produce, produce, produce. You don't always get it perfect, but it has much more of an improvisational element, and you learn.

Alex Hirsch

creative perfect love-is

Gravity Falls is a show about mysteries and magic but first and foremost it's a show about characters.

Alex Hirsch

magic character fall

I remember as a kid being scared of the things that go bump in the night, but I was way more scared of adults.

Alex Hirsch

adults night kids

My goal with Gravity Falls is to make people as paranoid and insane as I was as a child, and I'm delighted to see it's working!

Alex Hirsch

children people fall

A sibling is a friend for life, but they are a friend for life that you are forced to have. And like anything that you are forced to do, occasionally people will drive you crazy.

Alex Hirsch

sibling crazy people

If you ask anyone in animation, how long they've been into animation, they'll pretty much always tell you that it's since they can remember, and I'm no exception.

Alex Hirsch

animation remember long

Once you train an audience to look for significance, they start to find it everywhere.

Alex Hirsch

significance audience looks

Everyone has days where they don't get their way, where you have to go to bed early or you have too much homework to do or you can't eat the candy that you want or you miss your favorite TV show and, in those moments, you just want to tear the whole world down.

Alex Hirsch

tv-shows tears missing

Gravity Falls has transformed the children of America into an army of Dippers. I couldn't be more proud!

Alex Hirsch

army children fall

You can look at a finale as chance to make an impact or a statement, to shock people or shoot a big cannon and make a loud noise.

Alex Hirsch

impact people looks

I try to be a man of mystery. I try to keep the various projects I'm up to as close to the vest as possible until it's time to reveal them.

Alex Hirsch

vests trying men

The concern about what's too violent or what's too scary is something that I just completely don't let enter into my creative process. I feel like, if I spend a lot of time trying to worry about whether it will appeal to everyone and who will like it and who won't, and I try to please everyone, I'll just spread myself too thin and lose my mind.

Alex Hirsch

scary creative worry

When you're doing an animated series, you tend to pitch storyboards. You write a script and then you draw a comic version of that script and put it up on big boards, and then you pitch it to a big room of executives and writers.

Alex Hirsch

animated-series boards writing

When I was a kid, I was obsessed with UFOs in particular, and the paranormal. I grew up in the '90s, which is when The X-Files was at its zenith.

Alex Hirsch

x-files zenith kids

Your family, even though you love them, they can get on your nerves. You spend so much time together.

Alex Hirsch

our-family nerves together

I've always just loved drawing and loved cartoons. Growing up, I loved Disney films, I loved The Simpsons, and I was a big fan of the comic strip Calvin & Hobbes and the way that they would have weird fantasy and then down-to-earth funny character comedy.

Alex Hirsch

growing-up drawing character

When I was 12 years old, I was obsessed with codes, conspiracies, and secret messages. I would record TV commercials with SoundRecorder.exe on Windows 95 and reverse them to see if I was being subliminally influenced to watch Pokémon by Japanese spies.