Nick toons are normally well known for being bright and happy beacons of childhood innocence.
They’re usually colorful and the characters are nice and friendly to each other.
However, there is one major exception to this rule; that being Invader Zim.
Unlike the other cartoons Nick aired, it’s well known for just how dark and mean spirited
it is, and that has kept its popularity up throughout the years.
It’s filled to the brim with creepy stuff…
So keeping it contained to just 10 dark moments overall is pretty difficult.
But hey, what were you expecting from the creator of “Johnny The Homicidal Maniac”?
For this list, we’re taking a look at entire episodes; so every single moment will be accounted
for in ranking these disturbing episodes.
Hello, I’m Kyle with WickedBinge, and today, we’re counting down the top 10 most disturbing
Invader Zim episodes.
There are only two things you need to keep in mind here.
One is that any episode will count; if it’s a part of Invader Zim’s line-up, than it
counts.
And secondly, spoilers ahead.
Kicking us off on the disturbing episode train, we have Germs.
This episode pushes just how disgusting the very idea of germs can be.
After watching a movie about how aliens got defeated by people simply sneezing on them,
Zim does his own research and finds out that yes, germs are actually a threat to him.
Thanks to some microgoggles however, Zim is able to find the germs in his own lab and
hunt them down... one overly disgusting blotch of germs at a time...
No matter if they’re pleading for their life.
Now, this isn’t anything too out of the ordinary here, at least in regards to a standard
episode of Invader Zim.
Zim is ensuring that he can’t be killed and does this by simply cleaning his house.
However, it’s how detailed it is that puts it here.
The germs are a gross green color, crawling around all over the surfaces and his robotic
henchmen, GIR.
This ultimately climaxes with Zim covering himself with meat, realizing that the food
has no germs...
Looking both hilarious, and even more disgusting than the germs looked.
In terms of actually being scary, it’s rather low, but it’s here because of just how gross
and disgusting it all looks.
And it’s only gonna get worse from here on out; fair warning.
At ninth place...
It’s the episode Lice.
Take the germ episode from our last entry, crank the stakes up even higher, and you will
get this episode.
After seeing the school get infected with lice, Ms. Bitters decides to call in Countess
von Verminstrasser by teleportation, someone who bills themselves as a warrior against
any and all lice.
She decides to put the school under quarantine, fitting to the theme of 2020, and hunts for
a being that she calls the Lice Queen.
This ends up with the revelation that there is a Lice Queen that is the cause of all of
the lice in the school.
Thanks to Zim’s skin being used as ammo, the school was able to be saved.
There is a lot of dark comedy in this episode, as well as a lot of regular comedy here, putting
this episode relatively low…
Lke with Dib, the person trying to get people to believe in aliens, doubts the existence
of a queen lice in sheer irony.
However, the dark moments can’t go unstated.
A kid ends up scratching his head so much he goes through his hat, his hair, and even
his skin to itch at his skull.
Kids are being shaved, dunked in lice killer fluids, and having monkeys eat the lice off
of their heads.
Of course, we can’t forget the gross lice queen, as well as the queen herself.
Plus, we can’t forget just how horrifying Zim looks after having his lower body shredding
up to provide ammo for the fight against the lice queen.
Overall, saying that everyone gets put through the wringer in this episode would be an understatement.
It’s definitely dark and gross.
Really kicking it into high gear now, up next is Bestest Friends.
After realizing that by not having any friends he looks rather weird and alien to everyone,
Zim is forced to find himself a friend.
After finding a couple students who are equally rejected by the other kids, Zim decides to
put them through rigorous tests to see just who among them is the most worthy of being
his bestest friend.
These tests range from forcing their faces into a puddle of milk, electrocuting them,
and doing something with a toy taxi and beaver.
Whatever it is, it’s certainly painful for the kids.
At this point, it starts to lighten up a bit, with Zim and his new friend, Keef, playing
around during school.
However, at the end of the school day, when Zim doesn’t need Keef anymore, he still
finds himself hounded by him, up to the point where Keef decides to throw a party at Zim’s
house.
Fearing that this will ruin his mission, Zim decides to create robotic eyes for Keef so
that he would think a squirrel is Zim instead.
But wait, doesn’t Keef have eyes already?
Well, yeah, and that brings up to the main reason this episode is here.
Giving Keef a present, Zim watches with glee at the sight of Keef’s very own eyes being
ripped out and replaced with the robotic version.
Pretty messed up.
We’re stretching this next entry a bit, but we had to include it...
Up next is the movie, Into The Florpus.
Here is Zim at his full power, being able to get within a mere couple seconds from his
ultimate goal of destroying the Earth.
After a two year hiatus from trying to destroy Earth just to confuse Dib, Zim reveals his
latest plan.
Realizing that he’s failing the Tallest, Zim decides to just teleport the Earth straight
in front of the Tallest’s space fleet, and let them invade the planet.
This however opens up a portal called the Florpus, which is said to utterly break and
destroy reality as we know it.
This forces Dib and Gaz to not only get the Earth back into orbit in time, but to save
it from the Florpus.
What puts this into the creepy category was just how competent and powerful Zim reveals
himself to be.
He not only managed to get mere seconds away from his victory, but he did it by nearly
killing Dib.
This movie holds nothing back and shows just how terrifying Zim can be.
After only just finding out about Professor Membrane’s latest invention, Zim was able
to not only figure out how they work, but within seconds, had a plan ready to take over
the Earth.
If the fate of the Tallest after they ended up falling into the Florpus due to their hatred
for turning is any warning, then Earth would definitely be out of luck as the planet is
destroyed by that dangerous space hole.
Sure, it’s not as high up thanks to it being just as hilarious as it is disturbing, but
this serves as a clear reminder to never underestimate Zim.
Back with the TV episodes, our sixth most creepy episode is GIR Goes Crazy And Stuff.
Now, GIR is the most lighthearted character in the series; more or less viewing everyone
as a friend and just wanting to have fun in his own weird way.
However, as we see periodically throughout the show, he has a duty mode where he is much
more competent and powerful.
What would happen if he was in that mode permanently?
Well this episode offers an answer.
After getting frustrated with GIR’s antics, Zim decides to power up GIR’s duty mode
to “Dangerously high”, GIR becomes much more aware and dangerous.
He trashes a police car, becomes disgusted with Zim for his buffoonish methods, and in
an attempt to become more useful, raids a library to absorb it of all its knowledge,
and even hijacks the brains of the people in the library to get even more knowledge.
His most dangerous side shows when he chases Zim around the library, ready to kill him,
and would have, if it hadn’t been for Squidman.
GIR may not be as much of a threat as others are normally, but when the chips are down,
and when he goes crazy and stuff, he can be just as disturbing and cruel as the others.
Just past the halfway point, we have our next episode, Dark Harvest.
Bet you were expecting this episode to be in the top spot, weren’t you?
Well, you’re right, in that it is disturbing and creepy, but also, take this as a testament
to just how horrifying the other episodes are.
If you even heard a bit of this show, you probably know about this episode.
Zim has to go to the school nurse after getting a case of head pigeons.
Realizing that without human organs the nurse may find out he’s an alien, Zim decides
that the best course of action was to replace body organs from the kids with miscellaneous
items, and give himself those organs.
There is no getting around how disturbing it is, with Zim’s victims all reacting in
some pained way.
The plan itself is a parody of the Invasion Of The Body Snatchers, with the climax being
Zim chasing Dib around the school: a mixture of A Nightmare On Elm Street and Alien.
Zim also ends up becoming a disgusting body filled with different organs.
Heck, this episode was part of a court trial case of Scott Dyleski, claiming this episode
was what inspired him to kill his neighbor…
Seriously.
Now, the official records did say he was joking, but given the subject matter, feel free to
question the validity of that.
At the very least, the kids are still alive in the end…
So that’s good… right?
What episodes could be worse than Dark Harvest?
Well, Bolognius Maximus for starters.
In comparison to the kids at least still keeping most of their biology intact, here, Dib and
Zim receive no such luxury.
After being assaulted by some bologna from Dib, Zim decides to return the favor by making
Dib sit on a tack.
However, this isn’t any tack, as this one was a tack that Zim made specifically for
Dib.
What does the tack do?
Why, it turns you into bologna.
Your body swells up, you start to smell like bologna, and you even begin to taste like
it.
Dib finds this out the hard way after waking up to the smell, being hounded by dogs, and
that he even tastes good.
His own sister even rips a piece of his head off, eating it casually.
It gets worse once he infects Zim in order to force him to create a cure.
His own house’s computer doesn’t recognize him, and that he was transforming much quicker
than Dib.
Dib and Zim are just reduced to pieces of meat, forever, until the end of time...or
at least the next episode.
Either way, this definitely isn’t a note that I think anyone wants to go out on.
Our bronze medal for the most disturbing Invader Zim episode goes to Bad, Bad Rubber Piggy.
While Zim has done outlandish and evil things in the past, he really didn’t seem that
sadistic while doing it.
Yes, Zim has fun while doing his deeds, but his actions are influenced by his warped ideology
more than anything.
Here however, is Zim taking the most pleasure out of purposefully crippling a human life,
laughing to himself and cheering himself on, even celebrating with a drink.
At this point, Zim is just tired and through playing around with Dib, and wants to get
rid of him once and for all.
His solution?
Use a time machine to send a battle mech to the past to shoot up Dib when he is a much
younger kid.
Now, trying to kill a little kid is bad enough, but Zim takes it even further.
Upon realizing he isn’t killing him but just crippling him with a rubber pig, Zim
decides to just toss more pigs into the past, resulting in the younger Dib getting more
and more injured.
If that wasn’t bad enough, the current Dib is shown getting weighed down by his past
self’s injuries, and even ends up dying on Zim’s doorstep.
Things do lighten up a bit afterwards however, as thanks to Professor Membrane, Dib’s father,
he was able to pretty much repair his son thanks to a powerful robotic suit, and Zim’s
attempts to stop the angry and powerful new Dib only makes things worse for him, accidentally
giving his nemesis missiles as he tosses rubber pigs into the past.
Eventually, Zim was able to turn everything back to normal with one final rubber piggy...only
to lodge it inside his past self’s head, and pop his brain out.
Overall, there is a clear lesson we can learn from all of this.
Don’t time travel.
Just don’t do it.
Our silver medal of darkness and horror goes to Gameslave 2.
Gaz was already the most horrifying character on the show, with how emotionless and cruel
she can be to others without a care in the world.
In Gameslave 2, we see her being her scary usual self, but with full intent on scaring
someone.
After getting her copy of the Gameslave 2 stolen by a boy named Iggins, she becomes
hellbent on getting back that system.
Meanwhile, Dib, is sent on a wild goose chase, looking for a chupacabra, and after realizing
there wasn’t one, is more or less brushed aside for the rest of the episode.
What follows is her channeling horror movie cliches.
Stalking him all the way to his home, invading his house, leaving messages on bathroom mirrors,
and stealing his batteries as the system runs out of power.
Gaz goes above and beyond in trying to get her system back.
This culminates with her sending an elevator with her and Iggins flying down, and only
stopping it once she gets the system.
From traditional horror movie tropes to willingly killing herself and a kid if he wasn’t willing
to part with his game system, she has single handedly earned the second place spot here.
For our gold medal for darkest invader zim episode... there could only be one winner,
and that is the Halloween Special Of Spooky Doom.
Now, all these other episodes had the horror and disturbing imagery as just a side effect
of the story they were trying to tell.
Here however, horror and fear take center stage, with the show purposefully trying to
scare the pants off the audience.
In this double feature Halloween special, Zim, after hearing about the holiday from
Ms. Bitters and her twisted world view, believes that the kids have turned into monsters who
feed off candy.
After fleeing from school, he spends the episode locked up in his house, protecting himself
from these candy hungry monsters.
Pretty normal antics from Zim, sure.
However, Dib is much worse off, as he is losing his mind and acting much more paranoid than
usual, apparently seeing hallucinations.
He ends up being sent to an actual mental ward, only to be stopped as he is sent to
another world; one where those hallucinations are very much real.
After getting trapped in the nightmare realm with Zim, the two of them have to work together
to get back home.
This episode’s entire purpose is to just create as many scares as possible.
The nightmare realm lives up to its name, with the already twisted world of Invader
Zim being cranked up to the max... with much more graphic and disturbing imagery and warped
buildings.
The residents of this world are just as scary, with Nightmare Professor Membrane being a
ghoulish figure with tentacles from his robe, being able to spawn from nothing...
Nightmare Gaz acting more like an animal and having a very deformed mouth… and Nightmare
Ms. Bitters loping like an unholy amalgamation of various insects.
With horrifying character designs, a highly disturbing landscape and all sorts of horror
and fearl, we’re confident in giving the Halloween Spectacular Of Spooky Doom our number
one spot for the most disturbing Invader Zim episode.
And with that, the nightmare is over as our list concludes.
What do you think is the darkest Invader Zim moment?
Let us know in the comments below.
Hit that notification bell and binge our videos.
But most importantly, stay wicked!