The cartoon series follows attempts of a blue aardvark (voiced by John Byner,imitating Jackie Mason) attempting to catch and eat a red ant named Charlie (also voiced by Byner, imitating Dean Martin), usually doing so by inhaling with a loud vacuum cleaner sound. The aardvark character is essentially unnamed; in the episode "Rough Brunch", he claims his name is simply "Aardvark". Despite this, and his identification in the series title as an aardvark, in many of the shorts he refers to himself (and is referred to by the ant) as an anteater. The ant gives his nemesis a variety of names as sly terms of endearment (Ol' Sam, Ol' Ben, Ol' Blue, Claude, Pal, Buddy, Daddy-O). In several bumper sequences of The Pink Panther Show, he is called "Blue Aardvark".