Fans of Nickelodeon’s Invader Zim (including myself) have pushed, pressed, begged, and did just about what any fandom would do to revive a show. Now our efforts are almost rewarded. Movieviral has received a letter from the admin-assistant from “Operation: Head Pigeons” in response to my previous article on Invader Zim back in April 2010. Find out more on this viral campaign, and how you can help bring Invader Zim back on air, after the jump.
When I asked “is Invader Zim coming back?”, it was just mere speculation, but now it’s way beyond that. Two fan-driven viral campaigns called Operation: Head Pidgeons and Project Massive both have the same goal: send as many letters as you can to get Invader Zim back into production. This would only work if it got recognized by Nickelodeon. It has.
Operation: Head Pigeons gave us an update on their progress and I have to say, it is quite promising. Below are some of the thing mentioned.
Nickelodeon has tweeted about us Nickelodeon has tweeted about us
Series creator Jhonen Vasquez explained in fall 2010 that he’d “love to do more Zim stuff” but Nickelodeon decided a revival would be “too expensive.”
Two months after our card mailing campaign on December 2010 .. a ‘best of’ called DVD Operation Doom was released on February 2011. Do I have to say anymore? 😛
They were invited to host a panel at Invadercon
then given a ‘prime time’ slot when the weekend was drawing near.Invadercon itself got this reaction from Nickelodeon:
http://www.toonzone.net/news/articles/36775/nickelodeon-reps-overwhelmed-by-fan-turnout-at-invadercon
Shortly after Invadercon, “OHP” was tasked with being the publicist, or uniter of the underground fan army, for a letter writing campaign. By who? Nickelodeon? No but that cannot be stated right now. It was meant to take place around August 2011 but for optimization it has been delayed so as of now the ‘sending date and location’ remains unannounced.
Even months after deeming a revival too expensive, their official Invader Zim Facebook updates have increased exponentially. Everything from wishing the show creator a happy birthday to Gir popping out of a turkey on Thanksgiving.
The premiere of the pilot (which was only on the DVD’s) has been moved to a prime-time slot on Christmas Eve along with a Greatest Zim Moments ranking game. Their commentary on this:
One can hazard a guess at how much money it costs to promote a show which primarily airs past midnight or Sunday afternoon.
Does it mean Invader Zim is coming back *without* the letter writing campaign?
No.
Does it mean they’re testing waters to bring the show back?
No.
They’re looking forward to the letter writing campaign and at this point are wisely investing in preparing their audience for the road ahead
Jhonen was grand enough to tell us how it was meant to end, gave us plenty of background story and mythology, and more so the Zim fandom could be somewhat satisfied. Even after all that we just won’t let it die! It’s a cult classic that managed to make not one convention, but two conventions (The 2nd being Doom Con). I won’t beg or harass all of you to empower the revival campaign, just the viewers who want to see more of The Resisty or Agent Darkbooty. If you know anything about what I just mentioned, you probably already have.