Hold Up You Are So Freaking Onto Something That Is Equal Parts Funny, Genius, And Absolutely Horrifying

Hold up you are so freaking onto something that is equal parts funny, genius, and absolutely horrifying

*chef’s kiss* And you know what the REAL fucked up bit of irony is?

Zim isn’t even fighting alone. Dib is.

No matter what an antisocial, hazardous ally Zim makes, he STILL gets more barebones emotional support from the litany of defective machines he creates and surrounds himself with than Dib can reliably get from the very family he lives with. Zim STILL has a tool like Skoodge lining up to be his punching-bag/sidekick whether he wants that or not. He has an affectionate little companion in minimoose and an enthusiastic slave in GIR even if the latter is much less competent and even if Zim is emotionally willing to move on from them with barely a whiff of grief, thanks to the whole list of things probably wrong with his PAK.

He shoos off, mistreats, or outright destroys 99% of the beings crazy enough to team up with him, while Dib is. Freaking yearning for what Zim has and he can’t get it. He’s only some brooding works-alone antihero because he can’t get anyone else on his side. He’d love being in a whole team, he joined the Swollen Eyeballs for crying out loud. Gaz is the only close person who at least believes in Zim’s true identity, and for that she’s constantly dragged against her will into Dib’s antics. Literally refers to her as a sidekick, infodumps his updates on Zim to her, more than once contacted her for help when in a sticky situation no matter how delusional you’d have to be to assume Gaz gives one flying eff about exposing some idiot alien. Like, Dib wants them to be Dipper and Mabel Pines so badly it’s sad.

Tak shows up, shows the smallest bit of curiosity toward his hobby, and makes it clear that she has a bone to pick with Zim and it’s an entire buzzkill to Dib that Zim would barge in later and reveal that Tak is supposedly the same as him, if not a worse threat. One of the most genuinely hurt and snuffed out moments Dib has in the show was over finding out Dwicky was just humoring him at best and didn’t turn out to be a true partner in fighting the bad guy(s). Even with EVERYTHING else wrong and warped about Zib, his willingness to work with others, protect another Dib, and actively want a like-minded friend around him that isn’t a drone is not something he inherited from the parasite clinging to his skull.

There’s no “probably” about how that feeling of isolation is getting to him. “Vindicated” basically flayed that part of him open for all to see but it leaks through in every single time his eyes light up at being told by anyone that they’re here for him in this war.

Honest truth, with every episode of this messed up show I finish rewatching I’m more are more sure that Dib is just as incompetent and short-sighted when it comes to his “mission” as Zim is. But it’s so funny to me that while Zim just makes bad plans, has awful priorities, and improvises a lot by the seat of his pants, Dib’s incompetent in the classical bumbling villain sense. Like, he’s doing the right thing, he generally has clever approaches and insights, makes full use of his resources, yet,

He’s still aesthetically and narratively such an antihero, the poor dweeb.

Observe, my magnificent Venn diagram

Only thing I didn’t want to tack on that because it bears worth of some more elaboration: Both of these two are horrible about recklessly arming their nemesis with tons of free information and striking opportunity that can only be used against them.

And Dib is worse at this, like, so… so much worse. Zim will do the classic ‘Muahahaha, now that I have you right where I want you, here’s a detailed presentation of my entire insidious plan, Batman!’ routine while at least having the class to wait until the hero is being lowered over the acid vat or tied to the train tracks. Dib, as a villain? Would start reciting that same speech while in the middle of trying to kidnap the hero, about 3 and a half steps way too early. It’s actually crazy how fast he will telegraph his next move even when he’s not in a position of having a real advantage yet.

The first time the two met and Dib stood there loudly showing himself as the most perceptive and hostile human in range? And then stood there explaining alien sleep cuffs and what he was going to do with them? And then stood there declaring war and that he’d identified Zim’s base location, swinging said cuffs around in front of the gnome brigade? Granted, he wasn’t aware of Zim’s security at the time, but the essence of that sequence was a pattern that he was more than happy to keep repeating for the next couple seasons.

Also, Zim’s brutalism, while it went to some shudder inducing places, is more expected from a genocidal maniac born from a race of colonial supremacists. It’s part of his theatrics and it’s fun for him in the same way it’s fun for his leaders to blow up innocent ice cream space-trucks and unlucky planets. Dib gets mean with their face offs in a way that’s just dripping with spite. All the time spite. Trivial, personal, petulant spite. Even more than Tak and her grudge, which, should be a lot more surprising to me. But it’s really not.

What it did do instead was remind me of a very interesting quote I once heard, from a Cracked video about online gaming behavior, of all places,

I so adore this one. Not my favorite from Lovecraft but absolutely within the top 5. Wayne June never misses, and this is no exception

Ngl I had a Vortian OC concept rattling around in my head since summer of last year that was basically this

Yeah, these threats come off as desperate raving on Zib's part, and largely they are, but also? Given the two guys he's a combination of, I actually don't doubt for a minute that Zib will eventually carve a way out, even if he has to tear a million different realities to ribbons to do it. All involved parties ought to be very, very concerned

My favorite fanon thing with this show is when people frame Zim’s exile and the way his society looks down on him as like a poor ugly duckling who’s amazing potential was overlooked (that would be Skoodge) or like a divergent mind among heartless conformists and it’s like

no they don’t hate him because he’s different™ they hate him because you can’t leave him alone for 2 minutes without him remorselessly decimating his own kind. They’re understandably terrified of him.

To his people he’s like a dozen Jeffrey Dahmers stuffed into one broken computer. Red is leading a flight of ships across the galaxy to subjugate and exterminate other species and the full extent of Zim’s actions horrify and disgust him. Zim has accurately been called a monster by aliens and his own. Yeah, a monster they created in part, but the rap sheet is what it is. Even if Irk were some utopia, I can’t imagine what kinder and more lenient action you could take regarding handling him besides imprisonment or exactly what Red did. He can’t be reasoned with, he’s a manic loose canon, and every time you stick him in the same playpen as other Irkens, well, sometimes you lose a bunch of your most valuable soldiers, sometimes you lose a couple of almighty Tallests. Bro doesn’t just not value “other” life like the rest of them, he doesn’t even value Irken life. And then he turns around and brags about it. Brags about nearly annihilating their civilization like you should be giving him awards for cutting your brake lines and shooting you in the back. I don’t care if it was ‘just a misfire,’ I pity him and I’d still be gunning for his trial if I was among them too, if it takes away the gun!