Nickelodeon's Biggest Mistake

Aka "Don't Hire a Guy Who Draws a Comic Called 'Johnny the Homicidal Maniac to Make a Children's Show"

Invader Zim. Those of you who had the pleasure to see it back before it got cancelled know what I'm talking about. It basically consisted of an alien constantly shouting hilarious things while his fucked up robot dressed as a green dog danced and ate various foods. Now, this sounds lame and childish, but the show has lots of dark humor and less than happy endings. It was made by Jhonen Vasquez, drawer of the comic "Johnny the Homicidal Maniac." This shoulda been the first clue to Nickelodeon that they did not want to make this a children's show.

For example, there is an episode called "Dark Harvest." In this episode, Zim a pidgeon flys into the classroom and lands on Zim's head. The teacher then tells him he has "Head Pidgeons" and to go to the nurse before it spreads to the other students. Not so twisted. But Zim's arch-enemy Dib points out that the nurse will notice his lack of organs (Irkians like Zim instead have a Squiddlyspooge). So Zim decides he needs to get him some of these organs. The episode degenerates into something from a fucked up horror film as Zim, bloated from dozens of stolen organs, crawls through the ventilation system using his spider-like claws in his pack-pod, systematically stealing more organs from kids and replacing them with.... stuff! The episode features dozens of children getting their organs removed, x-ray glasses to show views of the children with various organs replaced with everything from cats to the 62-pound auxilary hall pass, a bloated Zim vomitting up an intestinal tube only to slurp it back up like spaghettic, and cooing doom dropping from the ceiling. It's just so twisted and wrong that I can't possibly see how they could have intended this to be a children's show at all.

And yet Nickelodeon refuses to sell the rights to the show to other networks like Cartoon Network to be put on Adult Swim, despite having cancelled it and having no indication of wanting to start it back up again.

Bah, I hate Nick. First Rocko's Modern Life, Ren and Stimpy, and Angry Beavers, and then Zim. When will the madness end? Oh wait, they already cancelled the only four good shows they ever had, the madness is already over and dead. Sure, if you're willing to fork out outrageous fees to your cable company you can still find these shows on the Nicktoons channel, but never again will they see the light of day.

Zim, I will avenge thee. Well, probaly not, but just maybe one day. Then those fools at Nick will be sorry.

-Vampire_Ninja