What'd you expect from a Sadist Show about an alien invader? Not even a Black Comedy show is safe from sad moments.
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General
- The entire show. It takes place in a post-apocalypse Earth where everyone is dumb (with the exceptions of Dib, Gaz and Professor Membrane), kids are constantly trying to kill each other, elderly, overweight and even mentally challenged people are bullied, mocked and made fun of, etc. After all, Word of God said that Invader Zim was conceived when he thought about "how stupid everything is".
- Gaz. Despite being a cynical and sadistic little girl, she is a growing pre-teen with emotional issues. She rarely smiles, she doesn't seem to have any friends and it is hinted to suffer from depression. It is possible that her behavior is due to Membrane neglecting her and her brother or the fact that she lives in a Crapsack World. Eric Trueheart, one of the writers for the show, has even lampshaded this:Eric: I always assumed that deep down Gaz's attitude was a coping mechanism for how messed-up her home life really was. Absent dad, crazy brother, mysteriously unmentioned mother, etc. I don't know if anyone else thought this way. Gaz's character could walk a line between horrible and sympathetic, so you had to be careful not to fall too hard on the horrible side.
- According to the IP bible for Invader Zim, Gaz is hinted at naturally being how she is in the show, but part of the reason why she acts the way she does to Dib is because he constantly used her as a lab rat for a lot of experiments that would hurt or humiliate her, one time tricking her into another experiment as an apology for the previous one. While this was for dark comedy purposes, it does explain things a bit.
- Dib's situation is not one that anyone would want to be in. As prideful and self-serving he can be, he genuinely wants to save the Earth from Zim's schemes, but is believed by no one (except Gaz, who doesn't care) in regards to Zim's true identity and is continuously made a pariah by the very people he's trying to protect. And things are no better at home where he is constantly on the receiving end of Gaz's wrath as well as belittled by his father for not studying "real science". The sheer amount of times he gets beaten up and put down would certainly take a toll on anyone's sanity, and in instances such as the Halloween episode it's implied that Dib has indeed been negatively affected by his circumstances and he is only a kid.
- Professor Membrane. He’s so busy that he, Dib, and Gaz only go out to eat together once a year. Which seems sort of funny... until you think about it.
- Though Dib seems to care far less than Gaz, interestingly enough. He was more than willing to miss out on that annual family outing without even a hint of regret. Though this is reasonable since his family is quite dismissive and abusive.
- Might as well put in a word for Zim too. Yes, he's an alien invader who not only sees any lifeform that isn't Irken as little more than dookie but is hellbent on taking over the Earth and dooming humanity. And yes, Zim's banishment and roughly 90% of his own failures are results of his own destructive and idiotic tendencies. And that's the sad thing: Zim is just so self-absorbed, delusional, and locked into his ways that not only does the cycle of failure continue he never truly realizes the full extent of his situation, namely that his entire race at best sees him as a pathetic joke and that his mission was just a way to get rid of him. Not helping is his constant need to receive validation from Red and Purple despite believing he's already the greatest invader ever, something that will never happen no matter how hard he tries.
- Mixes with Nightmare Fuel and Fridge Horror. "The Trial" would have revealed that mere moments after his "birth" Zim was thrown down a chute into a "downloading chair" and encoded with what would turn out to be defective information, meaning that part of the reason Zim's the way he is because he was literally reprogrammed to become that way. Even worse is before that Zim had a completely different personality akin to that of an affectionate and curious child, so it's a question of how Zim (and by extension the other Irken invaders and possibly the Tallests) might have turned out had he not been recoded by the Control Brains.
- The hints to Miss Bitters' past, if you think there's any truth to them. Think about it: the creepy Humanoid Abomination that terrifies her students on a daily basis was at some point a normal person with hopes and dreams who got mutated into her current state by a freak accident. Miss Bitters may be a monster, but if these stories are true, can you really blame her?Miss Bitters: I had a valentine once.
- It later becomes Harsher in Hindsight when you realize that Lucille Bliss, Miss Bitters' voice actor, died in 2012, with the latter having a silent cameo in Invader Zim: Enter the Florpus.
- Bloaty. The poor man is completely miserable, forced to do a menial job and gorges himself on pizza. This really makes you wonder if this is how people in costumed mascots feel. His eCard even reads:Once a skinny homeless man, Bloaty was randomly chosen as the mascot for Bloaty’s Pizza Hog in return for free pizza and a free room in the back of the restaurant. Now the size of a commuter bus, Bloaty longs for the days when he didn’t cough up cheese.
- Pretty much anytime GIR cries, even in minor cases like "Walk for Your Lives".
Season 1
Parent Teacher Night
- Zim’s flashback as a smeet can be kinda of a tearjerker. Just by hearing Zim’s first words "I love you, cold unfeeling robot arm!"
is heartwarming to hear him say that but also very heartbreaking since Zim has grown from such an adorable, all-loving smeet to a destructive but very unpopular Irken Invader who is hated by everyone on Irk.- While it’s Played for Laughs, Billy crying in embarrassment is very heart-wrenching and distressing to hear.
- In a later scene, not only does he cry again, his brother is clearly seen crying too.
- Even though Zim is always mad at GIR and calls him a "HORRIBLE robot", he does have a soft spot for him. When Zim gets mad at GIR for replacing the guidance chip for a cupcake, GIR started crying. Zim started feeling sorry for him and that getting mad at him would get them nowhere. But GIR was only sad because he ate his only cupcake, but you could think that he’s also sad that Zim was mad at him.
- Dib gets matched up with Bill, a paranormal investigator. Sounds like a match made in heaven, right? Except Bill believes in everything but the existence of aliens, dismissing the Galactic Equinox molt as hogwash. Just to rub salt in the wound, Bill believes Count Cocofang, a cereal box mascot, is real, and chases after the poor man dressed as Cocofang while Dib tries desperately to get him to look at the restaurant where Zim is molting through the doors and windows, without any luck. The molt comes and goes, the only hint of evidence being the completely-destroyed restaurant, and Dib loses his chance to not only expose Zim as an alien but to do so to someone who he thought would be interested in the subject.
- This episode doubles as both horror and Tear Jerker worthy because of what Zim does to poor Dib by crippling him horribly by tossing rubber pigs into Dib's past through a time machine, replacing seemingly random objects in ways that cause Dib to have horrible accidents, progressively crippling Dib to the point that he almost dies.
- GIR's reaction to Zim using his rubber piggies for this is a bit of minor example.
"WHYYYYYYY?!? MY PIGGIE!!! I LOVEDED YOU, PIGGIE!! I LOVEDED YOOOU!!!!"
- This episode really shows how much Dib is disliked by his classmates, with them constantly glaring at and insulting him. Dib actually wonders if they're worth saving, and when he does manage to, it's not because they're listening to him, it's because they all just want to sit away from him.
- Gaz yells at Dib for going off to fight Zim because she "just wants to go out to eat with dad". Considering the situation, this certainly counts.Dib: Can't you just go there to eat tomorrow?Gaz: ...You just don't get it, do you?
- Much like the above example, we get a brief flashback of Dib and Gaz as babies. The band-aid on Dib’s head makes you think that Gaz bullied him. And just seeing Dib using building blocks to spell "ALIENS"◊ is very cute, until Gaz just kicks the blocks out of her way only for Dib to just look in sadness.◊
- Just seeing a flashback of Zim and Dib in their baby stages, it makes you wonder what their lives have gone through before they were enemies.
- Chickenfoot talks about his past life with Dib where he was a normal man named Chewie Rodriguez until an accident occurred when the microwave was splashed with water while Chewie was wearing the suit and cooking chicken in a microwave, generating an explosion that "created an unholy fusion of man and chicken", causing him go insane and live all alone in an apartment with assorted Chicky Licky toys that he calls his "friends".
- Officer Squidman telling Zim I Have a Family is a lot sadder if taken at face value rather than for the absurdity that it is. Thanks to Zim, he'll never see them again because he doesn't remember them.
- Reinforced that he has children, but not a wife. What became of his kids?
- Dib enjoys a life of many achievements in technology and the humanities, and defeats the Irkens in battle, forcing them to surrender... until it turns out that it was all a simulation ran by Zim. Why? Because he wanted to know who threw a muffin at him in class. Zim could've just interrogated Dib in a more straightforward manner, but he wanted to twist the knife more by making Dib believe his wildest dreams were coming through before tricking him into admitting it.
- Gretchen, one of the rejects in the Skool besides Keef, is shown crying when Dib is talking with Tak thinking that she is not good enough for Dib. What is even sadder is that not only she's a reject like her friends, Keef, Melvin, and Dirge, but she is one of the only people who cares about Dib as she is shown giving him meat slabs with a smile on her face. Shown in an unused animatic, she dumps her skool lunch on Dib and laughs. But it could be reasonable since she is also one of the kids who poke fun of him before and after this episode. But no worries, though. He isn’t interested in Tak either. Only interested in talking about his paranormal studies.
- The ending has a moment of genuine reflection and realisation on Zim's behalf of the fact that he consistently fails the Tallest and that they don't like him at all. It's rare to see him with any sort of self-awareness, so seeing his delusions and facade slip a little to reveal some shame implies that he might know that they hate him and still wants them to be proud of him anyway.
Season 2
Dibship Rising
- The ending of the episode. The Dibship breaks free of Zim's control by focusing on its copies of Dib's memories, but this just depresses it due to how terrible Dib's life is, so it ultimately decides to delete itself.Dibship: I AM Dib!Dib: Yes!Dibship: Everyone thinks I'm a freak!Dib: (slowly, awkwardly) Yyyyes!Dibship: I'm a loser!Dib: Um... That's kinda mean, ship.Dibship: This... knowledge is horrible! I can't live like this! Must erase personality programming! Life passing before my eyes... backwards!
- Dib finding out Dwicky's been lying to him. When you see how he joyfully and rather innocently reacts to someone extending a measure of kindness and tolerance towards him, it starts to kind of hit you just how ridiculously YOUNG the poor kid is, and when his "ally" is taken from him it becomes almost impossible not to see just how thankless and lonely a life he lives in trying to save his own people from extinction.Dib: You don't believe me! You... (builds towards rage, then regresses to pleading, and winds up just staring at the ground in defeat) I thought you were different.
Dwicky: Look, I know you think I lied, and I—I did, but I was only trying to help.
Dib (bitter): Isn't this just great?! While you waste my time, Earth gets one step closer to being taken over! That's my problem right there! My problem is that the human race seems to want to be destroyed!- Dib going into a breakdown after Dwicky leaves with the aliens and Zim rubs it in (AND takes the super weapons that Dib unwittingly helped him acquire) is just the icing on this cake.
- This episode also shows how unpopular Dib is. When he's feeding Willy lines for his campaign and gets him to request that Dib be treated with respect, it proves so unpopular that he has to quickly change tracks in order to get Willy popular again. Worse, Zim — who also isn't liked by the other students — has no problem winning them over.
- The ending. Ok, Dib deserved some punishment for using Gaz as a guinea pig for his spell drive (good intentions or not), but not only tricking Dib into believing she was in danger when she obviously was not but also forcing him to clean up pig dookie with his head while he's crying for forgiveness? Not to mention all the horrific (and very graphic) death threats and beatings that Dib took from her while he was trying to help her?
- Well, there was also the horrible experiments that Membrane most likely did to her during her time in the isolation tank. It makes it worse knowing that her dad is the only person she has/shows any value for.
- During the experiments, merchandise of her as "Pig Girl" starts being produced, meaning Professor Membrane is using his own daughter as his cash cow. Experiment tours, plush dolls, story books, and even a theatrical film! Even though he did apologize to her at the end, it still doesn't make up how cruel it was to Gaz.
- Dib taking the punishment of the Shadow-Hog to save his sister. He's genuinely crying at the end and feeling guilty, and yet Gaz ignores this completely and leaves him to his fate. Not even Gaz's confession from that she actually cares about Dib from Enter The Florpus helps.
- Despite the fact that this episode is praised by fans for giving Gaz a main role, it also received mixed reaction by others due to Dib and Gaz being slightly OOC and for the Downer Ending.
- Well, there was also the horrible experiments that Membrane most likely did to her during her time in the isolation tank. It makes it worse knowing that her dad is the only person she has/shows any value for.
- When the Santa suit sucks up Zim completely, he sounds like that he lost all hope. When he curls into a fetal position, he looked like he hoped that everything was all a dream and that he was still in his smeet tube. Luckily, Dib accidentally rescues him.
- At the end, after it seems that the crowd will take to Dib's speech of how Christmas should be a time for family and not fake Santas, Zim proceeds to persuade the crowd into beating Dib up under the guise of an Easter platypus thing. Let's hope he is okay after the fight and we are sure his dad is proud of him for sending the monstrous Santa into space. Though luckily, this is also the last time Dib is beaten in the series.note
- Because of the monstrous Santa Claus suit Zim made, all future Christmases are now under attack and have to be put under a dome to protect themselves from the Santa suit. All of this wouldn't have happened if Zim just told Dib to destroy the Santa suit instead of just launching it to space. It is unknown whether this future Christmas timeline is canon or not.
- The intro marks an especially saddening moment for Dib. After spending possibly minutes to hours attempting to explain to his classmates that Zim is an alien and that they do exist, the kids continuously mock him and cause him to have a momentary mental breakdown in front of the entire class. After cooling down, he tries again only to have a large and imposing alien (alter revealed to be another Irken) kidnap Zim interrupt him while stating it came from outer space. Dib tries to use this as evidence to his statements about aliens only for bird poop to fall on his shoulder from the hole in the roof that the alien created. The kids totally ignore the roof and alien and simply start to laugh at Dib for having been pooped on by a bird. Cue a single tear from a heartbroken and embarrassed Dib.
- Zim's humiliating duties on Foodcourtia are funny at first, but become genuinely depressing after he has a complete breakdown and begins weeping after being forced to dance in a mascot costume filled with boiling oil.
Unproduced Episodes
- Overall, all of these unfinished episodes had potential. But because of the show's cancellation, none of them were even finished nor got the chance to. We would've seen how Minimoose came to be in "Nubs Of Doom", we would've seen how Zim lost and trying to retrieve his PAK back in "Ten Minutes To Doom", we would've seen Zim's backstory in "The Trial", we would've seen how Dib and Gaz are revealed to be clones of Professor Membrane, we would've seen Skoodge again in "Day Of da Spookies", etc. Too bad almost all of them weren't used for the comics. Talk about wasted potential.
- Zim bawling over GIR's dog suit filled with ground beef, thinking he was turned into ground beef in the unfinished episode "Invader Poonchy".
- "Mopiness of Doom", Dib gives up Paranormal Investigation to learn "real science" with his father. Zim finds himself too depressed to do any evil without Dib trying to stop him and winds up lying on the couch eating junk food. Things get better at the end as both Zim and Dib reunite.
- This line by Zim when he runs out of snacks while lying on the couch. "Why? Why does everything want to hurt Zim? I don't know!"
- There was a fan project by Soapy Waffles (aka. Emily Rose Satterfield) that animated the entire unfinished episode. Sadly, it was never fully finished.
- The entire episode makes you think of Zim and Dib's relationship. Do they really hate each other? Are they just lonely or nothing without each other? Both?
- There's actually another depressing layer to this episode when getting past the happy reunion of the two worst enemies. Dib realizes that being a scientist just wasn't his thing and decides to go back to his true calling. Unfortunately, this means that Dib decided to trade in what could have become a brighter, even successful future for himself (as he really did show true potential as a scientist which more than pleased Professor Membrane) for the very thing that has led to him becoming the isolated No-Respect Guy that we all know and will continue to endure hardships even if he does manage to keep Zim from completing his mission. Just a reminder that sometimes what one desires most can some at a steep cost...
