Recap / Invader Zim S 1 E 16 A Room With A Moose

Zim, sick of Dib and their other classmates, prepares to send them to their doom.

Tropes

• All of the Other Reindeer: This episode really shows how much literally everyone at Skool hates Zim and Dib. The plot is kicked off by Zim watching footage of the kids (Dib included) beating him up or generally picking on him, while the entire conflict is solved by the fact that nobody wants to even sit on the same side of the bus with Dib.
• Batman Gambit: Dib tells his classmates to join his side of the bus so that the weight of it causes it to lean towards the fork back to their dimension. His classmates refuse to be near him, so he reluctactly joins their side, causing them all to switch sides and save themselves.
• Butt-Monkey: Zim and Dib, obviously, but really pronounced this time. The episode starts with a humiliating montage of Zim in school, while the rest of it showcases Dib being The Friend Nobody Likes.
• Character Development: It's subtle, but both Zim and Dib get some in this episode, which goes on to inform their dynamic for the rest of the series.
  • Previous episodes focused more on Zim's attempts to blend into Earth society, and any harm done was only in an attempt to come off as more "human" (i.e. Bestest Friend, Dark Harvest, etc.). The only human Zim ever directly targeted was Dib, and only because Dib posed a very real threat to Zim's mission as the only one to see him as a dangerous alien invader. Here, though, Zim dooms the entire class to a moosey fate, not just Dib, as retaliation for being bullied by them in school. Though it's all Played for Laughs, for all intents and purposes, this is Zim's Moral Event Horizon.
  • Initially, Dib's obsession with exposing Zim as an alien came from a need for validation rather than out of any genuine heroism. It's here where he realizes that, as the only one to see through Zim's disguise (and care), it's his responsibility to stop Zim's plans for the good of all mankind rather than to turn him into a respected paranormal investigator.
    Dib: No! Without me the Earth is doomed! I can't let Zim run free, not while there's still hope!
• Closed Circle: Dib and the Skool children spend most of the episode trapped in the bus.
• Contrived Coincidence: The wormhole Zim found that leads to a room with a moose also happens to have a fork that leads back to Earth.
• Destroy the Evidence: Zim blows up the bathroom stall where he set his plan in motion when heading elsewhere to carry it out.
  Zim: LEAVE NO EVIDENCE!
• The Dog Bites Back: The beginning of the episode shows how Dib fights back as often as Zim does with his plans.
  • The whole episode is about Zim trying to simultaneously eliminate Dib and get revenge on his classmates for their treatment of him.
• Especially Zoidberg: The announcement about the class field trip mentions that it's for everyone in Ms. Butters' class except Zim and "especially Dib." Naturally, he's suspicious.
• Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Zim is secretly sending the Skool kids and Dib to a room with a moose.
• Faux Horrific: The titular moose eating walnuts.
• Incoming Ham: Zim enters the classroom, having just spent three hours in the bathroom, and announces "MY BUSINESS... IS DONE!"
• No-Respect Guy: Dib saved himself and a bunch of his classmates from being trapped in a room with a moose...and none of them will ever believe it.
• Refuse to Rescue the Disliked: Dib's classmates constantly belittle him and ignore his warnings about Zim's true nature, to the point where Dib actually finds himself questioning whether or not they deserve to be saved.
• Title Drop: Said by Zim.
• Wraparound Background: Zim rigs one on both sides of the bus so the kids are unaware that they aren't on Earth anymore. Dib eventually notices they're just going around the same places over and over.
• Villainous Breakdown: Zim has one once his plan has failed.
  Zim: THE MOOSE HAS FAILED ME!