Bill Cipher: His Past Revealed

How deep does Bill's mental health go?

Now the next thing to talk about is something I feel is more controversial. Something even I don't feel as confident about but is something I know is talked about amongst us theorists for Bill. Therefore I feel like I have to discuss it.

Trigger warning: Suicide and self-harm. Please skip over this section if either of these upset you. I promise it isn't as critical as other things and is more speculation as well as addressing the fandom's general speculation.

If you're still reading, yes what I said is correct. We are talking about that. I've given solid reasons as to why Bill is likely depressed, but many people have debated if Bill is actually suicidal or not. And now I want to put in my own take on the matter.

My answer? It's possible. I think evidence can point to yes, but I also think there's evidence that goes against it. This is mostly all pure speculation. I do not have a solid answer but I am aware of both sides of the argument.

For one we know he's just a straight-up masochist. Any time he's in someone else's body he creates pain. And it's practically self-harm. But let's talk more about the suicidal stuff.

I mean, let's take a look from a logical standpoint. Say that everything I said is true. If you were in Bill's shoes, if you were as lonely and depressed from the accident you created, single-handedly destroying everything you know... wouldn't you be suicidal? We know for a fact that he is not happy based on various clues as well as something I have yet to mention. That being the Axoltol's poem. But I'll get there after this.

When he shakes hands with Stan who is disguised as Ford, wouldn't he have known it was him? I find it really hard to believe a creature who is as smart as Bill could be easily fooled by this kind of trick. The two other times we've seen him be tricked and lose to humans there's a reasonable explanation. In Mindscappers, he loses because he underestimates the group but more specifically Dipper. He didn't expect humans could understand the Mindscape. The second time in Sock Opera, he was tricked by Mabel just by not knowing the limits and features of a human body.

But the third time he's tricked, there shouldn't have been any reason for him to be tricked. Stan was wearing the six fingered glove but even so Bill shook his hand. Bill would be able to feel five fingers instead of six. There's no way he'd just forget Ford has six fingers when that's his literal nickname for the Pines. Then he would have left Stan's mind right? But Bill didn't. I mean it just doesn't make any sense to me. So that would argue he's suicidal.

But maybe he was just so close to his goal that he became too egotistical to see the obvious truth. But it just doesn't seem in character for him to miss such an obvious detail regardless.

And this is me just being me and overthinking something super small. That's just a joke, but remember in Sock Opera when Bipper asks Soos if he wants to know the exact time and date of his death? It gets me thinking, did Bill actually know the date? Or was it something more like "Very soon! It's coming very soon..." Because if Bill did know the actual date, then he would have known that likely Weirdmageddon wouldn't have worked and he would have been stopped.

Why wouldn't Bill have done something about that then? Because maybe he knew Weirdmageddon was never going to work. Maybe he knew that Weirdmageddon was supposed to kill him. It's all very confusing.

Also just being alive that long.. sounds kinda awful. Maybe it isn't to him, maybe it is. We'll never know. But maybe this was the only way he could be killed. He was extremely powerful anyway. I doubt any of his henchmen could just kill Bill. He'd need something much more powerful.

This brings us to the Zodiac wheel. That would be powerful enough to kill him right? At least that's what we have to assume the circle does. But then why would Bill stop the group if he was counting on that to kill him? This suggests he's not suicidal.

There's preventing the zodiac wheel from working, but there's also more. It's commonly known that Bill saves himself from death at the last moment. (Again, this is about the Axolotl which I'll get to and explain more as well as review this point). Why save himself from death if he wanted to die? Either he really didn't want to do it or like some suicidal people, they never actually do the act. They are too afraid of death in the end.

Perhaps it's the fact it was his flames that would have killed him. The same flames that destroyed his home. It may have caused him to change his mind at the last minute. Personally I don't think he would have had peace in death if he were to die like his people. So he saved himself at the last minute possibly.

And another thing that points to him not being suicidal is just the fact he has such a large ego. Even if he's secretly depressed that ego still exists. Even if fake at first to be able to rule over the nightmare realm, it certainly became real.

The idea of Bill being suicidal is one I just struggle to solidify. There's too much evidence for both sides for me to decide on. In the end, I think it might just be more up for interpretation at this point. I'm not entirely sure if it matters to his backstory per se and more just his personality anyway. But I'm not here to explain his entire personality because most people already know it. It's just this feature may be one that's just not on the surface.

Lets review:

- Bill is from the 2nd the second dimension,
a world filled with different kinds of shapes and lines known as Flatland.
- Bill as an equilateral triangle is part of one of the lowest classes in society and is thus mistreated. Flatland has a social hierarchy that has triangles at the bottom, squares next, then pentagons, etc. Circles are at the top of society. At the very bottom (not considered part of society) are irregular triangles and irregular shapes, and the women who are straight lines.
- Unlike equal-sided shapes (every child has one more side than his father), Irregular triangles over many generations of careful breeding can have equilateral triangle sons.
- Bill Cipher, an equilateral triangle, comes from a line of ancestors (the isosceles) who have been oppressed all their lives for generations. Those same ancestors main purpose in society is to eventually give birth to Bill.
- Because of laws in Flatland, Bill would have been forcefully taken away from his birth parents and then adopted by a new family. He'd be forbidden to ever know or meet his birth parents.
- It's likely when growing up, Bill's ego, personality, mental health, and ideology were affected by living in Flatland.
- Bill would have gone to school and then would have started to learn about the hard truth of flatland.
- Bill Cipher's voice is echoey and loud because of Flatland. This is how Flatlanders can discriminate against triangles without being able to see shapes.
- In the gravity falls story, Bill Cipher takes the place of A Square from the book Flatland. Anything that happened to A Square, happened to Bill. The next parts of this review will be explaining what happened.
- A stranger appears before Bill. He is a Sphere (named Sphere) from the 3rd dimension. He explains to Bill that there is a third dimension but Bill does not believe him
- As a way to convince Bill, Sphere takes him into the Mindscape for the first time to see three dimensions.
- The theory of Bill being from Flatland and all the other things mentioned are proven by cannon, never before seen evidence in Journal
- Sphere came to Flatland to attempt to convince the government of flatland there is a dimension.
- The pupil was Bill. Sphere taught Bill all about the third dimension and magic. Eventually, Bill became bored with the information he was given. He wanted to know more. Bill believed there were more dimensions to learn about but Sphere denied this. The two fought and Bill decided he'd discover the fourth dimension by himself without sphere. He left the guidance of Sphere after.
- Determined to document what he's seen, Bill starts writing a book about everything he saw in the third dimension but continued to reach roadblocks and becomes mentally unstable. Just like Ford Pines.
- Bill shares his book filled with his discovery to the people of Flatland but is arrested and put on trial.
- Bill shares his book filled with his discovery to the people of Flatland but is arrested and put on trial.
- Bill was sentenced to death but Bill defended himself with magic. Due to his unstable emotions, his magic started destroying all of Flatland. He escaped by entering the mindscape and lost his physical form. His magic killed everyone in Flatland. He then becomes insane.
- Years later, Bill tells Ford about his home dimension and how he hated it. He admits to destroying his dimension.
- The parallels between Sphere and Bill's relationship and Bill and Ford's relationship are nearly identical
- TW for mental health and suicide: It's been theorized Bill is suicidal. There is evidence for this, but there is also evidence against it. It is left up for personal interpretation.