Invader Zim/WMG

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Wild Mass Guessing about Invader Zim includes:

Johnny the Homicidal Maniac, I Feel Sick, Squee, and Invader Zim are all in the same Verse

Invader Zim is the one who created Filler Bunny to keep the suspicious humans distracted and happy while he continues his plan of world domination.

Gaz and Dib were created specifically to defeat Tak and Zim.

11 years before the events of the show, Professor Membrane somehow (possibly by time travel or prophesy device) learned of a future where two aliens invade the earth and their rivalry to claim credit for dominating the earth destroys the planet. In order to prevent this, he creates two children, at least one of which using his own DNA as a basis (Dib), each specifically designed to contrast their respective alien counterpart. Thus why Gaz is more powerful than Dib: because Tak is a greater threat.

The hierarchy of being tall is an allusion.

Self Explanatory.[context?]

The hierarchy of being tall is an illusion.

The Tallest are not that tall. Those hover suits are a dead giveaway - they just have extra-long robes with fake feet hanging out the bottom. Or maybe robotic suits.

  • There is too much of a height difference. The question then becomes, are they still the tallest with it giving them the right to fake being even taller, or are they not tall at all but just working a good scam?
    • It seems obvious that the Tallest are simply puppets. The Man Behind the Man... may be a Master Computer that uses the Irkens as living weapons.
      • What makes that seem obvious?
        • Mostly since they don't seem to do anything practical.
  • They are definitely robot suits. Have you seen their hands? They're like long robot antennae, not the stubby gloved fingers all other Irkens have.
    • The DVD Commentary mentions this. The waists of the Tallest slim down to mere cable-cords over the course of the series, "Bringing up the question of whether there is tallest in them at all".
      • Beh, Jhonen just likes drawing things with modular designs. Or, there are different subspecies of Irken, Zim amd Tak and Skoodge and whatnot are Invaders, so they have a lot in common. The tallest are not invaders, so they have different attributes, like the small waist and everything.
    • This is explained in Fanon that the Tallest are the tallest Irkens in existence but have undergone major cybernetic enhancements to make them taller. They also lose their thumbs. They're not as tall as they're made out to be, but they are the tallest.
    • My interpretation was that they really were that tall, but that it was a result of severe gigantism, so they can't naturally support themselves without considerable cybernetic enhancement.
      • I don't know about that, as Sizz-Lor was almost as huge as the tallest, and he was downright athletic.
  • So... basically, in terms of the allusion/metaphor, it means they stuff their pants and get all the ladies anyway. Nyeh nyeh nyeh!
  • Minor thing, GIR eats a large amount of food, even though he doesn't need to, just like the tallest...

Backseat Drivers From Beyond the Stars was the final straw

You'll notice that the Tallest are mostly indifferent about Zim in Season 1, now that he's no longer a threat to Irk or Operation Impending Doom. They don't like him, but don't actively try to kill him and even occasionally entertain minor requests (like Zim's "inspection" in Walk For Your Lives"). But Zim hijacking the Massive, totaling it, nearly killing the Tallest by accidentally flinging them into a sun, leaving them vulnerable to attack from hostile forces and, worst of all, bruising their egos (Red had bragged about how no one would ever challenge them or the Massive? At the end of the episode, the Tallest are 'seething mad at Zim.

After this episode, Sizz-lor would find Zim and bring him back to Foodcourtia, and Zim would go on Trial for a defective PAK. I don't think either of those are coincidences; Zim's conduct in Backseat Drivers was the straw that broke the camel's back.

The Earth has already been taken over.

It's been taken over by whatever faction Dib's father Professor Membrane belongs to (or is enslaved by). The military is subservient as well. Zim is tolerated because he has solved more problems than he has caused, and he is a diversion for Dib.

  • Specifically, the mice from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy are the ones in control. This earth is actually the Second Earth, and most of the people are so painfully stupid because the creators of the artificial life either greatly underestimated human's intelligence or didn't quite have the technology to make them as intelligent as they originally were.
  • Or it was taken over by the furons, who abandoned the planet after getting enouh Furon DNA, which was well before 1979, and Zim landed in a location where most humans have non-functioning Furon DNA (the second game suggests that humans who's DNA is rendered useless are complete idiots). Membrane's family are among the exceptions.

Zim is meant to force human evolution as much as conquer Earth.

Zim is the Tallest's tool for grooming humanity. The humans are both technologically advanced and predisposed to outrageous violence, but they are too immature (aka stoopid) as a species. Hopefully, the humans develop and become aware of and defeat the ruinously self-sabotaging Zim; they will then be approached by the Tallest and be recruited into the Irken empire as The Dragon to the Irken Big Bad. But if they fail, and Zim succeeds—then, hey, free planet. ^_^

  • Evolution does not work that way.
    • Biological evolution doesn't. Cultural and technological evolution does.
  • The Tallest didn't even know about Earth. You can't have a plan to improve something that you don't know even exists.
    • The claim they didn't know about it...

Professor Membrane knows the Irken are testing humanity.

His experiments are to find a way to impress them. He is, however, unaware of Zim's significance.

  • If Dib and Gaz are clones, it could mean that since they're aren't as stupid as everyone else on the planet, they could be a resistance force for them if he doesn't gain their respect.

Dib grows up to be Buzz Lightyear.

Somewhere along the way, Zim winds up in a suit a la Darth Vader, becoming Evil Emperor Zurg. GIR's brain is separated into parts to serve the entire Hornet army. This is why the Hornets appear mindless. They're all 1/100000th GIR.

  • It also explains why they are less hyperactive.
    • Then what happens to Professor Membrane, Dib's father? In Toy Story 2, Zurg tells the other Buzz Lightyear that Zurg is his Father (in an obvious Star Wars parody). Also, Zurg is a bit of a generic supervillan at times, while Professor Membrane is always too serious.
    • A portion of GIR's core program also ends up in XR, explaining why he's somewhat hyper and often speaks in non-sequitors.

The entire series in Squee's hallucination.

Regularly during Squee!, the title character is seen drawing various things; one of the things he likes to draw is an alien that looks suspiciously like Zim. At the end of the series, Squee is placed in a mental institution to get rid of him for a while. As he is being strapped into an weird psychiatric chair, he sees Nny passing by the window. It is quite possible that this chair was meant to induce hallucinations for some horrible experiment; Squee seeing Nny would have kicked his fear response into overdrive. This explains why the world of Invader Zim is so crappy - what do you expect the name of the most squeamish kid in the world to come up with?

It also explains why the aliens who abducted Zim were so flanderised. When they first appeared in Squee!, they were somewhat menacing but still totally stupid. Squee only remembered their stupidity, and that became their defining trait when they came for Zim.

Finally, in the episode "Dib's Hallowe'en Spectacular of Spooky Doom", the supreme leader of all the monsters in Dib's head is an alternate Ms. Bitters. While this could indicate that the thing Dib ultimately fears the most is his teacher, we must remember that she taught Squee first; he, too, was supremely terrified of her. Who better to be the leader of the monsters than one of Squee's main sources of terror? Additionally, in that same episode, Nny makes a brief, dark, literally blink-and-you'll-miss-it cameo; he also shows up in the background of one of Squee's "dreamy time" strips when he is being auctioned by an alien slave trader. It makes sense for Nny to show up in Squee's dream.

This presumably means that Dib is Squee and Zim is Pepito. Dib trying to stop Zim may be a mental allegory for Squee overcoming his fear of Pepito.

  • Ok, while in general I find WMG kind of pointless, you have stumbled across some very interesting stuff.

Dib grows up to be Johnny the Homicidal Maniac

Ok, so it goes like this: While we pretty much know that IZ is set Twenty Minutes Into the Future, what we don't know is when exactly JTHM is set- IZ may well be its prequel. When you think about it, Dib's already got

  • The beginning of insanity.
  • The crappy childhood.
  • The obsession with the paranormal.
  • A damn fine trench coat.
  • If you shaved the sides of his head, he'd bear a pretty good resemblance to Nny.
  • There's always the possibility he just changed his name when he grew up.

This would also account for why Jhonen Vasquez wasn't tempted to slip a cameo by Nny in there somewhere... He was already the main character!

    • Um... Nny DID have a cameo, it was the halloween episode. His shadow and eyes can be seen amongst the monster crowd. While you can say that this was a projection of Dib's mind and how he viewed how he would grow up, that is negated when we see Dib's REAL progection (the first monster to talk to him in the asylum). Amusingly, he is just a giant head on legs. Guess Dib really does think his head is big.

Squee grows up to become Membrane

  • They both have a tendency to be constantly positive despite living in a Crapsack World.
  • They both have black hair.
  • It is stated by Word of God that Membrane is not a last name, and the good doctor's first name is never mentioned. For all we know, he could be Todd Casil.
    • It's not a last name, it's a first name.
  • It would explain his stubborn disbelief of aliens and other supernatural phenomena. "Aliens can't exist because if they do, some of my horrible childhood memories might be accurate. Denial? I'm not in denial! You're in denial!"
  • It's shown several times that IZ and JtHM exist in the same universe. Differing tech levels and a few other minor things suggest that Zim comes later.
  • Membrane might not just be a workaholic. He might be trying to actively avoid his kids because his father's influence messed him up so badly; he's afraid of doing that to Dib and Gaz.
  • His parents WOULD only get him socks for Christmas, but I'm not entirely sure he'd blame Santa, unless Santa is real in the IZ/JtHM universe (I figured Santa was only real once Zim created him.). Though, in his flashback, he just looks like a miniature version of his current self. Maybe in his mind, he imagines himself only as he is as an adult, and leaves his dark past behind.

Alternately, Squee grows up to be Agent Darkbooty.

Darkbooty looks identical to Squee's father, but personality-wise is nothing like him. This could be a result of Uncanny Family Resemblance.

Zim knows on some level that he has been exiled, and subconsciously doesn't want to conquer Earth.

If the Tallest don't like someone, then it doesn't matter if they are a successful Invader. A conquered Earth would lead to the Tallest being direct about it, just like they did to poor Skoodge. Thus, Zim keeps up his charade of conquest to prevent himself from facing the fact that his own species doesn't want him. Thus, he constantly puts GIR in charge of the crucial part of his plans.

  • This also seems to explain why Zim stopped GIR from absorbing knowledge in the episode "GIR Goes Crazy And Stuff".
  • This would also explain why, despite passing out in Zim's home at the end of Walk for Your Life, Dib is still alive by the next episode. If Zim really 100% cared about his mission, he would have taken advantage of the moment and killed Dib before he could wake up.

Zim is a failed Irken Super Soldier experiment

The Irkens seem to be vat-grown cyborgs trained from birth to be living weapons. Zim was one of the latest projects to be a genius soldier; but With Great Power Comes Great Insanity, and he ended up going nuts and on a destructive rampage. He's shown that he can be an utterly ruthless ultimate survivor when his life is in danger; because of this, the Irkens didn't execute him, like they should have had no qualms about, but tried to trick him into getting as far away from them as possible.

On a subconscious level, Zim despises his role; he spends more time on Earth goofing around than trying to make successful plans to conquer it. Dib is not just a Worthy Opponent but also the closest thing he has to a friend (or more); if the series continued, then he would have engineered an Evil Plan to get Dib to take over the Irken world as revenge.

  • I don't think it's quite fair to condemn a whole program because of a single slip up.
  • Zim's not that smart. There was an episode that was written called "The Trial" where Zim would have been evaluated as an Irken. Their process of creation involves some sort of thing where all the knowledge of their ancestors is implanted into them, and they're more or less organic computers. Zim is an obvious failure and was condemned to execution in this episode. Naturally, it doesn't work.

Johnny the Homicidal Maniac is dead

We mostly agree that Zim is set Twenty Minutes Into the Future from his series, but Nny's lack of appearance is probably because he isn't around any more. If Squee is old enough to be Membrane, then it has to be several decades ahead, and let's face it—Johnny does not appear to be much healthier physically than he is mentally, and probably wouldn't like the prospect of getting old. If not suicide or ill health, then something else might have got him eventually. Maybe Squee/Membrane put him out of his misery.

  • So...did he just leave the plane of existence or something?He ended up being kicked out of both heaven and hell for some reason.
    • ...yes. The world couldn't handle him.

GIR is the "puppet master" of the series

Not a new theory, by any means, but still good.

GIR is actively STOPPING Zim from taking over Earth. GIR is often the reason Zim's plans go to hell—GIR hides behind a mask of stupidity allowing him to get away with 'accidentally' screwing up Zim's plans.

The episode "GIR Goes Crazy and Stuff" only helps this theory along. With enough power, GIR immediately attempts to overthrow his master. It's also noted that GIR often lets strangers into Zim's house, not because he's an idiot, but because he's trying to expose Zim to these random people.

  • So... GIR is Pinky?
  • GIR did successfully conquer the world in Zim's absence. It was the aforementioned unfinished episode "The Trial".

It's all happening in real life -- sort of

But the reason we know nothing about it is because it's not happening on Earth. During Zim's long... Long... LONG trip to earth, he and GIR bonded, in a more-than-just-friends way,(there was plenty of time for it), then due to the way GIR was built, he fell apart. The grief broke Zim's mind, and he started hallucinating that GIR was still functional, but hated him as well to avoid being forced to suffer such grief again. That's why humans are such idiots, and how Zim and The Tallest are still in contact, it's all in his mind.

  • To expand on this, the Invader Zim universe is the real world, and we're the show. This Troper's mom, who's never seen the show, thought this.

The G in GIR stands for Graty

Which would make Zim the SlapChop. Think about it; the Graty is an undeniably awesome yet ultimately useless device that only grates cheese that's been cut into tiny pieces, packaged with an undeniably useless yet ultimately awesome device that sounds like it could butcher Cthulhu if it could hold more than a tiny handful of bikini.

Prof. Membrane is Johnny the Homicidal Maniac's illegitimate son.

It is insinuated in the seventh and last issue of JTHM that Johnny, before he went completely insane, may have had sex with some unnamed girl. He impregnated her, and she eventually gave birth to Membrane, which would explain why he, Dib, and Johnny all look similar. It also explains the Twenty Minutes Into the Future time leap.

Gaz is Haruhi.

And that Universe she imagined was just because it was all in the videogames she played during the addiction. She got so addicted that she continues to play them even after rebuilding the Universe to look like such thing.

  • Alternatively, Haruhi suffered some trauma (perhaps Kyon and the others died or otherwise became lost to her) causing her to resent the world. So the world became darker and more cynical because she didn't want people to be happy when she wasn't. It also explains her non reaction to knowing for a fact that aliens and such are real, given that she spent most of her life believing they were out there. It's just that without Kyon and the others she can't find the enthusiasm to get excited by it (Plus there's the fact that Zim is probably not the ideal example of intelligent life on other worlds she'd have liked to meet)
  • Or, both Dib and Gaz are manifestations of Haruhi. Gaz has her God-like powers and Dib has her enthusiasm of the paranormal.
  • Or, this.
    • Please tell me that is actually being produced.

There are no female Irkens.

It's kinda weird that female Irkens have Tertiary Sexual Characteristics. Maybe it's not a male-female thing; maybe it's just a common mutation in Irkens that make the eyelashes, curled antennae, and higher voices. In Irken grammar, there's a special set of pronouns for this mutation; when it's translated into English, it's translated into she, and normal Irkens are translated he. When your species is grown in vats, this can be sustained.

    • Actually, I think this may or may not be cannon, as Jhonen stated that Irkens don't have reproductive organs. This probably implies that Irkens are asexual, and some Irkens are just more feminine or masculine than others. Like Digimon.

Irkens Reproduce Orally.

Yes, it sounds odd but consider it for a moment. Irkens are shown to be made presently though technology (cloning most presumably) but before such technology came around they obviously had to reproduce biologically (unless Irkens were artificially created by some unknown third party as host for the PAK...but that is a speculation for another section). Jhonen said that Irkens don't have reproductive organs, and that is also shown in the show to be true. As a super-organ the squeedly spootch preforms all functions so therefore logically it is also responsible for reproduction, and via the mouth is the only access to the squeedly spootch (this may also explain why Irkens have unusually long tongues).

Irkens are genderless.

The above guess mentions that "female" Irkens have Tertiary Sexual Characteristics. However, that troper seemed to mean that there are only male Irkens. However, Irkens are artificially created, as we see in a flashback, and seem to have no genatalia whatsoever. They wouldn't actually need to be either gender. To this troper, it seems much more likely that Irkens do not actually have genders at all. Any time we hear an Irken being referred to by a masculine or feminine pronoun is simply implying which gender to other species the individual more closely resembles.

    • er, I believe you mean the Irkens are sexless. Gender is the mental component, and Irkens clearly display a mental gender split, some are "masculine" (the "Standard" Irken), and some are "feminine" (Irkens with curled antennae, eyelashes, and a higher voice). See Transformers, Tron or Digimon for examples of sexless entities that have gender.

Irkens are Asexual, but that was not always the case

The first Irkens reproduced more or less like humans, but as they moved towards mechanical reproduction they lost all sexual organs. Modern Irkens are technically not male or female, but retain aspects of gender because they are more or less harmless and provide diferent perspectives and offers resistance to bioweapons and other diseases (which is the same reason why Irkens are not all clones)

Zim and Tak are related to The Tallests

There are two theories for this one:

1) Through some weird mishap, Tak is the daughter of Tallest Purple, which is why they both have square purple eyes. (The beauty mark and lines on her mouth probably came from whomever the mother was.) Same thing with Zim and Tallest Red. Apparently, Zim takes after his mother.

  • 1.5) The Tallests are brothers (they're probably twins); therefore, Zim and Tak are cousins.

2) Zim and Tak are brother and sister of the Tallests, who are brothers themselves. Making one Royally Screwed-Up family.

3) Irken are "hatched" from test tube pods. It's likely that they're randomly genetically engineered Irkens. But they may have been based on the DNA of Allmighty Tallest Red and Purple!

4) Quite possibly. There's another theory that Zim is the son of Tallest Spork and the brother of Invader Zee. This one seems to have spawned from the Other Wiki.

-Building on that...

The Tallests are siblings, if not identical twins.

Without their armor, the only way you could tell them apart is by their eye color. As mentioned before, Irkens tend to look a lot alike by our standards, but these two are almost indistinguishable and happen to be exactly the same height in a society where height is everything. It would also explain why they're always seen together, bickering like teenagers but also maintaining an almost symbiotic malevolence and narcissism.

  • This Troper agrees with this theory.
  • Wait, this ISN'T already canon?

Dib is part Vortian.

Think about this for a while. Dib is an experiment created by Professor Membrane. Dib's hair looks kind of like the "hornflops" on a Vortian's head, but only one of them.

Here's the clincher: You know how Dib's pupils become triangular when he's stressed? In the episode "Backseat Drivers from Beyond the Stars", the Vortian leader of the Resisty's pupils go triangular in one scene. Maybe Membrane isn't so ignorant about aliens after all...

  • Dib is not the only one whose pupils become triangular when he's hysterical. It happens to almost every character with pupils, including Zim with his costume on.
    • which can only mean one thing...Lard Nar (the Vortian leader of the Resisty) is part human!

Dib and Gaz's mother is alive.

It is never stated that Dib and Gaz's mother is dead. Allegedly, Dib is an experiment created by Membrane, and Gaz may quite possibly be one too. But who's to say that Membrane was the only donor of DNA for the experiment?

Membrane and his wife are simply divorced; the children were cloned after the separation took place. The kids probably still have contact with their mother, but the Professor has either full or almost full custody. This seems to explain both Gaz's endless rage, and Dib's stranger tendencies (like talking to himself.)

  • For the record, it's also been alleged that Mrs. Membrane is in a jar somewhere. (Why is the real question.)
    • Hostile divorce?
    • It is possible that Membrane's wife died and Membrane has been so attached to her that he still keeps her ashes in a jar. Dib is definitely Membrane's younger clone, but Gaz's origin is not clear. It hasn't been stated that she's a clone, too. She might be Membrane's creation or his wife's clone, just like Dib is his own clone.

Membrane is an Ex Mad Scientist.

Think about it...some times he does have manic bouts of laughter that are very evil genius esque

  • Ex? The man has a santa-fighting mecha and a perpetual energy device.

The Swollen Eyeball Network is a splinter group of Torchwood.

The original Torchwood has a goofy and devil-may-care attitude of their operation. The Swollen Eyeball became a group of their own due to its members being more serious and business-oriented in dealing with aliens.

Dib and Gir are linked somehow

Gir actually seems to be at his most coherent when talking to Dib, suddenly remembering Zim ordered him to call the Tallest, and agreeing to hide a camera in Zim's home and then doing just that (by Gir's standards, doing something counter to Zim's plan correctly is actually an improvement). While this could be explained by simply saying the universe hates Zim, you have to remember that it hates Dib just as much.

Zim and Dib each have one of the Eight Great Spells in their heads, or some equivalent of it.

Magic was established as legitimate many times during season two. Dib could've unknowingly gotten an amazingly powerful spell stuck in his head looking through the Spell Drives, though I don't know how Zim would've ended up with one. In any case, it would be an easy explination for the Snap Backs involving the death of Zim or Dib—the Universe rearranges itself to prevent the spells from disappearing, a la The Colour of Magic and The Light Fantastic. (GIR probably just has repair nanites in him somewhere.)

The people of earth are not as "stoopid" as they are portrayed

They just appear to be stupid to show how vastly more intelligent Zim and Dib are.

Zim's self-foiling is The Plan by another alien race to sabotage the Irken invasion

He single-handedly set the Irken invasion back more than any fleet or army ever could. All due to errors at creation. There is no way that's an accident.

Johnny the Homicidal Maniac is alive, in Membrane (Squee's) basement somewhere in cold storage

He might come in handy one day. Maybe Dib would have found him and unleashed him on the Irkens.

Or is possibly reincarnated in Dib. Membrane does constantly state that he is insane.....

Zim in secretly best friends with the Tallest

Why else would he still be alive today...unless if he has a higher purpose in the Irken culture, but only the Control Brains know this.

Zim is immortal and can't die through black magic

How else would he survive those many deaths in the series? black Magic?

  • Maybe Irkens are just a little sturdier than humans?

There is no invasion.

It's all a game created by two hyperactive young friends.

Dib and Gaz are a young Mulder and Scully.

The sister that Mulder, aka Dib, thought he lost when he was young was actually Scully. When Gaz, aka Scully, proved to be a little too good at stopping Zim, Zim somehow, miraculously, managed to separate Gaz from her family, but since she is way too competent for him to outright kill her, he instead had her memories wiped and had her placed with another family. There are no human/alien hybrids, that's just the cover story so that Mulder doesn't accidentally make Scully remember her childhood, at which point she will easily trounce Zim and any other aliens on Earth.

  • Considering Mulder's and Scully's relationship, this theory is pure Squick.
  • Alternatively, Dib will grow up to become Agent Cooper.

One or more of the crew working on the show suffers from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.

This troper found all the intense close-ups and emphasis on disgusting details of everyday objects very telling in that regard.

The Irken are an offshoot race of the Orks.

They're green, they base their hierarchy on height, their entire existence is based around assaulting other worlds, and when "INVASION!" flashes on the screen they practically go into a Waagh. Best bet: they evolved from a Mek's experiments to tamper down the Waagh-instincts a little (in that they can go five minutes without violence).

  • Alternatively, it's the other way around. Since the series takes place long before the 41st millenium, it's possible that the Irkens were the original "Brain Boyz". True, most Irken technology is built by enslaved races like the Vortians, but chances are that they were able to cobble together enough ideas from stolen technology to make what they think is impressive war tech (read: loud explodey things that only work because they think it will work).
  • Another Alternate theory, the Irkens are the Old Ones first attempt at the Orks. The difference being that they grow taller as they get Smarter instead of Stronger. They were meant to be strategists and information gatherers. However, they turned out to be lazy as hell so the Old Ones just shelved them and got to work on the Orks.
  • So, are the Almighty tallest the basis for the legends of Gork and Mork?

Zim is Xykon.

Word of God confirms that Xykon is from modern earth. But why does Xykon act so zany? And what does happen to Zim at the end? Simple: Xykon is Zim, only much smarter. How did Zim not get executed after his "Operation Impending Doom 1" stunt? Zim was a lich from the start, so he couldn't be killed. How come Zim's disguises always work? He crafts illusions. How did he blow up a planet by scratching his butt? He's an epic-level spellcaster, remember? Why does he prefer science over magic? It's fun that way.

  • Well, word of a sick and delusional god who was obviously joking, but that aside I've always thought Xykon was quite eerily similar in personality to the Tallests...

The characters are at least indirectly implants from the characters of Death Note.

Zim is Light, a megalomaniac who is the "protagonist," Dib is L, the eccentric yet lovable detective "antagonist." GIR, Misa's implant, is the dumb sidekick who doesn't listen to the master. Mikami is...Minimoose, the later-added sidekick. Finally, the tallests are the shinigami. Not sure about Near or Mello, maybe one of them is Gaz. Tak is...C-Kira? Maybe BB?

  • Check your dates; Death Note dates from 2003, Invader Zim from 2001. It's difficult to be an allusion or implant from something that doesn't yet exist. However, if one were to flip this theory...
    • When I said "implant" I actually meant something more in universe, such as a "reincarnation" or possibly a purgatory of a Failure Is the Only Option Crapsack World as punishment for their general bad behavior in life. Although, that does make sense...

Zim and Gir become Pinky and The Brain.

Dib transforms them into mice and throws them into a cage. Being mice, they can't tell the people what is going on. They are put into that one machine that makes them smart, and gain the ability to talk as well as some intelligence (Zim is the super-smart Brain, and GIR as Pinky is able to form more complete thoughts, though he keeps his randomness). Unfortunately, this knowledge has to go somewhere, so their memories are cleared. However, Zim remembers that, for some reason, he MUST take over the world.

Jossed in so many conceviable ways

The Irken society was belief in respect to elders that evolved into an aristocracy.

In the past, older people were wiser. Since older people are often tall, tall people were more likely to get respect. Soon, there were contests as to who were the tallest. After some time, these got bigger and bigger until the whole of Irk respected these tallests. They were voted to be the wise advisors to the president. They gained more and more power due to their supposed wisdom and eventually overpowered the president. Slowly, the president left the equation in favor of a wise government. The tallest Irken is now the one and only ruler, unless there is more than one tallest.

The whole show is the crazy hallucinations of The Brain, and Zim, Dib and Professor Membrane represent different aspects of his personality

Zim is the megalomaniac part how wants to Take Over the World, Membrane represent his genius and Dib is the part in he's brain that's fed up with the megalomania and fights the megalomaniac part (Zim). Other characters represent other pepole that brain know-G.I.R is Pinky, Tak is snowball and so on... I just can't find out what Gaz is...

  • His preference for technology and disdain for humanity?

Professor Membrane is an Ex-Mad Scientist

Throughout the series he does have several bouts of evil laughter. This is a Crapsack World right?

  • Oh, he still is. Santa-fighting mecha, perpetula energy machine, experiments with hamsters, likes to make ventriloquist dolls, was once seen fiddling with a spork... he still is.

Zim is autistic

Think about it for a little bit.

  • Holy hell, that actually sorta makes sense. The loud, often unusual voice, the difficulty understanding other people's feelings, the obsessive fascination with very specific but often varying topics. ...Freaky. I think you just added a whole new layer to Zim for me.

Damn. And all I use my deviantart account for is troll fics.

    • Having Asperger's syndrome myself, I would say this is rather unlikely. Zim may show some personality traits of autism, but there are just too many anomalies (like his mostly extraverted behavior). I would rather say he has Attention Deficit Disorder. A more likely candidate for Aspergers or autism would be Gaz. But then, I am not an expert.
    • This troper agrees with the above troper.
  • To this troper (who has Asperger's), Dib seems to have a lot of autistic traits. He has major difficulty with social interaction, a tendency to obsess, doesn't seem to realize when his own behavior is abnormal, also can be sort of loud, and has a somewhat black and white worldview. All of these behaviors are associated with mild autism or Asperger's.
  • This troper (who has been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder) agrees with the ADD theory. Zim most likely would have Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Just think! He doesn't follow directions, is loud and is either very lazy or very energetic, drifts off topic, is competitive, hardly pays attention to what anyone's saying, doesn't think things through, won't listen to authority figures and hates to be told what to do, prefers something happening more often than not... he fits the bill perfectly. I don't think autism or Asperger's plays a huge part in this.
  • This troper actually has high-functioning autism and occasionally acts like Zim or Dib on accident. I think it is perfectly valid to say that BOTH of them have Autism, or Zim having the Irken equivilent. It also explains why they think he's a defect: He would have different thought patterns than a normal Irken, which could be mistaken for PAK coding errors.
  • This troper would like to point out that basically every human in existence has at least one autistic trait or tendancy, and that autism is a sliding scale on which diagnosed autists are only part... a few traits present does not make autism, nor does a few traits absent make neurotypical. Also, Asperger's is just a specific form of autism distinguishable only in childhood, by adulthood the two are identical and the genetic component in each is about the same, so the "rather than a human genetic disorder" argument really isn't valid.

Dib is Nny's clone

  • And, therefore, Gaz as well. After all, Dib looks just like a shorter version of Nny with a more consistent shirt design and more sanity.
    • Going with this idea, one could theorize that Dib was cloned with more of the physical traits in mind, while Gaz was cloned with more of the mental traits in mind. For evidence, see Game Slave 2.
    • Potential additional evidence. The episode where Dib gives Gaz pig senses. One of altered robot dolls looks a lot like Nail Bunny.

Irkens can breed much like humans

They just don't know how, and if an Irken did figure it out, the chances of actually getting smeets out of it are slim-to none, which explains why they use the vats. Yes, this troper has been reading fanfics. How did you know?!

The Irkens are puppets for the C'tan.

What are they going to do while the Necrons are sleeping? Suck the souls of the irkens out through their paks, of course!

The world of Invader Zim is our world in the near future (or at least the near future of 2001), rather than a Planet Eris.

In one episode, Dib or the teacher mentions that in the past, it was required that school lunches contain actual food. After certain public organization cutbacks, schools started serving the carbohydrate/condiment combination, with the occasional Sandwich Day. The Game Slave 2 is when the Game Slave (a device released several years after 2004 after Nintendo was destroyed by a giant fish in a bear suit) went from GBA/DS to DS3/PSP (the graphics upgrade was likely meant to be ridiculously advanced and smooth and 3-D from the point of view of 2001). There are other, even more minor hints throughout the show that this is the case, and the mention that Valentine's Day once had cards and candy exchanged instead of meat.

  • You mean its not already canon?

Humans do have squeedlyspooches.

Or at least female humans do.

  • Nah, sorry, but they showed what a squeedlyspooch looks like, so your far reaching attempt to see sexual innuendo has failed.
  • Alternatively, Gaz really is Irken. She was a part of Operation Impending Doom I, but, due to her Deadpan Snarker attitude, left before Zim caused a disaster that somehow made Irkens forget that there was a planet where Earth is. The only reason why the Earth isn't in her hands already is because Professor Membrane caught her while she was still in her Spittle Runner, forced her into her human disguise and stripped her of all Irken technology.

Ms. Bitters was telling the truth in her flashbacks.

She was an astronaut (possibly an alien astronaut) who died when something happened to her shuttle that her afterdeath memory blur rendered as implosion. For a while, she lived as a fairy princess, but then died or was electrocuted into forced metamorphosis (oh, please no one mention WMG/TimeLord...) and became the demonic creature we know and fear.

Tak's cat-SIR took its smoky abilities as camoflage because of Ms. Bitters' presence when they landed.

The fact that it actually looked like a cat was just because Tak's disguise unit and her use of it was so much better than Zim's use of his disguise unit and the unit itself.

The "G" stands for "Gumball".

GIR's a Gumball-issued Information Retrieval unit. As opposed to the Standard-issue Information Retrieval units. Because part of his brain is a gumball.

Scary Monkey is the prequel to Everybody Loves Hypnotoad.

Some glory to the Scary Monkey.

The monkey from Scary Monkey is the same scary monkey as the one in Chris Griffin's cupboard.

Remember that Invader Zim takes place Twenty Minutes Into the Future. Somewhere between Family Guy and Invader Zim, the monkey left the Griffins and started his own television career. Alternatively, the Scary Monkey show IS Family Guy and, by sheer chance, we see GIR watching it always at the points where Scary Monkey is on screen.

Minimoose was made from one of GIR's Piggie-type toys.

Zim took it, and he put SIR parts in it. And a hovermodule.

  • Actually according to the unmade origin episode for minimoose, he's made from various Vortian doomsday devices, an advanced AI brain, and a toy.

GIR's disguise is that of a Mongoose Terrier.

These fierce, quick, but dull-headed beasts will be bred in the mid-to-late 2000s to combat the growing mongoose problem. Their enlarged craniums and bipedal locomotion would have allowed them to combat the growing mongoose problem in Malaysia, but the upper-class French and English developed a liking for the little fellows and soon after they would become a not-uncommon sight in the western world. GIR, therefore, is a mongoose dog.

Dib's spell cards were meant for Gaz.

Professor Membrane arranged for them to be dropped off in front of his child so that while his son might be a proper Mad Scientist one day, his daughter would be able to hone her growing mystical powers and eventually become as powerful a witch as he is a Phlebotinum-chef. For one reason or another, they were dumped in front of Dib instead, and he eventually developed a computer reader and Rolodex program to help him use the cards.

Spell Points regenerate.

Or the cards collect spell points from the ambient aether under certain conditions. Dib may well have been able to shrink his head had he waited a week and put a bowl of salt water under his laptop.

The Chihuahua and the squirrel are sentient alien species.

The squirrel looks like a squirrel, but consistently attracts GIR's attention and can kill a ten-year-old human with its bare paws and seemingly using no teeth. Madness looks (vaguely) like a chihuahua, but acts like a watcher and eventually a nonverbal Mysterious Informant. The squirrel wants the earth to itself, and Madness may work for the secret society that Dib joined. In addition, it's possible that GIR's narration was not unreliable on Mysterious Mysteries (aside from the squirrel eating Dib's crazy head), and the squirrel told GIR that it was going back to its home planet to fight the bad guys.

The Chihuahua is related to Pinky Garcia-Shapiro.

Or, since the world of Invader Zim seems to be in The Future, could be Pinky.

Professor Membrane is the Humans' Tallest.

He's tall, and smart, and...powerful... Ms. Bitters would be the Tallest if she weren't trapped in the school and hunched over.

  • "...trapped in the school"? She was in the city crowd scene in the Christmas episode.

Professor Membrane is the reason Ms. Bitters is trapped in the school.

He went through a brief phase as a Ghostbuster. Streams were crossed For Science!.

Ms. Bitters was part of the necromancy Noodle Incident Professor Membrane keeps mentioning about Dib.

She died, twice, if she is to be believed. This is not at all incompatible with the guess directly above.

Professor Membrane is in charge of the Irkens.

He created Red and Purple, and possibly the Irken system itself. This is why they were a relatively diplomatic species only a few years ago, then suddenly turned to galactic conquest and the planet where Earth is is practically an urban legend despite being only barely off the edge of the The Big Board map (whether it's because he only recently took over before putting Red and Purple in power or because he got bored and left them to their own, warlike devices is up to the individual reader). His condescension of Dib's archnemesissing is either because he doesn't want to implicitly, explicitly, or by reverse psychology encourage Dib to break his stuff or because he knows what Zim is like.

Dib is an asthmatic.

Well, think about it. His obnoxious, wheezing laugh, the way he gags and chokes in small dust clouds... It would fit with the 'nerd' archetype.

Dib is an alien and Gaz knows.

She wasn't kidding when she asked Dib if he meant there was an alien in the room aside from himself. This is (part of) why she is unfazed by Zim (she doesn't care about GIR because she's Professor Membrane's daughter).

Sizz-Lor was banished to Foodcourtia because he's taller than the Tallest & they were afraid that he'd dethrone them

Look at him, he's ENOURMOUS! Normally the tallest have respect for tall Irkens, so why would he be working on foodcourtia instead of having some high-ranking military position? Simple. He was a threat to their rule!

  • As much sense as this would make, officially, it's just because he's wider than he is tall.
  • I have a different outlook. We know that snacking is a huge part of irken culture, so mabye the position of Fry-Lord is an honorable position fitting for one as tall as Sizz-Lor.

Professor Membrane is an Irken exile.

Not only is his technology roughly equal to that of the Irkens, but he posseses a lower-face-concealing cuff that many Irkens are seen wearing (most of whom are technichans), and his kids were created through cloning. He was exiled for being slightly taller than the Tallest and being much smarter. His refusal to believe in the paranormal probably has to do with either him refusing to accept the truth about his origins or desperately trying to keep it a secret.

Ms. Bitters is an Eldritch Abomination.

Her origin stories are probably describing her becoming of one and her arrival on Earth. Most likely, she was first fairy princess who was transformed into an Eldritch abomination via "bug zapper". Eventually, she traveled the cosmos doing....um....eldritch stuff...and, through some great cosmic event, "imploded", landing on Earth, possibly being implanted into/becoming some land. Eventually, the Skool was built. She took control of/became one with it shortly after it's completion, doomed to spend the rest of eterninty trapped there. She took on a slightly more human form, and posed as a human teacher, out to crush the hopes and dreams of generations to come.

Prof. Membrane is Dr. Robotnik

His hair is fake and under that giant collar is a giant nose/moustache combo. Also, under the collar is a voice modulator, so that Robotnik and Membrane sound nothing alike. He looks to be about the same height as Robotnik, & although Robotnik appears to be much fatter, it's just a really obvious fat suit (look at his mid-section in proportion to his arm & legs and then tell me I'm wrong). Also, Membrane is an amazing engineer, as is Robotnik.

    • What does this make the other characters?
      • Nothing. If he wanted to have a secret alter ego, then why would he hang around with his enemies?
        • No, what I mean is, due to being in the same universe, what does this make various characters in the Sonic universe? Does this change things for thier history/origin? Is the part of America the Membrane family living in part of the "Eggman Empire" (Heavy pollution, advanced technology, Crapsack, etc.)?
          • Uh, sure, let's go with that.
    • You should send this to Jhonen.

The room with a moose is actually where The Moose is sealed.

Initially, when Dib sees the Moose, his mind is incapable of comprehending it as anything other than an ordinary moose. The walnuts caused him to see it's true form. This is not shown, for the viewer's sanity.

This is in the same world as Mystery Science Theater 3000

  • Takes place in the near future.
  • The protagonist is a Genius Ditz.
  • TV's Frank.
  • Evidentally, there are many cheesy movies and TV shows.

Vampire Piggy Hunter is a Castlevania spinoff.

With the Silliness Switch turned on.

[[WMG: Gaz is Konata Izumi Impossible hair color, Missing Mom, plays a hell of a lot of videogames, and spends most of the time with her eyes shut.

  • Alternativly, her evil twin.

Dib will eventually defeat Zim.

  • Because Zim is already an adult, but Dib is only 11. Zim will be no match for a tall, teenage, Badass Dib.
  • This theory is confirmed by the long-term plans for the series had it not been cancelled.

Dib and his family are actually SuperHeroes

Professor Membrane can shoot lasers from his hands and Gaz can warp the world around her. Dib's powers just haven't developed yet because he's a late bloomer.

Mr.Dwicky is Squee.

Irken hierarchy is based on age, not height.

Irkens grow continuously throughout their lives, so their height corresponds directly to their age. Taller/older irkens automatically outrank others due to their(in theory) greater experience and wisdom. Red and Purple are ancient, decrepit irkens, hence their emaciated builds. Their rampant stupidity can either be attributed to senility, or...the fact that it's Invader Zim.

  • In "The Trial" Zim and Red/Purple are the same age.
  • That, and the fact that you don't get a name like The Almighty Tallest for being older than everyone else.

That guy was haunting the fork

  • Mother of God...

The Planet Jackers found a way to re-ignite their Sun permanently without the need to throw planets into it

Now they just do it for fun.

Skoodge will conquer the universe.

Sure, he seems cute, but Skoodge is dangerous. Like other Irkens, he has no moral qualms about conquering planets, but unlike other Irkens, he's good at it. Not only was he the first invader to succeed in conquering a planet, it was the home of the slaughtering rat people! Then he survives getting shot out of a huge cannon, shows up without his PAK, and momentarily manages to escape from the hogulus. Clearly, Skoodge is a force to be reckoned with. When he figures out that the Tallests really don't value him at all, things will get interesting.

Dib and Gaz's mother is Tallest Miyuki

  • Miyuki came to Earth with a human disguise, a REALLY good one (As she was a scientist) and met Prof. Membrane. This was back in a time when Irk didn't want to kill everything that moved, and she fell in love with the Prof. She revealed her true idenitity to him, and since her disguise was so advanced, she could mate with a human, even if the children's DNA ended up with Irken in the mix. After living with the Prof. and having Gaz and Dib she was called back to Irk, as she was now the Tallest. Once back there, she was killed in that incident with Zim. Prof. Membrane was informed and his heart was broken. The new Tallest, Spork, brought on Irk's new attitude towards other races by telling them that Vortians killed Miyuki and Earth was forgotten (No one knew about Gaz and Dib). Meanwhile, on Earth, Prof. Membrane tried to forget his pain by becoming a skeptic, and convinced himself that Gaz and Dib were his clones. Dib and Gaz are part Irken, which is why Dib is obsessed with aliens and why Gaz is a master of technology.

Invader Zim is set in a 1984 society

There are cameras everywhere and everyone is in a state of perpetual stupidity. Ms. Bitters and Prof. Membrane are probably part of the Inner Party and the Swollen Eyeball Network is the resistence (if such a thing actually existed). The only reason Zim hasn't been taken in is because there is no rule for such an occurence as an alien invasion.

    • At least the skool system is in this state. Voting of the Doomed pretty much confirmed it. Also, like 1984, nearly all the food that appears is vomit-inducing.

The episodes aired in Anachronic Order and Attack Of the Saucer Morons is supposed to be the series finale.

The episode ends with Zim being outed...twice!. Granted, the witnesses for the first time weren't exactly credible and probably wouldn't be that much of a threat to Zim's mission. The second group, however, seemed to be a fairly normal-looking set of people. Unless you chalk it all up to Rule of Funny or Zim pushing some kind of Reset Button after the fade-to-black, this must be what happened.

  • Or "Attack of the Saucer Morons" was the second to last episode and "Hobo13" was the last episode; after being discovered by humans, ZIM goes into hiding and contacts his Tallest for weapons to protect himself but pretends everything is the same. At the end of the episode, he DOES crash into the sun along with the other guy and they die.

At end of chapter Attack Of the Saucer Morons, Zim killed all the people who discovered their identity.

Zim is a Villain Protagonist and Ax Crazy Bordering in Complete Monster, Zim would have been able to do so without remorse.

  • Yeah, that would definitely count as a reset button. I'm still partial to the the above guess (mainly because it's my own), but your's is very much in the realm of possibility, especially when you consider Vasquez's dark sense of humor.

Gaz isn't naturally mean, she's a Jerkass Woobie with a Freudian Excuse

As if being neglected by her father wasn't enough, her brother pretty much ignores her unless she's actively throttling him (notice how he almost never responds to her complaints of eating her food). This treatment has made her into the bitter, withdrawn little girl she is in the show.

Granted, she's mean in the babies flashback in Mysterious Mysteries, but here's my take on that. In her short life, she'd been aware that no one in her family really paid any attention to her. One day, it seemed like her older brother was finally spending time with her by playing blocks. When he spelled out aliens, she realized that his mind was elsewhere and that he probably didn't even notice she was there. She proceeded to get angry and storm away.

  • I know this is a WMG, but it's a little unsettling how you're placing the largest amount of blame on the person she's most frequently seen to abuse. Gaz doesn't like it when Dib pays attention to her, she doesn't share his interests and finds that "his voice fills [her] with a terrible rage". We see her either telling him to shut up or simply walking away from him when he talks to her, she doesn't seek him out. She's shooed him away even when he was explicitly concerned for her welfare, because she was busy playing her game. It's not really established that he eats "her" food, he takes her to task for finishing off "his" and is met with a "you think you own all the cereal!" which comes off as a mite hypocritical. Pretty basic sibling territorial rivalry, there.

Dib is actually older than Zim

We know next to nothing about how Irkens age after birth and they are given a PAK which has all the information they need for their job, so they look combat ready in a matter of minutes instead of years.

  • In "Tak: The Hideous New Girl", Tak says that she and Zim met fifty years ago. Further Word of God sides against this as well, as in a chat session Jhonen Vasquez was asked about the character's ages and stated that Zim was "older than any human alive".

Invader Zim will return in 2012

it's the end of the world! it would be the sickest most twisted joke on earth!

Gaz and Dib actually do have a mother.

A surrogate mother. Gaz and Dib were clones, but they were grown inside a human woman. And, Gaz was designed to be superior while Dib was made inferior. Once Dib learns this, he'll develop a massive inferiority complex and capture a bipedal nuclear tank, demanding Professor Membrane's remains. Only Gaz will be able to stop him.

Dib cannot die from damage to his head

He's got an entire dimension to contain in there! If he got shot in the forehead, a monster would just crawl out and maul the shooter.

The characters are in a Higurashi-like Groundhog Day Loop

Based on the above theory that the show is shown in Anachronic Order, where Zim was discovered out of his disguise in Attack of the Saucer Morons, thus making it the series finale.

Well, not really. Some entity out there keeps hitting the Reset Button whenever something really bad happens. Usually that "really bad thing" is either Zim or Dib dieing. It happened twice; the first time was Attack of the Saucer Morons (where Zim was discovered and dissected off screen) and the other being Walk for Your Lives (Where Dib didn't fall unconscious, he actually died). Either there are two of them- one helping Zim and one helping Dib, or just one that resets things because he/she/it finds it hilarious to watch them fail.

  • Zim wasn't dissected in Attack of the Saucer Morons, he simply imagined that he would be and opened his eyes to find everyone worshipping him instead.
    • I meant the very end, when he crashes into the convention with the sign that says: "Aliens: Real or Not?". (Or something along those lines.) The people attending said convention take him away; not the Saucer Morons.

Irken Paks are wired to make the wearer stupid to keep the Irken Empire from falling apart

Ages ago, the Irken leaders of the day probably put that system into the Paks to keep things more or less stable - since with an Empire's worth of aggressive and destructive creatures like the Irkens around, all it would take is one short Irken with a Napoleon complex to overthrow their society. With this kind of 'stupid system' in place, Irkens wouldn't think twice about the height system and would focus their destructive tendencies on other parts of the universe. Control Brains were then put in place to keep the Empire running properly.

  • In addition, the reason Zim's Pak is considered defective is that he's actually too smart for the 'stupid system' to properly contain. That's how he can improve Irken technology that's supposed to already be 'the finest' and can invent new technology on the spot - though since his brain is still partially scrambled most of his inventions and plans go horribly wrong.

Gaz has a squeedlyspooch and Membrane's lying about not believing in aliens

Membrane stole all of the earliest tech he 'invented' from an Irken scout ship that was checking Earth for potential future use, killed the pilot and crew, and later put one of the squeedlyspooches he harvested into Gaz while he was making her to see what it would do. He surgically altered it and grafted on spare normal organs to keep anyone from finding out, but Gaz found his notes. And Membrane refuses to admit that aliens are real because then he'd lose his sweet monopoly on all the stuff he marketed as his own inventions.

The moose in the room could not have eaten the kids inside the bus

The bus is made out of metal. Mooses can't eat metal. Sure it could have chewed them up, but not exactly EATEN them.

  • It's implied in that episode that the wormhole leads directly to the inside of the moose's mouth; if the moose is enormous, it could even swallow the bus whole.
    • When is that implied?
      • By the fact that we don't see the moose pick up the walnuts, but just chewing them.

Zim, Red, and Purple have a vague three-way relationship

Zim likes Purple more than he likes Red, but Red likes Zim slightly more than Purple does. This is why Zim is so pleased when Purple calls him creepy and why Red let him talk for three hours in Backseat Drivers. This is also why Red panics immediately while Purple keeps his cool during Dib's Wonderful Life of Doom: Zim programmed them into the simulation from memory and made Red act more cowardly on purpose to make that version of Purple look better in comparison.

  • Both Red and Purple are slightly semi-vaguely fond of Zim (as long as he's not currently destroying the Empire), which is why they keep answering his calls and occasionally humor his ego with cheering crowds.
    • This Troper thinks that the Tallest simply find Zim to be a massive joke (he is!), and enjoy watching him look foolish. No three-way necessary, vague or otherwise.

The Principal of the Skool is worse than Ms. Bitters and is the only one she fears

This is a possible explanation for Miss Bitters's submission in an argument with him,and the hellish fire that is shown when the phone goes back into the desk.

Dib and Gaz were created to be Brains and Brawn

Dib was created/cloned by Prof.Membrane to be the smartest being on the planet, and Gaz was cloned to be the strongest. But once Dib got old enough all he talked about was ghosts, and bigfoot, and an evil alien at school. Membrane thought he had failed with Dib and succeeded with Gaz. But, he had actually succeeded with both.

There was no Snap Back after the Planet Jackers episode.

The Earth is now in orbit around the Planet Jackers' star. Whenever there's a shot of the sun after that episode, it appears to be a red giant.

  • But what about Battle of the Planets? Earth was clearly in its normal solar system then.

Ms. Bitters is the reason why the world is so stupid.

She's an Eldritch Abomination who is siphoning off the intelligence of everyone on the planet to return to her true form. Being installed in Skool allows her to keep the people of Earth stupid, hell probably is responsible for its misspelling. Dib, Gaz, and Membrane are somewhat immune-the side-effects is Dib's mannerisms, Gaz's apathy, and Membrane's indifference. When she is fully restored after siphoning off all human intelligence? She'll destroy the entire universe hence why she is so full of DOOM when she lectures.

Dib's head really IS huge.

  • Everyone keeps saying it. It could be a running gag, OR there could be more going on. Maybe an optical illusion, or other kind of field. Either way, Dib's head would have held an important plot point, had the series continued.

Zim messed with Dib's head during "Dib's Wonderful Life of Doom", and it stuck.

Let's face it, Dib seemed different in season 2. A little bit goofier, almost like a parody of his season 1 self. That's because Zim, whether intentionally or not, ended up permanently screwing up Dib's brain a little during "Dib's Wonderful Life of Doom".

  • Considering that it left Dib as a very old man in a twelve-year-old body, you may be on to something.

Dib isn't actually a genetic experiment

Membrane slept with one of his many fangirls however-many-years ago. In order to maintain his son's respect as both his father and a super-genius scientist, he fabricated the story in case Dib ever asked who his mother was. Only problem was, he never did since he became too obsessed with cryptids and the supernatural to notice. So the documents and whatever Membrane threw together as evidence were put away and forgotten about. Cue Dib discovering them on accident and coming to the conclusion.

Membrane Created the Irken species.

There was some sort of huge war going on. America was losing and needed some sort of weapon. So they created project IRK to create a bio-engineered form of humans that could help them win. Membrane was able to produce biological disasters. They were human, but with messed up DNA that includes DNA based of cockroaches due to their ability to survive almost anything. Membrane was unable to fully create functional inside the creatures. In order to fix this, he created PA Ks to work as fully-functional brains. They were created to be ruthless and antagonistic. America was able to win the war after which they had to figure out what to do with the horrible monstrosities.

Finally, they made a decision. The entire laboratory and the creations where they were made was sent out into space to never be seen again. The lab landed on a planet. There the creations decided to start a new life. They called themselves the irk after the project that created them. They used notes from the scientists in order to create more of their kind.

Their attempts to conquer the universe comes from the fact that they were created specifically for war. Their unintelligience comes from the fact that they weren't unable fully recreate the new species correctly. Finally, it explains why the Irken have so many simililarities to humans, both in form and in speech.

  • One problem to your theory: Irkens are far older than man (or at least are capable of living longer), and Zim is at least a century old.
    • There was a time warp similair to the Frycook what came from all that space.

The timeline of the series is actually in between the events of the Pixar movies Up and Wall-E.

Think about it. What exactly caused that vacant lot that Zim found in "The Nightmare Begins?" Not to mention the world of Invader Zim's timeline was probably half-polluted, causing the red sky and Zim's reaction to polluted water - meaning all water! Wall-E takes place when future humans of the Invader Zim world realize they've really screwed up with all the pollution. The incredible technology in Wall-E was all made by Professor Membrane, funded by Buy-N-Large!

  • Would Eve be a more advanced S.I.R unit, then? Technology stolen from the Irkens and used by the humans. She does have a "glitch" that allows her to have a personality. Or maybe Wall-E himself would be.

Iggins is of saiyan descent.

His powers laid dormant for years, but the incident with the elevator awakened his true potential.

Invader Zim takes place in the same world as Paranoia Agent.

Think about it, the world is completely screwed up and paranormal things are going on all of the time. Look at Maromi, it's so much like Gir it's not even funny!

Zim's "defect" is the ability to love and genuinely care about others.

Zim is shown to have the ability to love in the episode "Parent Teacher Night" during a flashback to the scene of his "Birth". His first words were "I love you, cold unfeeling robot arm!" He is later shown to be a defect in the unreleased episode "The Trial". In addition, he is shown to care about Dib in the unreleased episode "Mopiness of Doom". Caring about ones enemies is definately a defect in an invasive species like the Irkens, so he hid this from everyone and tried to make up for it by destroying stuff. It didn't work.

  • This is pretty much Fanon, even thought I don't remeber them actually SAYING Irkens don't feel.
    • You're to decide yourself whether or not this theory has been Jossed, but we see Skoodge visibly crying in the very first episode, a clear sign of emotion. However, Skoodge is just as much as an outcast as Zim and not a good canidate for what the "normal" Irken soldier would be, so... maybe...
      • Another point: Invader Larb was tearing up in the first episode also. "Why would you draw that?"

Membrane is the Emperor of Mankind still working in the semi-backround.

The man without whom this world falls into CHAOS!! Dib & Gaz are clearly Proto-Primarchs.


Iggins bursting from the wreckage of the elevator was an afterlife or (more likely) dying insanity.

He didn't survive... for long.

Invader Zim takes place in the same world as Higurashi no Naku Koro ni.

Everybody is crazy, and they're all REALLY scary when angry. Really, it would've been just as violent if Nick wasn't so overprotective.

Gir has a crush on Gaz

He shoots her an overly-delighted smile in Bloaty's Pizza Hog, makes her dance with him in Tak The Hideous New Girl and gives her a kiss (again, in the Tak episode). Granted, it could just be a case of Gir being...well...Gir. Or, it could be that everyone's favorite evil minion has fallen in love.

My theory is, had the series continued, Gaz would eventually have become a Butt Monkey due to this unwanted suitor...which would have been fair, given all that her brother goes through.

Zim really is a normal, human kid

Dib's just been tormenting him for so long with accusations of being an alien that he's formed a fantasy about it being true (thus caving to Dib's constant needling while also giving himself an imaginary escape from his stressful life). All the Irken scenes are imagined by Zim or are exaggerations of mundane events; he is so isolated from his own parents that he has incorporated them into his fantasy as well, and Gir is actually just a toy. In the first episode, Zim is simply returning to school after the summer (starting the school year late because of a stress-induced illness). The big allusion to this is when Zim says "Dib's always saying stuff; I remember that one time..." because he actually has known Dib for at least the past couple years—but Dib has been so intent on "exposing" Zim that he hasn't kept track of time and honestly believes Zim has only "just arrived" from space. Part of Zim just wants Dib to leave him alone, but he’s so attached to his fantasy that he keeps acting like an alien and making his situation worse. It turns out the whole series was very Calvin & Hobbes-inspired.

  • Alternatively...

Dib really is crazy.

Zim is exactly what he claims to be: a human with a very rare skin condition. Unfortunately, Dib, who (as has already been established) has watched way too many Sci Fi movies, refuses to believe that. The series is, in fact, told through Dib's mind; the parts with Zim, Gi R, and the Tallest are how Dib imagines Zim's "evil plans" are like. All of the other humans in the world act so stupidly because that's how Dib sees them: surely, if they can't see the "obvious" fact that Zim is an alien, they must be stupid!

Dib is a failed experiment.

Sure we know that Dib is a clone of some sorts, but don't you think that his dad says "my poor, insane son" a little too often? This could contribute to Dib going insane if he happened to find out about it.

The world could use a good physiatrist

Any physiatrist can see a case of self denial on Zim's case and severe issues with Dib and Gaz if the did have a mom she most likley died not long before The Nightmare begins.

Nickelodeon will bring the show back, as in making new seasons

In the Nicktoons Unite! games, they tend to only have characters from shows where new episodes are being made for them (well... the playable ones anyway). Zim is playable in 'Globs of Doom', and in the upcoming Nicktoons MLB. Considering that he's the only playable character from a show that wasn't still airing new episodes at least three years ago.....

Professor Membrane is a AU Dr Insano.

He does stuff For Science!, has goggles/glasses/whatever, and is morally ambigous(yeah, I know Insano is evil, but he's more Ineffectual Sympathetic Villian than actual evil). Not to mention that he's a Large Ham. And admit it, this would be awesome.

G.I.R is actually a God of Insane Robots.

I can't elaborate, since the entire concept s so insane, I am unable to type it out completely. Waffle?

Keef is a human/irken hybrid.

When Zim puts Keef and two other kids through dangerous tasks that a normal human wouldn't endure, Keef is the most resistant. This is because these are all factors Zim would look for in one of his own kind.He also demonstrates some amazing climbing abilities, and apparently regenerates his eyes after Zim removes them. One possible explanation is that long ago, the Tallest banished an Irken to earth much like what they would later do to Zim. This agent eventually decided to abandon his mission, got married, and Keef was born. The reason Keef admires Zim so much is because he senses the two are somewhat alike.

If the series had continued.

Then..

At the beginning of Dibship rising...

Dib didn't just download his personality into Tak's ship - Her personality went into him! Meaning that from this point on, Tak's personality is hidden inside of Dib, waiting for just the right moment to take over.

  • Or, alternatively, Tak's personality and Dib's both swapped places. The reason the ship really thought it was Dib was because it really WAS Dib! Of course, since it started emptying its own personality at the end, this means that Dib is dead. Or eternally stuck in a perpetual state of consciousness but unable to do anything. The reason Tak's personality doesn't act like herself is because she's adjusting to Dib's body. Later on, it is finally fully adjusted and just pretending to be Dib so that she can continue with her dastardly plans without drawing attention to herself. All while trying to contact the REAL TAK through working on her old body (Tak's Ship).

Dib is a clone, but not of Membrane

of this guy in the background, he looks just like Dib, even more than Membrane does, and clearly share his interest in the paranormal (he was one of the Children of the Bright and Shining Saucer and wears a UFO shirt)

Invader Zim really takes place in the vicinity of the Solar System.

It took Zim 6 months to travel from Conventia to Earth, and 6 light-months is only 1/8 the distance to the nearest star, not to mention that Zim made Mars into a spaceship, fought with Dib and drew it to the vicinity of Blorch during the same Irken meeting. Perhaps the comets of the Oort cloud collided and formed planets such as Irk, Blorch, Meekrob, Conventia, Foodcourtia, Callnowia etc. These planets eventually had sentient species develop on them and one of them (the Irkens) became villainous and power-thirsty while also being incredibly stupid.

  • The Planet Jackers' star is Proxima Centauri.

Gir uses food as a robo organic fuel source.

All that food is going out some where. Sir units are depicted as very complex creations but as shown their bodies aren't hammerspace. The food he eats actually fuels him while he's activated as well as fuel the jet booster flyers. Gir has the abililty to sleep like any other organic life form instead of charging like a robot and he doesn't have to recharge or get "his batteries replaced" to fuel himself. Further supporting the fact that he's closer to an organic being as most or better yet any other robot. His body has the ability to convert food into automatic fuel.

Drake is Dib, Josh is Zim, Megan is Gaz

After an accident in Zim's lab, Zim, Dib. and Gaz's appearances are altered, and they get amnesia, Dib remembers that his name starts with a D, Gaz remebers there was a G in her name, and Zim, due to his alien mind, just forgets everything.

  • In one episode Megan mentions a Pintendo 'GS' GS might as well mean gameslave, and Gameslaves might be made by Pintendo
  • Drake and Josh don't always get along, which could be a couple of memories that came back
  • Drake has a younger sister, at the series start . (And Megan has a G in it it, she could have just moved it to the middle of her name)

This backs up my 'Jade is an Irken' theory, in a way.

  • Not to mention some out of character behavior between Drake and Josh that I noticed a couple times.
  • "Sigh" Jossed.
  • What Josses it?
  • Guess Genius.

Dib will eventually get an Isabella

Dib will eventually meet a girl who will secretly fall madly in love with him, and this girl will most likely want to be a writer, and use her 'writing' as an excuse for why she's following him around.


If Invader Zim was on Cartoon Network it would of never got cancelled.

Perfectly self explanotory.

Failing that Dib succeeds in his plot against paranormal terrors he will grow up to be LIKE Dale Gribble.

Or if he's just crazy that will just make it worst.

The main cast of Invader Zim are descended from the casts of the comics.

Devi D. is Dib and Gaz's mother, an all-grown-up Todd is Agent Darkbooty, Johnny is either dead or locked up in the asylum.

  • Alternatively, Dib is the product of some sort of relations between Devi and Johnny, considering Dib's resemblance to our favorite serial killer.

Dib is Johnny reincarnated.

Self-explanatory, really.

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