Rat-in-a-Hat

**Rat-in-a-Hat** (also known as **Rat** for short) is the former main antagonist in Bananas in Pyjamas. He is the owner of Rat's shop and a friend to B1 and B2. He is busy, clever, usually greedy, and sometimes bossy. He says his catchphrase "Cheese and whiskers", and usually likes to trick the bananas and the teddies who would say "Oh no. That Rat-in-a-Hat". But also, the bananas try to help him carefully until they make the things right. He was portrayed & voiced by Shane McNamara in both the original and animated series.

## Appearance

### **The original series**

Rat originally appeared as a purple rat with a pink nose, pink ears, and a pink tail, and wears an orange and yellow cap, an orange vest with yellow teardrops, a yellow bow tie, big green pants, a green watch, and yellow and white shoes.

## Rat's song

Rat sings his own song in the shop when he prepares to run it.

*I'm a rat, I'm a rat, I'm a busy, busy rat.*

*I'm a rat, I'm a rat, I'm a clever, clever rat.*

## Businesses

Throughout the series, Rat has set up many different businesses, usually the type of business with the name "Rat". However, due to poor planning, a running gag in the series is that he usually forgets the most important aspect of the business (i.e. food at a cafe) or messes up and needs help to fix the problem. These usually last one episode, although some, such as Cafe Rat, recur. Below is a list of his various businesses and the problems he faces.

* Cafe Rat- Rat turns his shop into a fancy cafe but forgets to get any food in the first appearance
* Street Fair Games- Rat organises the games at the fair but forgets to prepare the prizes, leading him to rig the games to make them unwinnable
* Rat Wash- Rat tries to charge Lulu and the Bananas to do their laundry but is horrified with how much they send to him. His attempts to take a shortcut ruins their clothes and he winds up having to make them new clothes.
* Rat Post- Rat starts delivering mail for Cuddles Avenue. However, the other occupants of town start using his post to the point he gets exhausted
* Pony Ride- Rat sets up an area for pony rides in the park and prepares everything- except the pony. He gets the Bananas to dress as a pony instead.
* Salon Rat- Rat opens up a hair salon but the Bananas have no hair for him to cut. He tricks them with wigs and a "hair grow" formula instead.
* Rat Suits- Rat decides to sell fancy suits at his shop to the Bananas of all people. While he actually prepares everything properly, he manages to lose their measurements and the suits wind up being very ill fitting
* Hotel Rat- Rat turns his shop into a hotel but forgets that he only has one room in it, leading to his guests becoming very crowded
* Gallery Rat- Rat decides to hold an art exibition at his shop- but forgets the paintings.
* Rat's Zoo- Rat decieds to turn a section of the Park into a zoo for wild animals. However, as he cannot actually get any, he uses various items such as a pipe that looks like an elephant's trunk to make the Teddies think it is real.
* Taxi Rat- Rat sets up a taxi service with the Ratmobile but unfortunately his car can only seat 2, meaning he has to push the Bananas everywhere
* Yippee Chips- Rat sells chips called Yippee Chips with cards inside the packaging. The cards can be used to form a model of Yippee Chippee but Rat, realising that no one will buy the chips once they finish the set, leaves out the card with Yippee Chippee's head.
* Rat World- Rat sets up a carnival called Rat World. However it also became too successful that he decides to shut it down permanently.

## Trivia

* Rat is the only character from the original tv series to keep his original voice actor.