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Numberjacks
The Numberjacks as a whole
The main characters of the series. A team of anthropomorphic numbers who help innocent people out with whatever problems that come up against them.
- Anthropomorphic Typography: They're a group of sentient, talking numbers.
- Badass Family: The Numberjacks are very close with each other and are just as much a family as they are a team. And, they routinely help the people of the town they live in through the various ways they counter the problems caused by the meanies.
- Badass in Distress: Most of them end up in danger on various occasions, usually through either a fault of their own or the nature of the problem:
- Three is a frequent victim of this. To start off with, she has ended up in two of the Puzzler's puzzle bubbles, the first in "In, Out and Shake it All About", where she and Five had to figure out a Sudoku puzzle in order for the problem to be sorted, and the second in "The Container Drainer" after leaving Five to take on the Puzzler alone. And as well as that, she nearly becomes a victim to the Numbertaker's plan to get rid of 3's in "Being Three", and in "One, Two, Three, Go!", her mouth becomes stuck and as a result cannot say the last number of the Puzzler's puzzle.
- Four nearly gets sucked up by the Numbertaker in "4 He's a Jolly Good Fellow", gets taken away by Spooky Spoon as part of her plan to steal blue things (himself unfortunately being blue) in "Off Colour", and gets blobbed by the Problem Blob in "Almost Human", being made to think of himself as a human as a result.
- Five has also been trapped in two of the Puzzler's puzzle bubbles, the first alongside Three in "In, Out and Shake it All About", and the second in "Famous Fives", where the other Numberjacks have to come up with equations that add up to five in order for her to be let out. And then, in "Time Trouble", Spooky Spoon makes her fall from a great height with her eyes closed, and she becomes stuck in a pattern of silly actions in "Round and Round".
- Six becomes trapped inside a box in "Boxing Day" after Three ends up sending out too much brain gain, and gets stuck counting plates continuously in "Carry On Counting".
- Seven becomes trapped in one of the Puzzler's puzzle bubbles in "Seven Wonders", being used as a way to add any number of certain things up to seven.
- Eight gets caught by the Puzzler in "More Ways than One", and the Puzzler gets the other Numberjacks to come up with certain ways of adding up to eight in order for him to be set free.
- Nine (you guessed it) falls victim to one of the Puzzler's puzzles in "Nine Lives" and gets used as the basis of his "3 + 6 = 9" trick.
- Everyone except Zero becomes this in "Zero the Hero", where they all get stuck in various places and end up inadvertently causing multiple problems for the people in the area they're stuck in: One puts a chef's hat on a boy's head, Two puts gardener's boots on a girl's feet, Three is forced to give the balloon man three wooden boards from a builder, Four gives the builder a tennis lady's equipment, Five gives the gardener who owns the boots the balloon man's balloon animals, Six gives a lady a series of toys belonging to the boy with the chef's hat, Seven gives the cleaner the aforementioned lady's parcels, Eight gives the chef who owns the hat being worn by the boy a series of toys belonging to the girl with the gardener's boots, and Nine gives the tennis lady the cleaner's equipment. It's up to Zero, who also happened to be the one who caused the problem, to fire up the brain gain machine and help the others set things right again.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: At the end of each episode, one Numberjack will address the audience and suggest they try out a maths-based problem related to the one featured in the episode.
- Cast of Snowflakes: All of them have appearances that are distinguishable from one another, corresponding to the number they represent.
- Color-Coded Characters: In addition, their bodies are different colours as well — Zero is chartreuse, One is purple, Two is orange, Three is pink, Four is royal blue, Five is cyan, Six is yellow, Seven is red, Eight is sky blue and Nine is green.
- Gender-Equal Ensemble: There are ten Numberjacks, representing 0 to 9, and the male ones represent the even numbers, while the females ones represent the odd numbers.
- Good Is Not Soft: They're all good, selfless characters who are always willing to help those who get caught up in the problems caused by the meanies. But whenever they are dealing with the meanies themselves, they always stand their ground and try their best to put a stop to whatever madness is being created.
- Palette Swap: On some occasions, they change their number while dealing with the episode's problem (e.g. Three turning into a 4 in "Being Three", Four turning into a 5 and then a 6 in "One More Time" and Six turning into two 3's in "Nine Lives"). Whenever this happens, they look almost exactly like the Numberjack they resemble, only with a different body colour and eye colour.
- Secret Squatter: They live inside a sofa in a house, without the knowledge of the people who live there. Unlike most examples of this trope, however, they're heroic characters who put a stop to the problems caused by the meanies.
- Sizeshifter: When out on missions, they have they ability to make themselves grow or shrink depending on the size of the number or object they place themselves on.
- Tertiary Sexual Characteristics: Downplayed. Their faces are all similarly designed, with the main difference being that the females have longer eyelashes than the males.
- You Are Number 6: They are all named after the numbers they represent.
Zero
- Voiced by: Dylan Robertson
Zero is the youngest Numberjack. He is not able to go on missions.
- The Baby of the Bunch: Quite literally. He is the smallest Numberjack, and he acts like a baby.
- Baby See, Baby Do: Often when he's saying something that isn't his name, it'll be because he's copying someone.
- Baby Talk: He can only say his name and several other words, including "headache"note , "brain gain", and "purple"note .
- Color-Coded Characters: Zero is chartreuse.
- Innocent Blue Eyes: He is a little baby with blue eyes.
- Sleepyhead: Possibly due to his young age, he falls asleep a lot.
One
- Voiced by: Dylan Robertson
One is the youngest female Numberjack. She is not able to go on missions, with one exception when she went out in 'One Won' to help six take on the numbertaker in the Garden centre, and in 'Square Dancing', along with Four and Nine, she made safe squares to defeat the Shape Japer.
- Ambiguous Gender: She was once referred to as male. However, this was likely a mistake on either the writer or the voice actor's part.
- Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Downplayed when she got enlarged to scare the Numbertaker. She got made about the size of a human and it only lasted a few minutes at the most.
- Baby See, Baby Do: Once, upon hearing that they need to stop the Puzzler, she proclaims, "Stop Puzzler!".
- Baby Talk: Talks like this. However, in "Six of One", she spoke a full sentence:One: Just one. I'm only a little number.note
- Brainy Baby: Shows some mathematical ability even though she's a toddler.
- Color-Coded Characters: One is purple.
- Damsel in Distress: In "Zero The Hero", she gets stuck and involuntarily puts a chef's hat on a boy's head.
- Graceful Ladies Like Purple: She's purple.
Two
- Voiced by: Robert Watson
Two is one of the younger Numberjacks. He is not able to go on missions.
- Ambiguous Gender: In one episode, Six referred to him as female. However, this was likely a mistake made either by the writer or Six's voice actor. Apart from that, he is always referred to as a boy.
- Color-Coded Characters: Two is orange.
- The Ditz: Downplayed. He can't count, as proven in "Out for the Count", however, this is normal for most people his age.
- Distressed Dude: In "Zero The Hero", he gets stuck and inadvertently puts gardener's boots on the girl's feet.
- Genki Boy: When he's in a good mood, he is very enthusiastic.
- Irony: As proven in "Out For The Count", he can't count, despite being a Numberjack, although justified since he's only two years old.
- Mood-Swinger: He has a toddlerish mindset, so he is a bit moody.
Three
- Voiced by: Alice Baker (English), Miriam Aguilar (Spanish)
Three is one of the main Numberjacks. While she is still too small a number to go out on missions (That changes later on when they stop using the size of number and/or her apparent age as an excuse to stop her going out on missions on her own), she does get to help out with the machinery in the Control Room.
- Annoying Younger Sibling: One of Three's most frequently seen pastimes is bothering Four.
- Bratty Half-Pint: Downplayed. She can be rude and selfish at times, but isn't less mature than a normal three-year-old, and is a sweet kid, deep down.
- Catchphrase: Says, "Me, me, me" when she wants to do something.
- Cheerful Child: Is the most enthusiastic of the bunch and is three years old.
- Color-Coded Characters: Three is pink.
- Damsel in Distress: Where do we begin?
- In "The Container Drainer" and "In, Out, Shake It All About", Three gets trapped in a puzzle bubble.
- In "Being Three", Three gets dragged around by the Numbertaker and is briefly changed into a four to stop it.
- In "One, Two, Three, Go!", Three's mouth is stuck and she can't say the last number of the puzzle. Thank goodness for Nine.
- In "Zero The Hero", Three is stuck and is forced to give the balloon man three wooden boards from the builder.
- Ding-Dong-Ditch Distraction: While it's essential for the doorbell to be rang when there's someone in the room, Three has a particular fondness for doing it.
- Genki Girl: And how! She's easily the most active and enthusiastic of the bunch.
- Innocent Blue Eyes: A young girl with blue eyes.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: While she is normally an enthusiastic Cheerful Child, Three can also be whiny, sulky and impatient, and frequently pokes rude or insensitive remarks at Four. However, she is just as passionate about helping people with their problems as the other Numberjacks, and she still genuinely cares a great deal about Four despite her tendency to annoy or make fun of him.
- Mid-Season Upgrade: She finally got to go out alone in "3 Things Good", (albeit, due to Four not being able to go with her because the launcher broke.) Her first intentional solo mission was "Being 3". And she's had a few decent solo missions after that.
- Not Now, Kiddo: In "In, Out, Shake It All About", she blurted out her opinion during a briefing. Six shushes her.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: The loud and energetic red to Four's blue.
- Pink Girl, Blue Boy: The Pink Girl to Four's Blue Boy.
- Pink Means Feminine: Is a deep pink female Numberjack.
- Savvy Guy, Energetic Girl: A friendship example; she's the Energetic Girl to Four's Savvy Guy.
- Sick Episode: She catches "lurgi" from Four and Six in "The Dreaded Lurgi".
- Tagalong Kid: In Season 1, she sometimes accompanied Five or Six for missions. She was supposed to accompany Four on a mission in "Three Things Good", but the launcher broke and she was on her own. This is likely what gets her to go on solo missions later.
- Vitriolic Best Buds: Three often "mucks Four about" as he puts it in "all about Four", but in many cases, Three actually shows the most concern when Four is in trouble. She even calls him one of her favourite things in "Being 3".
Four
- Voiced by: Jonathan Beech
Four is one of the main Numberjacks. He is the techie, and handles most of the machinery and repairs in the sofa.
- Catchphrase:
- "Hold on, I'm putting it on screen!", which was updated to "On the screen!" once his voice actor's voice deepened.
- "I'm not sure."
- Child Prodigy: Despite only being four years old, he is intelligent enough to know how to fix the machinery.
- Color-Coded Characters: Four is royal blue.
- Distressed Dude:
- In "4 He's A Jolly Good Fellow", Four nearly gets sucked up by the Numbertaker.
- In "Off Colour", Four is taken away by Spooky Spoon because she was taking blue things. In Six's words "she's gone too far this time".
- In "Zero The Hero", Four is stuck and accidentally gives the builder the tennis lady's equipment.
- Hidden Depths: In One More Time, Four admits he likes trains.
- I Don't Think That's Such a Good Idea: He often voices doubts about his friends' ideas.
- Inopportune Voice Cracking: In late-Season 1, his voice began to crack at random moments. This mostly mellowed out by the time Season 2 began wrapping up.
- Mr. Fixit: Is the team mechanic.
- Nervous Wreck: He is usually hesitant to go on missions, and even outside of that, he tends to get tense and worked up easily, sometimes catastrophising over part of a game or activity going wrong or doubting himself even when the others are encouraging him.
- Pink Girl, Blue Boy: The Blue Boy to Three's Pink Girl.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: The quiet, deep thinking blue to Three's red.
- Savvy Guy, Energetic Girl: A friendship example, and is the Savvy Guy to Three's Energetic Girl.
- Sick Episode:
- In "The Trouble With Nothing", Four has a headache from a mission earlier on in the day when he had to be a four on a washing machine control. He can still run the control room, but isn't up to going back out of the sofa.
- In "The Dreaded Lurgi", he, Six, and eventually Three, get sick with a disease called lurgi. He and Six get better, though.
- Teens Are Monsters: Parodied in "Into The Teens". Four is temporarily turned into Fourteen, and immediately starts acting like he's all grown up and cool (read: he starts making a fool of himself).
- Vitriolic Best Buds: Four often gets frustrated when Three is being cheeky toward him, but he does genuinely care about her. One example is in "The Container Drainer" where Four is cross with the Puzzler for trapping Three in a puzzle bubble.
- Vocal Evolution: As his voice actor was experiencing puberty while the series was being produced, his voice became a lot deeper as the series progressed. By the series finale, when Jonathan Beech's voice had broken, his voice was almost as low as Eight's.
Five
- Voiced by: Laura Maasland
Five is one of the main Numberjacks, very positive and smart. She is the one who imagines what would happen if the problem continues.
- Cheerful Child: Maybe not as much as Three, but she's one of the more positive Numberjacks.
- Color-Coded Characters: Five is teal.
- Cool Big Sis: While not as much as Seven, Eight, and Nine, she sometimes looks after the younger Numberjacks and they look up to her. She even takes Three out with her during... for lack of a better word, three of her missions before the pink Numberjack graduates to doing them solo later.
- Damsel in Distress:
- In "In, Out, Shake It All About" and "Famous 5s", Five is trapped in a puzzle bubble. The latter episode also has her trapped in quicksand.
- In "Time Trouble", Five is made to blink for a long time and falls off the edge. Thank goodness Three's brain-gain made her fall slowly, otherwise she would have been hurt.
- In "Round and Round", Five is trapped in a pattern of five silly actions.
- In "Zero The Hero", Five is stuck and involuntarily gives the gardener the balloon man's balloon animals due to a fault in the launcher.
- The Fashionista: Downplayed. She knows a lot about fashion, but doesn't even wear clothes herself.
- Genki Girl: Downplayed. She is enthusiastic, but not as much as Three.
- Hidden Depths: In "Belongings", Three says that Five knows a lot about fashion.
- The Lancer: Her intelligence and calm demeanour make her a great contrast with Six. Five also tends to run the control room whenever Four is out on a mission.
- Ms. Imagination: She's always the one to imagine what could go wrong.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: The calm and level-headed blue to Six's red.
- The Rival: She has had to deal with Spooky Spoon more than the other meanies.
Six
- Voiced by: Oliver Keogh
Six is one of the main Numberjacks. He is acrobatic, likes cars and sees himself as a leader (often deciding who gets to go on missions) but is not as level-headed as Five.
- Catchphrase: Often says, "Did the trick!".
- Cheerful Child: Not as much as Three, but still one of the more optimistic Numberjacks, and he's a kid because each Numberjack's number corresponds to their age.
- Color-Coded Characters: Six is yellow.
- Cool Big Bro: Downplayed. He sometimes plays the role model to the younger Numberjacks, but not as often as Seven, Eight, and Nine. During "Nine Lives", Six even takes Three out with him before the pink Numberjack graduates to doing solo missions later in the series.
- Distressed Dude:
- In "Carry On Counting", Six is trapped counting plates over and over again.
- In "Zero The Hero", Six is stuck and gives the lady the boy's toys.
- In "Boxing Day", Three accidentally makes too many boxes and Six is stuck inside one.
- Genki Boy: While not as enthusiastic as Three, he's a close second, and is fond of doing acrobatics.
- Hidden Depths: In "Forward Thinking", Five reveals that Six is a fan of cars.
- The Leader: As Six is the biggest of the core four Numberjacks, Six sees himself as this.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: An enthusiastic Genki Boy, the red to Five's blue.
- Sick Episode: In "The Dreaded Lurgi", he, Four, and eventually Three, get a disease called Lurgi which makes them lethargic. He recovers at the end, though.
Seven
- Voiced by: Roz Ellis
Seven is one of the older Numberjacks and likes painting.
- Color-Coded Characters: Seven is red.
- Cool Big Sis: Sometimes acts as a role model and babysitter to the younger Numberjacks.
- Damsel in Distress:
- In "Seven Wonders", Seven is trapped by the Puzzler.
- In "Zero The Hero", Seven is stuck and inadvertently gives the cleaner the lady's parcels because the launcher was malfunctioning.
- Genki Girl: Downplayed. She's enthusiastic, but not as much as Three.
- Hidden Depths: In one episode and only one, numberjack Seven is shown to be able to display the seven colours of the rainbow as rings around herself, it's the same episode where she mentions her interest in painting.
Eight
- Voiced by: Harry Munday
Eight is the oldest male Numberjack. He is quite athletic.
- Color-Coded Characters: Eight is sky blue.
- Cool Big Bro: Has a special bond with his younger siblings, especially Four.
- Distressed Dude:
- In "More Ways Than One", Eight is trapped by the Puzzler.
- In "Zero the Hero", Eight is stuck and gives the chef the girl's toys (by accident; the launcher was malfunctioning because of a button Zero pressed).
- Genki Boy: Enjoys playing sports and is very upbeat.
- Hidden Depths: The audio story "Close Encounters" reveals he has an interest in spiders, partly due to them having eight legs.
Nine
- Voiced by: Roz Ellis
Nine is the eldest Numberjack and is very organized.
- Color-Coded Characters: Nine is green.
- Cool Big Sis: She spends a lot of time looking after the younger Numberjacks and is particularly close to Three.
- Damsel in Distress:
- In "Nine Lives", Nine is trapped by the Puzzler.
- In "Zero The Hero", Nine is stuck and gives the tennis player the cleaner's mops, buckets and brooms. This is because of a malfunction in the launcher that made this happen to everyone except Zero.
Meanies
The Meanies as a whole
- Meaningful Name: They are called the Meanies and are the villains of the series.
- Spell My Name with a "The": Except Spooky Spoon.
The Shape Japer
- Voiced by: Rachel Preece
The Shape Japer is a flying, slightly insane, purple sphere that sometimes turns into a cube. She is often the cause of problems relating to shapes.
- Ax-Crazy: Downplayed. She's only slightly mad and most of her evil acts are more annoying than dangerous.
- Cartoon Creature: She is a purple sphere and her species is hard to determine.
- Depending on the Writer: How verbal she is varies between episodes; sometimes she can only laugh ("Sphere Today, Gone Tomorrow"), sometimes she can only say one word at a time ("A Circle at Both Ends"), and sometimes she talks in Hulk Speak ("Bad Circles").
- The Ditz: Not very intellectual, she mainly acts on instinct.
- Flight: She can fly.
- The Hyena: She laughs a lot.
- Laughing Mad: Seems a bit loopy and laughs a great deal.
- Scary Teeth: The only meanie with sharp teeth.
- She's a Man in Japan: She's a man in the Polish dub, having a masculine name, being voiced by a male voice actor, and being referred to as a male.
- Voluntary Shapeshifting: Downplayed. She can change from a sphere to a cube or from a sphere to a cylinder in on one episode and from square to triangle in another.
The Puzzler
- Voiced by: Bob Golding
A flying head who spouts bubbles that can trap characters. He rearranges things to create "puzzles".
- Beard of Evil: One of the main villains with a goatee that is made of bubbles.
- Evil Redhead: One of the main villains with hair that is made of orange bubbles.
- Flight: He gets around by floating.
- Four Eyes, Zero Soul: Is one of the main villains and he wears glasses.
- Nerd Glasses: Wears glasses and is the most intellectual of the villains.
- Rhymes on a Dime: He speaks in rhyme.
- Weird Beard: It's made of orange bubbles, like the rest of his hair.
- Your Head A-Splode: He has two ways of exiting after the Numberjacks solve his problems - one is making his entire head explode, and the other is simply floating away.
The Problem Blob
- Voiced (well, vocal effects provided) by: Bob Golding
A green blob with an eye on a stalk inside his mouth. The problems he causes are pretty random and he initiates them by splattering them with slime.
- Cyclops: Has one eye that is on a stalk inside his mouth.
- Eyes Do Not Belong There: His eye stalk is in his mouth.
- Names to Run Away from Really Fast: He's just as problematic as his name implies.
- Sickly Green Glow: Is evil and green and produces green slime.
The Numbertaker
- Played by: Ross Mullan
A man in a white outfit who steals things with his gadgets. Occasionally, he creates excessive numbers and calls himself the Numbermaker instead.
- Ambiguously Human: Sure he's played by a live-action actor, but between his silent demeanour and his vaccum arm, he's likely not a human being.
- Artificial Limbs: Most of the time, his right hand is a robotic vacuum of sorts, but he can also replace it with other things, such as a hook or a net.
- Light Is Not Good: Wears white attire and is one of the meanies.
- Limited Wardrobe: He only wears a long white coat and a giant white hat.
- The Speechless: He never speaks.
- Sticky Fingers: While numbers are his favorite thing to take, hence the name, he'll take anything.
- Token Human: He's the only meanie played by a live-action actor.
Spooky Spoon
- Voiced by: Rachel Preece
A narcissistic plastic spoon, who causes disarray. She hates Five in particular.
- Accessory-Wearing Cartoon Animal: Wears only a necklace.
- Alliterative Name: Spooky Spoon.
- Animate Inanimate Object: A talking, flying spoon.
- The Rival: Spooky Spoon seems to have one with Five moreso than the other Numberjacks.
- Small Name, Big Ego: As her theme says, "She's only plastic but she thinks she's fantastic".
- Smug Snake: Is extremely vain and arrogant.
- Tertiary Sexual Characteristics: Is entirely pink, with a necklace and eyeshadow.
- Vanity is Feminine: As well as being quite vain, Spooky Spoon is also unconventionally feminine.
Other Characters
The Family
A family of humans, consisting of a mother, a father, and a young girl. They live in the house the Numberjacks' couch is in, but the Numberjacks don't want them to know about them.
- Ding-Dong-Ditch Distraction: Whenever one or more of them is/are sitting on the couch at launching time, the Numberjacks ring the doorbell to distract them.
- No Name Given: Eventually, the daughter's name is revealed to be Holly but the parents remain unnamed.
- Unnamed Parent: Neither the mother nor the father have names.
The People With the Problems
- Waitress/Cook played by: Zahra Browne
Cleaning man played by: Rob Thrittle
The victims of the problems the Meanies cause. They are always humans, mostly adults but a few of them are children. There are a few recurring problem victims, but some of them are random.
- Apple of Discord: In "Fraction Action", the Shape Japer made them argue over something, then divide the thing they were arguing about into fractions.
- Butt-Monkey: A few of them are unlucky enough to be recurring victims of problems.
- Fight for the Last Bite: In "Fraction Action", some kids argue over chocolate and the gardeners (who we see in several episodes) argue over an orange.
- Nice Girl: The girl with the marbles in "Sphere Today, Gone Tomorrow", who saves Six from getting run over by the marbles.
- No Name Given: They're just referred to as things like "the man" or "the old lady".
- The Quiet One: A lot of the time, they very rarely if ever have any lines of dialogue. If they do speak, it's normally just short simple sentences like "My peas" or "How's it going?".
- Supreme Chef: One of the most frequent victims is a cook who frequently makes delicious meals, including pizzas and cakes.
The Agents
This is only one of them.
A group of live-action children who notify the Numberjacks about the problems, help solve them, and use their thoughts to help make the Brain Gain.
- Big Damn Heroes: In "The Dreaded Lurgi", after Three falls victim to the titular disease, the Agents leap into action to create Brain Gain and save the day.
- Cast of Snowflakes: They all look unique, and different from each other.
- Childish Bangs: Agent 106 has prominent bangs.
- Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": They're only referred to individually as "Agent [Serial Number]".
- Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold: A few are blond, like Agent 73.
- Pink Means Feminine: Agent 99 is commonly seen in a pink-and-white shirt.
- Tomboyish Ponytail: Agent 16 always wears a ponytail.
- Victim of the Week: Occasionally, an agent will be the one needing help from the Numberjacks, such as when Agent 18 was flipped upside down and needed Brain Gain to be set back to normal.
Jasper
The family's cat. The Numberjacks don't mind being seen by him.
- Cats Are Mean: Averted. From what little we see of him, Jasper's actually quite laid back and doesn't mind seeing the Numberjacks fly out of the sofa.
Buddy Blocks
Creatures the Numberjacks keep as pets. Zero doesn't have any, the rest have an amount corresponding to their number (Three has three Buddy Blocks and so on).
- Animate Inanimate Object: They seem to have minds of their own.
- The Blank: They have no faces.
- Color-Coded Characters: They are color-coded with their owners (Three has pink blocks, Six has yellow blocks, etc.)
- No Name Given: Individual Buddy Blocks aren't named.
Dancing Cow
A cow who initially seemed to be a product of Five's imagination, but the audio stories reveal that she exists.
- No Name Given: She's only referred to as "the dancing cow".
- Not-So-Imaginary Friend: She seems like Five's imaginary friend, but then she turns out to be real in the audio story "Noisy Night".
