First broadcast on March 30, 2001, Invader Zim is an award-winning American animated television series created by comic book writer/artist Jhonen Vasquez and aired on Nickelodeon. The show's strange animation, quirky humor, and dark, cynical style gave it a devoted cult following, with an older audience than most of Nickelodeon's other cartoons. Because of this, ratings for Nickelodeon's core demographic (2 to 11 year olds) were fairly low, and the show was cancelled after one and a half seasons. Invader Zim DVD compilations have been released by Media Blasters and the series has been translated into several different languages for foreign broadcast.