List of Invader Zim episodes

Invader Zim, branded as "Invader ZIM," is an American animated television series that was produced by, and subsequently aired on Nickelodeon. The series revolves around an extraterrestrial named Zim from the planet Irk and his ongoing mission to conquer and/or destroy a dark and satirical version of the Earth. His various attempts to subjugate and destroy the human race are invariably undermined by some combination of his own ineptitude, his malfunctioning robot servant GIR, and his arch-nemesis Dib, one of very few humans not oblivious enough to be unaware of Zim's identity.

Invader Zim was first broadcast on March 30, 2001. The show was targeted at children in their early teens, and met with critical acclaim. However, after the first season the show's ratings began to suffer. Before the second season was completed, Nickelodeon canceled the series, leaving at least sixteen episodes and a planned television movie series finale unfinished. In bad-timed irony,because of its continued fan base and above average DVD sales since cancellation, Invader Zim has been called a cult hit.

The series consists of a pilot episode, forty-six canon episodes, and at least seventeen episodes that were in production at the time of the series' cancellation. As of August 19, 2006, all forty-six canon episodes have aired on television and been released on DVD. Thirty-eight episodes were originally broadcast in pairs, each twelve-minute episode debuting in the same half-hour. There are eight double length episodes. Almost every episode was directed by Steve Ressel; the only exception is the pilot, which was directed by Jordan Reichek.

This list is ordered by the episode order in the DVD releases, with broadcast dates noted for proper viewing.

Seasons

Season		Eps.	Originally aired	Prod. line	DVD release date
					Region 1	Region 2	Region 4
	1	36	2001-2002	100	April 4th, 2010	TBA	TBA
	2	10	2002; 2006	200	April 4th, 2010	TBA	TBA
See also · Notes · References

Episodes

Pilot episode

Title	Writer(s)	Airdate	Ep. #
"Pilot"	Rob Hummel, Ed Scharlach, Jhonen Vasquez & Eva Almos	Unaired	Pilot
Zim finds that he is severely allergic to the school cafeteria's beans, and Dib uses this fact to try to prove to the other children that Zim is an alien. Zim escapes and uses a listening device planted on the back of Dib's head to spy on Dib's house—Zim discovers that Dib intends to kill him with the cafeteria food. Zim and Dib stage an apocalyptic food fight in the school cafeteria, which ends with Zim escaping and Dib being blamed for the food fight. Billy West was the voice of Zim for this episode only. This episode was also created as an animation test. Richard Horvitz was chosen for the series role after the pilot was shown to Nickelodeon because West's voice was too recognizable from Futurama, according to Invader Zim creator Jhonen Vasquez's DVD commentary.

Season 1: 2001 - 2002

Title	Writer(s)	Airdate	Ep. #
"The Nightmare Begins"	Jhonen Vasquez & Rob Hummel	2001-03-30	1
The Irken race is having a great assigning for Operation Impending Doom II, where all Invaders are assigned a planet to conquer. Zim is not invited, as he nearly destroyed the planet Irk during Operation Impending Doom I; yet turns up anyway, and hoping to never deal with him again, The Almighty Tallest send Zim on a fake mission to the edges of their known universe and issue him a dysfunctional Standard Information Retrieval unit who called himself "G.I.R.", where they hope he will die/be lost and never found. Unfortunately, there is a planet called Earth on the outskirts of the Irken universe, and when Zim finds this world he assumes this is the subject of his "mission". After arriving on Earth, Zim attempts to fit in and fools everyone except his schoolmate Dib, a young paranormal investigator, who vows to capture Zim and prove that he is an alien.
"Parent Teacher Night"	Jhonen Vasquez & Rob Hummel	2001-04-06	3A
Parent teacher night is approaching and Zim is confronted with the fact that he doesn't have any parents (Irkens are cloned from a gene bank). He makes use of his robot parents to attempt to fool the students, teachers and parents. However, Zim knows that the roboparemts aren't equipped for such a job. Dib, who brings his dad's communication device, tries to prove that Zim is an alien. The robotic parents malfunction and wreak havoc during the meeting, but nobody discovers that they aren't human or that Zim is an extraterrestrial.
"Walk of Doom"	Jhonen Vasquez & Rob Hummel	2001-04-06	3B
Zim goes on an outing to the downtown area in order to test a new guidance chip he installed in GIR, but when GIR removes the chip before leaving to store a cupcake, Zim and GIR are left lost and having to resort to public transport to find their way back. Their journey home is complicated further by Zim temporally losing his vision by looking at the sun, his disguise being mistaken for that of a bank robber, and his escape from the police being wrecked by GIR replacing his extra rocket fuel with tuna fish.
"Bestest Friend"	Rob Hummel, Roman Dirge, & Jhonen Vasquez	2001-04-13	2A
Zim notices that all the other children in the school have friends except him. This is seen as a threat to his all-important mission, as well as a potential exposure of his real identity. He decides that as he doesn't want to appear strange, he must also have a friend. Zim chooses an annoying classmate named 'Keef' to be his best friend and once people have acknowledged that Zim has a friend, he attempts to abandon him. Keef, however, does not take the hint and so Zim must use more drastic methods to dispose of him. Keef tries to throw a surprise party for Zim, which does not come as a surprise on account of GIR, but instead, Zim makes Keef think Zim is a squirrel.
"NanoZIM"	Jhonen Vasquez & Rob Hummel	2001-04-13	4B
Dib sneaks into Zim's base, takes incriminating pictures of Zim without his disguise on, and puts them on a floppy disk. Zim discovers Dib and shrinks to microscopic size to enter Dib's body. Zim accesses Dib's nervous system, giving him control of Dib's arms, and makes him crush the floppy disk. Dib reveals he has a copy of the disk hidden in his house, so Zim travels to Dib's brain to wipe the memory of where the disk copy is hidden. Dib then swallows a mini-submarine (a creation of his dad's) and begins to fight Zim. When Zim accesses Dib's brain, Dib begins to lose control, and Gaz, who thinks this is merely an online game (and a lame one, at that) takes over. Gaz saves Dib's life and organs from Zim, who is later disposed of, but never realizes that this was more than a video game. This episode also features more intense computer generated sequences. Computer-generated imagery had been used in the series already, but this episode was the most demanding so far.
"Germs"	Jhonen Vasquez & Rob Hummel	2001-04-20	4A
Zim sees a B-movie reminiscent of the 1953 film version War of the Worlds, where an advanced extraterrestrial species is thwarted by common germs. Zim becomes acutely germophobic and dedicates himself to studying and exterminating all of the Earth's bacteria. He goes on incredibly thorough cleaning sprees and uses germ spray on himself and Gir. After running out of germ spray he heads out to buy more, but Gir runs off to McMeaties. He there discovers that he can protect himself from germs using a germ-resistant hamburger meat made of recycled napkins, which is sold there.
"Dark Harvest"	Eric Trueheart & Rob Hummel	2001-04-20	2B
When a pigeon lands on Zim's head in class, he is sent to the nurse for having "head pigeons", but he becomes concerned that the nurse may discover that he is not actually human. To avoid this, Zim steals human organs from other children and replaces them with other objects, resulting in him having multiple hearts and spleens. When Dib notices Zim has been out of class for a long time, he discovers Zim and what he has been doing and tries to stop him. In the end, Zim passes his examination, and after it is discovered that Zim had swapped a mooing can toy into Dib's body, he is immediately dubbed inhuman by the nurse, and is dubbed a "hideous mooing cyborg boy" in a resulting newspaper article.
"Attack of the Saucer Morons"	Jhonen Vasquez & Eric Trueheart	2001-04-27	5A
Zim's spaceship is sent spiraling out of control after an encounter with a bee and it crash lands in a park. A UFO-cult finds Zim's ship and so Zim attempts to recover it. Zim is captured by the group once his disguise falls apart, and they begin to worship him as their prophesied alien god. Zim cannot contact GIR directly after the crash due to GIR's attendance of a rave party. Eventually, Zim gets in contact with GIR who is able to rescue Zim and recover the spaceship, only to crash once more in the midst of yet another UFO-cult as a result of the same bee.
"The Wettening"	Roman Dirge, Eric Trueheart, & Rob Hummel	2001-04-27	5B
During a rainstorm after school, Zim discovers that water has a harmful effect on his Irken skin. Dib also learns this and over the weekend he constructs an automatic water balloon-launching weapon. Zim realizes he must defend himself and he discovers that paste protects his skin from the harmful effects of water. On Monday morning, Dib turns up at school with his weapon, and prepares to annihilate Zim—but when he attacks, he finds Zim has been replaced with a holographic decoy. Zim is in fact on a space station with his own water-based weapon. The space station siphons all the water on Earth (Including all oceans, lakes, and rivers) and into a massive water balloon of his own, which he subsequently drops upon the Earth—causing apocalyptic flooding and destruction and him taking over the world (though no major characters are harmed). The whole water balloon plan was to kill Dib (and possibly any other Zim finds annoying, the more humans gone, the better), but, as usual, Zim goes completely overboard. At the end, Zim marches off to what's left of his base, saying he's going to immerse himself in paste.
"Career Day"	Rob Hummel	2001-05-04	6A
It's career day at school and Dib has been paired with a paranormal investigator named "Bill", while Zim goes to work at a fast food restaurant called McMeaty's. However, after discovering Zim is moulting due to a planetary equinox, Dib tries to convince his new mentor to help him expose Zim. The moulting process, while disgusting and explosive, only lasts a few seconds, so it is crucial that "Bill" pays attention. The expert, however, is not interested and Dib must trick him into going to the restaurant. "Bill" is distracted and fails to see Zim moult. After moulting, Zim is fired from McMeaty's.
"Battle-Dib"	Jhonen Vasquez & Eric Trueheart	2001-05-04	6B
Dib desires to do a presentation about Zim for a meeting of the Swollen Eyeballs, a secret society which attempts to track down aliens and other such paranormal beings. The society requires that he must have a permission slip signed by his father, Professor Membrane, before he can do this though. Professor Membrane has a television show and Dib must endure various trials (including a Thunderdome) to gain access to his father. Dib fails the trials, but is successful in getting his father's signature. However, he cannot give his presentation as he lost his suitcase during the trail (which contained proof of Zim's alien heritage). This is the first of the three episodes to not feature Zim.
"A Room with a Moose"	Jhonen Vasquez & Rob Hummel	2001-08-17	9A
After reminiscing about his mistreatment at the hands of his schoolmates, Zim orchestrates a fake field trip, intending to launch the rest of his class into a wormhole in a spaceship disguised as a schoolbus. The wormhole leads to an alternate dimension which consists entirely of a room occupied by a Moose. How the moose is meant to menace the children is not made explicitly clear, however Zim implies that upon arriving in the alternate dimension, the schoolbus will materialize inside the mooses's mouth, to be eaten whole. After an internal struggle, Dib thwarts Zim's plan by weighing down the right side of the bus, causing it to veer onto an alternate path through the wormhole, a path that leads safely home.
"Hamstergeddon"	Eric Trueheart	2001-08-17	9B
Zim's class at school gets a new hamster, and Zim decides that its cuteness can be used as a form of mind control. Zim attaches a device to the hamster which causes it to grow to Godzilla-like size and develop several superpowers, such as the ability to fire a laser beam from its mouth. Unable to control it, Zim instead allows the hamster to rampage throughout the city. But when the hamster heads for Zim's base, Zim uses his alien technology to launch the creature into deep space. This is the second time in the series that Zim inadvertently saves the human race.
"Invasion of the Idiot Dog Brain"	Jhonen Vasquez & Rob Hummel	2001-08-24	8B
During maintenance of Zim's underground base, GIR's brain is accidentally put into the house's operating system. Zim cannot control GIR and attempts various methods at getting control of the house back. Eventually GIR decides he wants tacos and burritos, and makes the house morphs into a four-legged walker vaguely resembling a dog. The house, with Zim inside, then travels in full view to the restaurant to collect food. When discovering that he no longer has a mouth to eat the food, GIR lets Zim rectify the situation, much to Zim's distaste.
"Bad, Bad Rubber Piggy"	Eric Trueheart	2001-08-24	7B
By using a time portal device, Zim hopes to make a hunter-destroyer machine travel back in time and kill Dib when he is a small child so he can't interfere with his plans in the future. However, Zim discovers that he can't personally travel through time, but he can send objects through the portal, which end up exchanging places with objects in the past: when Zim throws a rubber piggy into the portal the first time, it replaces a tricycle Dib had been riding when he was a small child and in pursuit of an alien, which turned out to be a kiddie bop-bag; as a result, he crashes the piggy (which had replaced the trike) and becomes deformed by the accident. Zim continues to send a series of rubber piggies into the past to harm Dib until he is reduced to a catatonic state. However, this provokes Dib's father into building high-tech cyborg battle armor to protect his accident-prone son. Now the effect is reversed; when Zim sends a rubber piggy back, Dib gets even more badly hurt which makes his father redesign the armor to become even more resilient and dangerous. To stop this entire chain of events from happening, Zim sends a pig back to himself with the message not to use the portal device, thus restoring Dib to normal. Unfortunately, as the piggy must replace an object in the past, the piggy supplants Zim's brain. Zim is now reduced to the mental status of a three-year-old (which raises the question of how he could possibly send the piggy back to replace his brain; see the Grandfather Paradox).
"Planet Jackers"	Rob Hummel & Jhonen Vasquez	2001-08-31	7A
Various earthquakes begin on Earth and Zim attempts to find out why. He discovers that the planet is being stolen by two thieves who intend on using the Earth as kindling for their dying sun. After failing to persuade them to leave the planet for his conquest, Zim goes about stealing the planet back and is eventually successful. The citizens of Earth have no idea what was happening (although the "sky" inside of the capturing shell appears to pulse) and the Planet Jackers never realize that they lost the Earth.
"Rise of the Zitboy"	Frank Conniff & Roman Dirge	2001-08-31	8A
Zim reacts to being covered in grease by getting a zit. GIR enjoys the Zit very much and draws a little face on it, which Zim fears will make him stick out even more. After the Zit grows he discovers that its motion has hypnotic powers so for a little test he uses it on Gir which hypnotizies him. Zim takes a body from his GEARS/CIRCUTS/HEADLESS BODIES box and attaches it to the zit, which he names Pustulio and passes off as a friend. Zim uses this hypnotic pimple to gain control of the school children, and then forces Dib into revealing a weakness in Zim's base defenses. At that point the pimple grows even further and explodes; Zim then leaves to reinforce his base's defenses to remove the weakness, while Dib is forced to clean up the mess.
"Plague of Babies"	Rob Hummel	2001-09-07	10A
Zim fears that he has been seen out of disguise by a human baby. Believing the baby to be a threat to his mission, he attempts to interrogate it, only to discover that it is in fact an extraterrestrial monster that, along with others of its species, has been stranded on Earth since the destruction of its spacecraft years ago. The aliens attempt to steal Zim's ship, but by exposing them to a field that induces stupidity, generated by GIR, Zim is able to incapacitate them and pass them off as human infants once again.
"Bloaty's Pizza Hog"	Jhonen Vasquez & Rob Hummel	2001-09-07	10B
Dib is kidnapped by Zim and taken to a station orbiting Earth for torture and vivisection. Gaz is forced to go to save him so as to be in time for a rare family dinner at her favorite restaurant. Gaz nearly decides to let Zim attempt his experiment of taking out Dib's organs but thinks that Professor Membrane wouldn't allow them to go to the restaurant without reassembling Dib, so Gaz breaks out Dib and takes an escape ship that Zim foolishly guides them to. Zim takes chase in another ship but is taken down by Gaz's superior flying skills (most likely due to her gaming skills such as in NanoZIM). Gaz, Dib and Professor Membrane meet at Bloaty's Pizza Hog and are about to enjoy their meal when Zim bursts through the door. Dib protests that he should finish Zim off but Gaz left him strapped on a platform and he could not move. But Zim becomes afraid of the crudely-mechanized singing animals and runs back out the door.
"Bolognius Maximus"	Jhonen Vasquez	2001-09-21	12A
Dib throws bologna sausage during the lunch break at school, which dissolves Zim's skin. As revenge, Zim places a thumbtack on Dib's chair, which he then sits on. The next day Dib discovers that he smells like meat and is ridiculed by the other children, and at that point Zim informs Dib that his vengeance is complete. Dib discovers that Zim has infected him with a virus that is altering his DNA and turning him into bologna. As revenge he infects Zim with the same virus and as they start turning into sausages (and coming close to being devoured by ravenous feral dogs), they both work together to try and find a cure—only to fail and hide in a deserted house.
"Game Slave 2"	Eric Trueheart & Jhonen Vasquez	2001-09-21	12B
Gaz is in line for a newly released hand-held games console when the person behind her tricks the salesperson into giving the final console to him. Gaz is on the trail of this video game fan boy and pursues him to his home where she removes the batteries. Desperate for batteries so he can save his game, the boy heads to the shopping mall. While in the elevator Gaz scares him into handing over the console. She then puts some batteries into it and continues playing. This episode is one of three episodes not to feature Zim. The ending was quickly tacked onto the episode because Vasquez says that Nickelodeon protested against killing Iggins. It took several meetings before this ending became a reality. Vasquez claims that Nickelodeon protested, claiming that Vasquez was mocking them with the 'flying away' concept. The fictional console Game Slave 2 was originally going to be called the Game Slave Advance. Because of complaints from Nintendo that the name sounded too much like the newly released system at the time, Game Boy Advance, the name was changed.
"Halloween Spectacular of Spooky Doom"	Jhonen Vasquez & Rob Hummel	2001-10-26	16
Dib is doing experiments with his father's equipment until it goes wrong. Dib manages to launch a potal into a monster world in his forehead. Dib now starts passing in and out of an alternate dimension where everything is evil. He manages to force Zim to come into the dimension with him. The monsters capture Zim and say they won't release him if Dib doesn't "surrender his head." It is revealed that Dib's head is the only portal out of the dimension, and all the evil creatures within it want to go through it. Zim saves Dib so that he can get through the portal but he then leaves Dib to the monsters. The monsters have a look through the portal but turn back as they are disgusted by the sight of GIR eating candy.
"Mysterious Mysteries"	Courtney Lilly & Rob Hummel	2002-03-22	14A
Dib goes on his favorite TV show Mysterious Mysteries to tell the world the story of Zim and to share a video of Zim he had filmed. To Dib's surprise, Zim, GIR, and Gaz also appear on the show to tell their sides of the story. They each tell their own versions, which are then performed in reconstructions on the show for the benefit of the viewer. The presenter of the show decides that Dib and Zim are crazy and tells the viewers that nobody will ever know what truly what happened in the video, leaving Zim's cover saved, once again, by the show's character's stupidity. Although he shows signs of insanity himself, the show received strong ratings because "people love crazy".
"Future Dib"	Rob Hummel	2002-03-22	15B
Professor Membrane constructs an energy creating device and Zim gets the idea to sabotage it to destroy the world. Dib realises that he must stop Zim, but during his preparations he discovers a version of himself who is beaten up and hurt laying in his bed. This version tells Dib that he is from the future and he needs his help to stop Zim as he's too weak. So Dib goes to where future Dib told him to go, but it is a trap set by Zim, and the future Dib is in fact a robot controlled by Zim. Dib is stuck in a cage with a monkey while future Dib goes to the starting of the energy device to destroy it. Gaz is annoyed by Dib and beats him up, preventing him from causing the destruction. She then realises he is a robot after one of its robotic eyes pops out. Zim quickly gets over his loss and decides to watch the real Dib getting tormented by the monkey.
"Door to Door"	Eric Trueheart & Courtney Lilly	2002-03-29	11A
The school is having a fund raising door to door candy sale with the promise of a 'secret prize' for the student who sells the most candy. (The candy is extremely hard to sell because it's made up of sawdust. Zim: "Yup, that's sawdust.") Intrigued about what the prize could be, Zim attempts to sell as much candy as possible. Initially he fails, but he then utilizes virtual reality devices to torment innocent people and hence persuade them into purchasing his candy bars. Zimsells a huge quantity of the candy bars and wins the prize—only to find that there is no 'secret prize' and that it was concocted as a method of selling more candy bars.
"FBI Warning of Doom"	Frank Conniff & Jhonen Vasquez	2002-03-29	11B
GIR is watching a rented movie and Zim sees the FBI piracy warning on it. The rental store calls to demand that the movie be returned as it is very over due, but Zim fears that his mission is threatened unless he returns the movie immediately. (The computer, forced to make up FBI facts, gives Zim the wrong idea about what the FBI is. This really scares Zim.) He returns to the mall and breaks in so he can return the disc into the return slot, but mall security discovers him and so he battles through to get the DVD returned.
"Battle of the Planets"	Jhonen Vasquez	2002-04-05	13
Zim is surveying the other planets in the solar system and discovers that Mars has actually been converted into a space vehicle by the previous inhabitants of the planet. Zim decides to use the planet to crush all the lifeforms on Earth, but Dib discovers his plan and attempts to stop him. Dib uses Mercury, which has also been converted to a vehicle, and the two use the planets to battle each other in space. Zim, attempting to lose Dib goes into the asteroid belt but completely loses control. Dib, who thinks he's won, then realises that GIR had destroyed all his evidence recording equipment. This is the second double-length episode of Invader Zim. This episode was planned to be the first season finale until Nickelodeon ordered seven extra episodes for the season. This episode was voted one of the "Top 5 Best Invader Zim" episodes by ToyFare.
"Abducted"	Jhonen Vasquez & Rob Hummel	2002-04-12	14B
Zim and GIR are abducted by two aliens who think of them as human and dog specimens. Zim immediately informs the aliens that he is not human and GIR is not a dog, but they don't believe him as they are stupid. Escaping is not difficult, as the aliens have only managed to stop one specimen from escaping in the past. (The specimen that hadn't escaped had been fused with far too many things, making his body too heavy to move.) Zim and GIR escape the aliens and return to the base. Guest stars: Brian George, Jim Wise.
"The Sad, Sad Tale of Chickenfoot"	Roman Dirge & Eric Trueheart	2002-04-12	17A
Frustrated at how people see paranormal science, Dib sets out to disprove the urban legend of the Chickenfoot, who is actually a man stuck inside a chicken costume. The zipper on the costume got stuck after a microwave exploded at a chicken restaurant. Dib manages to unstick the zipper and remove the suit, but now people are suggesting that all legends, even ones that Dib believes in, are false. Dib protests, but, because the humans find him mentally unstable, they didn't care. This is one of three episodes not to feature Zim.
"Megadoomer"	Roman Dirge, Eric Trueheart, & Jhonen Vasquez	2002-04-26	19B
Due to an angry prisoner who sorts packages, Zim is accidentally shipped a high-powered robot with a cloaking device and he immediately heads off to destroy Dib with it. The robot does not come with batteries, however, so every few blocks, the machine has to be plugged into a new power outlet to stay cloaked. What's more is that the robot is cloaked, but Zim inside is not, making him visible for everyone to see. (Also, the power cord isn't invisible, either.) When he gets to Dib's house the cloak fails, giving Dib a golden opportunity to take photographs, so Zim is forced to destroy the robot. It turns out Dib had left the lense cover on his camera.
"Lice"	Rob Hummel	2002-04-26	18B
There is an infestation of headlice at the school and so a lice hunter comes to investigate the huge outbreak. She quarantines the entire school and Dib believes she is crazy, but it is revealed that there is a giant lice queen beneath the school. The lice hunter soon discovers that the only one who is immune to the infestation is Zim, and uses Zim's immunity to fight the lice queen in a parody of Aliens.
"Tak: The Hideous New Girl"	Jhonen Vasquez & Eric Trueheart	2002-05-10	20
A new girl at school, Tak, joins the class and "has a crush on Zim" according to the other children. Tak is actually an Irken, and reveals herself after many failed attempts by Zim of trying to get Tak to be his "love-pig" so he can find out more about the humans. Tak reveals her plan to be that she will hollow out the Earth's core and fill it with snacks as an offering to the Almighty Tallest. Zim, Dib, Gaz, and Gir team up to try and stop Tak. Zim distracts her in his spaceship while Dib turns off Tak's machine. GIR and Gaz manage to wreak havoc remotely. At the end, Dib laments that he never gets a break in his fight with Zim, only for Tak's abandoned ship to crash right in front of him. Guest stars: Olivia D'Abo, Rob Hummel
"GIR Goes Crazy and Stuff"	Eric Trueheart	2002-05-24	17B
Zim is frustrated with how useless GIR is, and puts him in permanent Defensive Duty Mode. Things start to go wrong when GIR sees Zim himself as a threat to their mission on Earth. GIR escapes to gain more knowledge of the humans so that he can complete the mission. He also tries to kill Zim, with his with his incredable power of his laser eyes. Gir is very hard to capture when he's being dutiful, but Zim follows him and manages to put him back into his normal, broken mode. Zim also will learn his mistake and never put GIR in permanent Duty Mode ever again.
"Dib's Wonderful Life of Doom"	Jhonen Vasquez & Eric Trueheart	2002-05-24	19A
Zim is hit by a muffin during the school lunchbreak and suspects it is Dib, but he cannot know for sure. That night, in a dream, Dib is visited by aliens and they say they have given him special powers. Dib then uses these powers to threaten Zim, who then willingly turns himself in and has gir self-destruct. Time passes and Dib spends his life solving other mysteries and thwarting aliens. Finally, at a very old age, Dib is being interviewed on TV when he is asked if he threw the muffin at Zim and Dib admits it. At that point it is revealed that Zim had simulated Dib's entire life just to find out whether or not Dib was the one who actually threw the muffin. He then proceeds to throw his own muffin at Dib, who then replied "you stink, Zim" and left. Guest star: Greg Ellis.
"Hobo 13"	Eric Trueheart & Danielle Koenig	2002-07-12	15A
Zim requests more powerful weapons but the Almighty Tallest do not want to give them to him, so he is sent to the deadly training planet Hobo 13 to prove he is worthy of the new equipment. Zim, through extreme selfishness and sacrifice of his teammates, surprisingly gets to the end of the trials. The commander, who is appalled at how Zim has acted, decides to take Zim on in a ring-fight, but Zim manages to beat him by using the power from his opponent against him.
"Walk for your Lives"	Eric Trueheart	2002-09-28	18A
Zim is doing time related experiments on Dib, but the experiment explodes. Dib manages to escape but he is "slowed down" and can only move very slowly. Also produced is an explosion, which is also exploding very slowly. Zim decides that the explosion needs to be put into the city cesspit to stop it from exploding and destroying his base. After some frustration and against the advice of GIR and the computer, Zim decides to throw Dib into the explosion to cause it to speed up. The explosion then explodes at normal speed.

Season 2: 2002 & 2006

The second season of Invader Zim began its run in 2002. After the season's first episode the show was canceled and the episodes that had been completed prior to the cancellation were not shown. The remaining finished episodes were released on DVD in 2004, and finally aired in 2006 on Nicktoons Network.

Title	Writer(s)	Airdate	Ep. #
"The Most Horrible X-Mas Ever"	Jhonen Vasquez & Eric Trueheart	2002-12-10	29
Zim discovers how much people like Santa Claus and decides to use this in a plan to take over the world by dressing up in a Santa suit full of data about Christmas. Dib once again tries to stop Zim, but this time has his father's help due to his dislike of Santa. The Santa suit malfunctions and engulfs Zim, effectively turning him into a real Santa Claus. Dib manages to stop the suit and then launches it into space. The episode ends two million years in the future in which it is revealed that the Santa suit (now massive) returns to earth every Christmas to wreak havoc and eat milk and cookies.
"Backseat Drivers from Beyond the Stars"	Jhonen Vasquez	2006-06-10	21
Zim desires to bring his masters, the Almighty Tallest, to Earth to witness his next plan for world domination involving a brain parasite, so he remotely takes control of the "Massive". However, at the time he takes control, the Tallest are under attack from a resistance group known as "The Resisty" (a name met with breath-taking laughter from the Tallest). Meanwhile, Dib has been attempting to salvage/reverse engineer Tak's spaceship (which he acquired in Tak: the Hideous New Girl) and manages to repair enough of its systems to establish a remote connection of his own to get into Zim's computer and wrestle for control of the Tallest's ship. When the Tallest realize what's going on, they transfer Zim's control over to the Resisty so he brings their ship in and they self-destruct. The Tallest then contact Zim to punish him for what he has done, only to find that he's under attack from the brain parasite.
"Mortos Der Soulstealer"	Eric Trueheart	2006-06-17	22B
Dib summons a mystical beast called Mortos Der Soulstealer to attack Zim and prevent him from taking over the world. Mortos will grant Dib anything he wants, but is tired and requests time and food to regenerate. It soon becomes clear that Mortos just wants to have fun and spends time eating and trying on clothes. Dib confronts Zim with Mortos and demands that he fulfill his request to stop Zim, but Mortos grants a random person's request for ice cream instead, and then returns to his realm to rest.
"Zim Eats Waffles"	Eric Trueheart	2006-06-17	25B
Dib has managed to get a spy camera into Zim's base in the hopes of recording some evidence that will prove he's an alien. Unfortunately for Dib, his hard drives aren't working and need to be automatically repaired, so Dib watches Zim while this is happening. It is a quiet day for Zim and he is just eating waffles, but every now and then he reveals part of an evil plan involving cyborgs. Every time this happens Dib tries to contact a member of the Swollen Eyeball to witness it, but by the time they answer, Zim is eating waffles again, and he eventually throws up on Dib's camera. Dib's hard drives finally repair, but then the cyborgs sent by Zim destroy them.
"The Girl Who Cried Gnome"	Rob Hummel	2006-07-15	22A
A girl selling cookies gets her foot trapped in Zim's front yard and it attracts the attention of the neighbors, press and the Earth president. The girl loves all the attention and won't let anyone simply pull her out. Dib manages to persuade the president to use a digging machine to dig under the girl to get her out. He suggests this because then Zim's base will be discovered. Zim finally decides that enough is enough and simply pulls the girl out of the hole. The title is based on The Boy Who Cried Wolf.
"Dibship Rising"	Eric Trueheart	2006-07-15	25A
Dib is again working on Tak's crashed spaceship, which turned on him the last time he activated it because its computer AI is a digital copy of Tak's mind. To stop it from acting so hostile to him he downloads his own personality into the ship. This does not go as planned because the ship then starts to believe that it is Dib. Zim discovers what Dib has done and reminds the ship that it is Irken technology and must do what Zim says. Zim commands the ship to throw Dib into the city sewage plant but the ship remembers that it is Dib, and throws Zim across town. The ship is so depressed that it is "Dib" that it deletes its personality. Guest star: Olivia D'Abo
"Vindicated!"	Danielle Koenig	2006-07-22	24B
Dib sees the school's counselor, Mr. Dwicky, about his problems at school, and Dib tells him about how Zim's an alien trying to take over the Earth. Surprisingly Mr. Dwicky says he believes him and that he wants to help him out. He later reveals to a colleague that this is just a ruse to get Dib to trust him. They trick Zim into thinking aliens are coming to meet him in the woods to give him super weapons but after a while of waiting, Mr. Dwicky reveals he doesn't really believe Dib. At that point some real aliens turn up and offer to take Mr. Dwicky with them. As he loved aliens as a child he jumps at the chance and Dib is left behind with nobody else believing him.
"The Voting of the Doomed"	Eric Trueheart	2006-07-22	24A
Zim decides to use the school's election to gain power, so Dib becomes the manager of his opponent to try and stop him. Zim streaks ahead after making many promises to the students that are crazy, but wins them over anyway. Dib counters this by using a mind control device on the child who's opposing Zim so he can debate him properly. Dib's candidate wins the election, but the school faculty brings him to a lab where they (very painfully) remove his individuality and free will, making him nothing more than a showmen for the oppressive school.
"Gaz, Taster of Pork"	Jhonen Vasquez	2006-08-12	26
Dib discovers that his electronic spell drives still have two credits on them, which allow him to cast spells. Not knowing what the spells would do, he casts one on his sister Gaz instead to see what would happen. The result of the spell is that Gaz tastes pigs no matter what she eats, apart from hot dogs. Gaz threatens Dib's life if he doesn't reverse the spell, so he and Gaz go to another dimension to request the spell be undone. Gaz answers three questions correctly and the spell is reversed. Dib, however, is stuck cleaning toilets with brushes on his head, as part of a deal he imposed on the creator of the spell.
"The Frycook What Came from All That Space"	Jhonen Vasquez	2006-08-19	23
While in school, a mysterious figure kidnaps Zim and takes him into space. It is revealed that this person is an Irken who was previously Zim's jail master before he escaped in the first episode. Zim is put to work in a fast food restaurant on a snacking planet called Foodcourtia. Zim manages to escape before a massive amount of snacking causes the gravity to prevent anyone leaving the planet for 20 years.

Unfinished Episodes

Due to the cancellation of Invader Zim, these episodes were remained unfinished. Rumor has spread saying that Invader Zim is returning in 2010/2011. There are hints going around: 1) Invader Zim Season 1 and 2 DVDs were released on April 4th, 2010. 2) A game called "Good GIR Gone Bad" was uploaded on Nicktoons.com

Title	Writer(s)	Ep. #
"Roboparents Gone Wild"	Rob Hummel	27A
Zim's roboparents go wild.
"Simon Sez Doom"	Courtney Lilly	27B
Mr. Elliot, Gaz's teacher, is running an orphanage care program. Zim joins it so as to take advantage of the game Simon Says by telling the orphans to destroy the earth. Dib joins the program to figure out what Zim's doing. He manages to save the city from the orphans, end the game of "Simon Says", and almost blow up the orphanage by leaving the diaper-changing machine unattended. Voices were recorded for this episode before cancellation.
"Invader Poonchy"	Brent Crowe & Rob Hummel	28A
Zim attempts to distract Dib from him by making it seem as though their classmate Poonchy is also an Irken Invader. The plan backfires when Zim gives Poonchy highly destructive Irken technology. Poonchy believes this technology is merely nothing more than a ton of realistic video games and begins to play. He almost blows up his own house but gets distracted by the fishsticks his mom is making for him. Meanwhile, Dib is telling everyone that Poonchy's an alien. Once this is proved incorrect, Dib is apprehended. Everyone agrees that, out of all the weird things Dib's done, this has to be one of the weirdest. However, they also notice that Zim is weirder than they had expected, seeing as he was witnessed yelling at a "little green dog." Voices were recorded for this episode before cancellation.
"Nubs of Doom"	Eric Trueheart & Jhonen Vasquez	28B
Gir embarrasses Zim in public by running off and stealing cheese, making Zim look stupid. Zim is then forced to dance and sing, "Clown! Clown! Clown!" to entertain the humans that were horrified by his screaming at the cheese-thief. Zim retrieves a new weapon, Minimoose, from Vortian Prisoner #777, and intends to use his new minion to replace GIR. However, the plan backfires when Zim cannot control the weapon's nubs. Had this episode been completed, it would have marked the introduction of Minimoose, who appeared in "The Most Horrible X-Mas Ever". Gir, instead of being insulted by this replacement, activates MiniMoose and asks for a SuckMunkey, which is a type of soda. Since the series was canceled early, this episode was left unfinished, leaving Minimoose without a proper introduction. Voices were recorded for this episode before cancellation.
"10 Minutes to Doom"	Rob Hummel	30A
Zim's PAK gets disconnected, which gives him only ten minutes of time before he dies without his life support system, causing him to slowly lose consciousness and memories within these ten minutes. Seeing this as an opportunity to finally defeat Zim, Dib steals his PAK and intends on keeping it out of his reach. However, this backfires in two ways. The PAK digs itself into Dib's belly and takes control of him. While the PAK is embedded in his stomach, Dib becomes more like Zim, sharing what used to be his ambition of destroying Earth. Dib remains sane enough to fight with himself. With the inadvertent help of Gaz, Zim manages to retrieve his PAK with a second to spare. Had Zim not regained the PAK, he would've died completely. Also, if Dib had the PAK in his body during that crucial second, he would've been completely destroyed. Apparently, the episode was to be set in real-time as a "life clock" would have been present throughout the episode. Jhonen Vasquez planned for Zim to actually die in this episode due to the series' upcoming cancellation, finding it to be a convenient series finale, but Nickelodeon did not allow it in case they decided to bring the show back. As such, Zim reclaims his PAK at the final second. Voices were recorded before the cancellation.
"GIR's Big Day"	Unknown	30B
Zim orders GIR to do some yard cleaning, and is hit by a truck in the process. This causes a sensation among the drivers and the bystanders, prompting scientists to capture him and attempt to clone him. However, during the process, several doughnut crumbs get mixed into the scramble. A script for this episode was never written.
"Return of Keef"	Danielle Koenig	31A
Keef, who originally appeared in "Bestest Friend", comes back to be Zim's friend again, but then becomes friends with Dib when he realizes that Dib, although happy with his paranormal-dedicated life, is extremely depressed by nature. He notices this after Zim pours a popping solution on Dib that will only activate when he's happy, which he never really is. Keef tries to get everyone happy, not knowing about the popping solution and only noting Dib's depression. When he starts to become even more annoying than before, Dib and Zim have to team up in order to get rid of him. During this, Zim actually admits he's an alien in front of Keef the human, even though he's scared of a human ever realizing it. (Neither Zim nor Dib know this, but Dib was a creation of his father's, so he isn't a human in reality. This may have been revealed, had the series continued. So technically, there are no humans aware of Zim's alien heritage.) Keef gets so happy by how Zim and Dib appear to be friends, he pops (he is covered in the popping solution that had not activated on Dib and started everything), and Zim says he willl be out for a few weeks. By the end, everything seems okay, although Zim and Dib are nowhere near friends. Voices were recorded for this episode before cancellation.
"Day of da Spookies"	Jhonen Vasquez & Rob Hummel	31B
Invader Skoodge leaves the Irken invasion force and comes to Earth to live with Zim after he realizes that the Almighty Tallest hate him. Later, Zim, GIR, Minimoose, and now Skoodge go and dress up as ghosts to scare Dib into believing that ghosts exist, provoking him to contact Mysterious Mysteries so they can discredit him. Zim and the fake ghosts get captured for testing, but Dib gets captured for just being insane. The script for the episode was completed.
"Mopiness of Doom"	Danielle Koenig	32A
Dib gives up on the paranormal to study real science like his father. Zim becomes bored with no arch nemesis, skips school, and just lies on the couch all day. While that's happening, Dib is avidly studying science, and, to his dad's surprise, his calculations and formulas are all correct. Later, Gir bursts in and demands that Dib get Zim off the couch because the couch is his. Dib says no, but then screws up a formula. Professor Membrane sees this as "a cry for help" and asks Dib what's wrong. Dib responds, "I'm fine, I just-" then gets interrupted by his dad and tells the truth. The truth is, "You're RIGHT, Dad! I feel empty inside! This REAL SCIENCE bores me to death! Maybe I'm not really doing what I was meant to do! Because what I was meant to do was CATCH ME THAT ALIEN!!" He bursts in on Zim, who's basically just sleeping on the couch. They fight a lot. The two realize how much they need each other and promise to keep fighting till the end. Gir gets his couch back, which he's happy about. Voices were recorded for this episode before cancellation.
"Those!"	Unknown	32B
Zim attempts to take over the world with giant ants the size of a shoe. The title of this episode is a reference to Them!. A script for this episode was never written.
"Top of the Line"	Jhonen Vasquez	33
The Almighty Tallest hold a contest to find the greatest SIR unit. Zim enters GIR into the contest in order to win the prize, as well as the Tallest's respect. Elsewhere, Tak seeks revenge on the other invaders by sabotaging their SIR units, inadvertently causing GIR to make it into the finalists. The script for this episode was never recovered from Nickelodeon, though it was completed.
"The Trial"	Jhonen Vasquez & Eric Trueheart	34
Zim is put on trial by the Almighty Tallest for everything he's done to Irk in his life. The script was completed before cancellation, but no voice tracks were ever recorded. In addition, several designs of this unfinished episode including Almighty Tallest Miyuki and Almighty Tallest Spork were completed and can be viewed online
"It Feeds on Noodles"	Unknown	35A
Zim becomes a vampire that must feed on Chinese food, with chopsticks for fangs. A script for this episode was never written.
"Pants! (When Pants Ruled!)"	Unknown	35B
Zim attempts to take over the world with mind-controlling pants. These pants were actually just aliens shaped like them, and they try to help Zim take over Earth and rebuild his spaceship, but then meet Dib, who claims trusting Zim is extremely stupid and they shouldn't do it. Apparently (according to InvaderZim.tv), Zim and Dib, both wearing these pant aliens, were going to have a dance-off. A script for this episode was never written due to similarities with the title of the first episode of The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius.
"Squishy: Hugger of Worlds"	Eric Trueheart & Rosearik Rikki Simons	36
An enormous creature called Squishy that destroys planets by hugging them finds Earth. A script for this episode was to be co-written by Rosearik Rikki Simons, but was never completed.
"Untitled Season Finale Part 1"	Unknown	39
Meekrob discover Invader Tenn, and hold her hostage. The Tallest must rescue her. All the Invaders must help, actually. Except Zim. But Skoodge is invited. But the Tallest don't know Skoodge is on Earth with Zim, and Skoodge would get in trouble. So Zim goes, and causes a war to begin.
"Untitled Season Finale Part 2"	Unknown	40
The war has begun. Other races of aliens begin to fight against the Irkens, including the Resisty from Backseat Drivers from Beyond the Stars. Dib wonders about Zim being gone, and begins to explore his base and finds out about the war. Skoodge frees Tenn. They escape, and Zim is left. Dib arrives (probably by using the Dib Ship), and begins to fight against the Irkens as well. Dib is named ambassador for Meekrob, and Zim is doomed.
"Invader Dib (Series Finale)"	Unknown	Unknown
In an IGN interview, when asked that "had the series continued, would Zim have been able to conquer Earth?", Jhonen Vasquez jokingly responded "Ultimately, my idea was to take his sights off world domination, as ZIM begins to understand that there is a beauty in human life, an understanding that sets him on his path to becoming a public legal defender. I was very inspired by Ben Affleck's powerful courtroom scenes in Daredevil, and I wanted to move people to tears like those scenes moved me. But the show was canceled before any of that, thus leaving our audience of ten unfulfilled.", leaving possibilities of Zim's fate towards the end of the series open.

DVD release

Further information: Invader Zim merchandise

All 27 episodes of the completed Invader ZIM were released on DVD, along with the pilot, an alternate cut of The Most Horrible X-mas Ever, and audio from seven of the unfinished episodes. Later a DVD boxed set with all the season was added to the market. This came with a box shaped like Zim's house, 46 episodes and all 6 DVDs. The last new episode was in 2005-2006. There was supposed to be 17 more episodes but they were unfinished.