

Web series
Shoebox Zoo
Believe.
Shoebox Zoo is an urban fantasy TV series made in a collaboration between BBC Scotland and various Canadian television companies. It is mostly live-action, but with CGI used for the animal figurines. The show centers on the story of a young girl named Marnie McBride, who is given a shoebox containing four toy animals by a mysterious old man at a junk shop, as a gift for her 11th birthday. These magical toys have the power to come alive on Marnie’s command, and they’re on a quest to find an ancient book that once belonged to a great and powerful wizard.
- Status
- Ended
- Type
- Scripted
- Last aired
- 2005-11-27
- Language
- English
BBC One
- loss of loved one
- magic
- female protagonist
- quest
- inanimate objects come to life
- cgi-live action hybrid
Seasons

Season 1
13 episodes · 2004
On her 11th birthday, Marnie McBride goes to a junk shop with her father to pick out a present. There, the mysterious shopkeeper eagerly gifts her a shoebox containing four animal figurines, all of whom have the ability to magically spring to life. Marnie now has to deal with the struggles of balancing her life between adventuring with the collectively named “Shoebox Zoo” animals on a quest to find an ancient book of magic, and her day-to-day life as a schoolgirl, on top of having to deal with the grief stemming from the loss of her recently deceased mother.
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Season 2
13 episodes · 2005
Marnie, with the Shoebox Zoo animals in tow, travels from Edinburgh to her hometown of Denver. Now accompanied by her best friend Kyle, the quest for the Book of Forbidden Knowledge continues as the two friends must piece together several clues in order to find the true location of the book, all the while having to once again stop the evil plans of Toledo, who is seemingly back from the dead as a ghostly apparition. Will Marnie and Kyle be able to find the book and turn the Shoebox Zoo back to their human forms? Or will the nefarious shapeshifter prevail?
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Top billed cast












Behind the camera
Produced in
Canada, United Kingdom
Gallery

Videos
Air dates
- First aired
- 2004-09-21
- Latest episode
- 2005-11-27
- Status
- Ended
- Next release
- Completed
- Season 121 Sept 2004
- Season 216 Oct 2005
Frequently asked questions
Streaming availability for Shoebox Zoo in India is not confirmed yet. Check back soon.
Audience reviews
1- Z10/10
Zen
1/8/2022
I discovered Shoebox Zoo quite recently, nearly 18 years after it originally aired (as of the time this review was originally written). Truthfully, I went into it with very low expectations, and was very hesitant to check it out at first, but my curiosity was piqued and so I ended up deciding to watch it. Much to my shock, I ended up enjoying it quite a lot, so much so that I’d even rank it among my favorite shows of…
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