Gasp! is an 2010 Australian animated series produced by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in association with SLR Productions.
Laughs, Lunacy and Logic — wait, scratch that last part — conspire in this situation comedy series about a larger-than-life little goldfish named Gasp, whose imagination is as big as his heart. This series follows the zany antics of a goldfish and his family-pet 'cousins' left home alone when Mum, Dad and their two kids, Ginger and Fred, have gone off to work, school or play. Ever wondered what pets get up to when there are no humans around to spoil the fun? This is the place to find out. From all-pet singing/dancing revues to Arctic expeditions through the freezer, anything can happen in this house — and usually does.
Gasp! contains examples of:
- Amazing Technicolor Wildlife: Dogbox is blue with a yellow head, and Catflap is a pale lavender.
- Amnesia Episode: In "Amnesia", the pets must teach Gasp how to be himself again when a bump on the head gives him a case of amnesia.
- Babysitting Episode: In "Fish Stick", Gasp, experimenting with mind-control techniques while babysitting, panics when he thinks he's accidentally turned Winston into a fish stick.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: In "The Cat in the Flap", a bedraggled stray cat plays on the sympathies of the kids in a crafty attempt to get the pets evicted and take their place.
- Cannot Tell a Joke: In "Funny Fish", Gasp works on the same joke, telling it over and over in numerous ways, until the pets have to laugh just to get him to stop.
- Cat/Dog Dichotomy: Dogbox is dumber than dirt; Catflap is a snarky intellectual usually found with her nose in a book.
- Companion Cube: Gasp spends a lot of time talking to Diver; the diver statue at the bottom of his tank.
- Cordon Bleugh Chef: In one episode, Gasp attempts to create a unique new cupcake flavor in order to win a new stove in a competition. His attempts include chocolate and fish flake, and apricot jam and liver.
- Dogs Are Dumb: Dogbox is easily the dumbest of the animals in the household; making him stupider than the goldfish and the cockroach.
- Easy Amnesia: In "Amnesia", the pets must teach Gasp how to be himself again when a bump on the head gives him a case of amnesia.
- Eat the Evidence: In one episode, Gasp and the other pets have to dispose of the enormous number of disgusting cupcakes (somewhere over 300) that Gasp had baked before the family gets home. They do this by eating them.
- Eek, a Mouse!!: In "Mouse Fishin'", a mouse scares Ginger out of the kitchen. This sets in motion the episode's Zany Scheme as Gasp ropes the pets into helping him capture and then evicting the mouse.
- Female Feline, Male Mutt: Dogbox, the male dog, and Catflap, the female cat.
- God Guise: In "Vactastic Voyage", Gasp is worshiped as a god by a mite tribe inside the vacuum cleaner while the pets try various ridiculous ways to get him out.
- Hopeless Suitor: Gasp has a completely hopeless crush on Ginger: hopeless because he is a goldfish, and she is a human girl.
- Human Mail: Not exactly human, but when Beetlenick seems homesick for Jolly Old England in "Beetles in the Mail", Gasp goes about trying to mail him back there.
- Identity Amnesia: In "Amnesia", the pets must teach Gasp how to be himself again when a bump on the head gives him a case of amnesia.
- Interspecies Romance: Gasp, a goldfish, is hopelessly in love with Ginger, the human girl who owns him. Ginger, for her part, is completely unaware of this. In the episode "Puppy Love", the other pets discover that Dogbox (a dog) has a crush on a seal.
- Lost Him in a Card Game: In "Pet Games", Gasp loses his Companion Cube Diver to Roachy in a board game when Roachy cheats.
- Mistaken for Aliens: In "Alien Trash", Gasp leads a mission to the backyard to make peace with the aliens in the new spaceship...that turns out to be a worm farm.
- Never Trust a Hair Tonic: In "Hair of the Fish", Gasp buys a Peruvian hair tonic online in an attempt to cure the bald patch he accidentally created on Catflap. After he is doused in the tonic, Gasp ends up growing hair all over his body. Gasp, it should be pointed out, is a fish.
- Protagonist Title
- Self-Offense: In "Beware of the Carp", Gasp employs an increasingly wacky security system to keep out a bandit, not realising it's just Dad trying to get back in.
- Shout-Out Theme Naming: The kids of the family are named Fred and Ginger.
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Catflap is a triskaidekaphobe; i.e. afraid of Friday the 13th. In "Lucky Guppy!", Gasp discovers this and he and the pets look for a lucky charm to get her through it.
- William Telling: In "Alien Trash", Mrs. Winston uses a whip to cut in half an apple balanced on top of Dogbox's head.
