The Amazing World of Gumball/Characters
The characters of The Amazing World of Gumball include:
The Wattersons
Gumball Watterson
The main character (as indicated by the title). Gumball is a talking blue cat in middle school. A mischief maker and somewhat lazy, the show revolves around his various mishaps around Elmore. Tends to have questionable morals at times and can be a little selfish as well.
- Accidental Kiss: With Darwin in "The Pressure".
- With Granny Jojo in "The Kiss".
- With Carmen in "The Storm".
- Adorkable
- All Guys Want Cheerleaders: Gumball has a crush on Penny, a peanut with antlers who is one of the cheerleaders at Elmore Junior High. The feeling is mutual, but neither of them are capable of expressing it.
- Almost Kiss: With Penny, several times.
- Ambidextrous Sprite: He always has three whiskers on one side and two on the other, but the pattern tends to flip as a result of this.
- Annoying Older Sibling: To Anais most of the time.
- Attractive Bent Gender: When he's forced in a dress.
- Bad Liar:
Nicole: Honey, are you in trouble? Because my mother senses are tingling. I can smell trouble.
Gumball: (laughing nervously) Trouble? No, we're fine. Absolutely fine. No trouble here, bye.
Nicole: Are you lying?
Gumball: Ha! Oh, no, of course not.
Nicole: Right. You're lying. I'm coming home now.
- Butt Monkey/The Chew Toy: Amusing Injuries are quite common, but Gumball seems especially prone to them.
- Iron Butt Monkey: Gumball is, to put it bluntly, indestructible. He's survived falling off a cliff, being punched through a wall, and even being flushed down the toilet.
- It's taken Up to Eleven in "The Curse".
- Catchphrase: "*sigh* (aggravated) Fine..."
- "What the what!?"
- Classical Anti-Hero
- Cute Kitten
- Cute Little Fangs: He is a cat
- Demonic Possession: In "The Ghost" by Carrie, and in "The Flower" by a jealousy ghost.
- Depending on the Writer: His level of intelligence varies from episode. Sometimes he's a complete idiot, sometimes he's just mischievous, sometimes he just acts like a dork, sometimes he's the Only Sane Man...
- In the latter half of Season 2 his Only Sane Man status is becoming the more distinct of them all.
- Detachment Combat: Without the combat though, but Gumball seems to be able to function perfectly whenever a body part gains autonomy.
- Determinator: In "The Third", he rides a tricycle for 140 kilometers, flies down a hill so fast he catches on fire, and gets covered in quick drying cement (which he promptly breaks through) just to prove that he and Darwin are still friends.
- He's determined to repay his debt to Mr. Robinson for "saving his life" (which he just stopped his car because Gumball thought he was gonna get "run over").
- Disproportionate Retribution: In "The Banana", when he decides to get back at Banana for chewing on Darwin's pen. Subverted, when he finds out what Banana accidentally did to Darwin's stuff. Then he starts to realize that this is is getting out of hand, but Darwin takes a far more step. In the end, a "huge" fight goes on between the three of them and it turns out the chewed pen was actually Gumball's and he actually chews on it all the time.
- Embarrassing Middle Name: "The Club" reveals that his middle name is Trisha, short for Tristopher—it was supposed to be Christopher, but Richard wrote it down wrong.
- Embarrassing Nickname: "The Meddler" has his mom calling him "Gummypuss".
- Fashionable Asymmetry: He has two whiskers pointing forward and three pointing backward, regardless of the direction he's facing.
- First Kiss: With Carmen of all people, though subverted as she says it's more of a headbutt than a kiss.
- Flanderization: Season 2 really ups his negative qualities, like his selfishness and sarcasm.
- Genius Ditz: He gets a little smarter later on in the second season, though.
- Hartman Hips: A rare male example. Clearly, he gets it from his mom.
- Heroic BSOD: He seems to be prone to these.
- Idiot Hero
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: While he can be exasperated with others and often does some dumb or insensitive things, he's a good kid and will go out of his way to try and help.
- Keet
- No Sense of Direction: He think he can somehow memorize a map after eating it and when the wind is directly speaking to him in plainly decipherable language he does the exact opposite of what it tells him.
- Only Sane Man: Following Season 2, this is his main characterization, though he still catches the Idiot Ball from time to time.
- Pink Girl, Blue Boy: Blue Boy to Anais's Pink Girl.
- The Protagonist
- Rubber Man: Gumball has been shown numerous times to be incredibly elastic.
- Sanity Slippage: In "The Bumpkin" and "The Helmet".
- Screams Like a Little Girl: Especially in the first season.
- Single-Target Sexuality: The only girl that has stolen Gumball's heart: Penny Fitzgerald.
- Supreme Chef: Shown to be at least decent in cooking in the episode "The Secret". Miss Simian has also called his cooking 'divine' and has gotten a B in home economics because of said cooking.
- Though he did make a hilariously bad meal for Anais in "The Responsible", though it may have been Rule of Funny at work.
- Strong Family Resemblance: He looks almost exactly like a shorter version of his mother. In "The Plan", he even tries to impersonate her and since he obscures the huge height difference by standing in a bush, it was amazingly effective.
- Too Dumb to Live: In "The Bumpkin", when he gets stung by a wasp on his left index finger and then tries to suck out the poison. Guess what happens next...
- Vocal Evolution: Along with Darwin, his voice has gotten deeper as of season 2, as his VA got older in the interim.
- Who Names Their Kid "Dude"?: His odd name is sometimes commented on, most notably by Mr. Small in "The Banana".
- Verbal Tic: He tends to squeak, usually when he's yelling.
- Why Did It Have To Be Spiders?: "AHHH, spider! Knock his block off!"
- With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: He displays this in "The Helmet".
Darwin Watterson
Gumball's pet goldfish-turned-family member after it sprouted legs, grew in size, and began to talk. Gumball and Darwin are seen as brothers (Darwin even calls Nicole "Mom") and attend the same school. Darwin is a bit naive due to his forced adaptation among the "normal" world, though he is more rational and moral than Gumball.
- Accessory-Wearing Cartoon Animal/The One Who Wears Shoes: Lampshaded in "The Meddler", where a scene in the shower pixellates Gumball's genitals and Darwin's feet.
- Actual Pacifish
- Adorkable
- Bad Liar: Neither he nor Gumball could resist darting their eyes to the side when lying to Anais.
- Beware the Nice Ones/Beware the Silly Ones: He becomes a lot more aggressive in the second season; a prime example would be "The Banana".
- Big Eater: At least, he tends to think with his stomach from time to time as most fish seem to do.
- In "The Party", he reveals he's part sucker fish and cleans the house by eating everything.
- Cephalothorax: As Masami put it:
"Yeah, he's great because... he's got legs, and, you know... a head..."
- That's if you want to consider the entirety a fish's body, a head.
- Cloudcuckoolander: Probably because he's a goldfish.
- Deadpan Snarker: Well, usually his snarking is a lot more cheerful, but he gets more and more of it after the first season.
- Depending on the Writer: Like above, his level of intelligence also varies depending on the episode, as does how peaceful and innocent he is.
- Deuteragonist
- The Ditz / Genius Ditz
- Fish Out of Water: A literal example.
- Genre Savvy: Like Gumball in "The Sweaters".
- Happily Adopted: Darwin's treated like as much of a member of the family as Gumball is.
- Although legally he's still registered as a pet.
- Incorruptible Pure Pureness: When taken over by Jealousy in "The Flower", he's the only one with no spite or envy of anyone else, instead just stating he's "actually quite happy with my life".
- Insistent Terminology: He prefers the term "Animal Companion".
- Keet
- Meaningful Name: He was once the family pet fish but then he sprouted legs and doesn't need water to breathe anymore. Think about that for a second.
- His middle names all have nautical connections.
- Morality Pet: He has a higher moral sense than Gumball does.
- Named After Somebody Famous: Several somebodies.
- Only Sane Man: Though not necessarily the smartest person in any episode he's in, he's traded off on the role of "the only person being objective while everything's going nuts" with Anais on occasion, and has started playing the Straight Man to Gumball's antics more. Gumball basically says in "The Sidekick" that his role in their dynamic is to stop him from doing really crazy things.
- Overly Long Name: In "The Party", he reveals that his full name is Darwin Radlin Caspian Ahab Poseidon Nicodemus Watterson III.
- Post-Kiss Catatonia: In "The Party", he helps Rachel clean up her home at her party before her parents come home. She rewards him with a kiss on the cheek, resulting in him crashing head first to the floor with a goofy smile on his face.
- Sarcasm Blind: In season 1. In season 2, he snarks with the best of them.
- Speech Impediment: In "The Sock", Gumball points out that Darwin has a lisp where gills whistle. Darwin retorts with "You're so stinky, sailors sing sea shanties about how stinky you are!" making a whistling sound with every 'S'. This only happens for that one and only time, though. In fact, the very next sentence he says contains 'S'es without the lisp.
- Stepford Smiler: He is this in The Meddler.
- They Killed Kenny: In "The Meddler", when his head explodes.
- Trademark Favorite Food: Fish flakes, apparently.
- Uplifted Animal
Anais Watterson
Gumball's genius little (rabbit) sister, who is his junior by eight years (Gumball is 12, she is 4). Due to her high intelligence, she attends Gumball and Darwin's middle school as well. Despite her competency, she still displays some traits of a typical four-year old.
- Adorably Precocious Child
- Annoying Younger Sibling: She has her moments, especially in season two.
- Beware the Nice Ones/Berserk Button: Do not insult Daisy the Donkey in front of her.
- Definitely made true in "The Remote", when she wants to watch a new episode of Daisy the Donkey on TV, but everyone else wants to watch something different at that same time, so she sets up a plot to be sure she is the only one home alone to watch TV.
- The Chessmaster: In "The Remote".
- Child Prodigy: Despite being four years old, she is described as the smartest character on the show and even attends Junior High with her much older brother.
- The Comically Serious: Usually involved in her brother's wacky antics.
- Everythings Better With Bunnies
- Fully-Dressed Cartoon Animal: Though she seems to just be wearing socks instead of shoes.
- However, in "The Goons", she was seen briefly not wearing (at least one of her) socks. Also, in "The Castle", she's wearing magenta footless pajamas for most of the episode, making her a Barefoot Cartoon Animal.
- It Is Pronounced "Tro-PAY": Subverted. Her name is pronounced both as An-ai-ees and An-ai-ahs and she never favors one over the other.
- Little Miss Snarker
- Not So Harmless: Has clearly proven herself to be this in "The Secret" and arguably "The Kiss".
- Only Sane Girl: Can be her or can be her mother, depending on the episode.
- Pink Girl, Blue Boy: Pink Girl to Gumball's Blue Boy.
- Pint-Sized Powerhouse: She is depicted as being able to life way more than her body weight at a very young age at that. Such as when she carried a ton of luggage Upstairs and the time she carried Darwin with a bunch of stuff on him all the way to the top of a mountain.
- Tomboy and Girly Girl: Girly Girl to Nicole's Tomboy.
- Took a Level In Dumbass: In "The Authority", thanks to Granny Jojo. She gets better at the end though, thanks to Nicole.
- Tuckerization: Named after Ben Bocquelet's younger sister.
- Wacky Parent, Serious Child: The serious child to Richard's wacky parent.
- Wise Beyond Their Years
- Not So Above It All: She's considerably more child-like when it comes to anything involving Daisy the Donkey.
Nicole Watterson
The maternal member of the Watterson family (and the same kind of cat as Gumball). She holds down a job at the rainbow factory and appears to be the only member of the family with any sense of responsibility. She's normally collected and organized but when things go awry, she succumbs to violent bouts of anger (almost always sparked by her sons).
- Action Mom
- Amazingly Embarrassing Parent: In "The Meddler", she decides to follow Gumball around at school everywhere, even in the public shower, doing things such as feeding him like a baby and calling him "Gummypuss".
- Badass Adorable
- Alternatingly, not at the same time.
- Berserk Button: MANY. Being called a loser (at least by Miss Simian), threatening her family and disrespecting her authority. And DON'T YOU DARE run away from her if she finds out you're in trouble.
- Beware the Nice Ones: She is really sincere, but sometimes she can get really violent, so it's best you run for it if she does.
- Childhood Friend Romance: Has known her husband, Richard, since they were Gumball's age.
- Competition Freak: She has a huge drive to win. In "The Fridge", she wins the company paintball game by shooting everyone, even her own teammates, to win the game. She also tries to pull an I Surrender, Suckers moment to Gumball during the family paintball game and cheats Anais out of six spaces while playing "Dodge or Dare" with the family in "The Game" through Loophole Abuse.
- Control Freak: Pointed out by Anais in "The Job". Anais thinks Nicole is worried about Richard working as a pizza delivery guy because she thinks it's upsetting the balance of power in the house when in reality Richard having a job will destroy the universe.
- Cute Bruiser: Don't make her mad. She is a lot stronger than she looks.
- Cute Little Fangs: Though they're visible far less often then Gumball's.
- Death Glare: "The Castle" gives her Glowing Eyes of Doom swirling with ghosts enough to frighten even the most delinquent person in Elmore.
- Determinator: She gets scary when she gets mad and probably can and will chase you down. "The DVD" and "The Limit" are based entirely on this.
- Disproportionate Retribution: When Gumball and Darwin laugh at some of Richard's past screw-ups, not knowing he was within earshot, she hurls cement cupcakes at them and downright refuses to provide for them until they apologize, when all she needed to do was scold them for being rude.
- Doting Parent
- The Dreaded: Her own family is scared of her, especially when she gets made. Case in point: in "The Quest", Gumball and Darwin both agree that suffering Tina Rex's wrath is better than suffering Nicole's.
- Flanderization: Nicole’s anger issues and her status as The Dreaded were initially just her being a Mama Bear that Gumball and Darwin were afraid of getting in trouble with. This got turned into her having a Hair-Trigger Temper and becoming a raging monster when sufficiently angered.
- Full Name Ultimatum: Subverted as she never uses Gumball's Embarrassing Middle Name, it's always "Gumball Watterson".
- Hair-Trigger Temper: Nicole cares for her family, but easily becomes upset when she discovers they did something wrong. She's even taking anger management classes, in which her behavior is far worse than she acts elsewhere.
- Hartman Hips: Not including her head, her hips are the widest feature of her body.
- Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: With Richard.
- Interspecies Romance: With Richard.
- Killer Cat She has proven herself to be made of this trope in countless episodes, most notably in The Fight, where she mercilessly tears through Tina Rex's father just at the mere inkling of assuming that Gumball was being bullied.
- Le Parkour: She's very good at this.
- Magic Skirt: Including one scene where she's hung upside down without it moving.
- Mama Bear: She's VERY protective of her own family.
- Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy: Masculine Girl to Richard's Feminine Boy.
- Muscles Are Meaningless: In "The Authority", she's able to bend an IV rack in several different places and then bend it back to normal. Though it seems she only has this super strength when she's angry.
- Not So Above It All: Nicole would be insufferable if not for her insecurity and occasional lapses in judgment.
- Only Sane Woman: Depends on the episode, which sometimes gives the role to Anais instead. If she loses her temper, though, this goes out the window.
- Parenting the Husband: Considering Richard is dumber than a brick...
- Rage Breaking Point: "The Limit" shows us what happens when her family pushes her buttons just one too many times.
- Super Weight: Unclear where she lies on the scale. At first glance appears to be 1, but some incidents, such as beating up Tina Rex's father (despite being 1/100th his size) suggests it may be higher. The nature of her power is unclear other than it appears to be fueled by anger.
- Tomboy and Girly Girl: Tomboy to Anais's Girly Girl.
- Tuckerization: Named after Ben Bocquelet's mother.
- Ugly Guy, Hot Wife
- Voice of the Legion: When sufficiently pissed off, her voice gets really deep as well as echoing.
- What Does She See in Him?: Really, whatever made her marry Richard, it's a mystery. One episode implies that his bravery and self-esteem got her attention, but it has to be more than that.
- Women Are Wiser
- Workaholic: Played for laughs in "The Painting" when Principal Brown tells her to relax and stop working so hard for Anais's sake. But she's so used to it that she can't relax and does her household chores anyway, and then proceeds to trash the house on purpose to give herself more "work".
Richard Watterson
Gumball's father and Nicole's rabbit husband. Richard is very immature for his age and hates to have any sort of responsibility. He is also quite lackadaisical and sleeps frequently. As a result, Nicole is usually forced to be the parent to their children.
- Adults Are Useless: Richard practically lives this trope.
- Amazingly Embarrassing Parent: In "The Hero", Gumball and Darwin fail to come up with something good for their dad and settles on embarrassing moments. Unknown to them at the time, Richard overhears the conversation and leaves depressed.
- Ax Crazy: In "The Prank", after the kids prank him one too many times, he goes completely psycho with Slasher Smile chasing them all over the house. It turns out that making them think he went insane was his way of pranking them.
- Badass Mustache: Which he can grow and retract back into his face at will.
- Big Eater
- Brilliant but Lazy: Most often Brilliant At Lazy.
- Bumbling Dad
- Cloudcuckoolander: He has his odd moments.
- Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: He can be very crafty when he wants to, such as tricking Gumball and Darwin into doing his chores in "The Laziest".
- Dismotivation
- The Ditz: It's easier to count examples of when he doesn't act like one.
- Drives Like Crazy: He follows his GPS without ever paying attention to the road, including the direction he's facing. When he was high on anesthetics he crashed in several cars and parked in a swimming pool which Gumball considered an improvement.
- Doting Parent: Shown in "The Hero".
- Fan Disservice: Whenever he's shirtless.
- Fat Idiot and Fat Slob
- Freudian Excuse: His laziness and stupidity is the result of his mother completely sheltering him his entire life and never letting him learn to do anything for himself. His mother's parenting style was to make him (and as she tried with her grandkids), scared of everything.
- Genius Ditz: He's surprisingly great at pizza delivery, of all things. Both doing actual work and not being incompetent is so out of character that it nearly destroys the universe through sheer wrongness.
- House Husband: Though he doesn't do much house work either. When he finally gets a job, it nearly destroys the Universe.
- Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: With Nicole.
- Interspecies Romance: With Nicole.
- Karma Houdini: Gets away with his actions in "The Prank" and "The Laziest", and lets his sons take the fall.
- Laborious Laziness: Richard is a master at this.
- Lazy Bum: Laziest man in Elmore since 1983.
- Man Child: He literally acts the exact same way as he did when he was a kid.
- Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy: Feminine Boy to Nicole's Masculine Girl.
- Moral Myopia: He's repeatedly expressed that bad things are only funny when they happen to someone else.
- One of the Kids: Much to his wife's frustration.
- Papa Wolf: In "The Hero".
- The Prankster: In "The Prank".
- Shirtless Scene: Prone to this.
- The Slacker: A rare version of one that has children.
- Sleepyhead: Most commonly seen sleeping on the couch.
- Stout Strength: Apparently has this in "The Remote" when he effortlessly rips the car door off to get to Nicole.
- Too Dumb to Live: Thanks to his mom.
- Trademark Favourite Food: Sausages, apparently.
- Tuckerization: Named after Ben Bocquelet's father.
- Ugly Guy, Hot Wife: Honestly speaking, he's kinda cute actually (he's a bunny, after all).
- Wacky Parent, Serious Child: The wacky parent to Anais' serious child.
- Walking Techbane: Judging from how automatic doors, elevators, and self-checkout scanners treat him.
Gumball's classmates
Alan
A teal colored balloon who, despite their physical incompatibility, deeply loves Carmen. He is overly nice and even-tempered, never showing anger or raising his voice even when the subject of insults or physical attacks, much to the annoyance of his classmates. Being filled with helium, Alan regularly speaks in a high-pitched voice.
- Apologizes a Lot: In "The Voice", he even apologizes for making someone feel they need to apologize.
- Beware the Nice Ones: "Just shut-up, O.K.!!!"
- Fatal Attraction: Alan and Carmen are passionately in love with one another, but because Alan is a balloon and Carmen is a cactus, their relationship is impossible.
- Flying Face: Alan is just a balloon with a face drawn on it. His lack of limbs is a frequent frustration of his.
- Helium Speech: Invoked as he has a high squeaky voice similar to the effects of helium.
- Justified since he's a balloon.
- Incorruptible Pure Pureness: Is ludicrously good and perfect - a Purity Sue parody.
- Nice Guy: So nice, that it makes Gumball (and everyone else) sick.
- Parody Sue
- Running Gag: He has no hands!
- Sickeningly Sweethearts: In "The Storm", he is sickeningly sweet with Carmen much to their classmates' disgust.
- Tertiary Sexual Characteristics: While he's confirmed to be a boy, he has obvious eyelashes that makes him appear to be a girl.
Anton
A simple-minded piece of toast who was forcibly drafted into Tina's gang despite his unwillingness to do so, and only appeases them to avoid their anger.
- Animals Hate Him: Well, not so much hate as "Find delicious."
- Butt Monkey: Oh, yeah.
- Cephalothorax
- The Chew Toy: Sometimes literally.
- They Killed Kenny: He's been eaten (not even whole, actually torn to piece and eaten) several times now.
Banana Joe
A hyperactive banana, he is the class clown of Elmore Junior High and has the tendency to crack a joke whenever possible. His jokes often serve as a source of irritation to others.
- Annoying Laugh
- Auto Cannibalism: It's mentioned in "The Promise" that he had to eat part of himself to survive after getting left behind on a camping trip, so that's why he doesn't have feet.
- Berserk Button: Do not ruin his family's pen.
- Or ruin his school picture.
- Catch Phrase: "I'm a banana."
- Class Clown
- Pungeon Master
Bobert
One of the smartest students at Elmore Junior High, he is a robot who constantly struggles to understand emotion and develop a social life. Multiple times in the series, he has showcased his ability to transform into a much larger form by triggering his "defense mode".
- Cute Machines
- Does Not Know His Own Strength: Gumball learns this the hard way when they play punchies.
- I Just Want to Be You: Tries to become Gumball in "The Robot"
- Kill and Replace: Which inevitably resulted in trying to get rid of the real one.
- No Waterproofing in the Future: He lost to a sprinkler.
- Nuke'Em: Is capable of this in his fighting robot form. Hiding behind a nearby chair is enough protection though.
- Pint-Sized Powerhouse: Even at normal size he can easily punch someone across a room.
- Robot Kid
- Teacher's Pet: Considers himself to be this
- Transforming Mecha: Capable of increasing his size into a fighting robot the size of a very large car.
Carmen
A cactus who is considered to be a leader among her female classmates. She is in a relationship with Alan, though the danger of her spikes bursting him is a constant hindrance. Their relationship annoys their classmates, who are frequently annoyed by their romantic gestures and deem them "too perfect".
- Fatal Attraction: With Alan, as previously stated.
- Sickeningly Sweethearts: In "The Storm", she is sickeningly sweet with Alan much to their classmates' disgust.
- The Smart Girl: Carmen is one of the smartest girls in school according to the website.
- Tertiary Sexual Characteristics: Averted. She has no distinguished trait that shows she's female.
Carrie Krueger
An emo ghost who lives in a malevolent mansion and "enjoys being depressed". She has the abilities to teleport and possess living bodies.
- Big Eater: Justified, considering she hasn't eaten since she became a ghost, but she'll eat until the body she possesses passes out.
- Cute Ghost Girl: Darwin sure seems to think so when he kissed her.
- Demonic Possession: She can possess someone's body by flying into their mouth and down their throat.
- Emo Tween
- Hair Decorations: Has a bow on the side of her head.
- The Hedonist: It's been so long since she's been able to do things like eating, that when she has a body, she'll immediately starting binge-eating absolutely anything (except, apparently, pickles).
- Luminescent Blush: When Darwin kissed her in "Halloween".
- Our Ghosts Are Different
- Peek-a-Bangs: Much like Gumball's whiskers, subject to Fashionable Asymmetry and Ambidextrous Sprite.
- Perpetual Frowner
- Troll: As seen here.
Clayton
A red ball of clay who is a compulsive liar, with a tendency of making up absurd stories about himself.
- Bad Liar: An almost serial one at that.
- Claymation: He's literally a blob of clay.
- Meaningful Name
- Poisonous Friend: Plays this to Gumball and Darwin in "The Skull," though to their credit Gumball and Darwin figure out he's a bad influence on them almost right away and break it off with him... only for him to attempt to lie his way back into their good graces.
- Voluntary Shapeshifting: He can change into a lot of shapes, including other people (and fake their voices as well).
Hector Jötunheim
A massive but Gentle Giant who is the largest student in Elmore Junior High, to the point that only his legs and feet are seen.
- A Day in the Limelight: In "The Colossus".
- Art Evolution: Sorta. In Season 1, originally the only thing that can be seen of him was usually just his feet due to him being too big to fit in the screen. Other body parts of his would occasionally be seen also but he never appeared in full body view. In Season 2, he still retains his original depiction but from time to time, his entire body would be shown in full view, most notably in "The Colossus".
- The Generic Guy: His mother was intentionally keeping him this way so he would never get emotional and go on a rampage.
- Gentle Giant: Literally, because if he wasn't, he'd quickly wreck up the whole town.
- Meaningful Name: His surname is a reference to Jötunheimr, the homeland of giants in Norse mythology.
- Our Giants Are Bigger: Way bigger.
Idaho
A free-spirited potato from the rural countryside with old-fashioned beliefs, he is one of the less popular students of Elmore Junior High.
- American Accents: Southern.
- Cephalothorax
- Good Ol' Boy: He's a jovial hick.
- Meaningful Name: He's a potato
Jamie
Juke
- Big Ol' Unibrow
- Squiggle Vision
- The Unintelligible: A foreign exchange student who speaks in beat box
Leslie
An effeminate, friendly daisy who plays flute in the school band and can often be found hanging around the girls.
- Ambiguously Gay: Mostly blatantly shown in "The Mustache", when Gumball's butt suddenly becomes incredibly muscular and Leslie just stares.
- The Ditz
- Gender Blender Name: Male, despite the name and appearance
- It's not made entirely clear what gender Leslie is in the FIRST place. While originally introduced as a boy, Leslie hangs out with the girls, and didn't object when referred to collectively as 'the girls.'
- He's definitely a guy, a very flamboyant and girly guy, but a guy nonetheless.
- Leslie is a flower. Technically speaking, (s)he's both.
- Malaproper: In "The Words", much to Darwin's annoyance.
Masami
A living cloud, she is the wealthy daughter of the Rainbow Factory's owner. Spoiled by her parents, she is prone to tantrums and has threatened to have her classmates' parents fired should she not have her way. When angry, Masami has the ability to develop into a full storm cloud capable of causing mass amounts of damage.
- Ax Crazy: In "The Storm".
- Alpha Bitch: Acts this way toward the other girls.
- Jerkass: The most consistently bitchy character in the show. Yes, even more than Tina.
- Manipulative Bitch: Forces Darwin to be her boyfriend and then fake-cries to make him feel guilty when he tries to break it off.
- Spoiled Brat: Daughter of the rainbow factory owner and has a smug sense of superiority.
- Yandere: For Alan in "The Storm". Until she remembers he's "such a wet cheeseball".
Molly
- Everything's Better with Dinosaurs: A sauropod, although she looks more like a Cartoon Creature.
Ocho
An 8-bit spider and a generally friendly person, but often overreacts to what people say about him in a negative manner.
- The Dreaded: Gumball lives in fear of the guy when he's near. For good reason.
- Hair-Trigger Temper: He literally tries to kill Gumball for insulting him.
- Meaningful Name: Ocho is Spanish for Eight.
- The Unintelligible: Spoke in Arcade Sounds in Season 1.
- Suddenly Voiced: In Season 2.
Penny Fitzgerald
A living peanut with antlers growing out of her head who is Gumball's primary love interest. She returns Gumball's affections, but both are incapable of expressing their feelings for one another.
- The Cheerleader: Averted.
- Genre Blindness: In "The Storm", when Alan is in danger as Masami becomes Yandere and literally becomes a living tornado which abducts him, Carmen tells Gumball to save him only for Penny to stop him and decides to do it herself because Gumball made Alan and Carmen's relationship complicated despite him trying to fix it. But because she is not the protagonist nor the character focus of the episode which are Alan and Carmen, she gets hurt for her effort and changes her mind for Gumball to do his part.
- Mix-and-Match Critters: Penny is a peanut with antlers.
- In other words, a doe nut
- Nice Girl: Popular, cheerleader, and sweet as can be.
- Not So Above It All: The end of "The Flower" implies she's capable of the same illogical jealously that Gumball had been going through.
- Smitten Tweenage Girl
Sussie
An upside-down chin with googly eyes and puppet-like characteristics. She is talkative, odd, and obnoxious, and as a result is generally avoided by the rest of her classmates.
- Big Eater: Rarely seen not eating.
- Cartoon Creature
- Cloudcuckoolander
- Fat Bastard: Less bastard and more just plain annoying.
- Fat Idiot: More so in Season 2.
- Fat Slob: Complete with Jabba Table Manners.
- Verbal Tic: She tends to repeat the last word she hears.
Teri
A hypochondriac paper bear, and as a result of her condition is usually be found in the nurse's office. Although somewhat self-absorbed and paranoid, she is very nice and is one of the school's cheerleaders.
- Everything's Worse with Bears: Not the case even if she wanted it to be, as she has about the strength you'd expect out of a crumpled piece of paper.
- Face Doodling: Does this to herself at times when necessary (e.g. "The Virus", where she draws tears under her eyes to represent crying, and later draws a surgical mask over her mouth). Her paper body gives her the capability of erasing face doodles quite easily.
- Ill Girl: Or at least that what she's worried about being
- Paper People: A crumpled-up one.
- Terrified of Germs: Much to the annoyance of the school nurse.
Tina Rex
A Tyrannosaurus Rex who lives in the Elmore city junkyard, she is the Elmore Junior High school bully. She often picks on her fellow schoolmates, especially Gumball, and has her own gang of bullies which includes Jamie, and, to his reluctance, Anton. As a dinosaur, Tina is the strongest person in school, contributing to her fearsome and aggressive reputation.
- Art Evolution: In Season 1, she originally had a cartoon-like design similar to the old T-Rex depictions. In Season 2, she is given a more realistic design similar to modern T-Rex depictions.
- The Bully
- Everything's Better with Dinosaurs: Not the case, especially not when her dad gets involved...
- Fluffy the Terrible
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: She shows shades of this from time to time.
- Jerkass Facade: It is revealed in 'The Fight' that she isn't really a bully, she just acts that way because of her scary father and the fact that it is what people expect when they see a T-rex that Does Not Know Her Own Strength.
- Larynx Dissonance: Has a very deep male voice, due to being a Tyrannosaurus.
- Meaningful/PunnyName: T.(na) Rex the T. Rex
- Tyrannosaurus Rex
Tobias Wilson
A multicolored humanoid who is heavily interested in sports and possesses an overbearing self-confidence. He thinks of himself as a heavily built jock, despite actually being rather weak, and appears to be quite wealthy.
- Butt Monkey
- Cephalothorax
- Dumb Jock: Tobias isn't very smart.
- Flanderization: Tobias started out as a stereotypical rich, popular Jerk Jock. It didn’t take long for him to become the show’s resident Straw Loser and punching bag.
- Jerk Jock: Although he is nicer after "The Third".
- Not a Zombie: Inverted in "The Joy", as being ignored by all the girls with the happiness virus that makes you rainbows left him the only one note infected, but his technicolor appearance made Miss Simian think he was anyway (possibly that's why none of the male infected bothered him either).
- Small Name, Big Ego: Claims to be well-built when he's clearly very scrawny.
- Shout-Out: Him and his sister are named after characters in Animorphs.
- Stalker with a Crush: To Penny in "The Knight".
William
A flying eyeball who is Miss Simian's personal spy and only talks when reporting information to her.
- Creator Cameo: His "voice" (actually his internal monologue) was provided by Mic Graves, the same person who directs most of the show's episodes.
- Faceless Eye
- Flight
- I Just Want to Have Friends
- The Informant: For Ms. Simian
- Mind over Matter: He has telekinesis that's strong enough to crush lockers and smash down walls.
- Oculothorax: An eyeball with wings, though he can still blink with fleshy eyelids that sudden appear when he needs them
- The Speechless: He can't speak because he has No Mouth, but until the end of "The Voice" he didn't know that and assumed everyone was just ignoring him.
- Teacher's Pet
Rob/Dr. Wrecker
A blue cyclops who was the most generic character on the show. “The Nobody” revises his character, revealing he was trapped in the void and was left disfigured while following Gumball and Darwin out of it. Enraged that Gumball and Darwin had abandoned him to his fate (they really didn’t notice him), he vowed to become their arch nemesis.
- Big Bad
- Evil is Cool: Gumball and Darwin genuinely like him and would rather be his henchmen.
- Harmeless Villain/Not-So-Harmless Villain: Depending on the Writer, he alternates between scarily competent or being a total failure of a villain.
Other adults
Principal Brown
A furry slug who is the principal of Elmore Junior High. Ever since he fell in love with Miss Simian, he has been a dangerously incompetent principal and spends most of his time flirting with her, thus keeping him from properly running the school.
- Berserk Button: Apparently he does not take cheating on a math test well and will give whoever he catches cheating a spring break's worth of detention.
- Cartoon Creature: "furry slug" is the most accurate description of what exactly he's supposed to be.
- Humiliation Conga: Happens to him in "The Mystery" where he was slammed with a door by Mrs. Simian, leaving him dizzy and causing him to fall down the stairs, covering himself in toilet paper, then smashed into Penny's painting and falling into some burning chemicals, causing him to fall down MORE stairs and wrapping himself in more toilet paper, then finally landing inside Gumball's locker.
- Happens again in "The Meddler", where Gumball crashes into him and he spills his hot coffee all over his face. He douses the coffee with a can of paint, burning his eyes; he washes off the paint with chlorine for the pool, burning off all his hair; and he finishes by neutralizing the chlorine with fertilizer, painfully growing his hair back. He is unscathed by the end of it, but he gives Gumball detention for potentially damaging his face.
- Happens in "The Sock", though at a smaller scale. In this episode he has his head set on fire, and later he throws himself out of a window to "rescue" Miss Simian.
- In "The Apology", Miss Simian repeatedly trashes his office in rage every time she fails to get Gumball and Darwin in trouble.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: In "The Apology", he refuses to punish Gumball or Darwin unless he's given solid evidence and he threatens to fire Miss Simian if she keeps trying to frame them, in spite of his personal feelings for her.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: Blue Oni to Miss Simian's Red Oni.
- Took a Level in Jerkass: In "The Lesson".
Doughnut Sheriff
An ineffective doughnut police officer who works in Elmore. He is rather oblivious, and as such is not a very good police officer. Similar to Carrie, Doughnut Sheriff is eternally hungry, because since he is a doughnut, anything he attempts to consume just goes out the other end of his mouth.
- Carnivore Confusion: His favorite food is doughnuts.
- Cephalothorax
- Donut Mess with a Cop: He's cop and a living doughnut. As his doughnut hole is his mouth, anything he tries to eat (like other doughnuts) goes immediately out the other end.
- Expy/Shout-Out: He has a lot in common with Chief Wiggum from The Simpsons, they even sound similar.
- Police Are Useless: Big time.
- Trademark Favourite Food: Doughnuts.
Laurence "Larry" Needlemeyer
A rock man who works at almost every movie/video game store, gas station, and grocery store in Elmore. He ultimately despises the Watterson family, mostly because they are consistently getting him fired.
- Butt Monkey: So, so much.
- Cartoon Creature: He's suppose to be a rock-man, but his design makes this slightly hard to tell.
- Humiliation Conga: Goes through one at the hands of Gumball and Darwin of all people, but he gets better.
- That Man Is Dead: Lazy Larry.
- Why Do You Keep Changing Jobs?: Runs pretty much every shop in town.
Gaylord Robinson
The Wattersons' stuck-up next door neighbor, and Rocky's father. He is always grouchy and deeply despises Gumball and Darwin for annoying him all the time; the boys, however, idolize him because they believe him to be a war veteran.
- Big Ol' Unibrow
- Cartoon Creature
- Cranky Neighbor
- Fail O'Suckyname: Seriously Gaylord?
- Grumpy Bear
- Lookalike Lovers
- Marionette Motion: He's based on muppets
- Unfortunate Name: his first name, the last name pretty normal.
- Unhappily Married: He and his wife Margaret are "happily" married because they argue, a lot.
Margaret Robinson
Gaylord's wife and Rocky's mother. She is just as grouchy as her husband and is always in a bad mood. Margaret never speaks; the only vocalizations she can make are hoarse whispers.
- Cartoon Creature
- Cranky Neighbor
- Flanderization: Margaret went from a mild Jerkass to irredeemable monster.
- Hartman Hips
- Jerkass: A rather mild one at first, but taken Up to Eleven in “The Wicked” and beyond.
- Lookalike Lovers
- Unhappily Married: See Mr. Robinson's entry above.
- The Sociopath: She loves watching other people suffer.
- The Unintelligible: She speaks only in unintelligible grunts and grumbles.
Rocky Robinson
An orange, fuzzy Muppet-like character who has various jobs around Elmore Junior High. He is the son of Gaylord and Margaret Robinson, the Wattersons' next-door neighbors. Rocky is good-natured and gets along with the kids and everyone else much better than he does with his parents.
- Cartoon Creature
- Catch Phrase: "Word."
- Nice Guy: In 'The Ape" he tells Mrs. Simian that not even he likes her...and he likes everybody!
- Replacement Goldfish: LITERALLY with Rockwin in "The Genius".
- Why Do You Keep Changing Jobs?: He fills pretty much every non-teaching, non-administrative job at school from the janitor to the bus driver
Mr. Steve Small
A tall, fluffy creature who is the counselor of Elmore Junior High. He is interested in New Age culture and possesses hippie-like qualities in terms of appearance and behavior. Mr. Small's strange and unorthodox teaching methods are usually more confusing to the children than helpful, and most of the kids leave his office confused and not any better, if not worse from the time they entered. With this, many Elmore Junior High students are left wondering why he still has his job. Like other characters, Mr. Small is afraid of Tina Rex. He is also shown to have violent mood swings, which could possibly be attributed to bipolar disorder.
- Cloudcuckoolander
- Chew Toy: Him being injured as the result of the protagonist's actions is starting to become a Running Gag.
- Conspiracy Theorist
- Companion Cube: His van Janice.
- Drill Sergeant Nasty: His short rant/speech in "The Meddler".
- Flanderization: Later episodes ignore his Jerkass qualities in favor of making him a possible stoner and conspiracy theorist who is in love with a van.
- Hippie Counselor: Though he's rather less patient than the typical example.
- Large Ham:
"Don't hate me because I'm beautiful!"
- Mood Swinger: Can go from an easy-going hippie to an enraged maniac in a snap.
- New Age
- New Age Retro Hippie
- Nothing but Skin and Bones: On a few occasions where he wears skin-tight clothes we can see his ribcage with a disturbing amount of detail.
- Piss-Take Rap: Has one about honesty; while dressed in a bear costume.
- Scare'Em Straight: Does this to Gumball and Darwin by showing them a grotesque diagram of the soul of a liar. This can also be applied to his sock puppet, the Silence Snake, whom he uses to scream at people and shock them into shutting up.
- Straw Vegetarian: In "The Castle", he states he's only a vegetarian for the feeling of superiority. “The Potato” shows he is still secretly addicted to meat.
- Tuckerization: Named after a friend of the show's creator that also works in animation—the same one that made his character design, in fact.
- Unmoving Pattern: His shirt.
Miss Simian
An elderly baboon who is Gumball and Darwin's sadistic teacher. She takes great pleasure in giving her students pop quizzes and being generally unpleasant. Miss Simian is madly in love with Principal Brown, and he seems to gladly return the feeling. She utterly despises Gumball and will do anything to ruin his mischievous plans.
- 0% Approval Rating: Loathed by the entire town, Principal Brown excluded. Even Rocky, a Nice Guy who claims to like everybody, openly admits he hates her.
- Action Survivor: in "The Joy"
- Ax Crazy: In "The Apology".
- Everything's Better with Monkeys: Eh, close enough.
- Fan Disservice: What her body shows.
- It's All About Me: Her mug even says, "I Love Myself".
- Jerk with a Heart of Jerk: In the Ape, she was a complete Jerkass to Nicole when she was young and would even use Gumball and Darwin just to get the Teacher Award. When she was given a choice to either get the form with the signature on the car and fall out of the bridge or get off the car and redeem herself by staying friends with the Wattersons. She went "Nah!" to the latter and does the former which leads to her fall.
- And yet she has also shown to not be COMPLETELY heartless as she gave up her attempts to frame or catch Gumball and Darwin when they attempted to ACTUALLY get in trouble to save her dignity, her job and her relationship, and even attempted to clean up the mess they made to keep them out of trouble. Even when Darwin COMPLETELY milks the fact that she's actually saying sorry for her behavior, she just chuckles. It's a surprisingly sweet moment for such a mean character.
- Not So Above It All: She's a Jerkass to end all Jerkasses...but she loves a good party.
- Really 700 Years Old: 300,000 years old to be exact.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: Red Oni to Principal Brown's Blue Oni.
- Sadist Teacher: Miss Simian has been teaching seventh grade for 300,000 years and really doesn't like Gumball.
- Species Surname
- Time Abyss: At least 300,000 years old
Video Game Store Manager
- Bad Boss
- Honest John's Dealership: He absolutely refuses to give refunds for anything under any circumstances, and also once sold a paper shredder claiming it was a game console.
- Jerkass: He makes Laurence admit it was his fault that there was traffic which caused him to be late (and probably make him say it like he means it). Then he hangs up on him.
- Killer Rabbit: Subverted; despite what Needlemeyer insists, he's physically capable of nothing more than slight annoyance. The person he was attacking just happened to be a complete wuss.
- Money Fetish: He makes Mr. Krabs look generous.
- The Napoleon
Sal Left Thumb
A walking fingerprint who is a very dangerous criminal in Elmore. He often is seen doing some devious activity such as robbing a convenience store or trying to break into someone's car. Strangely, Sal's weapon of choice is a rusty spoon, which, for some reason, many of the male characters in the show are terrified by.
- American Accents: Has a thick Bronx-accent.
- Verbal Tic: Says 'suckers' a lot, which is what eventually gets him in trouble at the end of the episode.
Granny Jojo
- Deadpan Snarker
- Gross Up Close-Up
- The Nicknamer: Calls Gumball "the blue one" Darwin "walking fish" and "fish kid".
- Obnoxious In-Laws: To Nicole in "The Authority"
- Screw Politeness, I'm a Senior!: She's very blunt and she made Anais carry a suitcase that's clearly too heavy for her.
Mr. Fitzgerald
- Fat Idiot: Subverted. Mr. Fitzgerald is scarily on the ball when it comes to parenting, and seems to be a very authoritative and strict person.
- Large and In Charge: The biggest in the Fitzgerald household.
- Overprotective Dad
- Papa Wolf: To Penny.
- Ugly Guy, Hot Wife