Invader Zim S 1 E 24 Battle Of The Planets - TV Tropes

While exploring the solar system, Zim discovers that Mars is actually a spaceship. Now Dib has to stop him before he can use the Red Planet to destroy all life on Earth.

Tropes

• Almighty Janitor: The janitor at NASA whipped up his own rocket in the cleaners cupboard, one that took Dib all the way to Mercury.
• Asteroid Thicket: The asteroid belt proves incredibly dangerous for Zim to fly through. Understandable when he's piloting a literal planet, as it would be large enough to be bombarded with asteroids in the process. Less so when he gets in his personal spacecraft to retreat and is still being pelted.
• Blatant Lies: At the end of the episode, following the failure of his scheme, Zim claims that he was trying to destroy Mars all along in an attempt to save face with the Tallest. They don't buy it for a second.
• Blofeld Ploy: An unintentional example. When an Irken in the crowd admits to not remembering Zim ruining Operation Impending Doom I, Tallest Purple orders him Thrown Out the Airlock. After security throws out the wrong guy, Purple shrugs it off as the point still being made.
• Butt-Monkey: Skoodge was sent to Blorch, home of the Slaughtering Rat People, because the Tallest didn't respect him due to his height. In this episode, when he ends up being the first Invader to successfully conquer a planet, the Tallest respond by shooting him out of an orbital cannon so that they don't have to give him any recognition.
• Chekhov's Gunman: Agent Darkbootie, a fellow member of the Swollen Eyeball Network, is introduced early on in the episode as the only person willing to hear Dib out for his findings on the strange activity on Mars. He returns later as an important ally that helps Dib get into space to fight Zim.
• Continuity Nod: The Tallest remember when they got a transmission from a meat-covered Zim, a Call-Back to "Germs".
• Didn't Think This Through: Zim tries to escape Dib by flying through an asteroid belt. He gets bombarded with asteroids and is eventually forced to abandon Mars when he loses control over it.
• Dropped Ice Cream of Sadness: A kid cries after he dropped his ice cream, before proceeding to pick it up off the ground, lick it, and cry again when it falls.
• Dumbass Has a Point: Even Zim doesn't understand the logic of the Martians working themselves into extinction to convert the planet into a spaceship. This, coming from someone who repeatedly fails to understand that nearly destroying his own race during "Operation Impending Doom I" was a bad thing.
• "Everybody Laughs" Ending: Everyone on board the Massive laughs after Zim claims that he conquered Mars as a warm-up before his takeover of Earth and calls himself an unstoppable death machine.
• Failed a Spot Check: The Irken fleet on the Massive is too busy laughing after Zim's last transmission to notice that Mars tore through some of their ships.
• Holding in Laughter: The Tallest do this during the first two transmissions with Zim, and are less successful during the first one, but manage to keep it together during the second (though Purple is struggling not to laugh in this case), and explode with laughter when it ends.
• Mike Nelson, Destroyer of Worlds: After Zim loses control of Mars and leaves it flying randomly through the universe, the end of the episode shows it ramming through the Irken Armada.
• Noodle Implements: For some reason, Zim is wearing a bear suit at the start of the episode.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: Played for Laughs with GIR. When Zim sics GIR on Dib during the battle in the climax, instead of attacking Dib like it initially seems he will, GIR just sits next to him and begins pressing random buttons, which causes Dib to fly out of control as he starts to panic. Zim even comments with pride maybe GIR's not such a bad evil minion after all. Although Dib easily gets rid of GIR by telling him to go away, he realizes too late that GIR also stole his camera, meaning he still has no proof of Zim being an alien.
• Orbital Bombardment: This episode explains that the Irkens perform an "organic sweep" on conquered planets, to wipe out any remaining indigenous lifeforms.
• Planet Spaceship: The Martians turned their planet into one, after practicing on Mercury.
• Rule of Cool: According to the Martian hologram, this is why the Martians worked themselves to extinction turning their planet into a ship.
• Sci-Fi Writers Have No Sense of Scale: But Dr. Membrane does, when dismissing Dibs claims that there's an alien on Mars, he claims that there are no aliens. Then clarifies that even if there were they'd never be able to travel the distance that separates Earth from the other galaxies.
• Surveillance Station Slacker: All of NASA Command is this when it comes to anything relating to Mars; despite having a Martian Rover that has an active camera feed pointing directly at Zim sitting in the drivers' seat on the Face of Mars due to the fact that their funding was cut.

  "Since they cut the funding; we're not allowed to look at those monitors."

• Too Dumb to Live: At the end of his fight with Dib, Zim flies Mars through the asteroid belt to lose him. As Dib points out, this is very stupid — the asteroids pelt Mars until Zim loses control and is forced to flee.