What if Zim has been a victim of sabotage from the very beginning?
There are some really cool theories out there in the Invader Zim universe, like Gir being a genius, and Professor Membrane being an Irken.
The theory I want to share is what if Zim has been a victim of sabotage from the beginning, even before his mission on Earth?
The Tallest quite clearly want him as far away as possible. He destroyed Impending Doom 1, killed many of his own in the process, and slaughtered two Tallest during his career. Zim never denies it or even explains why. It argues the question of whether or not he was set up to do this, and lead Red and Purple into power.
Despite Red and Purpleās height and automatic privileges it is doubtful they would have liked the competition from another Tallest and their differing opinions on military matters. Zim also could have been abused during his early life in the military and took the opportunity to get revenge. You could argue that the deaths of Tallest Spork and Miyuki were purely accidental events but it seems too big a coincidence for two powerful leaders to be so easily erased by one tiny and āincompetentā Irken, especially if Zim can dress his techniques as āaccidental.ā
Imagine what you can get away with when you pretend you havenāt a clue what youāre doing.
In the unaired episode The Trial, Red and Purple advocated for his execution (which takes time, I think all in all it took 20 years), so while they waited they needed to keep him as far away as possible, and hope that he would die. Even if he was in cahoots with Red and Purple, and murdered Spock and Miyuki to get Red and Purple into power, Zim would still be a loose end, and would still know too much that could inevitably hurt Red and Purpleās position. (Thus it would be better to label him a joke and to keep anyone from taking Zim seriously).
During the first episode The Nightmare Begins the Tallest are surprised he even makes it to Earth. They had no name of the planet they sent him to, as if they didnāt really know it existed, so Zim finding Earth was most likely accidental. Perhaps they hoped heād continue to travel through space until some planet or other turned up, or maybe they hoped he would be simply devoured by space, and would never hear from him again. Purple anxiously says: āYouāre alive?ā when they get a transmission from him for the first time since he left for āEarthā after six months.
It would also be pretty easy and advantageous for them to give Zim faulty equipment to make sure he doesnāt survive. Gir is testament to this. They made sure to give him something out of garbage, something that would be a real spanner in the works, since heās not a real invader anymore (demotion and banishment due to his killing spree). Zim tries to rectify Gir in the episode Gir Goes Crazy and Stuff, and though some would argue that Gir, in his new sane state just sees Zim as a menace and danger to the mission, what if it just made the malfunctioning Gir far worse? If Zim was a real menace to the mission, why did Gir so needlessly expose himself to the public when he went to the library?
So if Gir is faulty, and was meant to make Zimās life a living hell, what else could the Tallest do to sabotage him? What if the very base he uses on Earth is also faulty, prone to breaking down, and is frequently unreliable? Sending an Irken to his death, and risking that Irkenās exposure to the enemy does seem counterproductive, since Zim is carrying equipment that can be reverse-engineered, like the PAK, but maybe the Tallest were simply so desperate that they decided not to care or considered it as a risk worth taking.
And if their problem is 30 million light years away, who cares right? Unless of course that little problem is still capable of sending stuff through a teleporter directly to the Tallest, or sending a planet crashing through half the Armada in Battle of the Planets. Zim may seem reckless and incapable, but he has a very short danger meter that goes from āvaguely annoyingā to āmurderousā in two seconds flat. Even when they sent him to Hobo 13 in another attempt to get him killed, he came out on top. Zim was so drugged up on pride that he realized too late that the ship theyād given him as a reward was programmed to fly straight into the sun.
The show may very well hinge on Zimās small but very personal war with the Tallest and vice versa, with Dib becoming more of a threat than Zim initially realized, which keeps him constantly on his toes.
These are just my opinions, and I will inevitably add to this as thoughts and speculations come up. My most favorite subject to this day is Zimās defectiveness, and how this relates to his development, and how much of it influences his mission and his abilities.
Like, how does his defectiveness affect him exactly, and what does it do?
The stories Starfall and Twilight Skies will hinge on this theory, as there is so much to dive into!!
Anyways, thatās all from me for now. Iād love to hear your thoughts and ideas!
