{ Basics: Aside from the pilot episode (and excluding any future, yet unknown episodes), the format of "Invader Zim" is your basic two near-fifteen minutes cartoons in one half hour show. My summaries will include a summary of the episode (of course) but be warned that they will be babbling and a bit long, but it should still be entertaining. We will also look at fun things that we saw, and the tie-in. What is a tie-in? Well, in every episode I have noticed there is a little thing that is maybe only seen briefly in the first part, but prevalent (or just seen again) in the second part. There will also be a disturbing rate, but it will be in general terms (low, low-average, average, average-high, high), and the factor will be determined by how much it disturbed ME personally, and that is quite a feat. O_o

Episodes
{1} The Nightmare Begins
{2} Parent Teacher Night & Walk of Doom
{3} Bestest Friend & Nanozim
{4} Germs & Dark Harvest
{5} Attack of the Saucer Morons & The Wettening
{6} Career Day & Battle-Dib

{1} The Nightmare Begins. (Pilot). Full half hour episode.
Disturbing rate: Low-average (If you don't mind aliens taking a laser to the eye)
} There is a great space empire led by a race of insectoid/humanoid creatures called Irkens (thus, it is the Irken Empire!). In this society, your social rank is determined by your height. The most powerful of the Irkens are the Almighty Tallest (Red and Purple). A specially trained group of Irkens, (are they children or adults?), are called the Invaders. They lead the invasions on certain planets that are singled out to be conquered. As the Almighty Tallest hand out assignments, (the smallest getting the worst planets like the planet of rabid rats, and the taller ones get nice planets like the planet of fluffy bunnies), a late comer crashes in and announces himself as Zim, the greatest Invader of all time. He isn't that great, as it turns out; apparently, during Operation Impending Doom I, he had invaded and destroyed HIS OWN HOME PLANET. Rightfully scared of Zim, the Tallest decide to send him to a special, oh-so-dangerous planet that is SO important that no one knows of it. Thinking it was SO important, Zim readily agrees. Given a crappy ship and GIR, an idiotic model of the highly intelligent SIR robots, he launches toward the unknown planet. Six months and many verses of The Doom Song (sang by GIR) later, Zim reaches the planet EARTH. After scrutinizing and gathering much information on the inhabitants, Zim lands in a small empty lot in a culdasac, and he disguises himself as a regular human boy--well, he just puts on a pair of lenses to hide his red eyes and a wig. GIR is disguised as a dog--a green dog with a huge head and eyes, and with a noticeable zipper. He builds a "normal" house filled with "animal things" and huge, creepy lawn gnomes. Robotic parents are included in the deal, too! In order to learn of the human weaknesses and defenses, Zim enrolls in "Skool."

A paranoid pale boy in a trench coat named Dib had overheard the Irken conference through a radio transmitter all those months ago, and when Zim was introduced as a new student, Dib tried to warn everyone of the oncoming alien invasion, but Dib isn't very . . . reliable, so everyone thinks he is just being loopy again. After Skool, he tries to capture Zim, but he is thwarted. Zim is pleased by how the day went (even after being attacked by Dib, a dog, and being injured quite a bit), and as he reports to the Almighty Tallest about how much of a pushover Earth was, the Tallest are quite surprised to see him still alive.
Tie-in: None.
Things: When Zim is looking over human body choices, he passes over a skinny guy ("Too Ugly!") and a heavy set guy ("Too stinky!"). Those two were the creator Jhonen Vasquez and the producer of "Invader Zim."
} Bigfoot uses your belt sander, so beware.
} Aliens have Big Gulps, too!
} Not only can you make fires WORSE, but you can make them BETTER.
} Ms. Bitters is/was Squee's teacher. (Squee is another of Vasquez's work.) Or at least I believe she is.
{Top}

{2} Parent Teacher Night
Disturbing rate: Average-high
} Zim learns that he had unwillingly agreed to bringing his parents to parent-teacher night that night, despite how much he protested to do so. After Dib's comment, though, about how Zim was making such a big deal about something so simple, Zim declares that he will bring his parents and that they would be the most parental parents EVER. However, his robot parent decoys are quite uncouth and they make Avon ladies brush their teeth. Hooking the parents up to a wall of TVs, Zim put in a tape about proper parenting, and left for them to absorb the knowledge. However, GIR became bored five seconds in, and he began to watch a whole smattering of shows and commercials, the parents soaking it all in. Zim, believing everything had gone as planned, took them to Skool. Meanwhile, Dib and his gothy sister Gaz were already there with their father, Professor Membrane, who was in a floating telescreen because he was busy in the lab (where there was an explosion and a mushroom cloud could be seen through the window). Zim shows off his parents to Ms. Bitters before he left, requiring punch. Dib tried to point out Zim's alieness to Membrane, but the great professor is very dense as well. Eventually, the parent decoys begin to act out what they learned from GIR's TV shows, causing no end of trouble, and giving a mother a severe case of pokeytidous. Sensing that their "son" is upset, the parents deploy their all-too-human feet jet packs, and take off through the window. Dib is, of course, the only one to see this.
Things: Ms. Bitters is fucking cool. (Yes, it is necessary to use THAT word.) She slithers and hisses and floats around like a ghost. Wow.
} GIR enjoys make-up.
} Irken babies are born from tubes that smile. I wonder if it's a cloning process? 'Coz it's sad to think that with females in that society, they can't have any fun.
} Despite the extreme creepiness of the parent decoys, I'd love them as my own parents. I know that mine wouldn't do a Lord of the Dance dance for me, no matter how upset I am.
} Dib learns never to throw punch ever again.
} Even though they are great enemies, and even though Dib was only a figment of Zim's imagination at the time, Dib is kind enough to warn Zim when he's about to trip over a puppy.
} If you ever see (or read) someone shrieking, "You lie! YOU LIE!!!!!" and they flail their arms, they picked it up from Zim.

{2} Walk of Doom
Disturbing rate: Low-average ('Coz the skin on Zim's eyeballs melt. :3)
} Zim upgraded GIR's location chip so wherever they may be lost, GIR will be able to find their way home. To test it, they head out into the melee of the big city and get hopelessly lost. When Zim has his fill of stinkiness and madness, he tells GIR to find their way home, however, GIR left its chip at home so it could store a cupcake in its head. Zim tries to make a compass, but it is more magnet than compass and it attaches to GIR. Next, he tries the bus, but he didn't have any fare. Zim tries to determine which way is west by starring at the sun, and the skin on his eyeballs melt. Needing a break for the skin to grow back, Zim and GIR sit on the sidewalk till nightfall, where a . . . KIND . . . passer-by advises him to get a job. If he got a job, he could get money, and then he could ride the bus! Remembering the freaks in the park dancing and doing tricks for money, Zim and GIR go and entertain with lame karate moves and with the robot dance. They get quite a bit of money, including some bills from a strange little man dressed up like Zim's new disguise. (A white beard, a ratty coat, and a hat.) Boarding the bus, Zim is immediately scared of all the stinkbeasts on there, so he hops off. Next, he remembers that Invaders have standard issue "INCREDIBLE EYES," so he could spot the general area of his home from a high building. They head for a tall bank building that had just been robbed. Mistaking Zim for the criminal (the strange man at the park), the cops chase him and Zim runs up the stairwell, deploying his extremely nifty spider legs. Locating the general area of his home from atop the building, he tries to blast off using GIR's jet packs, but they crash due to the fact GIR emptied his fuel and replaced it with tuna. They hail a cab, Zim pointed in a direction, and told the driver to take him home. They are dropped off in . . . Mexico or some Mexican subsection of a city, where GIR dances with a greasy, fat butcher guy to a groovy beat that goes "Lalala-la." I love that song.
Tie-in: The Scary Monkey Show. It's seen for a bit in the first part, then GIR gives it a name in the second part, and you even see it playing on the model TVs in an electronics store. A second tie-in are Zim's spider legs. You see them for the first time in Parent Teacher Night when he lifts himself up onto the sofa, and then he uses them to run away from the cops in Walk of Doom.
Things: The Scary Monkey Show IS very scary, and it's very prevalent . . . a symbol?
} As stated before, the spider legs are nifty keen . . . I want some.
} The baby on the bus reminded me of Stewie from "The Family Guy." That made it even creepier.
} What is that Hispanic girl selling? Visas? Radios? Drugs? What?
} The greasy guy reminds me of a certain Satyr.
} "I love this show."
{Top}

{3} Bestest Friend
Disturbing rate: High (Keef himself is scary, his eyeballs being popped out, him interrupting his own call, driving by the window in one direction one right after another . . . 'tis freaky.)
} Overhearing a girl saying that it was weird and inhuman that Zim hadn't made any friends at Skool yet, Zim goes to find a best friend. After doing a series of odd and obviously painful tests, he chooses a boy named Keef. Keef is your basic obsessive loser who latches on like a tick. All skool day long, Keef and Zim have a fun playing tether ball (with Keef as a bat!), doing drawrings of each other, and generally doing "fun friend stuff" while bouncy, happy music plays in the background. At the end of the day, Zim tells Keef that he no longer required Keef's services as a friend, but Keef doesn't quite comprehend . . .
KEEF: Do you have any video games?
ZIM: Yes.
KEEF: (smile)
CAR: *vroooom*
ZIM: (slams door shut)
Keef doesn't give up and calls Zim on the phone, and he even interrupts HIS OWN PHONE CALL. Then he passes by the house on his bike TWICE IN A ROW FROM THE SAME DIRECTION. Zim runs to the lab telling GIR not to let anyone in, but when the doorbell rings, GIR thinks it's a leprechaun and does a big flashy transformation piece before it calmly gets into its doggie suit. The next morning, Zim comes up and finds Keef making waffles and bacon for he and GIR. He tells Keef that he is sick and is staying home, then throws him out on his ass. GIR, following to eat the bacon Keef had been thrown out with, is told a secret: Keef is gonna throw a surprise party for Zim since he's sick, and Zim isn't to know. Returning with party favors, GIR let's slip to Zim that Keef is gonna bring kids over for a party, and that it was making the cake. Zim goes to prepare . . . The only kids that will come are the losers, and Keef runs in to bring out Zim, and Zim is waiting for him with a present. The present are robotic arms that yank Keef's eyeballs out of his head, and puts new ones in with red irises. When Zim snaps his fingers, Keef sees a squirrel out in the yard, but he sees it as his best friend Zim. Keef chases "Zim" up to the roof where he is savagely attacked by the squirrel while an ominous floating GIR head continues stirring cake batter and singing "doodoodoo."
Things: For some reason . . . Keef interrupting his own phone call creeped me out more than his eyeballs popping out. . . .
{ Zim's drawrings and writing is veddy cute, like he's 6. Well, I guess you can't judge his writing, I bet if you were to write something in Japanese after learning the language quickly, you'd be mocked, too.
{ Oh, and Keef's painting, that was creepy, too, can't forget that.
{ I am a proud owner of the song that plays when Zim and Keef frolick-ck-ck about! X3 I love it.
{ Creepy.

{3} Nanozim
Disturbing rate: Low (Unless if a toilet and the inside of Dib's body scared you.)
} GIR came home from the store with a lovely slushee, and leaves the door open. As Zim works down in the lab on his back . . . pod . . . thing, an intruder alert came up, and he goes rushing upstairs, not bothering to put on his disguise. When he sees the door open, he thinks it's just a fluke. When reprimanding GIR, all GIR does is show off the chocolate-bubblegum slushee globs in its mouth. But it DOES notice the little man crawling around on the ceiling, it just fails to mention it to Zim. Zim opened a portal to go down to check on the laser weasel experiment, but he hears someone shout "Wow!" and a camera flash. Spinning about, Zim sees Dib in a very . . . very nifty . . . black bodysuit spy gear typething. Dib easily escapes Zim's computer's robotic arms (screaming like a big puss the whole time he's doing flips and jumps, you have to admire a guy like that). Leaping out the open window, Dib runs away with the photographic evidence that Zim really is an alien, and he plans to expose it to the world through the television show "Mysterious Mysteries of Strange Mystery." (Who knows the answer to the question, "Is life out there?" is a resounding, "MAYBE.") The next day at school, Dib points out to Gaz that Zim wasn't in class today. She figures he was just sick, but Dib believes that he is SICK with FEAR that he will be exposed and placed on an autopsy table. Gaz then politely tells Dib that his life will be a living hell if he doesn't leave her alone to finish her video game. That night, Dib addresses an envelop to Mysterious Mysteries and sits down on the couch with Gaz to watch another fulfilling episode. However, his arms start to act of their own accord and they bug Gaz, who leaves in a huff to beat her game. His arms then pick up the envelop and take out the disk with the photos on it, and who should appear on his TV screen but Zim. Zim is transmitting from Dib's disgusting belly, attached to his arm control nerve.
DIB: Arm . . . control nerve?
ZIM: Yes.
DIB: In my . . . belly?
ZIM: (annoyed) Yes.
DIB: Humans don't HAVE arm control nerves!
ZIM: Don't question me, I control your arms!!! Eee! Eee! Eee! (yanks on a few levers)
Apparently, when Zim was supposedly at home sick with fear, he had actually shrunk himself in a mecha to a . . . really really small size, and snuck into Dib's food, where he was eaten in a mouthful of peas. He made Dib crush the disk, but the pale boy foolishly let slip that that wasn't the master copy, so Zim heads off for Dib's brain to erase that memory and to make his mind not so smart no more. Freed from Zim's arm control, Dib runs to his father for help. Apparently the world needs Membrane's help, but he le's his son play with his microscopic mecha thing. Dib swallows it and manages to slow Zim down with it, although Gaz came down and began bugging him about wanting to play, since she thought it was an online game he was playing with Zim. She was helpful, however, and she told him the transformation code so he could fight Zim, but Dib is a big puss, and Zim shot a peg into Dib's arm control nerve so he couldn't use his hands anymore. Gaz takes control of the mecha, and chases after Zim who had reached the brain and was erasing the knowledge of where the master disk was hidden. Before he could erase all of Dib's intelligence, however, Gaz comes in and kicks serious ass, knocking the alien down into Dib's guts once more. Releasing Dib's nerve and entering her name, Gaz declares the game stupid, and leaves. And Dib's finishing move is . . . er . . . well, it ends up with having Zim being flushed down the toilet, so you can probably guess. A fitting end I think, at least.
Tie-in: Gaz's games. You see her play her handheld counsel for the first time in Bestest Friend, and then . . . she's just the little game freak in Nanozim. She keeps playing her games in future episodes.
Things: Membrane is quite full of himself . . . not only does the world need his help, but his likeness is in the shape of a lamp cover and an ashtray. He must have other nifty things in his likeness laying around. I was sad that the toilet was not. However, that toilet was spotless, don't you think?
} Bless you, people who do "Invader Zim," for drawing the insides of someone and not making it utterly disgusting with sticky green mucus and vomit and all sorts of lame humor tactics. I love you more for it.
} I personally think that this is the coolest, most threatening line ever said: "I'm in your trachea now, Dib. Your brain is so close I can smell it.
} Insert your own clever thing, I'm tired.
{Top}

{4}Germs
Disturbing rate: Low ('Less YOU'RE scared of germs . . .)
} Watching a B-movie about aliens invading the Earth and the aliens being destroyed by germs, a doubtful Zim researches on germs and learns that Invader really have fallen due to a planet's microorganisms. He buys some special goggles that help him to see the germs and is horrified to see all the little killers crawling all over his lair. Zim instantly becomes a compulsive cleaner, spraying everything with disinfectant and washing every inch of the house. GIR, however, just finished playing with a pig, dirties the house again and tries to hug Zim because he seems upset. Zim ties GIR outside and continues to clean, and he calls the Almighty Tallest to tell them he's doing all right, but he only manages to make them more afraid of him as he screams at germs. Zim runs out of spray and he takes GIR to go buy more supplies, but GIR is sidetracked by a fast food restaurant, McMeaties, and Zim has to follow him. It is nothing but germs in there and germs and germs . . . except for on the meat. A creepy old guy behind the counter explains about the development of SPACE MEAT which was developed with germ-free qualities. McMeaties used it to stave off all the lawsuits from customers that got sick from their meat. Zim takes all the meat and wears it to Skool. YUM.
Things: Vasquez and the producer type guy were back and eating burgers at McMeaties. Zim manhandles their meat.
} GIR is adorable, there's no denying that. Any huge headed creature that rolls about on the ground spreading dangerous germs is adorable.
} There was an old guy with no legs in this episode . . . he must have lost them in THE WAR~
} I had dog named Snow once, and she used to run around and gag herself on her leash like GIR was . . . I miss Snow. ;_; So that fact made me love GIR more. *sniffle* God bless you, GIR.

{4} Dark Harvest
Disturbing rate: HIGH
} During recess, Zim laughs it up as a human's inferior organs are injured by a ball to the gut. However, he stops laughing when the ball hits him and he moans, "Oh, my squigglyspootch!" Dib overheard this and points out that humans do not have squigglyspootches, but Gaz says that she has one, thus putting Dib back a step. However, a delivery is made to him; it's an X-ray organ identifier goggle thing that he uses on Zim. It, of course, cannot identify anything in Zim, so this proves that he is not a human, but how to get the others to notice? Later, while in class, a pidgeon lands on Zim's head and Ms. Bitters sends him off to the nurse to get it taken care of before the other kids catch it, but as he was putting on the exploding hall pass, Dib foolishly tells Zim that when the nurse examines him, she'll notice that he has no human organs and he'll be caught. So Zim decides to go on a *dark harvest* (ah! title insertion!) for human organs by sucking out one organ per person and replacing it with something else. After finishing a drawing of Zim cut open and with his guts spewing on an autopsy table, Dib becomes suspicious of Zim's long absence, and lodges a pencil up his nose to have an excuse to go to the nurse as well. His hall pass is an old heat radiator! Once there, he sees that a kid had his liver replaced with Zim's hall pass, so Dib heads back to the room to warn the class, but it's hard to be in a hurry when you have to lug a 60 pound object with your string beanie arms. When Dib has left, however, Zim's organ remover has come down and took the nurse-who-plays-with-a-moo-can's brain out and replaces it with a soda, so whenever she tries to speak soda fizz comes out of her mouth! When Dib reaches the door, and as Zim is about to remove an organ from him, the lunch bell rings and the opening of the door knocks the helmet thing askew, saving Dib, but no one listens to him when he calls out warnings. They should have listened, for when Dib reached the cafeteria, everyone was stumbling around, all of them missing one organ or another. Even Gaz had something replaced in her with her Gameslave counsel, and she was still playing it through her skin. Sitting at a table is a bloated Zim, stuffed to the literal brim with organs.
DIB: You have a heart?
ZIM: Six of them.
DIB: Intestine?
ZIM: Small and large.
DIB: Spleen?
ZIM: In three different colors!
DIB: Lungs?
ZIM: *silence*
Then he leaves to find some lungs. Dib finds the only other kid with all his organs, Torque, and he tries to protect him, but Torque is caught anyway. Dib is the last child left with all his organs, and therefore he is Zim's last target. He runs hard and far with Zim following in the ducts, but he is finally caught in the boiler room. At the nurse's office, Dib and Zim are sitting there waiting for the nurse to check on them. Dib did have an organ removed and it was replaced by the nurse's moo can, but what organ we cannot say . . . but he moos occasionally. Dib is confident that the nurse will be able to tell that Zim has too many human organs; but she doesn't. She says he's healthy and with such plentiful organs! As she checks on Dib, however, a moo escapes him and she screams bloody hell, saying that it's inhuman. The tabloids print that he is a horrid mooing cyborg cow boy. Poor Dib.
Tie-in: Squigglyspootch. In Germs, as Zim is fighting the germs in his lab, he mumbles to himself, "They're after my squigglyspootch! They can't have my squigglyspootch!" Then, of course, in Dark Harvest he injures his squigglyspootch and he's so confident about visiting the nurse that he'd bet his squigglyspootch on it.
Things: One of the greatest dialogues ever:
DIB: Ms. Bitters! There appears to be a pencil lodged in my brain. Can I go see the nurse?
BITTERS: How far in your brain?
DIB: *pause, looks at pencil that is up his nose* Prettyyyy far~
BITTERS: All right, you may go.
} Dib draws scary pictures . . . *pauses* Hmmm . . . And, hey, slasher folks? There is absolutely NO romantic idealism in that picture! You do not draw those that you have a crush on with their squigglyspootches spewing forth from their ruptured flesh!!!!
} Going on this, please do not put too much in on the quote: "See, Gaz, in order to defeat my enemy I must become my enemy, then move in with my enemy, then wear my enemy's clothes, then--"
} Hey! That was KEEF writhing in pain behind Gaz! I guess he WASN'T killed by that squirrel! Too bad.
} Did ANY of you folks know of moo cans before seeing this episode? It's so sad, I did, and so did Kasey . . . in fact, she HAS one and brought it for me to play with two days straight. But no one at school knew what it was. Are all of you SO deprived?!
} Funny story. My mom likes this show, and I was watching Dark Harvest with her and my little brother. Mommy was feeling really really sick to her stomach because of an ear infection. She nearly vomited with the intestine fell out of Zim's mouth. But she bravely watched on. God bless you, too, mommy.
{Top}

{5} The Day of the Saucer Morons
Disturbing Rate: Low
} Hello from Salt Lake City, Utah! (Well, it was written in rough there while I was on vacation . . .) About five minutes after viewing "Invader Zim" with my bestest friend, I am writing this . . . Wonderful episode. Wonderful. Now.
Investigating Earth defenses, Zim rides his Voot Rider out on a highway and drives in the way of a police car, causing it to crash spectacularly into a weenie stand down below. As Zim heads for home, a bee smacks into his windshield, knocking the Voot Rider completely out of control and it crashed in a wonderful fireball in a park where a convention of UFO worshipers happens to be the next morning. Returning with a tow the next day, dressed as the hobo and with the tow disguised as a giant floating pig, Zim sees the worshipers gathered around his ship. He tries to get near it, but a creepy woman (whose voice I quite liked, though), told him that he must prove himself worthy before he is allowed to approach the "love ship." So, after being initiated, he returns to see that they had found his tow. Losing it, Zim screams and generally loses his cool, making his hat and his lenses fall off. Instead of being caught and dissected as he thought would happen, Zim is worshipped!--which doesn't suit him either. He finally gets a hold of GIR who had been at a discotheque, and told it to come rescue him. A bit later, after being worshipped some more, GIR shows up dressed in a robotic government agent costume, rescues him by claiming Zim is a secret government airplane . . . or something to that effect. (I keep forgetting what it says at that point.) Returning to the pig, the creepy old guy rants about why they should hand over their discoveries to the government, and GIR rubs his head, "I like you . . ." Zim knocks GIR out of the robot and they blast off on the pig after picking up the pod. They happily fly off, putting many children in danger--and a bee smashed into the pig, making it explode and fall out of the sky into an alien discussion convention.
Things:: This was . . . nifty. That chick that was on the pig with Zim and GIR . . . O_o That was me five times worse and with longer hair. Very scary.
} The chick with the purple hair is SHO.
} The producer, whose name I keep forgetting, was back in this episode. He saved a baby from being hit by the pig, and he CRIED. It was cute.
} I knew half of the dialogue in this episode thanks to the Invader Zim Theme Doom Remix! *kiss*
} Some people have been claiming that Vasquez is dancing at the club AND he's eating an ice cream cone by a tent at the UFO worshippers' convention. I haven't been able to confirm this yet, but I'll trust these folks . . .
} What made this episode extra special for ME was that Frank Connif wrote for this episode, AND he was in it. Some of you are probably wondering why the hell THAT'S important, but it is to me because Frank used to be a writer for and act in "Mystery Science Theater 3000," the best TV show ever. He played TV's Frank, the lackadaisical assistant to Dr. F. Frank was also cameoed in this episode, like how Vasquez and the producer are, but I didn't recognize him at first because I only know him with WHITE hair. (Yes, white.) This was his part:
OLD GUY: (this is paraphrased, by the way) Your forecoming was foretold in the prophecies of . . . . . . FRANK.
FRANK: Yup. Told you he'd come.
I'm just so sad he only writes for 7 episodes.

{5} The Wettening
Disturbing rate: Average
} One day it began to rain, and Zim didn't know what it was, and so Dib taunts him.
DIB: What's the matter, Zim, don't they have rain on your planet?
ZIM: Oh, yes, we did. Oh, what rain we had! It was delicious.
The bell rang and all the kids went running out, baa-ing in joy, but when Zim tried to feel the rain, the water burnt him. Dib taunts him more, so do the skool children--they sing and dance and spin about in the sky, and fly about through the air, declaring how much they love the rain. To prove that he could stand the rain, Zim runs out into it . . . and he proceeds to burn and he runs under a tree, screaming in utter pain. Gaz comes out with her umbrella telling Dib that she was going to leave without him if he didn't go then, but he wants to stay to help save the world.
GAZ: (big eyes) Oh! CAN I STAY AND WATCH--oh, wait . . . forget it.
She steps out under the cover of the umbrella. Zim sees her protection and he goes dashing out . . . only to grab Gaz and use her as a cover. The rain stops and so he puts her down . . . and she doesn't look at all pleased. She goes back to get her umbrella and comes running back, intent on smacking Zim with it, but Dib appears, leaping in a puddle, and he splashes both Zim and Gaz. Zim burns . . . Gaz isn't happy. The siblings walk home and as Dib brags about how he had found something that caused Zim great discomfort, Zim leaps out and scares the bajooties outta Dib, making him fall into a puddle. The next day, Dib tortures Zim during arts and crafts, and after skool he pelts him with a water balloon. After jerking about on the ground, Zim and Dib agree to a challenge and Zim notices that he was protect from the water where some glue had stuck on his glove.
Through the weekend, Dib and Zim worked diligently on their projects. On Monday, Dib goes to skool wearing a nifty water pack balloon filler thing that turns into a huge slingshot. Very impressive for a small Earth boy. He fires one at a scared-stiff Zim, but it turns out to be a hologram. Zim is truly up in space with a HUGE ASS water balloon. He sucks up all the water in the area, fills the balloon, and DROPS IT ON EARTH. Needless to say, Dib lost, and he lost even more when Gaz dropped a water balloon on his face as he was floating and muttering, "The wettening . . . the wettening . . ." Pretty much everything was destroyed, including Zim's home, but Zim doesn't mind, he's happy. But as he heads down to the lab via the toilet, his head gets stuck and he starts to suffocate.
Tie-in: There really wasn't one . . . but for sake of saying so, Zim's technology was more prevalent this episode than the others.
Things: I wouldn't be at all surprised if Frank Connif had something to do with that creepy rain song . . .
} Vasquez and the producer were back. Vasquez was at home, enjoying a comic book (Happy Noodle Boy perhaps?), and when all the water was sucked up, his aquarium was emptied and his piranha thrown into his glass of water. He swallowed the piranha and he didn't look too happy about that when he grabbed his chest and groaned. The producer was just buying a hot dog when the water balloon hit.
} Gaz draws scary pictures, too.
} For the record, I love Dib. That's all.

Career Day
Disturbing rate: Average (average-high if you were more disgusted by the molt than I)
} It starts with all the children telling what they wanted to be when they grew up--a doctor, a vet, a fire fighter, lord of all humans, a paranormal investigator and an astronaut. We learn that Ms. Bitters had wanted to be an astronaut, but her dream had imploded on itself, just as everyone else's would--thus it's test time! The students identify ink blots (all of Zim's were "human slave," natch), and when the results were computed, only Dib was told he would be what he wanted to be. Zim was assigned fast food preparation, but he still believed that with his iron fist he can start at fast food and work his way up to ruling the world. They are given adult partners to show them the trade of their jobs. Zim heads for McMeaties with a geeky guy with a huge zit. Dib is with a spooky investigator named BILL. During all this, a rash began to grow on Zim. Zim goes to McMeaties where he believes 8 billion people serve under McMeaties rather than McMeaties has served that many people.
ZIM: 8 billion serve McMeaties? That's more than the world's entire population!
Zim's goal is to reach the top to rule over them all. Dib learns that Bill is a bit loopy; Bill believes in Count Cocofang and other such nonsense, but not in Bigfoot or dinosaurs. Dib learns of the Equinox theory where that very day at five o'clock, when all the planets align, all aliens on Earth will go through a horrible molt for a few seconds. That was why Zim was developing the rash! Dib tries to get Bill to drive to McMeaties, but Bill had to stop to investigate a crop circle (which was made by a very adorable cow that was rolling about on the ground). Zim hears of the Equinox from a customer; he wants to go home, but if he leaves he won't be promoted. . . . Dib finally tricks Bill to go to McMeaties by telling him Count Cocofang would be there. That had been a lie, but the Cocofang mascot dude was signing autographs across the street, so Bill chases after him with a stake, Dib after Bill trying to get him to see Zim. Five rolls around and Zim's disgusting rash expands into . . . a beyond disgusting gelatinous wave with pulsing veins that flows out of every crevice and opening of the restaurant. A few seconds later, it disappears, leaving a green puss mess. Dib sees it all, but not Bill, since he was chasing Cocofang. Dib calls him a jerk. Bill is a jerk, but I still think he is nifty. Oh, and Zim was fired.
Things: This episode proved once again how effing keen Ms. Bitters is. When she went to the door, she hovered there, making jet noises, and when her feet went down, one after the other, they made loud clunking noises. I love her.
} The producer guy was among the adults. (I REALLY need to find out what his name is.) (LATER: Steve Ressel! Thank you, Apricot! I thought that's who it was, but I wanted to be sure . . .)
} Melvin's head snapped off as he was screaming he would be an astronaut . . . I'm just trying to figure out WHY.
} And here's a fun quote to say to any child:
"You poor, doomed child."

{6} Battle-Dib
Disturbing rate: Low
} (Lemme get this out of my system . . .) YAY! ALL DIB EPISODE! YAYAYAYAYAY!

} Now. We learn that Professor Membrane has a TV show, and Dib goes to the studio to see his dad for him to sign a permission slip so Dib could go to a meeting of the "Swollen Eyeballs" to show his findings on Zim. The studio is locked-down and heavily guarded, and the guard seems to take more pleasure in shocking Dib than he does in listening to Dib explain that Membrane is his father. Gaz shows up "to help," but she actually wants revenge since Dib had stolen her pizza. The guard tells Dib that if he wants to see Membrane he has to take a test to qualify for being in the audience. Dib is sucked up a tube (cracking his back on the edge), and he appears in a desk where he has to take a test on math, science, and info on Membrane. It's very scary that all the other kids taking the test know more about Membrane than his own son does. Gaz, coming in through the staff entrance, took a seat behind him, but she keeps popping up in odd places, keeping Dib from cheating (and probably just to unnerve him . . .). Dib passes by .1 percent, and he is sucked up another tube (cracking his back AND head), and he is dressed up in battle gear and thrown into a battle ring where he must fight another contestant--Shunk, a hulking greenish fella with an . . . ODD head. ("More like a reject jelly bean," comes to mind.) Gaz is there to "help," but she only makes it harder on Dib by pissing Shunk off.

} Even though the battle was probably supposed to be the focus of this episode, we shall be skipping over it. Dib basically lost, but as he was being dragged out, he forged a signature on a spare slip and it exploded since that's what the slips were designed to do if forged. As the guards spun around, Dib broke loose and ran away, looking for Membrane's dressing room. Meanwhile, Gaz has found another piece of pizza, but as she was about to eat it, the guards chasing after Dib bumped into her and she dropped it on the floor. Dib finds Membrane, but his father doesn't recognize him in the battle gear (or so *I* assume and believe), and when Dib asks him to sign the slip, Membrane says "no autographs backstage." Dib is caught and dragged out bawling. He had dropped the slip, however, and Membrane signed it anyway. Ecstatic, Dib laughs a victorious (ie: geeky) laugh, and runs off to the meeting. Once there, though, he realized he had left his briefcase with all his evidence in the alley.
DIB: Can we reschedule this?
Tie-in: Dib's paranormal affiliation. (And on a much smaller scale, Gaz's Career Day partner was one of the guards from the studio, thus is probably why she knows of the staff entrances.)
Things: Poor, poor Dib. He tries so hard. But it's nifty that even though he gets the worst end of the stick, those that dish it to him gets punished, too. (EXAMPLES: "The Wettening," Zim gets his head stuck in the toilet; "Nanozim," Zim is flushed down a toilet; on here Gaz loses her pizza again.)
} Muffiny Kasey calls Gaz's huge-ass shining eyes her "Pizza Eyes."
} I wonder though . . . Did Membrane not recognize Dib 'coz of the gear, or would he still not have without the gear?
} I really have nothing else witty or urbane to say.
} Except I hope there are more episodes like this. ^^ Not a whole lot, just . . . once in awhile.

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