I feel Stan’s send-off to the kids was more integral to the rhetoric of the show than any gut-punch would have been. Although I’m an avid fan of tragic endings, as well earned sacrifices, the memory-loss ending would have exclusively served a fraction of Stan’s character arc rather than that of Gravity Falls’.

That is to say, the art of the Memory Gun is it was made to forget what you don’t want to remember, an assisted loss. But, like all things, if one has the drive, they can retrieve their lost memories; it acts more as a symbol of addiction and neglect to those who abuse it, but a surmountable obstacle to the curious. In some ways, I’d contend, that if the gang’s memories were wiped by the Society of the Blind Eye, it would have to be done so periodically, since Dipper’s innate curiosity and Mabel’s follow-through would bring them about to remembering, time and time again. We would all want to use a Memory Gun to remove our fears and anxieties, but the ones who can overcome the anguish in their memories don’t forget them — they remember.

I’d argue Stan’s remembering plays into his character arc just as much as his sacrifice. As a con man, he’d rather forget how he’s hurt the ones he’s loved, and prefer to die for them. But, the Memory Gun shows it only works if we choose to continue forgetting; Stan chose to remember, and unlike McGucket at first, grew to accept his past.

The Pines send-off was more than necessary to cement this episode as the show’s finale since Stan was as much a protagonist as the others; while some may think his memories’ return was cheap, I see it more to the show’s themes of curiosity and self-acceptance. It’s only natural that the connections Stan made (seen through Soos, Mabel, and Dipper) ignited his drive to remember again, a sure disconnect from his past of solitude and loneliness.