Earthworm Jim is a really weird game!
The titular Jim is an annelid from Terlawk, Texas. One day while Jim was burrowing through the dirt and breaking to the surface, a super suit fell from the sky. The suit was designed by the mad genius, Professor Monkey-For-A-Head, and was to be delivered by Psy-Crow to the Evil Queen Pulsating, Bloated, Festering, Sweaty, Puss-Filled, Malformed, Slug-For-A-Butt (I didn’t even have to look that name up!), who has taken over the planet of Insectica and holds her sister, Princess What’s-Her-Name captive. Also, inside the backpack of the super suit lives a sentient booger named Snott.
To go along with such an insane collection of characters, Playmates Interactive came up with some equally crazy advertisements, which all played up the fact that Jim is a nematode. I’m aware of five of these line-drawing ads for the original game’s release, so I’ve presented them below, along with some scientific facts about earthworms. You can look at these old ads and learn something, too!
Earthworms are invertebrates, so they literally have no spine. However, earthworms are segmented, and their intestines go from their 15th segment to the 120th segment, which is the overwhelming majority of their body. So… yeah! Jim is literally all guts! This joke is well-constructed because it’s obviously referring to the English phrases of “having a spine” or “having guts” being euphemisms for bravery, but also… it’s biologically accurate. Fantastic!
I was never clear if this image was supposed to be an extremely sad Jim, or if it’s supposed to be one of his parents being old and crusty. Earthworms, by the way, are all hermaphroditic. That means they have both male and female sex organs. Anybody who says “there are only two genders” is clearly ignorant of actual biological science. Earthworms rub on each other to swap sperm, excreting it through their skin, which will fertilize the others’ eggs. Jim is constantly referred to using male pronouns, so I think it’s safe to assume that means Jim identifies as male. I don’t know how his parents identified, but it doesn’t really matter since they’re dead now. Ironically, they were killed by Psy-Crow, the very being who is the reason Jim has the super suit, and therefore the enhanced intelligence to even understand having parents in the first place! Augh!
Worms don’t sleep on a regular schedule like humans, or, in fact, most mammals — Which makes sense, since they’re, y’know, not mammals. Worms only sleep when they are going from one form of development to another, or after a stressful situation. When they do sleep, it’s usually for for several hours at a time. That said, it’s unknown if earthworms actually dream. They don’t have eyes, ears, or a nose, so if they could dream, I guess it would have to be about the tactile sensations they feel as they burrow, or maybe about the taste of a delicious micro-organism? Jim, however, has been anthropomorphized by his super suit, so maybe HE dreams more like a human.
Earthworms don’t really have butts in the same way as humans, but they do have an anus. In 7th grade life science, I remember we were studying live earthworms — Coincidentally, around the same time that the Earthworm Jim video game was released on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) and Sega Genesis in North America — and one started excreting feces all over the table. Incidentally, take a look at the concept art for Queen Pulsating, Bloated, Festering, Sweaty, Puss-Filled, Malformed, Slug-For-A-Butt. How was she ever going to fit into that humanoid suit?
Professor Monkey-For-A-Head messed up.
Earthworms can’t juggle. They don’t have hands.
The following year, EWJ was released on the Sega CD and later Windows 95 in a Special Edition. It was mostly the same game as the Genesis version, with enhanced graphics and sound, and a bunch of extra animations and secrets. It got a new line-drawing print ad:
All earthworms are omnivores, meaning they’ll eat both plant and animal matter, as well as other groovy stuff like algae, fungus, bacteria, and other micro-organisms. But some are detritivores, meaning they feed on detritus — dead particulate organic material. I don’t know if any of them eat dessert.
Earthworm Jim and all related characters are owned by Interplay Entertainment Corp.