#what she's done! Unjustifiable! And she knows it!! And instead of wallowing in that. She tries to be better. And she doesn't ask

[radical-dadical-rafael]

I so understand why ppl like making content where Jon and Daisy are friends but have you considered the fact that um. They wouldn't be.

[ckret2]

Knowing what a florpus is now, how would you have done the IZ special?

Well, first off, I would’ve given the Florpus a LOT more character development. Where was its pathos? Its depth?? And I don’t mean the depth of its black hole like portal, I mean its emotions. What were its motivations? Why does it throw people into alternate universes? Is it, somehow, trying to escape its present universe—trying to escape its tragic existence? Does it long to flee to a new life, but can only fling others into those new lives instead? Does it experience a longing? Does it yearn for that freedom? Does it—

No but seriously.

I’m gonna be nitpicky because there’s no point in answering a question like “how would YOU have done it??” with “oh I would have done it, like, the same, in all these areas,” so I’m focusing on the things I feel coulda used tweaking, with a few mentions of things I thought were particularly good additions.

With a few days’ distance? I still think the moments I’m iffiest about are the moments around Dib that get some, like, emotional depth/kindness—although at this point more because they stick out and feel a little shoehorned in.

- His moment of “wow, we’re the same” with Zim feels absolutely unnecessary, when it didn’t really lead to anything—not a later “HOW COULD YOU BETRAY ME WHEN YOU KNOW WE HAVE THE SAME STRUGGLES?!” “BECAUSE I DON’T CARE ABOUT YOUR HUMAN STRUGGLES, LOL”; not a moment where Dib reconsiders his actions based on this new empathy; not even a joke about how Dib’s totally willing to use Zim for his own purposes anyway. It’s pointless. it goes away immediately. Either do something with a comment that big and heavy or leave it out, what’s the point of Dib having a moment of groundbreaking status-quo-shattering empathy with Zim if 1) it doesn’t effect anything, and 2) the movie doesn’t even bother to lampshade that it doesn’t effect anything?

- Gaz’s comment about how she’s only mean to Dib because she knows he can take it, while nice to have confirmed, also feels a little under-justified. Like it’s really pretty obvious that the line was in there because they wanted to establish that new characterization for her. Dib said “Why aren’t you saying I told you so?” and she could’ve left it at “because making fun of you is no fun when you’re this sad” and it would’ve felt more natural. If they wanted her to get in the “I’m only mean because you can take it” line, it would’ve worked better if like, Dib had been going “go on! beat me up! kick me in the head! tell me how terrible i am! i deserve it!” in an actual excessive display of looking-for-punishment; and then it would be more natural for her to feel like she had to step back and explain their whole relationship dynamic to him. What we got form Dib was... okay, it was excessive by normal standards, but not by Invader Zim standards.

- And the part that felt the most off to me was Prof Membrane telling Dib he was always proud of him. In a movie where he demonstrated no pride in him at any point, unless you count the rather backhanded “this is a very impressive fake space ship.” And in which Dib’s greatest achievements—his rescue of his father, his efforts to fight Zim, his demonstrating abundantly over and over that aliens are really real—are all dismissed by Membrane as hallucinations. It really... really doesn’t feel like Membrane is proud of Dib, in the slightest, about anything. Because there’s no evidence backing up the statement in the movie. (Or, for that matter, in the show that the movie follows.) It honestly feels like Membrane, who thinks all this is fake, is playing along with the fantasy idea that he’s got a son to be proud of, the way he plays along with the fantasy robot invasion by fighting it off.

And that would be a fair way to play that line. It would throw the whole “let’s give Dib a little more love and kindness” thing out the window completely—but yeah, deliberately playing Membrane’s “I’m proud of u” as a lie he trots out in a world that he thinks is imaginary would be a very interesting take—an exquisitely painful dagger in Dib’s heart, hearing the words but only in a context where he knows that they can’t possibly be true. From the framing of the scene, though, I’m p sure we’re supposed to consider his words 1) touching, and 2) sincere.

On the other hand, to make it actually sound sincere? We’d need something, somewhere, anywhere, to point to to show that he actually is proud of Dib. The “this is a great not-real ship” line edges close. It would take something like that, where he shows he’s proud of the things that Dib achieves that Membrane DOES believe in—the impressive surveillance equipment array in his room, the inventions he’s made in the past while chasing around Zim, etc etc. Something like that, earlier in the movie, where he shows that there are indeed things he’s seen out of Dib that he’s proud of.

A thing the movie did get right with Membrane: it actually does feel like Membrane loves Dib, even when he doesn’t believe a word he says—which is a big shift from the show. In the movie he’s just oblivious rather than neglectful. It wouldn’t be hard to jump from “love” to also including “pride,” but it doesn’t quite make that leap. Still, though, the love is there, and that’s important.

So: either make it really clear that Membrane is lying because he doesn’t think any of this is real and would like to imagine that in this fantasy world he can be proud of his son, so that it’s extra painful and we can wallow in that pain; or establish that he actually is proud of Dib and give us enough evidence that we can see that even if Dib can’t as long as he’s hanging all of his hopes on being believed about aliens; OR, hell, just have Membrane acknowledge that this is reality, accept that this will be one thing where the status-quo doesn’t snap back at the end of the movie, and have him go forth and believe in Dib in whatever hypothetical future Invader Zim projects might come to be. He shouldn’t need to believe in Dib about aliens to still be a parent who’s proud of his child—and I do like that message, even if it feels unjustified by the script in its current form—but if he did believe Dib, there would be no “... wait, really? that ain’t true” when he tells Dib he’s proud of him.

Other little things I would’ve altered: it felt sorta cheap to have this “GO TO OTHER UNIVERSES!” portal and then they didn’t go through it. they went halfway through it and jumped through some art styles but, like... When Star Wars introduces the Death Star you wanna see it blow up a planet, and then it does. When ETF introduces the Florpus you wanna see it spit Earth into another reality, but we don’t get to see that. Just a quick shot of puppet Tallest who went there instead of our main characters.

And the last: Dib hauling Zim in to show him off and then that NOT happening was sorta... hm. Someone once pointed out to me that Simpsons episodes are completely and utterly unpredictable because the plot that the episode starts on is about a million plots away from where the episode ends up; the episodes’ set-ups and the punchlines have nothing to do with each other, it’s just One Thing After Another that veers in new directions. And it sorta felt like that. We were setup for this thing and then it veered into a new direction. It didn’t feel like a twist, it didn’t feel like a subversion, it felt like we were set up to do one thing but only half-assed our way into setting up that thing before going in another direction. The plot sorta steadies out once Zim seizes control of Membrane’s lab.

Things I wanna make a note of praising though because I feel they’re particularly worth keeping:

In the show, it sorta felt like all the characters lived in their own emotional bubbles and took turns saying their own thoughts without really, like, absorbing each other’s words. It feels like they don’t acknowledge each other’s personhood/inner lives. Like, to every individual character, they are the only person who exists, and everyone else is an automaton or an NPC to them. Whereas in this movie they actually talk to each other and process each other’s words and thoughts. They converse, they don’t just take turns monologuing. That was nice. It was shockingly different—and it’s amazing, how different the movie feels from the show just from how it handled the dialogue!—but it gave their character relationships a richness that the show didn’t have.

Gir’s song is flawless. It had exactly the right tone. It was the perfect mix of banal, cheesy, catchy, and weird. I was delighted.

The characterization of the Tallest—especially their bullying that poor navigator—was also utterly flawless. Spectacular, delightful stupidity.

The computer, I think, had more personality in the movie than in the show. It had a good deal in the show, but the sass and resentment is oozing here. I love everything about it.

Foodio 3000, Clembrane, and the robot army were all wonderful characters, and I adore each and every one of them. Especially Foodio 3000, whom I would like to adopt, and not just because I can’t cook. Clembrane, I think, could still use a little polish—his character is still a little bit rough around the edges to me, I woulda worked on him a tad more—but he’s still a fine addition to the Membrane household.