Backseat Drivers from Beyond the Stars

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Zim's latest plan

Plot

Zim notices the Almighty Tallest are closer than ever to Earth. He wants them to view his newest scheme to destroy the humans, a monster that sucks out and eats the brains of human beings that Zim has in stasis waiting for release. The Tallest, of course, don't care.

During this time the Tallest run into a Vort cruiser filled with a resistance movement against the Irkens, the "Resisty." The cruiser is obviously no match for the Tallest's ship, the "Massive" and the Tallest fire on the ship, strangely missing the Vort ship. The Massive goes out of control and starts crashing into things. The "Resisty" follow, firing on the ship as it goes on its crazy course.

It turns out that Zim is the source of the problem and has used his computer to lock onto the Massive's power core to steer the Tallest to Earth. However, Dib uses Tak's ship, with the signal relayed Zim's base, to also take control of the Massive. He is able to do this as while inside Zim's base, because in Tak, the Hideous New Girl (you don't see this happen directly in the episode) placed a probe inside ZIM's base. The probe in conjunction with Tak's ship, which crashed on Dib's lawn at the end of Tak, lets Dib control the Massive.

Zim fights with Dib over control over the Massive. Later, however, the robo parents escape and wreck havoc when someone visits Zim's house, and the Brain-eating parasite starts to break free. In the end, the Tallests use a teleporter to switch their power core with the Resisties, resulting in them getting dragged towards the planet.

Trivia

• Backseat Drivers from Beyond the Stars is Jhonen Vasquez's favourite episode, as mentioned on the DVD commentary.

• In the episode, we discover that Invader Larb completed his mission.

• There is a reference to The Terminator in that when Dib runs from Tak's ship at the end, the ship gets stuck in a garage door. [link]

Quotes

• Shloonktapooxis: "How 'bout the pirate monkeys? Issa awesome name."

• GIR: "You gonna make biscuits?"

• Zim: "My brain!! My brain!!! Me hurty to think!!"