Astro

Astro is the pet dog of the Jetsons and one of the main characters of the Jetsons franchise. His voice was originated by Don Messick.

Adopted by the Jetsons family in the year 2062, Astro lives a life as a housepet of theirs. Although a little clumsy and a stress to the family, he remains consistently loyal to those around him, especially his best friend George.

TV series

 * The Jetsons
 * Astro and the Space Mutts
 * Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law
 * 2.5 "Back to the Present"

Movies

 * The Jetsons Meet the Flintstones
 * Rockin' with Judy Jetson
 * Jetsons: The Movie
 * The Jetsons & WWE: Robo-WrestleMania

Specials

 * Hanna-Barbera's 50th: A Yabba Dabba Doo Celebration (no lines)

Shorts

 * The Jetsons
 * 1.1 "Father & Son Day" (no lines)
 * 1.2 "The Best Son" (no lines)

Comics

 * The Jetsons (Gold Key Comics)
 * Laff-A-Lympics
 * #11 "The Toys from Tomorrow" (no lines)
 * The Jetsons (Harvey Comics)
 * The Jetsons (Archie Comics)
 * The Flintstones and the Jetsons
 * Scooby-Doo! Team-Up
 * #8 "Future Shocked"
 * The Jetsons (DC Comics)

The Coming of Astro
Astro made his debut in the fifth episode of the series, "The Coming of Astro," where Elroy first brought him to the Jetsons residence. Elroy states that he was an orphaned puppy and demonstrated him dog tricks to his mother Jane, and older daughter Judy. While the two quickly accept Astro as a sweet pet, Jane is hesistant that her husband George would disapprove on having Astro as their pet, but decides to call him if Elroy takes him out of a walk. However, because George refused to let his family have a pet during a live chat with Jane, the latter devises a plan to convince George that they would have Astro. They first hid the dog until George gets home. But when George arrived, he surprises the family with a nuclear-powered robot dog named 'Lectronimo; He promised that it will keep burglers away from their apartment. After Astro lunges at George, he orders the dog to leave. But Jane insists that he should not let Astro go, and the rest of the family propose on having a contest on which dog can stay. Despite Astro's best efforts, 'Lectronimo wins the contest and Astro is left out of the home, much to Elroy's disappointment. The two dogs are put to the test when a cat burgler showed up in the Jetsons' apartment. 'Lectromino chases him and wakes up the family, but after a mishap involving the bugler switching identities with George to mess with 'Lectromino's programming, Astro captures the cat burgler and George accepts him as their pet, making him a permanent member of the Jetsons family.

Behind the scenes

 * Don Messick would later use Astro's dog-like accent and the phrase "Ruh-roh!" for when he provided the voice of Scooby-Doo during his career.

In popular culture

 * Although having no part in the actual movie, Astro, along with George and Jane, was featured on the poster of the film D.A.R.Y.L. The inclusion of the family may represent something Daryl is missing out on, while Paramount Pictures may have included it as an Easter egg as they had acquired the rights the same year for what became an undeveloped live-action movie.
 * In Chris Rice's song "Cartoons," Rice questions if Astro is religious and would say "Rough-ray-roo-loo-yah" in place of "Hallelujah."
 * In the Family Guy episode "From Method to Madness," Peter thinks it's fine for Stewie to go into acting at such a young age because he thinks Elroy turned out okay. But Elroy has grown up to become a poor drunk. He gets taken out of a bar by its bouncer and put into a taxi driven by another former child star Bamm-Bamm. The bouncer tells Bamm-Bamm to take Elroy home, but he wants to go to Astro's grave, instead. Elroy and Bamm-Bamm later attended one of Stewie's terrible one-man shows.
 * In The Fairly OddParents TV movie Channel Chasers (part 1), Astro is parodied as a robotic dog belonging to Tony Futurelli, who are portrayed as both stereotypical Italian-Americans in the same vein as the HBO drama The Sopranos. Just as in the closing credits to The Jetsons, Tony takes his dog for a walk, but the dog is distracted by a cat who owes him money. The dog and cat end up jumping on the balcony as they watch Tony get stuck on the revolving treadmill.
 * In the Drawn Together episode "Toot Goes Bollywood," at the beginning of the episode, Foxxy is making love to Scooby, who she mistakes for Astro.
 * In the DTV movie Futurama: Bender's Game (cut as part 2 when aired as part of the TV series), Rosie has been sent to the HAL Institute for Criminally Insane Robots for killing Astro, referring to him as a "dirty dog".
 * There is an anthropomorphic thug-like dog strongly resembling Astro in the Samurai Jack episode "Episode XCVII." He was voiced by Greg Baldwin, although he didn't sound like Astro.
 * For the 2021 Halloween special of Live with Kelly and Ryan, Michael Gelman, one of the show's executives, was dressed as Astro.