H2O: Just Add Water (Season 1)

H2O (Season 1)
Season 2
No. of episodes	26
Release
Original release	7 July (2006-07-07) – 29 November 2006 (2006-23-29)
Season chronology

H₂O: Just Add Water (H₂O) is an Australian TV Series originally aired on TEN tv network in Australia. And Nickelodeon in the U.S. and U.K. .

Cast

Main cast
Actor	Character	Episodes
Claire Holt	Emma Gilbert	26
Cariba Heine	Rikki Chadwick	26
Phoebe Tonkin	Cleo Satouri	26
Angus McLauren	Lewis McCartney	26

Plot

Emma Gilbert (Claire Holt), Cleo Sertori (Phoebe Tonkin) and Rikki Chadwick (Cariba Heine) are three fifteen-year-old girls who become stranded on the mysterious Mako Island. When they enter an underground pool of water that leads to the ocean, they find themselves bathed in the glow of moonlight from overhead. After being rescued the girls return to their normal lives, but soon discover they have changed: seconds after contact with water, they transform into mermaids with unique supernatural powers over water. Emma can freeze it, Cleo can control its shape and volume, and Rikki can boil it. The girls enlist Cleo's longtime friend Lewis McCartney (Angus McLaren) to try and determine why this has happened to them and help them avoid being exposed. The series focuses on the girls learning to control their powers and dealing with everyday problems like siblings and accidental contact with water.

The first series features a single primary storyline with three main elements. The girls meet Louise Chatham (Christine Amor), an older woman who reveals that she too was once a mermaid. She helps the girls understand their own situation and warns them of the dangers involved. After a confrontation with Ms. Chatham, Zane Bennett (Burgess Abernethy) gets trapped on her sinking houseboat, which forces Emma to rush to his aid. During the rescue, Zane sees her tail and becomes obsessed with finding this "sea monster". Doctor Denman (Lara Cox), a marine biologist, also becomes focused on the mermaids when Lewis accidentally leaves behind a genetic sample of the girls he was working on in her lab. Zane later helps her to capture the girls without realising their identities. When he realises what he has done, Zane works with Lewis to release the girls, who trick the scientists into believing they have given up their powers to a lunar eclipse, while they have actually only been removed for twelve hours.

Episode	Title	Director	Original airdate	Production code
01	"Metamorphosis"	Colin Budds	14 March 2008 (2008-03-14)	101
Three girls—Emma Gilbert, her friend Cleo Sertori, and Rikki Chadwick—find themselves stranded on Mako Island and seemingly trapped in an underground cavern. They manage to escape through a moonlit pool of water connected to the ocean. The girls are later found by the water police. The following day, the girls realise they are no longer the same: they become mermaids every time they come into contact with water. In addition, Cleo and Emma discover they have unique powers over water. Cleo can control its shape and volume, and Emma can freeze it. Rikki concludes she lacks a power after several failed attempts. All three girls understand that this experience will change their lives and friendship forever.
02	"Pool Party"	Colin Budds	14 March 2008 (2008-03-14)	102
Despite the risk involved, the desire to attend Miriam's pool party is too strong for Cleo. Rikki discovers she does indeed have a power at the JuiceNet Café: the ability to boil water. While at Miriam's party, the prankster Zane Bennett and his friends toss Cleo into the pool, while Lewis arrives on the scene just in time to discover Cleo's secret. Emma and Rikki arrive soon after; Emma freezes the door locked so no one can come out and see Cleo as a mermaid, and Rikki evaporates the water off Cleo's tail so she returns to normal. The girls have gained an ally in Lewis, who swears he will never tell of their secret. Meanwhile, Emma is upset because she's a mermaid now, so she leaves every swimming training for the first time, causing her parents to be concerned about it. In the end, Emma decides to leave the swimming team which makes her parents very worried.
03	"Catch of the Day"	Colin Budds	16 March 2008 (2008-03-16)	103
Cleo does not share her friends' enthusiasm for their new-found abilities. Rikki and Emma make efforts to free young sea turtles from fishing nets, only to cause a media frenzy of sharks patrolling the waters. Believing her father to be involved with illegally catching the turtles, Cleo goes after one of his boats – but finds herself caught in a net. Rikki and Emma save her, and Cleo discovers it was her father's workers, not her father himself, catching the turtles. The episode closes with the girls running into the ocean, and with Cleo showing her friends she can swim and hold her breath.
04	"Party Girls"	Colin Budds	23 March 2008 (2008-03-23)	104
Emma travels back to Mako Island where she finds a mysterious locket at the bottom of the moon pool. The risks associated with Cleo's new job at the marine park give her friends cause for concern, but Cleo's determination to lead a normal life helps convince Emma to set aside her own concerns and go ahead with her annual sleepover party. Lewis tries to check what bottles don't have a water. Miss Chatham makes her first appearance by giving hints to Cleo about her mermaidness when Cleo got splashed by one of the fish that were supposed to be fed to the dolphins. Miriam is upset because she wasn't invited to the sleepover. Zane comes with a plan and they invite themselves to the party. All of the girls (except Cleo, Emma and Rikki) begin talk with Zane and this makes the party boring. Emma and Rikki evict Zane from the sleepover party and Miriam is surprised to see Emma's locket, so she wants it. Cleo accidentally touches water, but runs and hides herself in a closet. When the guests open the closet door, Cleo has already zipped herself up in a sleeping bag. She prevents others from feeling her tail by making the drinks explode, just as Miriam was about to steal Emma's locket. Rikki catches Miriam with the locket, takes it back, and gives it to Emma, who in return gives it to Cleo. She does this based on the belief that a mermaid who can hide her tail so well can surely take good care of so valuable a locket.
05	"Something Fishy"	Colin Budds	30 March 2008 (2008-03-30)	105
Cleo's secret diary falls into her sister Kim's hands. Kim grows suspicious when she reads that Cleo and her friends are mermaids and shares her ideas with Elliott, whose initial scorn turns to belief when Emma accidentally freezes his shower. Rikki, Emma, and Lewis quickly turn the kids' suspicions to Miriam, who Kim thinks is the leader of the pack. Kim and Elliott plan to expose the girls at the Miss Sea Queen pageant. Cleo, who is on stage, uses her power to repel the water while the other girls' costumes—including Miriam's—are ruined. Cleo convinces Kim the diary was for an English project, and to keep anyone from finding it again submerges it in the moon pool. Meanwhile, Lewis goes to Mako Island to analyse the moon pool to find out that how the girls became mermaids.
06	"Young Love"	Colin Budds	6 April 2008 (2008-04-06)	106
In an attempt to show off, Elliot goes surfing and nearly loses his life; Rikki is forced to save him, despite the risks involved with her secret, and ends up with Elliot developing a crush on her. The girls turn to Lewis for advice when the crush gets out of hand but the abrasive Rikki has a hard time letting him down gently, resulting in him running away. When Rikki finds him to apologise, however, she risks revealing the mermaid secret to him by almost being locked in a green house that was about to water the plants. Cleo, Emma and Lewis come to the rescue. Rikki and Elliot become friends.
07	"Moon Spell"	Colin Budds	18 August 2006 (2006-08-18)	107
Miss Chatham forewarns Cleo to not look at the full moon, but the girls scorn her warning on the basis that they are mermaids, not werewolves. Emma throws a birthday party for her dad, but forgets everything and loses her inhibitions when a full moon strikes and she sees its reflection in a bowl of punch. She is unusually rude to the guests and devours all the food prepared for the party when her friends try to hide her from the guests. Additionally, her mermaid tail will not go away after she touches water; however, when the full moon goes down, the tail vanishes along with Emma's memory of what happened that night. The girls learn that the full moon is a true danger to them and begin wondering who this mysterious Miss Chatham truly is. In the end, Byron tells Emma she kissed him in two times last night (Emma kissed Byron in two times while being affected by the moon) and she starts wonder what he's talking about.
08	"The Denman Affair"	Colin Budds	25 August 2006 (2006-08-25)	108
The girls reluctantly agree to let Lewis get a research assistant's position with a marine biologist, Dr. Linda Denman, hoping to determine what's behind their transformation. They are concerned when Cleo notices Lewis has a crush on Dr. Denman. Lewis forgets a DNA sample from Cleo, which is discovered by Dr. Denman. She realises the sample is not what Lewis claimed it was, and offers him a lucrative job. He must decide what it is he wants: money, or loyalty to the girls. Cleo finds out Dr. Denman created the article about the sample. Dr. Denman is going to leave and asks Lewis to come along. The next day, when Dr. Denman leaves, Lewis doesn't leave, takes the sample and deletes the article.
09	"Dangerous Waters"	Colin Budds	1 September 2006 (2006-09-01)	109
One of Cleo's fish has died. Rikki, in the attempt to make up for her brusqueness, tries to find her a replacement fish. She uses her mermaidness to her advantage by diving where no fish collector can dive and picking out a fish that strongly resembles Cleo's lost one. She meets a man who offers her to pay her well if she sells him fish like the one she was bringing to Cleo. Rikki agrees, believing that the man is what he says he is (a marine park breeder of rare fish), but when she learns the man who hired her is lying and actually is selling the fish illegally to earn large profits, she takes it upon herself to get revenge and deliver him to the authorities. Rikki uses her powers to attack the man, but Cleo and Emma stop her.
10	"The Camera Never Lies"	Colin Budds	8 September 2006 (2006-09-08)	110
A short film contest on the subject of heroes captures the focus of the girls' attention, but a film about Emma's mother is not Rikki's idea of fun and she decides to use her abilities to capture some impressive underwater footage of sharks. Ineligible to compete himself as his father is on the judging panel, Zane recruits Lewis to document a recreation of his father's famous windsurfing trip to Mako Island and gets trapped by sharks on the shore. Luckily, Rikki was also there filming her "masterpiece" and manages to scare the sharks away with her powers. Rikki quits from the contest because she has to explain from where she shot the film. Emma also quits because her mother said she rescued Zane's father from drowning.
11	"Sink or Swim"	Colin Budds	15 September 2006 (2006-09-15)	111
Byron asks Emma for training help prior to the school swimming meet. After initially turning him down, she changes her mind but becomes a "heavy training dragon", to Byron's disappointment. Lewis continues his experiments on the girls but Rikki does not like being treated like a specimen and does her best to disrupt his research. Emma and Byron end up kissing, but Emma dumps Byron, believing that coaches should not be involved with their students. It turns out that Byron is challenging Zane; though Emma swore she wouldn't attend the race, she comes anyway and watches Byron beat Zane in the race. After the victory, Emma and Byron become friends.
12	"The Siren Effect"	Colin Budds	22 September 2006 (2006-09-22)	112
Another full moon approaches. Before nightfall, Rikki enters Cleo up for a karaoke contest, not realising that she has no ability to sing and Cleo embarrasses herself in front of everybody listening. That night, Lewis and the mermaids sleep at Cleo's house to try avoiding the full moon; while in the bathroom Cleo glimpses the full moon in a reflection, touches the water bearing it and is suddenly able to sing better than any other girl in town. Lewis realises she's become a siren, one of those ancient, mythological mermaids whose voices lured sailors to their deaths. Cleo hypnotizes Lewis with the siren song and they kiss. Emma, Rikki and Cleo's father see this and Cleo's father takes Lewis out. As with Emma's experience, Cleo's unstoppable under the moon and manages to get her voice on radio. In the morning, Cleo, to her father's irritation, escapes to the JuiceNet café and sings in front of all the town's boys; the full moon sinks, causing Cleo's wonderful voice to go with it, along with her brief burst of popularity. In the end, Cleo meets up with Lewis and says that they are only friends, but they have strange feelings.
13	"Shipwrecked"	Colin Budds	28 September 2006 (2006-09-28)	113
When Zane causes the enigmatic Miss Chatham to be evicted from her boat, Emma invites her to stay at her home. Overhearing her concern for her "treasure", Zane chases after Miss Chatham seeking compensation for his damaged jet ski when she departs the marina in her boat. Zane attacks Miss Chatham and she passes out. Emma and Lewis arrive in time to help with a medical emergency but when Zane gets trapped on the sinking boat, Emma must risk being seen as a mermaid to save him. Emma uses her tail to break open the boat's door, and Zane sees her tail. After he passes out, Emma takes him to Mako Island, where he wakes up and makes a vow to find out what it was that saved him. Emma gives Miss Chatham her treasure, which is a locket. Miss Chatham moves to a retirement home.
14	"Surprise!"	Jeffrey Walker	6 October 2006 (2006-10-06)	114
Cleo is counting the days until her sixteenth birthday, fully aware that her big day can only be ruined by one thing: another one of her father's embarrassing birthday parties. Zane embarks on a hunt for the "sea monster" he saw when he nearly drowned and recruits Lewis to help, but Lewis has promised the girls to do everything he can to keep Zane well away from them and Mako Island. Cleo is upset when her father throws her a party and escapes to Mako Island, but Lewis and Zane are there. Lewis spots Cleo and tries to stop Zane from seeing her as a mermaid. Lewis and the others have a party at the JuiceNet café for Cleo.
15	"The Big Chill"	Jeffrey Walker	13 October 2006 (2006-10-13)	115
Emma is excelling at her new job at the JuiceNet café, but when Wilfred leaves her in charge for an entire weekend, her no-nonsense managerial style puts her at odds with her newest employee: Rikki. When Zane and Miriam come into the café for a drink, Rikki brings Miriam the wrong drink, and after Miriam becomes irritable, Rikki quits the café. In retaliation, Miriam sneaks into the café's freezer and turns the temperature up. Emma arrives, and upon noticing the freezer open and warming up, uses her powers to freeze the contents, which includes Miriam, who has hidden inside. Despite the animosity between Rikki and Emma, the girls work together - Rikki slowly melts the ice while Cleo gets the bodily fluids moving - before Wilfred returns. After saving Miriam, Wilfred is going to fire Emma, but Rikki becomes rude to be fired and giving Emma her job back.
16	"Lovesick"	Jeffrey Walker	20 October 2006 (2006-10-20)	116
Cleo attracts the attention of a new dolphin at the marine park. Zane Bennett, in his attempt to find out what "monster" saved him, convinces Cleo that he needs the marine park's library in order to learn more about dying species of wild sea creatures. Cleo's friends and family mistakenly believe that Cleo is calling a boyfriend when speaking with Zane; when Mr. Sertori grounds Cleo, Kim eavesdrops on her sister while she's speaking on the phone and draws the conclusion that Cleo's going to elope. Lewis, Emma, Rikki, and the Sertoris come just as Zane and Cleo are kneeling in front of a marine park manager, learning about dolphins' habits, and learn that Cleo had only been trying to help a sick dolphin.
17	"Under the Weather"	Jeffrey Walker	27 October 2006 (2006-10-27)	117
A sudden thunderstorm forces the girls to fake illness to stay home from school or risk their tails growing in front of Emma's mom. Doctors believe this is a "rare topical disease" when Rikki gives the girls red blotches and high temperatures before Emma gives them low temperatures. Arrived with Cleo's parents to visit the girls, Kim suspects that the girls are faking it but has no proof until the girls are about to be taken to the hospital; Emma lies and says they had pretended to be sick so they could avoid a biology test. Doctors say the only one who's sick is Elliot because he has measles. Kim also has the measles.
18	"Bad Moon Rising"	Jeffrey Walker	3 November 2006 (2006-11-03)	118
Yet another full moon is approaching. Haunted by his encounter with the "sea monster", Zane steps up his investigation, which leads him to Mako Island. Rikki catches a glimpse of the full moon's reflection, causing her to lose control of her power. Rikki escapes Emma's house to go to Mako Island, and later Zane arrives when he sees fire. After they find each other on the island, Rikki kisses Zane, causing him to pass out from dehydration. Emma, Cleo and Lewis followed Rikki to Mako and find her sitting beside Zane, who has no memory of that day's events. Rikki is taken to the moon pool, where the moon finally leaves the sky and Rikki realises that for the first time, she saw the full moon and she's not invulnerable to its attacks. The next morning Zane confronts Rikki about the kiss in front of Cleo, but having no memory of it Rikki tells Zane to forget about it.
19	"Hurricane Angela"	Jeffrey Walker	10 November 2006 (2006-11-10)	119
The arrival of Cleo's cousin Angela is seen by the girl's father as an opportunity for Cleo to learn some maturity and responsibility. However, chaperoning a headstrong girl with a fondness for water quickly brings on its challenges - especially when the girls find they have stolen possessions, a lost cousin and a pelican in their house. Cleo accuses Kim for the pelican. When Cleo gives the pelican back, she's accused for the pelican. The pelican is soon revealed to not from the marine park. Angela is finally found. It is soon discovered Angela stolen the pelican to make Cleo and Kim fighting, only to go for body boarding. In the end, Cleo buys the MP3 player and gives it to Kim. Cleo and Kim end the argument. Kim asks Cleo where she bought the MP3 player only to return it because she less like the blue colour. This forces Cleo and Kim argue again.
20	"Hook, Line and Sinker"	Jeffrey Walker	17 November 2006 (2006-11-17)	120
The annual fishing derby has arrived, which the eager Lewis has entered in the hopes of winning with his quirky new lure. Cleo, who knows this lure cannot attract fish, intervenes by purposely placing a deep-water tuna on his line; rather than securing Lewis's victory, Mr. Sertori, the judge, believes Lewis to be a cheater and disqualifies him. Meanwhile, Rikki attends a seminar where she runs into Zane. The pair gets locked up in the Bennett's balcony when the door gets shut; they have no choice but to speak with one another; they realise they have feelings for one another. Cleo rectifies her error by enlisting Emma to help her place large fish on the other contestants' lines, which results in Mr. Sertori allowing Lewis back into the competition and announcing him as the winner.
21	"Red Herring"	Jeffrey Walker	24 November 2006 (2006-11-24)	121
An innocent comment about her dependable nature convinces Emma she needs a change, so she decides to colour her hair red. The girls discover that as dying hair involves water, resulting to mermaid transformation, Emma only has red hair when she has her tail. Zane's sea monster investigation leads him to Miss Chatham who he's convinced is at the centre of the mystery. When trying to find more research on the "monster", Zane gets Nate to help him inspect Miss Chatham's (sunken) boat, near Mako Island. After spotting sharks, Nate returns to the boat, but Zane spots a mermaid with red hair leaving Miss Chatham's boat; this was Emma fetching pictures of Miss Chatham with her mermaid friends, in mermaid form, before Zane could look around the boat and possibly stumble upon them. Zane returns to the JuiceNet cafe, and tells what he saw; to everyone's disbelief. Afterwards, Rikki tracks Zane down and agrees to go out with him as long as he stops his mermaid hunt.
22	"Fish Out of Water"	Jeffrey Walker	1 December 2006 (2006-12-01)	122
When at the cinema, Cleo and Emma spot Zane and Rikki on a date and find out that they are going out. Concerned that Zane will find out their secret, Emma gives Rikki an ultimatum: her and Cleo, or Zane. Rikki believes "friends don't give friends ultimatums" and refuses to choose. Zane's father, Harrison Bennett, throws a lunch where he unveils his plans to develop Mako Island. Emma and her parents are guests, as well as Rikki, as Zane's date. Feelings realign between friends as Emma joins Rikki's vocal opposition to the plans, and Zane once again takes a stand against his father, causing the Mako-renovation plans to be destroyed.
23	"In Too Deep"	Jeffrey Walker	8 December 2006 (2006-12-08)	123
History may be repeating itself as Rikki's ability to keep the girls' secret is tested when she discovers a locket almost identical to Miss Chatham's in a jeweler's shop. Miriam, a sworn enemy of Rikki, discovers Rikki's longing for the locket and purchases it first to get under Rikki's skin. While Zane tries to persuade Miriam to give it up, Miss Chatham recounts to the girls the story of her teen years. Her friend Julia, who was nearly identical to Rikki in personality and disposition, made a mistake Rikki seems close to making – she told her wealthy boyfriend she was a mermaid, only to have him betray her. Zane manages to acquire the locket, and gives it to Rikki. Rikki assures her relieved friends that she would never tell their secret to Zane.
24	"Love Potion #9"	Jeffrey Walker	15 December 2006 (2006-12-15)	124
Lewis and Miss Chatham are arguing what will help the girls: Magic or science. With the school dance approaching, Emma and Cleo are fretting about having to ask Byron and Lewis to go with them, relying on the boys to make the first move. But Byron does not ask Emma, who he thinks is too busy heading up the organising committee, and Lewis is too caught up in his work on a new scientific way to make it easier for the girls to be mermaids, by making them waterproof; however, the formula backfires and makes the girls redden, forcing them to leave the dance or risk humiliation. The girls go to Mako Island, to the underground cavern where they became mermaids. Lewis leaves the party, to head to Mako Island, and encounters Miss Chatham on the pier. She convinces him that science can't explain everything, and that maybe he should just be there for the girls. After Lewis arrives at the underground cavern, he apologises about the side-effect. The girls lament about missing the dance, and Lewis tells Emma that Byron is still at the dance. Emma says that if Byron asked Miriam to the dance, he would feel honour-bound to walk her home. Lewis reveals that Miriam had asked Byron, not the other way around. Emma dives in the underground pool, racing back to the dance. Rikki then believes Miriam must have gotten her "claws" into Zane, but Lewis says Zane had asked his "mates" to keep her away from him, and that he's still waiting for her (Rikki). Rikki then follows Emma's lead, and dives into the pool, to return to the dance. Lewis admits to Cleo he'd forgotten about the dance and apologises. Cleo says the only reason she went with Nate was because no one else had asked her. Cleo admits that she's interested in Lewis, who starts to analyze why. He then decides to stop analyzing it, and just go with the "magic". They share a kiss and become a couple.
25	"Dr Danger"	Jeffrey Walker	22 December 2006 (2006-12-22)	125
Emma's family is planning a trip to a resort where Emma will have to go swimming, so she has no choice but to refuse to go - which irritates her parents and causes animosity between them. The return of marine biologist Dr Denman concerns Lewis and the girls but Zane sees a possible ally (or worse, a competitor) in the search for his mermaid and approaches her for help. Dr. Denman finds one of Cleo's scales from her tail and realises it's identical to the one Lewis left behind awhile before in her lab (see episode 8). She also finds the heart Lewis carved into the sand by the moon pool and makes the connection, realising the owner of the scale is no ordinary fish. She attempts to badger information out of Lewis, thoroughly convinced that Lewis is strongly connected to the scale she found, while feeding wrong information to Zane, leading him to believe that she is approaching information on the mermaid Zane is positive he saw. Rikki accidentally tips Zane off to Dr. Denman's thoughts on the discoveries near Mako Island. Zane brings up the topic of mermaids, which grows into a fierce argument and Zane yelling at Rikki to never see him again. Meanwhile, Dr. Denman sets up underwater cameras and detectors, leading to photos of the mermaids while swimming. Dr. Denman gets perilously close to the secret while the girls try frantically to hide their secret and not allow the scientists to expose them. Their efforts are in vain; when Mr. Bennett, Zane's father, finds a picture of the girls with their faces - and tails! - the scientists are bent on finding them, capturing them and will not give up.
26	"A Twist in the Tail"	Jeffrey Walker	29 December 2006 (2006-12-29)	126
The hunt for the now identified mermaids intensifies as Dr Denman sets a trap for Cleo, Emma, and Rikki at Mako Island, then forcing Zane to make a decision about where his loyalties lie: with his father or with Rikki. A lunar eclipse also gives the girls an opportunity to free themselves from further pursuit by losing their powers. While they are led to believe this is permanent, they eventually discover that the effects of the lunar eclipse only lasts for twelve hours and they get their powers back. Rikki and Zane break up, but they remain friends.