were dib and zim supposed to be canon on the show? :o
Well, I don’t have any actual sources on hand right now, but if you’re talking about flat out romance then no- Zim and Dib were never meant to be an actual couple on the show and I’m pretty sure that the show’s creator Jhonen Vasquez does not approve of the pairing at all.
In fact, at face value- romance, friendship and warmth have no actual place on the show itself and whenever those concepts are brought up or introduced they’re immediately squashed and trampled on and the person/character involved with their introduction is either ridiculously over the top and saccharine about it OR they just end up, you know, eventually exploding and screaming off in the distance before the episode ends *lmao
I think ZADR pretty much only exists within the fandom and inside of one big collective AU that everyone has just agreed upon. I highly doubt that it’ll ever become canon on the show or in the comics but hey- that’s what fanart and fanfiction is for *lmao
However, in terms of a Zim and Dib friendship well- that’s a little bit more plausible but still kind of murky. They have teamed up before to fight an enemy that’s stronger than both of them (e.g Tak and Zim’s Bologna Experiment) but they usually end up right back as enemies when everything is over and done with.
And while Mopiness of Doom did heavily suggest that they actually need each other Zim was still going to try and liquify Dib’s organs so yeah- it’s anyone’s guess *lmao
I’m not sure if any of this helps but hopefully some of it did~! Thanks for the message anon and I hope that you have a nice day~! ♥♥♥