#zim age discourse

[fanboyvini]

i've been noticing this pattern for a while now, and i can't think of anything other than that word that starts with homo and ends with phobia

[fanboyvini]

The “zim is an adult” thing just creeps me out too much to accept as canon. He’s attending an elementary school and joining Girl Scouts and tries to get what he 100% thinks is a ten year old girl to date him and he looks and acts similar to the other kid characters and I’m meant to parse him as like a 55 year old man? I’m sorry I can’t JV it’s just too fucking weird. If people wanna interpret him that way fine but it weirds me out too much

SAME!

I don't even think it would make sense to see him as an adult, I know he's tecnically the same age as the Tallests, but it's so obvious that Jhonen did not create him with the intent to make him an adult/much older than Dib, and it stays like that for at least 99% of the series (if we want to count the "Zim and the Tallests are the same age" as a proof that Zim is an adult).

[emeraldspiral]

Looking at Invader Zim age discourse trying to claim that X number of years in one species's lifespan is the equivalent of 1 human year makes all of my brain cells want to commit die. It's "Loki is 16" all over again. I'm begging yall to get off social media and take a science class cause Jesus Christ how do you function in society being this ignorant?

Different species do not mature at the same rate relative to their lifespan. Grogu being a toddler for 50 years is not a thing that actually happens in nature.

Let's look at dogs for a second. It's commonly said that a dog ages 7 years per 1 human year. Most dogs live about 10-13 years, or 70-91 years, which sounds about right, doesn't it? But some dogs live to see 20-31, or 140-217, way longer than any human has ever lived. But let's also consider their early development. Dogs can start walking after just a couple of weeks while human babies take several months. Dogs can reach adulthood and sexual maturity in less than a year. Some 7 year old children do experience premature puberty, but this is far from being the norm and does not mean they are fully mature adults. Additionally, it is said that a fully adult dog only has the cognition of a 3-5 year-old human child. No matter which way you look at it, you can not equate the way a dog matures and ages to human development and lifespan.

Most newborn animal species, regardless of how long or short their lives are, are much further along in their development than human babies are, closer to toddlers than infants. Many are able to walk or crawl within a few days or even minutes after birth. Compared to most animal babies, human babies would be considered extremely premature.

With Zim, we saw onscreen that as a newborn he could walk, stand upright, jump, grab and hold things, and speak, more like a human 3-5 year-old than an infant. If we were going by the logic of "1 Irken year is 10 human years" that goes around in fanon, 10-year-old Zim should still be a baby, only barely be able to walk, pick up objects, and say a few words. But in the unfinished episode The Trial, concept art for 10-year-old Zim shows him looking like about what you'd expect the actual Irken equivalent of a 10-year-old to look like; taller than a newborn, but smaller than an adult, which for Irkens doesn't get much taller than a human 12-year-old with rare exceptions. There really is no basis what-so-ever to assume that Zim has only developed to the equivalent of 12 or 16, especially when he has a job in the military and lives on his own with no supervision. I don't know why anybody who headcanons that for shipping reasons would even want that to be the case when by that logic it would mean Dib and Gaz and any other human characters they want to pair him with would very quickly grow up to be adults while he remained a child.

In most cases, when dealing with extremely long-lived fantasy/sci-fi races, if the rate of aging is addressed at all, it is much more likely that the characters develop at the same rate as humans until they reach their 20s, at which point they'd be fully mature physically and from then on their bodies would simply not break down and display signs of aging as quickly as a humans. It makes no sense for a humanoid species to remain in a state of helpless infancy for decades or spend hundreds of years going through puberty. The only times you'll usually ever see something like that in fiction is if it's being played for a joke, or because the writers actually wanted to address how messed-up it would be to be to go through developmental stages like that for so long. Usually it's not even a matter of aging, the characters are just vampires or androids or something stuck at whatever age for eternity, yearning to grow up but never being able to.

Keep in mind however, that physical age and maturity are separate things. There's no reason to think that just because a character is immortal or long-lived that they mature as slowly as they age. Maturity has a lot more to do with life experience than physical growth, especially once your brain finishes developing at around 25. Often in fiction, when dealing with an immortal adolescent, being condescended to as if they were a child is a source of great frustration because they do have the mind of an adult. On the flip side, even in real life some people in their 30s, 40s, and 50s may be stuck in a state of arrested development, with teenagers surpassing their level of maturity.

My personal interpretation of Zim is that he's a manchild. He probably aged more or less like a human until his 20s and then stayed physically 20-25 for decades or centuries until the time the show takes place. He's just so immature he finds his equal in a 12-year-old human child. However, if he were to stay on earth long enough, I could see him maturing along with his peers at skool and starting to act more his age when they get into their 20s, (assuming he actually follows them to hi skool and college and doesn't just keep repeating 6th grade forever). If he stuck around Dib and Gaz into their 30s and beyond, I could see him continuing to match their level of maturity into their old age while he remains physically young.

If you have a problem with Zim being canonically an adult pretending to be a child, I don't know what to tell you guys. Like, if you think it's sad, that's the point. Literally, in the commentary for Mortos, Jhonen says that's the joke. That Zim's "basically an old man" getting into slap-fights with actual children and it's funny because it's so pathetic. If you think it's creepy, that's also kinda the point. He's a villain. The fact that he's not even human and that he's plotting the demise of the human race is already disturbing. He steals a bunch of children's organs in like, the third episode. He used time-traveling rubber piggies to maim and eventually kill Dib starting from when he was a toddler and then took a victory sip after watching the life leave his eyes. The entire concept of Zim is inherently sinister and predatory. But at the same time, Zim being a sexual threat is completely off the table. Canonically, he's aroace. He has no reproductive organs and no sex drive. He finds humans repulsive, and between that, his germophobia, and general paranoia it would be far more in-character for him to be terrified of the prospect of unwanted sexual advances than to be a sexual predator himself. That's why I don't think anybody thought too hard about Zim trying to woo Tak when he thought she was an actual human child, and why you shouldn't either. Yes, he had ill intentions toward her, because he is a bad guy, but those intentions were entirely chaste. Zim is not a threat to children because he might try to manipulate them into inappropriate relationships, he's a threat to children because he might manipulate them into helping him enslave their race.

There's no need to hand-wring about problematic age discourse. We're talking about a horror comedy that was cancelled two decades ago where the prospect of romance was never on the table to begin with. There is no such thing as a canon-compliant romance fanfic, and all fanfic by definition is non-canon anyway so it doesn't even matter. Make the characters whatever ages you want and tweak their characterization or circumstances in whatever ways you need to make whatever the fuck story you wanna tell work. It's all make-believe anyway. You don't need to make up fake quotes or deny or creatively interpret real quotes or bend yourselves into pretzels to prove the age headcanons you use to justify why you do or don't like a ship.

But for fucks sake, if you're gonna go there at least pretend like you know a single goddamned thing about the way aging, development, and maturity work before you unironically make talking points following the same logic as "According to my calculations, this character first portrayed by Tom Hiddleston at age 29 is actually 16".

[addysfandomdump]

Neither anti-Zadr nor pro-Zadr but a secret third thing (I don't like Zadr, not because I think shipping Zim with Dib is morally reprehensible or anything* but because it is incredibly annoying how widespread the ship is.)

*Zim is not explicitly confirmed to be a kid or adult last I checked (extremely annoying but unfortunately true) and any "evidence" arguing for either side doesn't hold water for me.

[fanboyvini]

holy shit

Y’all I know how to get around the ‘Zim is an old man’ anti argument.

Dib is an old man too. He lived an entire life in his Wonderful Life and you know he lived that full life because of how dazed he was when he got out, plus Zim fucking would make Dib physically live out his entire life to hit him with a muffin. THEY BOTH OLD MEN, IT EVEN

I’ll take my Nobel Peace prize now

[tenten-shi]

These mfs be like "Oh Jhonen told so much about Zim's age" and then reblog the fucking Show Bible which contains this shit

Yo guys reading is really good, try it sometime

[fanboyvini]

I did this because i am very tired of being falsely accused of a horrible crime that is ped0philia for liking a ship since i was 12 years old. It's so exhausting mentally, and i want to show my points.

And with that i rest my case, continuing to ship my first mlm ship that i have a lot of love and care for without felling guilty because i know im not doing anything wrong

Edit¹: oh shit i spelled it wrong in the last pannel 💀should be *using them AS A labrat

Edit²: If Zim is an adult he could disguise himself as an adult with some scholastic profession at school. (ex: teacher, principal, janitor etc.) But he is disguised as a primary school student, and he even has robot parents. The others disguises of him are an old man or Professor Membrane in ETF, which are disguises for comic effect and not to be taken seriously for the audience

[fanboyvini]

one more thing: me and many other shippers have spent more than A DECADE seeing (and we still see it that way, because we have many arguments on the show that claim this) that zim and dib are the same age. it's not something we can change overnight and we don't want to change because we genuinely don't have that interpretation of zim

Are the antis really still interacting with zadr content?

Like I assume if you despise or hate something, you tend to avoid it anyway possible. 

If its the whole “trying to prove a point on how pedo it is” Then WHY aren’t they making a fuss about, zagr, datr, pmazr, rapr… These pairings to the antis has the same flaws as zadr, but those pairings never seem to be the targeted from them at all, why is that???

We all know why… These antis are just threaten by zadr, because its massive popularity, and loyal fans that actually buy the comics. ZADR fans have been around since IZ came out ((most of the antis werent even born)) we haven’t just watched the movie and “BAM” act like we know everything ((like alot of antis tend to do)). We actually followed ((still follow)) everything that IZ content post out, all the commentaries and interviews. And yet antis act like zadr fans know nothing, and we should only go by what Jhonen says ((As every true IZ fan should know about how much of a troll he is))    

Finale words to the antis… Do not be threaten by zadr, they will never become canon, so you can chillax and move on with your lives….No more man hunts over fictional aliens and human pairings. 

p.s I mentioned rapr because jhonen has stated before that they are brothers. And since you all tend to follow the word of jhonen, and take him seriously, and I know alot of you pair rapr.. By your logic, we can accuse you of incest supporting, but we wont because we aren’t petty, and we know Jhonen changes his canons all the time.

[b0ylik3r]

I dont wanna get myself involved in any more ZADR discourse, but I also don't want misinfo to spread around and people to get discouraged or anything like I had been for a while. So I'm going to say this: Zim in Invader Zim is most likely a child.

There are a plethora of reasons I think this, but if you don't care then scroll. I'm going to provide my reasoning under the cut.

My first reason is that from a writing standpoint, there is absolutely nothing appealing about the dynamic between Dib and Zim if Zim is an adult. What would or do you find enjoyment out of their dynamic if they are not meant to be foils of one another like the show HEAVILY implies them to be NUMEROUS TIMES? If Zim is a child, their dynamic becomes "2 children want parental approval and go against each other for it, when in reality the approval and love they seek is unattainable because the parental figures will never give them it. They would be better off being friends or allies, but instead keep fighting to be loved because they're dumb kids and don't realize that it's fruitless and dumb". If Zim is an adult, their dynamic becomes "Immature man cannot beat child". What is to be enjoyed or explored there?

My second reason is that Zim acts like a child in a multitude of different ways. His interactions with The Tallest, his general immaturity, and even how he surrounds himself. He goes to school. He has made himself robot parents to support that idea. He needs different disguises to act like an adult. Again, from a writing standpoint, if he was an adult infiltrating a school building and pretending to be a kid, that's just fucking weird. I don't think Jhonen is that type of person. I don't think the writers are that type of people.

Also on this subject is the episode Tak: The Hideous New Girl. At the point of the episode, Zim was trying to impress and "crush on" and be the boyfriend of this middle school girl. It doesn't matter if Tak was actually irken. It doesn't matter if she is the same age as him actually. It doesn't change that Zim was trying to get into a human relationship with what he thought was a middle school girl. If he is an adult, that's pretty fucking weird. Again, I don't think Jhonen is that type of person and I don't think the writers are that type of people.

The "flying ships before you were born" only proves that on Irk, he was an adult or at least the age that would permit him to fly ships. Calendars are manmade, why would irkens use the same years? Zim's age could also easily translate into human years into the late tween years. We also have to think logically about things.

Also, I sometimes feel like people are forgetting that Irk is a dystopian society. They are a hyper-militarized alien race that codes people's brains on the daily and does not wait for the children to grow up even a little before they start military training (or, at least training for military training). What morals prevent them from using child labor or child soldiers? We also have to remember that in accordance to The Trial, Zim was a smeet or older allowed into violent chemicals and resources that can kill, like it did Tallest Miyuki and Tallest Spork. That, in a way, proves that Irkens are not above dangerous child labor.

One other argument I have is that in Enter The Florpus, during the species change clip, Zim, Dib and Gaz switch species. The thing is, Dib and Gaz look the same as Zim in this clip. They don't become little smeets, they don't become tiny kids. They become Zim's age. Zim also does not become an old man in this clip. He stays the same as Dib and Gaz. Being that these are their canon human/irken translations, I don't see how someone could still defend this.

You could take all of this and say "Okay, but ZADR is still proship because they are abusive to each other so why are you so pressed". But like I said in a previous post, there is a major difference between "haha 2 people fight each other n get hurt haha" and "this adult man is grooming this child sexually". That's not funny. That isn't cartoony. That is a fully serious topic taken seriously in every single media that it is represented in. Cartoony unserious fighting has been a staple for years in animation and media. Grooming is not cartoony. That is why so many people have a problem with it. Some people don't enjoy shipping things that are seriously fucked up in the real world like that, or shipping proships.

This all started because of one singular tweet Jhonen made that you all believed. I bet if he tweeted "guys invader zim didnt actually happen and dib was hallucinating the whole time, lmao dream theory is canon", some of you would believe it.

I leave you off with this: "If it looks, sounds & acts like a kid, it's a kid, no matter if it's actually 1000 years old or not."

[kryptonbabe]

A personal argument in favor of transgression in fandom spaces

Marquis de Sade (1740-1814), would he write Wincest, Reylo and Zadr fanfiction with obsessive yandere mafia boss tropes if he was alive today?

It's so weird for me to come to fandom at my current age (30) and with my background, I was not a very online teenager, I had an art tumblr growing up, but that was very far from the whole Superwholock bubble and discourse. My first interests reading were classic literature and stuff from school and Harry Potter for little bit, then Tolkien for a long time, then science-fiction and transgressive literature, starting with A Clockwork Orange, then Piano Teacher, Bret Easton Ellis, Yukio Mishima, Dennis Cooper etc. I'm a sensitive traumatized person (for reasons I won't explain) and I've been depressed and anxious most of my life, experiencing disturbing intrusive thoughts, so the themes in fiction that interested me were always the things I was most afraid and uncomfortable with in real life, traumatic events close to me that I had no other way to explore and no one else to talk to about. In a way transgressive art was always there for me, showing me how evil thoughts and experiences are not an exclusive thing, not a burden I must carry alone, those artists and writers also cared and thought about those things in meaningful ways, that was a relief. Slowly and with therapy I learned to organize my intrusive thought as creative thoughts, ideas I could use to paint or write, and this really really helped me.

The thing is I started to get interested in comic books too, this by the age of 20, reading them by myself and sharing my ideas with some close friends who didn't care about comics, but would listen to me. I started being active in fandom spaces recently, almost ten years after I started reading comics and, oh boy, is this a different environment. Where the morally ambiguous, weird and transgressive are very close to forbidden, people are divided among anti and proshippers, and exploring heavy themes and disturbing scenarios is frowned upon. I recently read about an Invader Zim artist who was bullied and had to abandon their blog due to attacks to their weird art. As if Comte de Lautréamont, Marquis de Sade, Georges Bataille and I don't know, the fucked up passages of the Bible never existed, to free us from the closed-mindness. It's all so backwards, restrictive and conservative. Not the fact that some people do not want to engage with these themes, you have the right to do so, but we accomplish nothing by judging and hating on people who want to talk about these subjects, who understand the human nature as a complex experience not imune to evil, malice, bizarre impulses and desires.

Talking about these things is different from supporting and agreeing with them, but they are a part of our existence and sometimes expressing awful experiences through art is the only escape someone have. To ignore the worst in us is a conservative attitude that idealizes a perfect conduct and ideal way of being, an hygienist perception of what it means to be human, with a lack of nuance and complexity that is just boring on top of being a form of censorship.

[izzydrawsforfun]

I know this is a dead topic but what are your views on the Zim Age Discourse?

It's a dumb discourse. And got even dumber when people claimed that Jhonen said that "Zim was 16" but no one gives an actual source to this bs. The Wiki is not a trusted source, anyone can edit that. And then the whole thing of Zim being "older than any human" or whatever that came out.

I refuse to believe people really thought Zim was meant to be an adult on the original series. It's clear that he is meant to be a kid in Irken years. It's clear that Irk is a planet where the Irkens gotta work from the moment they're literally born. Zim being a kid and a soldier is not a impossible concept.

It's clear that Jhonen intended for Zim to be around the same age as Dib, but in alien years. I don't give a damn if he decided to retcon it years later after the series was already done and over. The original show concepts even reffer to Zim as a kid during the events of the cartoon:

People can have whatever headcanons they want for Zim's age, but making a big deal about people who disagree with you, or cancelling artists for writting and drawing their own interpretations is just fucked

[fanboyvini]

i have shown my points of view in this post so i think it would be nice to share them here too ^^

and to be totally honest, i think cartoons a few years ago the production didn't think so much about the age of the characters (like woody woodpecker, in some eps he's working and other eps he's at school) and zim was one of the last shows to go through that. They are cartoons that are not interested in having (that much) a continuous story without plothole and worldbuilding, the important thing is to be funny and that's totally ok

but in the show and movie, zim is seen and behaves like a child in several scenes

i think the worst part of this discourse is that a lot of people decide to focus on zim's age just to shit on zadr shippers and accuse us of pedophilia, when us the shippers see zim and dib at the same age (of course there can be an apple rotten that ships them in a problematic way but this happens in all fandons, it's not something exclusive to iz and zadr)

Zim’s age

This was entirely written for fun, do whatever you want with this/feel free to debate 👍👍

Zim is a ADULT (kinda)

Jhonen has confirmed on multiple occasions that Zim is a canonically a adult, even before zadr shippers existed/were a concern

Zim is also not the “Irken equivalent” to a child, in the comics and show we see him as a actual child and his looks and behavior are fairly different (eg, The Trial and Issue 25) + the fact he’s the same ages as the tallest and skoodge

THAT BEING SAID

There’s still the argument that in canonical alternative universes (canon AUs) he IS a kid

In the original pitch bible he’s referred to as a kid, and based off his demeanor in the pilot it’s likely the same story (though REMINDER the pilot and bible are not applicable sources for the main universe in the show)

In ETF during the flashing of AUs in one he’s shown as a human child

In issue 40 the “depressing indie universe” seems to show him as a child, aswell as the “Interpretive dance universe” though that one is more uncertain

(kinda related but in a ton off canon AUs dib is shown as a adult (it’s around 50/50 at this point between him being a adult or child) + the fact he’s been aged up in the show before) honestly i could make a entire separate post dissecting his age cus if anything it’s more complicated then zims

um conclusion!!2!1! Zim is a adult and Dib is a child usually

so if in your au it’s different than that’s fine, just don’t say that in the main universe it’s anything other than that (without a reason)

[satirn]

im not gonna spread discourse think what u want interpret how you'd like death of the author and all that. and i would not like that on this post. that being said

as much as a full grown man beefing with a literal child is funny, and its peak comedy dont get me wrong. i feel like with the shit zim has gone through, him also being a kid is 100x more of that specific brand of jhonen comedy of tragic + funny.

could you imagine. you're put with some of the most advanced grown ass scientists in all of the vast space-conquerung empire you're apart of, making cutting edge technology and achivements and dangerous expirements and you are the ripe old age of like 7 YEARS OLD... AND YOU PULL YOUR FUCKING WEIGHT. you create an INFINATE ENERGY SOURCE that ends up asasinating NOT ONE BUT TWO FUCKING DICTATORS OF SAID EMPIRE. you are sent to DIE but since you are so Built Different, end up emprisioned to CASHIER AT SPACE MCDONALDS, now around 9 or something.

a few weeks into your child labor space prison fastfood job you end up hearing about a political election for the empire's newest child soldiers for galactic conquest taking place and end up JUST FUCKING WALKING OUT THE DOOR and GOING TO THE ELECTION deMANDING TO BE ASIGNED TO CONQUER A PLANET because you are 100% CON. VINCED. that you're the best guy EVER TO EXIST and NO ONE CAN TELL YOU OTHER WISE and if they do YOU DELUSION YOURSELF TILL YOUR SHIT MEMORY FORGETS, CAUSE IF YOU FACE THOSE FACTS YOU WILL HAVE A MAJOR MENTAL BREAKDOWN and you are 10 years old

god I love this show

[emmabirb8]

I've been an Invader Zim fan since 2011.

I was 15-16 at that time, and though I did thoroughly enjoy the show, I was not mature enough to really get it. Sure, it was funny, but I didn't pick up on the subtleties and style of humor beyond the surface level. I liked the wackiness and the characters, but I SURELY wasn't at a point of being able to deconstruct themes or analyze character motivations and narratives (like I very much enjoy doing now). I remember discovering an artist on DeviantArt who drew cute ZaGr stuff, so that was the pairing I liked too. I didn't think too deeply about much, and honestly, I don't think the majority of fans (if they were my age or younger, that is) did either. Everything was taken as dumb and silly for the most part, and that IS truthfully a major component of the show itself.

Getting back into Invader Zim within this past year though, I'm looking at it through a WILDLY different lens. I like Invader Zim for what it is and how it's intended to be perceived. I like that the show is meant to be dark, satirical, and tragic at the same time that it's silly, chaotic, and nonsensical. Almost everything that happens onscreen is written in to be funny above all else. (I've mentioned before that I've been watching Jhonen's Twitch streams for a while now, and I have a MUCH better understanding of his sense of humor bc of that. IZ makes way more sense if you can sorta see things from JV's perspective, lol.)

But at the same time, I also like Invader Zim for what it offers in terms of interpretation and what it can imply (intentionally or not). There is genuinely SO MUCH DEPTH to this dorky lil cartoon that a casual viewer wouldn't immediately pick up on. And a lot of that depth, I think, was not woven in purposely. The show itself was never meant to be taken so seriously. Nevertheless, I'm constantly fascinated by what IZ implies about good and evil, the nature of general society, and especially how it goes about demonstrating the devastating effects of social isolation and bullying. Meta for this series is always pretty damn *chef's kiss.* And what's even more interesting is how viewers manipulate canon to expand upon this world and these characters.

Given that I've come to understand Invader Zim better, I've also grown very fond of ZaDr. Now, while I wouldn't want to see this pairing happen in canon material, I love the potential it possesses in transformative contexts.

In reality, I get that these characters were intended to have a deep hatred for one another and a never-ending rivalry for the sake of comedy and not much else. It's an extraterrestrial perpetually throwing hands with a 12 year old because he's incompetent and his plans often fail. And that's funny. That's the point. But beyond that, canonically, these are two characters who are mirrors of each other; they're both treated like garbage by their respective peers, and they both crave acknowledgment, validation, and a sense of purpose. Throughout their story, they find they're only able to obtain these things from each other, so as a consequence of their similar personalities, they become utterly, unhingedly obsessed with each other (to a sometimes unhealthy degree). They are undeniably forever intertwined by design of how the show is set up.

And because of that, shipping of these characters was, frankly, inevitable in fandom spaces. I myself fell victim to their appeal too. (Sorry, Jhonen. 😅)

I'm not gonna go into any discourse surrounding this pairing because there's already PLENTY of that to go around online. Everyone has their own opinion on the subject, and that's fine. I respect that. Point is, even though I understand and appreciate what Zim and Dib are supposed to be in the context of the show, I also enjoy the idea of them as friends and romantic partners outside of and beyond the confines of canon.

And that's something that I think many fans who are biased toward ZaDr would also agree with! Actually, I'd say the majority of people who ship characters in ANY media would concur. We like the idea of seeing how specific relationships could develop over time and/or within different settings and circumstances. It's NOT always about wanting to see a relationship unfold on screen or in fan works strictly adhering to canon. It's about stretching canon, or in some cases, scratching canon entirely however you see fit! Who cares! It's fiction!

For me personally, I enjoy ZaDr because its attributes fall into so many trope categories that I've come to adore over the years (ones that I either wasn't aware of when I was younger, or that I didn't enjoy in the same intensity as I do now). Zim and Dib are, or could be, depending on context:

Codependent toxic soulmates

Human x non-human

Shared history

Classic enemies to lovers (or, as I often prefer it, enemies to friends to lovers)

Bicker couple

Battle couple, when put in the right setting for it

Violence as a love language

Smol and tol

The wild card paired with the rational one, the best part about this being that sometimes the more rational one is Dib, and sometimes it's Zim bc they're both a special flavor of insane

Make each other worse/stupider when together, tho oddly, they also kinda bring out the best in each other too

And, my personal favorites, the potential for hurt/comfort and angst with a happy ending, with the comfort and happiness aspects ultimately coming from each other

I like what these characters could be, to and for each other, apart from their roles in the show.

I would never want to explore a dynamic between Zim and Dib that goes beyond "frenemies" territory in canon (because that doesn't fit what the show is, and I do appreciate the integrity of Jhonen's vision). The subtle foundation for them is there, it's just that it can't really work unless a few key details are changed or manipulated, and, well...

I sure as hell like exploring every bit of that expanded potential in fan works because it's fun to imagine the various directions things could go if they were different!

This isn't me, like... trying to defend my (or anyone else's) enjoyment of this particular ship or trying to convince people to like it. Or the show for that matter! To each their own, truly. And I'm obv aware of the controversy ZaDr often incites and why. Everyone has valid reasons for liking OR not liking it, and I accept differing viewpoints on it. It's a touchy, nuanced subject to be sure. But this isn't about that.

I don't really know what this is, actually, aside from a very long very weird essay, lol. I just wanted to process why and how all of this works for me with my changed perspective from when I was first introduced to Invader Zim in my teens up until now.

It's strange, looking back. I didn't get ZaDr years ago. But I do now, and so much of it, at least from my perspective, has to do with taking the crumbs present in canon (that are undeniably there, whether you choose to acknowledge them or not, and whether they're intentional or not) and absolutely running with them to the ends of your own wild imagination.

(ZaDr content is always tagged appropriately on my blog. Pls use tag blocking functions if needed.)

[emeraldspiral]

“I generally assume when people are asking about like irken anatomy or weather or not Zim is an adult or a child, I feel like they’re kinda circling around, uh, you know, particular things but that’s not the show. Enjoy what you enjoy, like what you like but yeah, they’re into some shit”

- Jhonen in an interview you can watch here: https://youtu.be/WoiqWHNQHFc?si=SIc1MsQTU_6H-qE4

He might say we’re into some shit but it seems like he does not care. Yet another reason why ship / age discourse and hanging onto his opinion doesn’t matter. We’re already commiting sins against canon by doing things that Jhonen says isn’t a part of the show anyway, like shipping in general. And he says so himself - enjoy what you enjoy. He doesn’t give a shit.

It's crazy how much people invest themselves in seeking Jhonen's validation for purity culture discourse when prior to Zim this guy was most famous for an ultra-violent horror comic about a serial killer. Like, I'm pretty sure most people who create and consume horror media have an innate understanding that the entire point is to explore the taboo from the safety of the realm of imagination. Nny even goes on a rant in one comic dismissing the idea that media influences people to become violent and Professor Membrane in one episode of Zim says "Video games develop hand-eye coordination and make children into better human beings" as a direct rejection of contemporary conservative talking points about video games causing violence.

[lethal-spaceship]

"I love my parents soooo much :3333" said the oblivious green child while eating another packet of fun dip and writing them wholesome letters where every dot in "i" is a heart, a congratulations about their marriage anniversary and birthdays, unaware that his "parents" literally hate him.

ermm hai new iz followers ! just so y’all know i don’t really ship zadr myself anymore because i kinda grew out of the ship but i used to and i still believe that thinking it’s a proship is insanely stupid so if u don’t fw that then i suggest you Leave and never return ❤️

here’s a really shitty doodle for u