The first series of Australian comedy Bump was an indubitably high-concept affair. Mere minutes after we were introduced to uptight, intellectually ferocious, all-round-type-A schoolgirl Oly, her life had been turned upside down. A sudden stomachache in the playground quickly progressed into vomiting in the school toilets then full-blown labour in the back of an ambulance – but know-it-all Oly (Nathalie Morris) had no inkling she was even pregnant. That the father was not her similarly nerdy boyfriend Lachie but a mildly delinquent classmate called Santiago (“Santi”) added even more world-shattering horror into the mix.
Birth did not magically bestow Oly with motherly instincts. “Get that thing away from me,” she snarled when introduced to her newborn daughter. But once the shellshock and fury had dissipated, she did manage to adjust, and Bump grew into a much calmer show about the maternal juggle. Granted, this balancing act involved lessons being interrupted by a wailing baby, but it still felt oddly relatable. In fact, by hurling such freedom-eviscerating responsibility into the lap of a teenage girl who had been led to believe the world was her oyster, Bump was able to highlight the universal unfairness of new motherhood: the sleep deprivation, the mastitis, the bleeding, the simmering jealousy towards the relatively unfettered father – these things happen whether you are 17 or 47 (although having your peers snigger over a gif of your face superimposed on the head of a calving deer is something most of us are spared).
