From the 1980s onwards, most episodes were more story-driven and frequently involved some kind of squabble or dispute between the puppet characters of Zippy, George and Bungle, and Geoffrey's attempts to calm them down and keep the peace.

[3] Violet Philpott was cast as the puppeteer of Zippy, with Peter Hawkins providing his voice, as well as those of Sunshine, Bramble and Pillar, however policy changes after the pilot meant those latter characters were recast.

[4] No script was made for the pilot,[3] which led to Hawkins attempting to rewrite gags, difficult for the preschool audience, and would lead to him departing the show after its first year,[4] recommending Roy Skelton to take over.

[5] For the first two filmed series, the show was presented by David Cook, with John Leeson as Rainbow, renamed Bungle, and featured songs by the group Telltale.

Stanley Bates also left the show at this time although he continued to contribute as a scriptwriter, with George's puppeteer Malcolm Lord replacing him in the role of Bungle.

Following the nationwide newspaper campaign to bring Rainbow back on air, a reboot of the show was announced by Tetra Films in late 1993 and debuted on Children's ITV in on 10 January 1994.

An additional puppet character was also introduced in the form of Cleo, a blue female rabbit voiced and operated by Gillian Robic.

Cleo's role was unclear, with some episodes portraying her as a mere customer to the shop, others as a nosy neighbour and others as a playmate for Zippy and George.

Rainbow Days re-embraced the 'variety show' format of the original series, generally focusing on an educational subject and consisting of scenes with Dale educating the puppet characters about the episode's subject, interspersed with comedic exchanges between Zippy and George in a similar style to the 'Sunshine and Moony' sketches from the earliest seasons, and songs performed by the whole cast, led by Dale.

Although Roy Skelton and Geoffrey Hayes died in 2011 and 2018 respectively, the characters of Zippy, George and Bungle still make the occasional TV appearances to the present day.

In 1979, the cast and crew of Rainbow made a special exclusive sketch for the Thames TV staff Christmas tape, sometimes referred to as the "Twangers" episode.

[citation needed] TV Offal also broadcast some very risqué material featuring Hayes, Zippy and George as guests on a variety programme hosted by comedian Jim Davidson in the 1980s; the sketch in question featured former children's TV presenter Tommy Boyd asking a question about Adam and Eve.

Boyd and Davidson used some profanities in the sketch, along with some innuendo from George (presumably again not intended for broadcast like the above), and Zippy exclaimed to Geoffrey an expletive phrase quite out of character from his children's television persona.