"The Nightmare Begins" is the first episode of Invader Zim.
Synopsis[]
On the Irken-ruled planet Conventia, the beginning of a galactic conquest campaign known as Operation Impending Doom 2 is about to start. The Irkens want all the races of the universe to serve under their already vast Empire, so they plan send Irken Invaders to make the planets vulnerable so the Irken Armada can easily invade and conquer them. Zim arrives uninvited, and it is revealed that Zim single-handedly ruined the original Operation Impending Doom by stealing a Frontline Battle Mech and unwittingly annihilating a portion of his home planet, Irk.
Reluctant to have Zim involved with the new operation, the Almighty Tallest, the two leaders of the Irken Empire, send Zim away to a distant planet on the other side of the Galaxy, represented on their galactic map as a sticky note with a circle drawn onto it with a question mark in the circle. It turns out to be Earth, thus ending the assignment process. On Earth, a boy named Dib Membrane intercepts a signal and hears about the Irken invasion plan, but his sister Gaz and their father Professor Membrane do not take any interest in this.
Invaders are receiving robot assistants called SIR (Standard-issue Information Retrieval) units. Not wanting to give away advanced technology to Zim, he is given a robot constructed of garbage named GIR. It is not known what, if anything, the G stands for. GIR appears unintelligent and Zim comments on this, but the Almighty Tallest lie and convince him that "it's not stupid, it's advanced". Zim and GIR head for Earth, and upon their arrival Zim picks disguises and constructs a base. (The disguises scene involves cameos of the creator, Jhonen Vasquez, and the director, Steve Ressel.)
The next day, Zim attends the local school as he believes he will learn about his enemy there. Dib is there and recognizes Zim as an alien, but nobody else does. Dib makes an attempt to capture Zim but gives up when Zim gets to his base, as the front lawn is covered in laser firing lawn gnomes.
Notes[]
- This episode was ranked #36 and #26 in The 100 Greatest Nicktoon Episodes countdown.
Home video releases[]
- VHS
- Nickstravaganza! 2
- DVD
- Nickstravaganza! 2
- Invader Zim: Volume 1 - Doom Doom Doom
- Invader Zim: Season 1
- Invader Zim: Operation Doom
External links[]
| This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The article or pieces of the original article was at The Nightmare Begins. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with Nickipedia, the text of Wikipedia is available under the GNU Free Documentation License. |
| Invader Zim episodes | |
|---|---|
| Season 1 | "The Nightmare Begins" • "Bestest Friend" / "NanoZIM" • "Parent Teacher Night" / "Walk of Doom" • "Germs" / "Dark Harvest" • "Attack of the Saucer Morons" / "The Wettening" • "Career Day" / "Battle-Dib" • "Planet Jackers" / "Rise of the Zitboy" • "Invasion of the Idiot Dog Brain" / "Bad, Bad Rubber Piggy" • "A Room with a Moose" / "Hamstergeddon" • "Plague of Babies" / "Bloaty's Pizza Hog" • "Door to Door" / "FBI Warning of Doom" • "Bolognius Maximus" / "Game Slave 2" • "Battle of the Planets" • "Halloween Spectacular of Spooky Doom" • "Mysterious Mysteries" / "Future Dib" • "Hobo 13" / "Walk for Your Lives" • "Megadoomer" / "Lice" • "Abducted" / "The Sad, Sad Tale of Chickenfoot" • "GIR Goes Crazy and Stuff" / "Dib's Wonderful Life of Doom" • "Tak: The Hideous New Girl" |
| Season 2 | "Backseat Drivers from Beyond the Stars" • "Mortos der Soulstealer" / "Zim Eats Waffles" • "The Girl Who Cried Gnome" / "Dibship Rising" • "Vindicated!" / "The Voting of the Doomed" • "Gaz, Taster of Pork" • "The Frycook What Came from All That Space" • "The Most Horrible X-Mas Ever" |