Cheap Invader ZIM - Doom Doom Doom (Vol. 1) (DVD) (Steve Ressel) Price

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Customer Reviews of Invader ZIM - Doom Doom Doom (Vol. 1)

Great show; hilarious DVD commentaries
When I discovered this show on Nickelodeon and saw the name "Jhonen Vasquez" plastered across the TV screen, thoughts of dread and cancellation filled my teeny head....but then I saw GIR the robot pouncing across the TV and my head was filled with joy! ....But I didn't think the show would last for long. I mean honestly, how long could the creator of "Johnny the Homicidal Maniac" and the creators of "Dora the Explorer" co-exist in peaceful harmony? It was only a matter of time. <
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>....The DVDs are great; the commentaries in these DVDs are so hilarious. The show crew/animators basically sit and munch on snack food and talk about absolutely nothing to do with the show, like squirrels and killer pigs and what they watched on TV the other day. It's great. The Irken subtitles are kind of pointless (...or ARE they?), but other than that, I recommend the DVDs just for the great commentary, just to listen to Vasquez and crew--to prove they are normal human beings like you and me (....or ARE they?) :-)

WHY PIGGY WHY?? I LOVE-ED YOU!
If there's one person that Warm Subject shoppers worship, it's Jhonen Vasquez. His comic Johnny the Homicidal Maniac inspired many teenagers full of angst to start acting weird on their own, and force themselves to keep people away with their odd behavior. I hate Vasquez for it. Through high school, the "goth" crowd wasn't even goth at all. It was more or less a group of people trying to beat each other in who could wear the most black or collect the most Johnny shirts. Labeling Vasquez's work as "sick humor" or "risque" makes me laugh. The guy's stuff was pretty tame, but people who never saw anything like that before act as if it's the be-all of "demented humor". Needless to say, I don't like the guy, or care much for his comics. When Invader Zim rolled around, I ignored it as well. Again, the "goth" group in my school at the time worshipped this show, and always came with Zim goodies like stuffed pigs, Gir bracelets, Zim slippers, and more. It wasn't until last year that I finally gave the show a chance, if only to see what was so great about it after a few friends of mine with normally good taste told me it wasn't half bad. And you know what? Invader Zim's worthy of most of the hype. <
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>The show starts out with the Irken Empire holding a huge meeting for young invaders to take over planets for future destruction. The Empire's leaders appear to be the All mighty Tallests (yes, power is determined by height here), and they send off the young'uns one by one, then leave to finish their day. Or at least, they were about to until Zim shows up. The definition of zealous, Zim is given the fake mission of taking over Earth. Building him an assistant robot, literally from garbage behind their backs, Gir. The two of them fly to Earth, and actually make it their in one piece. They set up a base in the form of a cutesy green house in the city, and begin the mission. In order to not let his alien identity out, Zim comes up with a disguise so he can walk around in public. By disguise, I mean human eye contacts and a wig. The only person smart enough to see through the disguise is Dib, the "weird" kid in school. He's got tons of knowledge, but isn't that smart when it comes down to it. His dad is a renowned professor, and his sister, Gaz, is addicted to games, and has more common sense than Dib'll ever have. She hates Dib, and is annoyed the second he opens his mouth. Zim and Dib go to the same school, and share the same class, which is where they'll spend the majority of their time making each others' life a living hell, while everyone else is annoyed by it. With Zim representing the Irken Empire and Dib trying to save our world, you feel sorry for both sides. <
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>For most, this show's going to be hit or miss. While I'm a bit of a fan of Invader Zim, I can admit that a few episodes in this volume just don't do anything for me. When the show has a good episode, it's fantastic, and you'll be laughing weeks after seeing it. But when there's a bad one, you'll sit through the whole thing, waiting to see if something great happens in the end. It doesn't, so you wonder why you didn't skip to the next one, and completely forget about it. But the show hits more often than not, especially with the help of Gir and Gaz. Gir could have a religion built around his quotes with the popularity he has. To get a good idea of how Gir acts, just picture a robot with ADD. Now remember that he was built from scrap and garbage. Bingo. Gir watches tv almost constantly, runs around dancing like a monkey, plays with stuffed pigs and a squeaky moose, and craves tacos. He even removes his new navigation chip to make room for a cupcake in his head. Sure, he's stupid, but he's just so lovable that it doesn't matter. What gets me though, is that Invader Zim was canceled (Nickelodeon claims it was because of low ratings). Something about how it didn't hit the right demographic of 2-11 year olds. Of course it didn't. One episode will give away that this was aimed for the 14+ crowd. I don't even see how this was aired by Nick in the first place. While I may not care for Johnny the Homicidal Maniac, didn't they read that comic before picking up the show? That should've been a dead give away. Standout episodes in this set include: Parent Teacher Night, NanoZim, Germs, Attack of the Saucer Morons, Career Day, Rise of the Zitboy (this one disgusts most people but I love it), Bad Bad Rubber Piggy, A Room With a Moose and Hamstergeddon. <
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>The picture quality is great for the most part. Colors are bright, there's no grain to be found, clean CG use...but there's one problem that Invader Zim has that most animated series do as well. There are TONS of interlacing errors. Jagged lines are everywhere, even when there's no movement on-screen. It's a big shame too, given that this is a more recent cartoon. The audio fares much better, and you can pick between English and Spanish language tracks...with or without Irken subtitles. Yep, text that the Irken Empire uses can be displayed on screen for every bit of dialogue. I'm sure there are some diehard fans out there who can actually read this. Voices are clear and free of fuzz, and there's a surprisingly good use of surround sound. <
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>The big special feature here is a commentary track for every episode, something that many shows, animated or not, are lacking. In fact, the only other animated show I know that got commentaries for all episodes is The Simpsons. Featuring Vasquez, some of the creative team, and most of the voice actors. It's almost scary how Zim's voice actor's normal voice IS Zim's voice, only slightly calm. Each commentary is a blast to listen to, and sometimes, they're funnier than the episodes themselves. Very rarely does the group not talk, and if they do, they make up for it in spades. They joke around with each other, go over auditions, point out small jokes we may not've seen, and more. It's almost worth getting the discs just for these tracks, seriously. The second biggest extra comes in the form of animatics...FOR EVERY EPISODE. Jesus, these guys really went all out, didn't they? If you don't know, animatics are more or less story boards. It's interesting to see the differences between the finalized episode and pre-production. You could watch these with the commentary track and kill two birds with one stone, or watch them with the original audio for the episode. On disc two along with the animatics and commentaries, are the original pilot episode (Billy West doing the voice of Zim? Weird) and a featurette with the voice actors doing their thing. It's weird to watch the pilot after all the other episodes, as it's done in a different tone from the final show. Everything looks more Flash-animated/PhotoShoppy, the music's different, and of course, Billy West doing Zim's voice. Man, all I kept hearing was Stimpy on speed. He even delivers lines like Gir at different points in the episode. Speaking of Gir, his voice is out of wack too. Thank god they changed it. The pilot is about 13 minutes long. I guess it's worth noting that there's also a pig commentary track for the Bad Bad Rubber Piggy episode. All it is, is pigs squealing for the whole episode. It gets old after 10 seconds, trust me. You're better off ignoring this one. Overall though, this is a great set of extras for a show that "got low ratings". <
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>While the first volume of Invader Zim does have great extras and audio, this set of episodes is just too jumpy when it comes to the good to bad ratio. Plus, things get much better in the second volume, where the show really kicks off. Still, this is a good start (obviously), to see if you're into the show or not. You either like it, or you don't. It's that easy.