Netflix Friday #7: INVADER ZIM

Yes, I bloody know it's Thursday. But Mike does Guitar Fridays. I could change this to Netflix Thursdays, but I'd much rather just post on Thursdays, and chalk it up to whimsy.

Invader Zim is streaming instantly. Oh, you lucky bastards.

"But John," I hear you say. "I can tell from the cover art -- quirky kid's cartoon. I already watch (and am amused by) Adventure Time with Finn & Jake and The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack. I do not need more quirky kiddie time-waster."

You are adorable. Adventure Time and its ilk are genially surreal, the kind of cartoons engineered to appeal to a moderately stoned audience. Invader Zim is E.T. written by David Cronenberg and directed by Takashi fucking Miike. *

Do me a favor, just try the first episode, "The Nightmare Begins". The relentless alien Irkens are setting off on their next galactic invasion plan. To prevent any more of his legendary screw-ups, they exile pint-sized sociopathic Invader Zim to ... well, nowhere. To die alone in space.

This was presented as a children's cartoon.

Zim stumbles upon Earth and decides to conquer it. He wears a backpack that allows him to scuttle around like a spider on spindly nightmare legs; his sidekick is a retarded killing machine/robot disguised as an adorable dog with undead eyes; he passes himself off as a green-skinned bug-eyed middle schooler, which often allows him to experiment on the living bodies of his ten year old classmates. Their. Living. Bodies.

This was presented as a children's cartoon.

Take your pick of moments that will leave you slackjawed with joyous horror.** The surrealist nightmare world of the "Skool". Hamstergeddon, the class pet gone horribly wrong. (where my Lovely Wife and I first heard the phrase we still bellow: "Have some of THIS!") The policeman with the transplanted mind of a squid. The fast food joint known as McMeaty's. The time travel episode where Zim, through proper application of rubber piggies in the time stream, reduces a ten year old boy to a shuddering cybernetic cripple. "A Room with a Moose". The one-two punch of the Halloween and Christmas specials -- the Christmas special is the one where Zim enslaves the world with an army of robotic Santas, while wearing an organic Santa flesh-suit. Santa. Flesh-suit.

This was presented as a children's cartoon.

There are a few clunkers in there, episodes that are more concept piece than story. But creator Jhonen Vasquez was doing something truly original and uncompromising: there was nothing like Zim on TV before its arrival, and nothing like it since its departure. He Made a New Thing.

Allegedly, high DVD sales and rerun ratings mean Zim may be coming back for another run this year. If that's true, time to bone up. If not, revel in what exists.

Invader Zim, streaming instantly on Netflix, is your Memorial Day Weekend recommendation. I know we've got some fans out there, so tell you what -- in the Comments, lay out the "Watch these 10 episodes" list for new viewers who may not want to plow through all 46 episodes.

Oh, and what the hell, it's a sci fi theme. Toss in any sci fi book recommendations you may have.







*Actually it's written by the filthily talented and bent Jhonen Vasquez, creator of the comic Johnny the Homicidal Maniac. But you get the metaphor.

**And I mean "joyous". Zim is laugh-out-loud funny. Oh, it's a high-pitched, nervous laugh, but a laugh nonetheless.