Line #58 Trivia/InvaderZim


1	!Trivia tropes for ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZim''
2	!!Trivia With Their Own Pages
3	[[index]]
4	* [[ReferencedBy/InvaderZim Referenced by...]]
5	* [[WhatCouldHaveBeen/InvaderZim What Could Have Been]]
6	[[/index]]
7	----
8	!!General examples:
9	* AscendedFanon:
10	** Fans assumed that Dib and Gaz's last name was "Membrane", since their dad is Professor Membrane. At the time, WordOfGod said that Membrane was actually the professor's ''first'' name. The comic continuation, however, just makes Dib's surname "Membrane", which the show itself went with, as well in the movie ''Enter the Florpus''.
11	** Another example from the movie -- for years, one of [[FandomSpecificPlot the most common plots]] in Invader Zim fanfics was Zim [[ReassignedToAntarctica learning his mission is a lie]] and falling into a depression over it. The movie ended up using this for a key part of its plot.
12	* AuthorsSavingThrow: Jhonen Vasquez admitted that, as misanthropic as the show already was, Dib's abusive sister and neglectful father were ''too'' cruel to find funny, and when creating the comics, rewrote Gaz from a FlatCharacter to a more dynamic AnnoyingYoungerSibling (notably in Issue 14) and had Professor Membrane interacting with his children a little more. This extended into ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZimEnterTheFlorpus'', which firmly shows that the Membranes love each other in spite of their dysfunction. All to make the cruelty funnier, of course.
13	* BeamMeUpScotty: Gaz only threatens to send someone to a nightmare world once (with the full line being "What you need is to give the Game Slave to me, or I will plunge you into a nightmare world from which there is no waking!") However, some fanfics treat it like her catchphrase and have her threaten to send someone to a nightmare world every time she gets angry.
14	* CreatorBacklash: Minor example -- Jhonen wasn't fond of the original design of Mac Meatie's in "Germs", thinking it looked too cartoonish, so as a result it was given a radically different look in "Career Day".
15	* CreativeDifferences:
16	** Surprisingly, the Nickelodeon executives were (knowingly) very hands-off with the creative process. Character deaths that were originally written were never allowed, though.
17	** According to Rikki Simons, this was more a problem between Vasquez and series director Steve Ressel than it was with any of the suits. Ressel wanted to go all-out with camera angles and cinematography while Vasquez wanted the gags to speak for themselves.
18	* CreatorKiller: Series director Steve Ressel's career in animation didn't last much longer after this series, no doubt due to his afore-mentioned CreativeDifferences with the rest of the staff. He created one more animation project, ''Trubble Bub'', before moving into graphic novels and music. Any chances of Ressel ever making a comeback were effectively destroyed when [[https://meaww.com/invader-zim-director-steve-ressel-accused-grooming-of-underage-girl-shannon-strucci-inappropriate he was accused of sexually harrassing and grooming of underage girls in 2020]].
19	* CreatorsFavorite:
20	** Some of the supplementary material indicate that Dib is Jhonen Vasquez's favorite character.
21	** Gaz as well, from the comics onward. Vasquez has gone on record multiple times as saying that he's most excited to have another chance to expand her character from what it was in the original series.
22	* CreatorsFavoriteEpisode:
23	** According to the DVDCommentary, "Backseat Drivers from Beyond the Stars" is Vasquez's favorite episode out of the whole series, with him even describing it as, "the pinnacle of all that is good and went right with this show."
24	** In a voice cast example, Creator/RichardStevenHorvitz has gone on record to say that his favorite character interaction comes from "Rise of the Zitboy".
25	--->'''Zim:''' Whyyy was there BACON ''IN THE'' '''''SOAP?!'''''\
26	'''GIR:''' III made it ''myself''!
27	* CreatorsPest: Downplayed, but Steve Ressel admits to finding the Almighty Tallest "a little boring" due to being not quite as visually dynamic as other characters like Zim or GIR.
28	* CrossDressingVoices:
29	** In Mexico, Zim is voiced by a woman.
30	** In a few languages (European Spanish, German, Italian), GIR is often voiced by a woman.
31	** Zim, Dib and GIR are voiced by women in the Japanese dub
32	** In "Halloween Spectacular of Spooky Doom", Nightmare Bitters was voiced by ''Rodger Bumpass''.
33	* TheDanza: In the French dub, Dib was renamed Fred, and he was voiced by Frédéric Popovic.
34	* ExecutiveMeddling: Significantly less than you'd expect for a Creator/{{Nickelodeon}} show created by the guy who did ''ComicBook/JohnnyTheHomicidalManiac'', but there are a few anecdotes that have been shared:
35	** Two specific incidents that make little sense, however: In the first episode, the writing staff changed radioactive rubber ants to rubber pants simply due to RuleOfFunny. In the words of Jhonen, "Suddenly we had a fight on our hands!" And in a later episode, they had to fight to keep a line in where a kid told his mom to have fun at work because Nickelodeon thought it was inappropriate to have that line. Why? Because it's about one in the morning, leading some to conclude that the kid's mom was a prostitute.
36	** Due the show's proximity to 9/11, some elements (firefighters watching the slow explosion from their fire truck in Walk For Your Lives, vision of destroyed New York in Door to Door) were [[DistancedFromCurrentEvents deemed too offensive to air]]. The explosion was turned green instead of orange, the firefighter gag was removed and a new "horrible future" vision (that was somehow more destructive than the original one) was produced for Door to Door. Jhonen Vasquez said he preferred the new vision to the old one, as it was more violent. Also Nick seriously considered banning "The Girl Who Cried Gnome" from airing at all due to a scene where the rescue workers attempt to rescue a girl from Zim's Gnomes (as Nick thought it could be seen as insensitive to the rescue workers at Ground Zero) but instead they just post-poned it before finally airing it in 2006.
37	** Nickelodeon objected to the original ending of "Walk of Doom", in which Zim and Gir were dropped off in a ghetto with a banner reading "Welcome to Mexico", feeling that [[ValuesDissonance it came off as racist]]. Jhonen Vasquez, himself Mexican-American, agreed and it was changed to a vaguely Mexican-looking (but still filthy) town.
38	** Another objection Nick had was the apparent demise of "Pig-Boy", a student which Dib unintentionally offends which results in him jumping out a window and [[MadeOfExplodium inexplicably exploding]] offscreen. Apparently, when confronted about the scene about Pig-Boy's death, Jhonen responded "he didn't die! In fact, he was so full of life that he ''flew away!''" and thusly changed the scene to have Pig-Boy jump from the window and soar into the sky. According to Jhonen, Nickelodeon failed to share his sense of humor about it, but [[ThrowItIn allowed the edited scene to air anyways]].
39	** When working on ''Enter the Florpus'', Vasquez remarked during a San Diego Comic-Con panel that "You know that's too dark, Jhonen" became a constant refrain from executives during production.
40	* FollowTheLeader: After ''Zim'' hit cult status and became immensely popular with the preteen demographic, many other animated TV shows started turning towards dark and random humor. ''WesternAnimation/TheMarvelousMisadventuresOfFlapjack'', ''WesternAnimation/JimmyTwoShoes'', and ''WesternAnimation/MakingFiends'' are a few examples.
41	* GodNeverSaidThat:
42	** Unfortunately, the phrase "[[WordOfGod Jhonen said]]" has been falsely appended to so many baseless rumors that unless there is an actual verifiable citation included you're far more likely to be reading something someone ''heard'' Jhonen said from someone else who who heard it and so on... following the GossipEvolution back to its source often leads only to the reveal of glorified {{fanon}} whose origin had been lost in the shuffle. According to (note the citation) [[http://www.questionsleep.com/mindspill/?p=1208 Jhonen on his blog]], even Wikipedia and IMDB have included errors as a result of this.
43	** One of the most common assertions to fall under this clause is Zim being 16 in "Irken Years" and 150 or 159 in human years. WordOfGod on the age business is that Zim is [[http://www.revolutionsf.com/article.php?id=552&page=5 older than any human alive]], but {{fanon}}, perhaps not liking the [[PickOnSomeoneYourOwnSize extreme age gap between the show's main protagonist and his chief rival]], invented the concept of "Irken Years" to put his "relative" age far closer to Dib's, and his real age closer to the lower bound of "older than any living human". Somewhere along the line this made the jump from {{fanon}} to false WordOfGod. You won't find any interviews or blog posts verifying this fact, although some user-edited information sites such as Wikipedia have listed it from time to time (entries inevitably being deleted due to the lack of citation).
44	** The biggest example of a rumor gone wrong would have to be the once-common, entirely mistaken belief that Vasquez hated working on the show and would never return to it unless he was offered a huge amount of money. It's often attributed to the man himself, but it's more likely that it came from comments by [[http://www.buzzyworld.com/zim/archives/askstevearchives.html#103103 series director]] [[http://www.buzzyworld.com/zim/archives/askstevearchives.html#082803 Steve Ressel]], who has indeed made it clear that ''he'' would never return, as he had his own issues with the way things were run. Vasquez often makes disparaging remarks about ''Zim'', but in the same way he does about pretty much ''everything'' -- [[JokingMode with his tongue superglued to the inside of his cheek.]] If his continued associations with the show's fan community failed to dispel the rumors, then his involvement with the comics and ''Enter the Florpus'' were what finally did.
45	** After the show was cancelled, many rumors were circulated and accepted as fact by fans for many years, such as Nickelodeon cancelled it because it was too dark for their tastes or that Jhonen Vasquez ended the show because he wasn't allowed to be as dark as he wanted or that he hated how the show was over merchandised. Vasquez eventually explained that the only reason the show was cancelled was because Nickelodeon felt the show wasn't profitable.[[note]]Invader Zim had good ratings, regularly beating out other children's shows in its time slot, but it was never a powerhouse like ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants'', ''WesternAnimation/{{Rugrats}}'', or ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddParents'', and it didn't attract the younger audience that Nickelodeon wanted. Likewise, the animation for the series was apparently more expensive than other Nickelodeon shows at the time, in no small part thanks to the large amount of CGI that caused the show to more or less live paycheck-to-paycheck.[[/note]]
46	* HeAlsoDid:
47	** One of the show’s head writers was Frank Conniff, also known as [[Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000 TV’s Frank]].
48	** Jhonen Vasquez was one of the main character designers for ''WesternAnimation/RandyCunninghamNinthGradeNinja''.
49	* IWantYouToMeetAnOldFriendOfMine:
50	** Tak, the Hideous New Girl is voiced by Olivia D'Abo, aka Karen Arnold from ''Series/TheWonderYears'', which also starred Andy Berman (Dib) as Chuck Coleman.
51	** Richard Horvitz, voice of Zim brought over a few of his fellow actors from ''The Angry Beavers'' including John Garry, Wally Wingart, and Creator/KevinMcDonald.
52	* LateExportForYou: The show did not air in Canada until 2006, 5 years after its US premiere.
53	* LifeImitatesArt: In 2005, a 17-year-old psychopath named Scott Dyleski reportedly attempted to re-enact the episode "Dark Harvest" in real life. Thankfully(?) he was only able to eviscerate one person before he was caught, tried and sentenced to life in prison.
54	* LyingCreator:
55	** A sarcastic variant. Compounding the GodNeverSaidThat issue above, where fans mistakenly attribute words to Creator/JhonenVasquez that he never actually said, Jhonen ''himself'' has often gone on record with information that's intended to be sardonic. For example, it's said in [[http://dvd.ign.com/articles/543/543764p3.html this interview]] that Zim would eventually get a HeelFaceTurn... and become a lawyer:
56	--->Ultimately, my idea was to take his sights off world domination, as ZIM begins to understand that there is a beauty in human life, an understanding that sets him on his path to becoming a public legal defender. I was very inspired by Ben Affleck's powerful courtroom scenes in ''Film/{{Daredevil}}'', and I wanted to move people to tears like those scenes moved me. But the show was canceled before any of that, thus leaving our audience of ten unfulfilled.[[note]]If that is not ridiculous enough on its face to give away the game, the ''Daredevil'' film came out in 2003, a year after the show's cancellation, meaning the quote literally cannot be true, and "moved to tears like those scenes moved me" is almost certainly meant as a StealthInsult. See also TheWalrusWasPaul.[[/note]]
57	** A shining example of this is the [[http://www.questionsleep.com/?tag=invader-zim-fact "INVADER ZIM Facts" series of posts on his blog]], which typically include a small kernel of something that might be true, but quickly spiral into obviously false stories involving violence and death, leaving the reader wondering if even that small kernel was genuine.
58	** It's claimed in the commentary that the original ending of "Bad, Bad Rubber Piggy" was Dib dying and being replaced by a character named "Louie" as Zim's new rival. Fans have taken this joke as a fact, even adding it to the show's wiki. Eric Trueheart confirmed this to be a joke in his book of ''ZIM'' scripts, Vol. 1.
59	* TheMerch: An insane amount of it available at [[MisaimedMarketing Hot Topic]]. Note that a good 95% of it will be focused on [[EnsembleDarkhorse GIR]].
60	* NoExportForYou: The [=DVDs=] have never been given a Region 2 release (outside of Germany, and that only as of 2019).
61	* OneBookAuthor: Dib Membrane is basically Andy Berman's only voice role (alongside a few minor characters in the show). While he has voiced Dib in other media appearances such as the ''Nicktoons Unite!'' series and the TV movie ''Invader Zim: Enter the Florpus'', he's never done anything not Zim-related.
62	* TheOtherDarrin: Creator/BillyWest voiced Zim in the pilot. Vasquez only had him replaced because West was already voicing the [[WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}} main character of another science fiction show at the time]]. Creator/RichardStevenHorvitz would fill in the spot instead when the series started.
63	* TheOtherMarty: According to writer Eric Trueheart in his book ''THE MEDIUM-SIZED BOOK OF ZIM SCRIPTS: Vol. 1: Waffles 'n' Pigs'', Creator/MarkHamill was the first actor to play Zim in the pilot, before he was redubbed with Creator/BillyWest, who was replaced by Creator/RichardStevenHorvitz for the series. Hamill's take on Zim can be heard [[https://youtu.be/_7FSSk4gAC0?si=R1n0Kqh81-2QGnJM here]].
64	* PlayingAgainstType: Creator/MelissaFahn, who plays Gaz, primarily works in anime dubs, with ''Zim'' being one of only two American shows she's worked on (the other being ''WesternAnimation/OKKOLetsBeHeroes''). In addition, most of her roles involve characters with very sunny dispositions, while Melissa herself would describe the apathetic and sardonic Gaz as being a little girl version of Creator/JackNicholson.
65	* PopCultureUrbanLegends: ''Invader Zim'' tends to be a major victim of this thanks to the combination of GodNeverSaidThat and TrollingCreator, with the alleged and eventually debunked "Invader Dib" being one of the longest-lasting of these. Said to be the intended GrandFinale, it was going to be a three-part episode/television movie wherein Dib would travel to Irk and attempt to take over or destroy the Irken race. This would lead to a large war with Dib, the Meekrob, and The Resisty on one side, and Zim, the rest of the Irken, and even Gaz on the other. How this would have ended depends on the source, with the common ending having Zim win, somehow becoming the new Tallest, and banishing Dib to Saturn/turning him into a military test subject. This was eventually found to be a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWDfW1Uuth8 complete fabrication that originated on fan wikis]]. When pressed at an [=InvaderCon=] panel about how he would have ended the series, creator Jhonen Vasquez loosely described a completely different plot wherein everyone joins together against a new galaxy-spanning threat. Head writer Eric Truehart would follow this up, both in later convention appearances and in his book ''The Medium-Sized Book of Zim Scripts: Vol 1: Pigs 'n' Waffles'', by additionally stating that no TV movie was even proposed during the show's run (much less an outlined or scripted "Invader Dib"), and if there were any ideas for a proper finale, they resided purely in Jhonen's mind.
66	* ProductionPosse: Vazquez more or less hiring all his comic book author friends to do the show with him doesn't ''strictly'' qualify, but Rikki Simons (voice of GIR and color artist for the show) had previously done the color for ''ComicBook/IFeelSick''.
67	* ReleaseDateChange: Two episode pairings were changed before airing, "Dark Harvest" was originally paired with "Bestest Friend" and "Germs" was originally paired with "[=NanoZim=]", but the network execs didn't like the former pairing as they didn't think it was a good idea to put two of the most disturbing episodes of the series together, so the order was switched around.
68	* ScrewedByTheNetwork: Maybe not as bad as had been rumored, but still a factor. The show was constantly jumbled all over the schedule so that nobody ever knew when it was on, and new episodes were premiered at timeslots like 9:15 pm. However, while the suits didn't always understand exactly what he was doing, they gave him an awful lot of leeway. Vasquez himself would later admit that, given ''complete'' creative control, the only thing that might change was that extras would explode at random. The exact reason why the show was screwed is still debated, from complaints by MoralGuardians that the series was too dark and violent, to out-of-control costs, and of course, being beaten in ratings by [[WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants a certain sponge]].
69	* ThrowItIn:
70	** The first episode contains the line "Invader's blood marches through my veins like giant, radioactive rubber pants!" The line was supposed to say "ants", but Horvitz flubbed the take and Vasquez liked it much better. Plus, it's the kind of show where "pants" actually fits better.
71	** One scene in "Hamstergeddon" called for Ultra Peepi stomping down the street towards some tanks. It came back from animation with him walking with an odd sort of swagger, which Jhonen found so hysterical that he told Kevin Manthi to put a funk score under it, saying "I want to hear Music/BarryWhite saying 'Ultra Peepi!'"
72	** Another instance of one of Zim's fubbed lines being kept in the show: in 'Bad, Bad, Rubber Piggy' Zim says the phrase "temporal doom." It's technically supposed to be pronounced temp-er-al, but on every take Horvitz would only say temp-ohr-uhl. After a few takes they realized they wouldn't be able to get him to say it correctly, so they kept the line in.
73	** Those coughing fits Gir has when he drinks something is Rikki Simons having a mild asthma attack from having to make slurping noises.
74	** In the original script for the scene in "Mortos der Soulstealer", where Zim and Dib yell at each other across an intersection, the street between the two was supposed to be filled with vehicles driving by, which would contribute to why the two had to yell back and forth to be heard over the traffic. When the animation got back from the studio, the crew was chagrined to find that they'd forgotten to animate in the traffic....however, upon reviewing the footage with the dialogue, they found that the awkwardness of the two shouting over nonexistent traffic was hilarious, and kept it as it was. The scene was even called back to in ''Enter the Florpus''.
75	** In one scene from "Walk of Doom", a random police officer was drawn slightly too big and ended up becoming gigantic when they tried to have it redone. They decided to just roll with it and added some appropriate sound effects.
76	* TorchTheFranchiseAndRun: [[LampshadeHanging Lampshaded.]] Long after the show had been cancelled, TrollingCreator Jhonen Vasquez announced on his website that, as the maker of IZ canon, he officially declares that Zim [[KilledOffScreen crashed his spaceship and died off-screen]], in response to constant fan inquires about reviving the show. Vasquez and Nickelodeon would do so years later with a comic continuation and a TV movie.
77	* TrollingCreator: Vasquez has a habit of posting things on his Twitter like "Good news for Zim fans! I just ate a delicious burrito. Also, Zim is still cancelled forever." Reached its apex in 2017, where he denied rumors that the series would be getting a movie... ''literally hours before Nickelodeon released the trailer''.
78	* UnfinishedEpisode: Of the 40 episodes that were ordered for the second season, 21 were left unfinished due to its sudden cancellation. Of these, seven were far enough along in production to have audio and storyboards included in the Zim's House Box Set DVD release (but not, ironically, in the so-called "Complete Invasion" Box Set).
79	* WordOfGod:
80	** According to Jhonen Vasquez, Dib and his family aren't white, but very pale Mexicans, [[WriteWhatYouKnow like himself]]. This would later be reflected in ''Enter the Florpus'', where they're given slightly darkened skin tones to better match his own.
81	** During development, Dib's name was originally short for Dibble, before becoming his actual name.[[note]]Most likely because ''dibble'' was already [[WesternAnimation/TopCat an existing character name]] and was also in use by ''Literature/TheBabySittersClub'' series (which had ended only four months before ''Zim's'' premiere) as a slang term for "awesome", and Nick didn't want a possible double infringement suit on their hands.[[/note]] Jhonen's also stated that his original name was Feebly, though it's hard to tell if that's just one of his usual jokes. Meanwhile, Gaz has always been short for [[PunnyName Gazlene]], though it wouldn't be stated within any official ''Zim'' material until ''Enter the Florpus''.
82	** [[https://twitter.com/notjustcart00ns/status/1646885692004261888 The official style guide given to licensors]] stated that "Membrane" isn't Dib's last name and that his real last name is [[NoFullNameGiven unknown]], which would later be {{retcon}}ned for ''Enter the Florpus''.
83	** If the Tallest ''did'' tell Zim the truth about his mission, he would refuse to believe them due to his arrogance.
84	* WordOfStPaul: Rikki Simons has basically made a secondary career of talking about his experiences with the show on the convention circuit, so much of the behind the scenes information comes from him.
85	* WorkingTitle: The title was initially ''Invader: ZIM'' before losing the colon and the over-capitalization.

Context Trivia / InvaderZim