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.

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

I thought that was the coolest thing in the world, the idea of somebody trying to solve mysteries. I would see conspiracies in everything. I think I believed in leprechauns longer than any of my fellow classmates because I tried to catch them.

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.

I absolutely love television. What's so great about TV is that I can tell 20 stories in a year. If I was working at a feature studio, I'd tell 1% of someone else's story, over the course of four years.

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!

I've always loved The Simpsons, just because it was really, really funny. As a kid, you love the characters. You know that the dad is dumb and frustrated, and you know that the boy is smarter than everyone else around him and is constantly getting into mischief.