Television series

Round the Twist

Name: Round the Twist
Genre: Children
Released: 1990
Cast: Mathew Waters, Andrew S. Gilbert, Ebonnie Masini, Jeffrey Walker, Rian McLean

A cult slice of Australian children's TV from 1990, adapted from Paul Jennings' short stories, following the Twist family as they move into a lighthouse where ordinary life keeps getting derailed by talking statues, gender-swapping ghosts and other gleeful absurdities. It's weird, a little gross, oddly moral, and completely unafraid of unsettling its young audience. Great for nostalgic adults and curious kids who like fantasy served strange.

TVMaze rating

6.3

If you liked this

Goosebumps1995

R.L. Stine's gleeful appetite for grossing kids out while still landing a proper scare mirrors Jennings' own trick — creepy, funny, never quite safe.

But Episode quality swings wildly and some entries feel rushed compared to the source books.

The Worst Witch1998

British boarding-school magic played with the same dry, slightly wonky charm — spells go wrong, kids get embarrassed, nothing is ever too polished.

But More gentle sitcom than eerie adventure; lacks Round the Twist's edge of genuine strangeness.

My Parents Are Aliens1999no page yet

A family sitcom that treats the fantastical as everyday domestic chaos, much like the Twists shrugging off ghosts and curses over breakfast.

But Broader, sillier, and squarely aimed at younger viewers with less bite.

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Catweazle1970

Decades before the Twists met their ghosts, Catweazle proved the format — ordinary life derailed by magic nobody else can quite believe — could carry a whole kids' show. Round the Twist inherited its DNA of bafflement played for laughs.

A grubby, bewildered 11th-century wizard stumbles into 1970s England and tries to make sense of tractors and telephones — chaotic, funny and strangely tender.

But Slow by modern pacing standards and very much a product of early-70s British telly, dated effects included.

Ocean Girl1994no page yet

Australian coastline, family secrets and a supernatural mystery washing up from the sea — the same sun-bleached, slightly eerie backdrop.

But Plays it straighter and more earnestly; the anarchic humour is largely absent.

Jim Henson's The Storyteller1988no page yet

Jim Henson's fairy tales go properly dark and strange, with the same appetite for unsettling kids without traumatising them.

But Puppetry and folklore replace the suburban-Australian setting entirely; a very different texture.

Grim Tales1989no page yet

Rik Mayall narrates macabre fairy stories redrawn with a wicked grin — a cousin in spirit to Jennings' moral-but-mischievous plotting.

But Short, cheaply animated, and very much of its era; a curio rather than a binge.

ParaNorman2012

Same trick, different toolbox — take the fears and grossness kids actually enjoy and wrap them around a real emotional core, just rendered in stop-motion instead of live-action sitcom.

A stop-motion horror-comedy about a boy who talks to the dead, gleefully macabre and genuinely moving, with the same nerve to scare kids a little.

But Two hours instead of a season, and the animation's gothic style is a world away from Round the Twist's sunny lighthouse setting.

Lake Mungo2009

Strip out the comedy and gross-out and you're left with the same bones — an ordinary Australian family, a strange coastal town, secrets the adults can't quite explain. Lake Mungo plays that premise entirely straight, showing how dark it could get.

An Australian mockumentary ghost story that takes small-town secrets and coastal unease dead seriously, building genuine dread instead of laughs.

But Slow, quiet and unmistakably adult — a ghost story that lingers rather than entertains; no jokes, no eels.