Please take a look at this dorky self-portrait, because it speaks volumes about Dipper’s public persona:
Here is the image Dipper chooses to introduce himself with in Dipper and Mabel’s Guide to Mysteries and Nonstop Fun.
Dipper has tacked a red curtain up in the kitchen and has deliberately placed items in the shot. A globe, a telescope, a model airplane and a stuffed dodo bird.
He is mimicking a history of portraiture on intellectual vanity, as you might see, for example, in a painting like Ambassadors (1533) by Hans Holbein the Younger.
The subjects pose beside an array of scientific and cultural instruments that show off their knowledge and achievements in a variety of intellectual fields.
So what is Dipper trying to boast with these visuals?
Globe — worldliness; bigger picture knowledge.
Not surprising for a kid who wants to know everything.
Dipper is larger in scale than the globe in this picture. He might like to consider himself on top of the world. Telescope — knowledge of the world beyond; foresight.
Dipper prides himself on his unique perceptiveness and his ability to discover things that other people don’t notice.
It is interesting that the telescope is pointed directly at Dipper’s face. Does he hold an accurate view of himself? Are his self-perceptions misaligned? Do others see him more clearly for who he is?
Stuffed dodo — knowledge (and mastery?) of extinct or mythical creatures. (The dodo bird was once considered the product of someone’s imagination.)
In Dipper’s dealings with the paranormal, he has sort of earned this bragging right.
Model airplane — might signify travel; ascending, soaring, or rising above.
Assuming that Dipper assembled the toy airplane himself, he could also be showing off his pragmatic skills. Competence and industriousness are important parts of a child’s self-esteem.
Posture — Dipper is puffing his chest out and posing like an explorer. He has thrown cereal boxes on the floor to achieve this effect.
Dipper really, really wants people to think highly of him. He wants to be considered a powerful figure; an enlightened adult.
I might very well be reading into it too much, but I feel like I should also point out the potential significance of Dipper treading on a box of cereal. An ancient method of threshing grain (otherwise known as cereal) is by trampling it with oxen, and with the other recurrent themes of separating the enlightened from the common dross that we have going in this book it’s not too far a stretch to imagine this as a representation of separating the wheat from the chaff.
It’s also possible that his treading on wheat- a symbol of love and charity, hope and the future- could have more ominous connotations.
That or Dipper is just giant dork and has low regard for a healthy balanced breakfast.
Nobody puts the heart into their storyboards that Alonso Ramirez Ramos does! Selected boards from “Not What He Seems” by Alonso, directed by Stephen Sandoval, shack exterior boards by Dana Terrace.
