A number of spin-offs have been made, including the television seriesThe Tom and Jerry Show (1975),The Tom and Jerry Comedy Show (1980–1982),Tom & Jerry Kids (1990–1993),Tom and Jerry Tales (2006–2008), andThe Tom and Jerry Show (2014–2021). In 1992, the first feature-length film based on the series,Tom and Jerry: The Movie, was released. Thirteendirect-to-video films have been produced since 2002. In 2019, a musical adaptation of the series, titledTom and Jerry: Purr-Chance to Dream, debuted in Japan, in advance ofTom and Jerry's 80th anniversary. In 2021, the live-action/animated hybrid filmTom and Jerry was released, while a Chinese-American computer-animated film,Tom and Jerry: Forbidden Compass, premiered in June 2025.
Plot
The series features comic fights between an iconic set of adversaries, a house cat (Tom) and a house mouse (Jerry). The plots of many shorts are often set in the backdrop of a house, centering on Tom (who is often enlisted by a human) trying to capture Jerry, and the mayhem and destruction that follows. Tom rarely succeeds in catching Jerry, mainly because of Jerry's cleverness, cunning abilities, and luck. However, on several occasions, they have displayed genuine friendship and concern for each other's well-being. At other times, the pair set aside their rivalry in order to pursue a common goal, such as when a baby escapes the watch of a negligent babysitter, causing Tom and Jerry to pursue the baby and keep it away from danger, in theshortsBusy Buddies andTot Watchers respectively. Despite their endless attacks on one another, they have saved each other's lives every time they were truly in danger, with the exception ofThe Two Mouseketeers andBlue Cat Blues.
The cartoons are known for their violent gags; Tom uses axes, hammers, firearms, firecrackers, explosives, traps and poison to kill Jerry, and Jerry's methods of retaliation are far more violent, with frequent success, including slicing Tom in half, decapitating him, shutting his head or fingers in a window or a door, stuffing Tom's tail in awaffle iron or amangle, kicking him into a refrigerator, getting him electrocuted, pounding him with amace, club ormallet, letting a tree or electric pole drive him into the ground, sticking matches into his feet and lighting them, etc.[3] WhileTom and Jerry has often been criticized as excessively violent, there is no blood or gore in any scene.[4]: 42 [5]: 134
Music plays a very important part in the shorts, emphasizing the action, bringing in humor, filling in for traditional sound effects, and lending emotion to the scenes. Musical directorScott Bradley created complex scores that combined elements ofjazz,classical, andpop music.[6][7] Bradley often used contemporary pop songs and songs from other films, including MGM films likeThe Wizard of Oz andMeet Me in St. Louis.
Even thoughTom and Jerry almost never speak, the shorts often had dialogue from other characters. Minor characters are not similarly limited, and the two lead characters speak English on rare occasions. For example, the characterMammy Two Shoes has lines in nearly every cartoon in which she appears. Most of the vocal effects used forTom and Jerry are their high-pitched laughs and gasping screams.
Tom, named "Jasper" in his debut appearance, is a gray and whitedomestic shorthair cat. "Tom" is a generic name for a male cat. He is usually but not always, portrayed as living a comfortable, or even pampered life, whileJerry, whose name is not explicitly mentioned in his debut appearance, is a small, brownhouse mouse who always lives in close proximity to Tom. Despite being very energetic, determined and much larger, Tom is no match for Jerry's wits. Jerry possesses surprising strength for his size, approximately the equivalent of Tom's, lifting items such as anvils with relative ease and withstanding considerable impacts.[8]
Thomas Jasper Cat Sr.
Gerald Jinx Mouse
Evolution of Tom Cat (top) and Jerry Mouse
(bottom):1940 to 1958: Hanna-Barbera era1961 to 1962: Gene Deitch era1963 to 1967: Chuck Jones era1975 to 1977:The Tom and Jerry Show1980 to 1982:The Tom and Jerry Comedy Show1990 to 1994:Tom and Jerry Kids1992:Tom and Jerry: The Movie2006 to 2008:Tom and Jerry Tales
2014 to 2021:The Tom and Jerry Show
Although cats typically chase mice to eat them, it is quite rare for Tom to actually try to eat Jerry. He tries to hurt or compete with him just to taunt Jerry, even as revenge, or to obtain a reward from a human, including his owner(s)/master(s), for catching Jerry, or for generally doing his job well as a house cat. By the final "fade-out" of each cartoon, Jerry usually gets the best of Tom.
Other results may be reached. On rare occasions, Tom triumphs, usually when Jerry becomes the aggressor or he pushes Tom a little too far. InThe Million Dollar Cat, Jerry learns that Tom will lose his newly acquired wealth if he harms any animal, especially mice. He then torments Tom a little too much until he retaliates. InTimid Tabby Tom's look-alike cousin pushes Jerry over the edge. Occasionally and usually ironically, they both lose, usually because Jerry's last trap or attack on Tom backfires on him or he overlooks something. In Chuck Jones'Filet Meow, Jerry orders a shark from the pet store to scare Tom away from eating a goldfish. Afterward, the shark scares Jerry away as well. They occasionally end up being friends, although there is often a last-minute event that ruins the truce. One cartoon that has a friendly ending isSnowbody Loves Me.
Both characters displaysadistic tendencies, in that they are equally likely to take pleasure in tormenting each other, although it is often in response to a triggering event. However, when one character appears to truly be in mortal danger from an unplanned situation or due to actions by a third party, the other will develop a conscience and save him. Occasionally, they bond over a mutual sentiment towards an unpleasant experience and their attacking each other is more play than serious attacks. Multiple shorts show the two getting along with minimal difficulty, and they are more than capable of working together when the situation calls for it, usually against a third party who manages totorture and humiliate them both.
Sometimes this partnership is forgotten quickly when an unexpected event happens, or when one character feels that the other is no longer necessary. This is the case inPosse Cat, when they agree that Jerry will allow himself to be caught if Tom agrees to share his reward dinner, but Tom then reneges. Other times, Tom keeps his promise to Jerry and the partnerships are not quickly dissolved after the problem is solved.
Tom changes his love interest many times. The first love interest is Toots who appears inPuss n' Toots, and calls him "Tommy" inThe Mouse Comes to Dinner. He is interested in a cat called Toots inThe Zoot Cat although she has a different appearance to the original Toots. The most frequent love interest of Tom's isToodles Galore, who never has any dialogue in the cartoons.
Despite five shorts ending with a depiction of Tom's apparent death, hisdemise is never permanent. He even reads about his own death in a flashback inJerry's Diary. He appears to die in explosions inMouse Trouble, after which he is seen inheaven,Yankee Doodle Mouse and inSafety Second, while inThe Two Mouseketeers he is guillotinedoffscreen. The shortBlue Cat Blues ends with bothTom and Jerry sitting on the railroad tracks with the intent ofsuicide while the whistle of an oncoming train is heard foreshadowing their imminent death.
Tom and Jerry speaking
Although many supporting and minor characters speak,Tom and Jerry rarely do so themselves. One exception isThe Lonesome Mouse where they speak several times briefly, primarily Jerry, to contrive to get Tom back into the house. Tom more often sings while wooing female cats. For example, Tom singsLouis Jordan's "Is You Is or Is You Ain't My Baby" in the 1946 shortSolid Serenade. In that short andZoot Cat, Tom woos female cats using a deep, heavily French-accented voice in imitation of then-popular leading man, actorCharles Boyer.[9][10]
At the end ofThe Million Dollar Cat, after beginning to antagonize Jerry he says, "Gee, I'm throwin' away a million dollars... BUT I'M HAPPY!". InTom and Jerry: The Magic Ring, Jerry says, "No, no, no, no, no." when choosing the shop to remove his ring. InThe Mouse Comes to Dinner, Tom speaks to his girlfriend Toots while inadvertently sitting on a stove: "Say, what's cookin'?", to which Toots replies "You are, stupid."
Another instance of speech comes inSolid Serenade andThe Framed Cat, where Tom directs Spike through a few dog tricks in a dog-trainer manner. InPuss Gets the Boot, Jerry begs and prays for his life when Tom catches him by the tail. Jerry has whispered in Tom's ear on several occasions. InLove Me, Love My Mouse, Jerry calls Toots "Mama".
Co-director William Hanna provided most of the vocal effects for the pair, including Tom's leather-lunged scream, created by recording Hanna's scream and eliminating the beginning and ending of the recording, leaving only the strongest part of the scream on the soundtrack,[11] and Jerry's nervous gulp.
The only other reasonably common vocalization is made by Tom when some external reference claims a certain scenario or eventuality to be impossible, which inevitably thwarts Tom's plans – at which point, a bedraggled and battered Tom appears and says in a haunting, echoing voice "Don't you believe it!", a reference to the then-popular 1940s radio showDon't You Believe It!.[12][13] InMouse Trouble, Tom says "Don't you believe it!" after being beaten up by Jerry, which also happens inThe Missing Mouse. In the 1946 shortTrap Happy, Tom hires acat disguised as a mouse exterminator who, after several failed attempts to dispatch Jerry and suffering a lot of accidents in the process, changes profession toCat exterminator by crossing out the "Mouse" on his title and writing "CAT", resulting in Tom spelling out the word out loud before reluctantly pointing at himself.
One short, 1956'sBlue Cat Blues, is narrated by Jerry invoiceover, voiced byPaul Frees,[9][10] as they try to win back their ladyfriends. Jerry was voiced bySara Berner during his appearance in the 1945 MGM musicalAnchors Aweigh.[9][10]Tom and Jerry: The Movie is the first, and so far only installment of the series where the famous cat-and-mouse duo regularly speaks or is able to be understood by humans. In that film, Tom was voiced byRichard Kind, and Jerry was voiced byDana Hill.
In his attempts to catch Jerry, Tom often has to deal with Spike, known as "Killer" and "Butch" in some shorts, an angry, vicious but gulliblebulldog who tries to attack Tom for bothering him or his son Tyke while trying to get Jerry. Originally, Spike was unnamed and mute, aside from howls and biting noises as well as attacking indiscriminately, not caring whether it was Tom or Jerry though usually attacking Tom. In later cartoons, Spike spoke often, using a voice and expressions, performed byBilly Bletcher and laterPatrick McGeehan, Jerry Mann, Bob Shamrock,John Brown,Stan Freberg andDaws Butler, modeled after comedianJimmy Durante.[9][10] Spike's coat has altered throughout the years between gray and creamy tan. The addition of Spike's son Tyke in the late 1940s led to both a slight softening of Spike's character and a short-lived spin-off theatrical series calledSpike and Tyke.
Most cartoons with Spike in them conform to a theme: usually, Spike is trying to accomplish something, such as building a dog house or sleeping, whenTom and Jerry's antics stop him doing it. Spike then presumably due to prejudice, singles out Tom as the culprit, and threatens him that if it ever happens again, he will do "something horrible" to him, effectively forcing Tom to take the blame, while Jerry overhears. Afterward, Jerry usually does anything he can to interrupt whatever Spike is doing, while Tom barely manages to stop him, usually getting injured in the process. Usually, Jerry eventually wrecks whatever Spike is doing in spectacular fashion, and leaves Tom to take the blame, forcing him to flee from Spike and inevitably lose.
Off-screen, Spike does something to Tom, and Tom is generally shown injured or in a bad situation while Jerry smugly cuddles up to Spike unscathed. Tom sometimes gets irritated with Spike. An example is inThat's My Pup!, when Spike forces Tom to run up a tree every time his son barked, causing Tom to hang Tyke on a flag pole. At least once, Tom does something that benefits Spike, who promises not to interfere ever again, causing Jerry to frantically leave the house and run into the distance, inHic-cup Pup. Spike is well known for his famous "Listen pussycat!" catchphrase when he threatens Tom, his other famous catchphrase is "That's my boy!" normally said when he supports or congratulates his son.
Tyke is described as a cute, sweet-looking, happy and lovable puppy. He is Spike's son. Unlike Spike, Tyke does not speak and only communicates, mostly towards his father, by barking, yapping, wagging his tail, whimpering and growling. Spike would always go out of his way to care and comfort his son and make sure that he is safe from Tom. Tyke loves his father and Spike loves his son and they get along like friends, although most of time they would be taking a nap or Spike would teach Tyke the main facts of life of being a dog. Like Spike, Tyke's appearance has altered throughout the years, from gray, with white paws, to creamy tan. WhenTom & Jerry Kids first aired, this was the first time that viewers heard Tyke speak.
Butch and Toodles Galore
Butch is a black, cigar-smoking alley cat who also wants to eat Jerry. He is Tom's most frequent adversary. For most of the shorts he appears in, he is usually seen rivaling Tom over Toodles. Butch was Tom's chum as in some cartoons, where Butch is leader of Tom's alley cat buddies, who are mostlyLightning,Topsy, andMeathead. Butch talks more often than Tom or Jerry in most shorts.
Butch and Toodles were originally introduced inHugh Harman's 1941 shortThe Alley Cat, but were integrated intoTom and Jerry rather than continuing in their own series.
Nibbles is a small gray mouse who often appears in shorts as an orphan mouse. He is a carefree individual who very rarely understands the danger of the situation, simply following instructions the best he can both to Jerry's command and his own innocent understanding of the situation. This can lead to such results as "getting the cheese" by simply asking Tom to pick it up for him, rather than following Jerry's example of outmaneuvering and sneaking around Tom. Many times Nibbles is an ally of Jerry in fights against Tom, including being the second Mouseketeer. He is given speaking roles in all his appearances as a Mouseketeer, often with a high-pitched French tone, provided byFrancoise Brun-Cottan.[9][10] However, during a short in which he rescued Robin Hood, his voice was instead a more masculine, gruff Cockney accent, provided byLucille Bliss.[10]
Thehousekeeper, usually seen from the torso down, is a heavy-set, middle-aged black woman who often has to deal with the mayhem generated by the lead characters. Voiced by character actressLillian Randolph,[9][10] she is often seen as the owner of Tom, and perhaps the homeowner as well. Her face was only shown once, very briefly, inSaturday Evening Puss. Her appearances have often been edited out, dubbed, or re-animated as a slim white woman in later television showings, since her character is amammy archetype that had been protested asracist by theNAACP and other civil rights groups since the 1940s.[14][15] In a 1975 article in Film Comment she was referred to as "Mammy Two Shoes," a moniker that has been inaccurately attributed to the character ever since, The name "Mammy Two-Shoes" was on the Disney model sheets for a character in a Silly Symphony cartoon, though the name was never spoken in the cartoon. A similar housekeeper then appeared in MGM Bokso cartoons by Harman and Ising, also without a name. At no time, ever, was the name used in any Tom and Jerry cartoon, The author of the 1975 article later apologized, but too much time had established the incorrect information, including on the DVD releases of the cartoons, in which the script read byWhoopi Goldberg on theTom and Jerry Spotlight Collection: Vol. 2 DVD set, while explaining the importance of African-American representation in the cartoon series, however stereotyped, mentions the incorrect name numerous times.[16]
History
Tom and Jerry titlecard from 1947 to 1953
OtherTom and Jerry titlecards from 1940s to 1950s
"Tom and Jerry" was a commonplace phrase for young men given to drinking, gambling, and riotous living in 19th-centuryLondon,England. The term comes fromLife in London; or, The Day and Night Scenes of Jerry Hawthorn, Esq., and his elegant friend, Corinthian Tom (1821) byPierce Egan, the British sports journalist who authored similar accounts compiled asBoxiana.[17] HoweverBrewer notes no more than an "unconscious" echo of theRegency era, and thusGeorgian era, origins in the naming of the cartoon.[18]
Hanna-Barbera era (1940–1958)
In August 1937, animator and storymanJoseph Barbera began to work atMGM, then the largest studio in Hollywood.[19][20] He learned that co-ownerLouis B. Mayer wished to boost the animation department by encouraging the artists to develop some new cartoon characters, following the lack of success with its earlier cartoon series based on theCaptain and the Kids comic strip. Barbera then teamed with fellow Ising unit animator and directorWilliam Hanna, who joined Harman-Ising Productions in 1930, and pitched new ideas, among them was the concept of two "equal characters who were always in conflict with each other".[20] An early thought involved a fox and a dog before they settled on a cat and mouse. The pair discussed their ideas with producerFred Quimby, then the head of the short film department who, despite a lack of interest in it, gave them the green-light to produce one cartoon short.[20]
The first short,Puss Gets the Boot, features a cat named Jasper and an unnamed mouse,[21] named Jinx in pre-production, and an African American housemaid named Mammy Two Shoes.Leonard Maltin described it as "very new and special [...] that was to change the course of MGM cartoon production" and established the successfulTom and Jerry formula of comical cat and mouse chases with slapstick gags.[22][20] It was released onto the theatre circuit on February 10, 1940. The pair, having been advised by management not to produce any more, focused on other cartoons includingGallopin' Gals (1940) andOfficer Pooch (1941).[20] Matters changed when Texas businesswoman Bessa Short sent a letter to MGM, asking whether more cat and mouse shorts would be produced, which helped convince management to commission a series.[23][19]
A studio contest held to rename both characters was won by animator John Carr, who suggested Tom the cat and Jerry the mouse. Carr was awarded a first-place prize of $50, equivalent to $1,122 in 2024.[24][25] It has been suggested, but not proven, that the names were derived from a 1932 story byDamon Runyon, who took them from the name of apopular Christmastime cocktail, itself derived from the names of two characters inan 1821 stage play byWilliam Moncrieff, an adaptation of 1821 Egan's book titledLife in London where the names originated, which was based onGeorge Cruikshank's,Isaac Robert Cruikshank's, and Egan's own careers.[26]Puss Gets the Boot was a critical success, earning anAcademy Award nomination forBest Short Subject: Cartoons in 1941 despite the credits listing Ising and omitting Hanna and Barbera.[22][20]
After MGM gave the green-light for Hanna and Barbera to continue, the studio entered production on the secondTom and Jerry cartoon,The Midnight Snack (1941).[21] The pair continued to work on the series for the next fifteen years of their career.[27] The composer of the series,Scott Bradley, made it difficult for the musicians to perform his score which often involved thetwelve-tone technique developed byArnold Schoenberg.[21] The series developed a quicker, more energetic and violent tone which was inspired by the work of MGM colleagueTex Avery. Hanna and Barbera made minor adjustments toTom and Jerry's appearance so they would "age gracefully".[21] Jerry lost weight and his long eyelashes, while Tom lost his jagged fur for a smoother appearance, had larger eyebrows, and received a white and gray face with a white mouth.[21] He adopted a quadrupedal stance at first, like a real cat, to become increasingly and almost exclusively bipedal.
Hanna and Barbera produced 114 cartoons for MGM, thirteen of which were nominated for an Academy Award for Best Short Subject. Seven went on to win, breaking the winning streak held byWalt Disney's studio in the category.Tom and Jerry won more Academy Awards than any other character-based theatrical animated series. Barbera estimated the typical budget of $50,000 for eachTom and Jerry cartoon which made the duo take "time to get it right".[20] A typical cartoon took around six weeks to make.[21]
As per standard practice for American animation production at the time, Barbera and Hanna did not work with a script beforehand.[19] After coming up with a cartoon idea together, Barbera would flesh out the story by drawing astoryboard and provide character designs andanimation layouts.[28] Hanna did the animation timing - planning the music and temporal beats and accents the animation action would occur on - and assigned the animators their scenes and supervised their work.[28] Hanna provided incidental voice work, in particular Tom's numerous screams of pain.[28] Despite minimal creative input,[28] as head of the MGM cartoon studio, Quimby was credited as the producer of all cartoons until 1955.[21]
The rise in television in the 1950s caused problems for the MGM animation studio, leading to budget cuts onTom and Jerry cartoons due to decreased revenue from theatrical screenings. In an attempt to combat this, MGM ordered that all subsequent shorts be produced in the widescreenCinemaScope format. The first,Pet Peeve, was released in November 1954. The studio found that re-releases of older cartoons were earning as much as new ones, resulting in the executive decision to cease production onTom and Jerry and later the animation studio on May 15, 1957.[19] The final cartoon produced by Hanna and Barbera,Tot Watchers, was released on August 1, 1958.[21] The pair decided to leave and went on to focus on their own production companyHanna-Barbera Productions, which went on to produce such popular animated television series includingThe Flintstones,Yogi Bear,The Jetsons andScooby-Doo.[21]
Production formats
Before 1954, allTom and Jerry cartoons were produced in the standardAcademy ratio and format. In 1954 and 1955, some of the output was dually produced in dual versions: one Academy-ratio negative composed for a flatwidescreen (1.75:1) format and one shot in the CinemaScope process. From 1955 until the close of the MGM cartoon studio a year later, allTom and Jerry cartoons were produced in CinemaScope. Some even had their soundtracks recorded inPerspecta directional audio. All of the Hanna and Barbera cartoons were shot as successive color exposure negatives inTechnicolor.
Deitch states that, being a "UPA man", he was not a fan of theTom and Jerry cartoons, thinking they were "needlessly violent".[35][36] However, after being assigned to work on the series, he quickly realized that "nobody took [the violence] seriously", and it was merely "a parody of exaggerated human emotions".[35] He also came to see what he perceived as the "biblical roots" inTom and Jerry's conflict, similar toDavid and Goliath, stating "That's where we feel a connection to these cartoons: the little guy can win (or at least survive) to fight another day."[35]
Since the Deitch/Snyder team had seen only a handful of the originalTom and Jerry shorts,[37] and since the team produced their cartoons on a tighter budget of $10,000, the resulting films were consideredsurrealist in nature, though this was not Deitch's intention.[30][36] The animation waslimited and jerky in movement compared to the more fluid Hanna-Barbera shorts, and often utilizedmotion blur. Background art was done in a more simplistic, angular,Art Deco-esque style. The soundtracks featured sparse and echoicelectronic music, futuristicsound effects, heavyreverb and dialogue that was mumbled rather than spoken. According to Jen Nessel ofThe New York Times, "The Czech style had nothing in common with these gag-driven cartoons."[38]
Whereas Hanna-Barbera's shorts generally took place in and outside of a house, Deitch's shorts opted for more exotic locations, such as a 19th-century whaling ship, the jungles ofNairobi, anAncient Greek acropolis, or the Wild West. In addition, Mammy Two Shoes was replaced as Tom's owner by a bald, overweight, short-tempered, middle-aged white man, who bore a striking resemblance to another Deitch character,Clint Clobber. Just like Spike the Bulldog, he was also significantly more brutal and violent in punishing Tom's actions as compared to previous owners, often beating and thrashing Tom repeatedly; the character and his extreme treatment of Tom was poorly received.
To avoid being linked to Communism, Deitch modified the Czech names of his crew in theopening credits of the shorts to look more conventional to English-speaking audiences, e.g. Štěpán Koníček became "Steven Konichek" and Václav Lídl became "Victor Little". These shorts are among the fewTom and Jerry cartoons not to carry the "Made In Hollywood, U.S.A." phrase on the end title card. Due to Deitch's studio being behind theIron Curtain, the production studio's location is omitted entirely on it.[36] After the 13 shorts were completed, Joe Vogel, the head of production, was fired from MGM. Vogel had approved of Deitch and his team's work, but MGM decided not to renew their contract after Vogel's departure.[36] The final of the 13 shorts,Carmen Get It!, was released on December 21, 1962.[30]
Deitch's shorts were commercial successes. In 1962, theTom and Jerry series became the highest-grossing animated short film series of that time, dethroningLooney Tunes, which had held the position for 16 years.[39][32] However, unlike the Hanna-Barbera shorts, none of Deitch's films were nominated for anyAcademy Awards.[32] In retrospect, these shorts are often considered the worst of theTom and Jerry theatrical output.[35] Deitch stated that due to his team's inexperience as well as their low budget, he "hardly had a chance to succeed", and "well understand[s] the negative reactions" to his shorts. He believes "They could all have been better animated – truer to the characters – but our T&Js were produced in the early 1960s, near the beginning of my presence here, over a half-century ago as I write this!"[40] Despite the criticism, Deitch'sTom and Jerry shorts are appreciated by some fans due to their uniquely surreal nature.[34] The shorts were released on DVD in 2015 inTom and Jerry: The Gene Deitch Collection.[34]
Production formats
The 1960s entries were done inMetrocolor but returned to the standard Academy ratio and format.
Chuck Jones era (1963–1967)
After the last of the Deitch cartoons were released,Chuck Jones, who had been fired from his 30-plus year tenure atWarner Bros. Cartoons, started his own animation studio,Sib Tower 12 Productions (later renamed MGM Animation/Visual Arts), with partner Les Goldman. Beginning in 1963, Jones and Goldman went on to produce34 moreTom and Jerry shorts, all of which carried Jones' distinctive style, and a slight psychedelic influence.
Jones had trouble adapting his style toTom and Jerry's brand of humor, and a number of the cartoons favored full animation, personality and style over storyline. The characters underwent a slight change of appearance: Tom was given thickereyebrows (resembling Jones'Grinch, Count Blood Count orWile E. Coyote), a less complex look (including the color of his fur becoming gray), sharper ears, longer tail and furrier cheeks (resembling Jones'Claude Cat orSylvester), while Jerry was given larger eyes and ears, a lighter brown color, and a sweeter,Porky Pig-like expression.[41]
Some of Jones'Tom and Jerry cartoons are reminiscent of his work withWile E. Coyote and the Road Runner, included the uses ofblackout gags and gags involving characters falling from high places. Jones co-directed the majority of the shorts with layout artistMaurice Noble. The remaining shorts were directed byAbe Levitow andBen Washam, withTom Ray directing two shorts built around footage from earlierTom and Jerry cartoons directed by Hanna and Barbera, and Jim Pabian directed a short with Maurice Noble. Various vocal characteristics were made byMel Blanc,June Foray and even Jones himself. These shorts contain a memorable opening theme, in which Tom first replaces the MGM lion, then is trapped inside the "O" of his name.[42]
Though Jones's shorts were generally considered an improvement over Deitch's, they had varying degrees of critical success. MGM ceased production ofTom and Jerry shorts in 1967, by which time Jones had moved on to television specials and the feature filmThe Phantom Tollbooth.[42] The shorts were released on DVD in 2009 onTom and Jerry: The Chuck Jones Collection.
Tom and Jerry hit television
Beginning in 1965, the Hanna and BarberaTom and Jerry cartoons began to appear on television in heavily edited versions. The Jones team was required to take the cartoons featuring Mammy Two Shoes and remove her by pasting over the scenes featuring her with new scenes. Most of the time, she was replaced with a similarly fat white Irish woman. Occasionally, as inSaturday Evening Puss, a thin white teenager took her place instead, with both characters voiced byJune Foray.[9]
Recent telecasts onCartoon Network andBoomerang retain Mammy with new voiceover work performed byThea Vidale to remove the stereotypical black jargon featured on the original cartoon soundtracks.[43] The standardTom and Jerry opening titles were removed as well. Instead of the roaringMGM Lion sequence, an opening sequence featuring different clips of the cartoons was used instead. The title cards were also changed. A pink title card with the name written in white font was used instead.
Debuting onCBS' Saturday morning schedule on September 25, 1965,Tom and Jerry moved to CBS Sundays in 1967 and remained there until September 17, 1972.
Second Hanna-Barbera era:The Tom and Jerry Show (1975–1977)
In 1975,Tom and Jerry were reunited with Hanna and Barbera, who producedThe Tom and Jerry Show for Saturday mornings. These 48 seven-minute cartoon shorts were paired withGrape Ape andMumbly cartoons, to createThe Tom and Jerry/Grape Ape Show,The Tom and Jerry/Grape Ape/Mumbly Show, andThe Tom and Jerry/Mumbly Show, all of which initially ran on ABC Saturday mornings between September 6, 1975, and September 3, 1977.[44] In these cartoons,Tom and Jerry, now with a red bow tie, who had been enemies during their formative years, became nonviolent pals who went on adventures together, as Hanna-Barbera had to meet the stringent rules against violence for children's TV. This format has not been used in newerTom and Jerry entries.[42]
Filmation era (1980–1982)
Filmation Studios were commissioned byMGM Television to produce aTom and Jerry TV series,The Tom and Jerry Comedy Show, which debuted in 1980 and featured new cartoons starringDroopy, Spike, Slick Wolf, andBarney Bear, not seen since the original MGM shorts. The FilmationTom and Jerry cartoons were noticeably different from Hanna-Barbera's efforts, as they returnedTom and Jerry to the original chase formula, with a somewhat more "slapstick" humor format. This incarnation, much like the 1975 version, was not as well received by audiences as the originals, and lasted onCBS Saturday mornings from September 6, 1980, to September 4, 1982.[42]
Tom and Jerry's new owners
Tom and Jerry on the No.9 Cartoon Network-sponsored Ford in June 1998, driven byLake Speed
Third Hanna-Barbera era:Tom & Jerry Kids (1990–1994)
One of the biggest trends for Saturday morning television in the 1980s and 1990s was the "babyfication" (child versions) of classic cartoon stars. On March 2, 1990,Tom & Jerry Kids, co-produced by Turner Entertainment Co. and Hanna-Barbera Productions (which was sold to Turner in 1991). debuted onFox Kids, and aired for a few years on British children's block,CBBC. It featured a youthful version of the famous cat-and-mouse duo chasing each other. As with the 1975 H-B series, Jerry wears his red bowtie, while Tom now wears a red cap. Spike and his son Tyke, who now had talking dialogue, and Droopy and his son Dripple, appeared in back-up segments for the show, which ran until November 18, 1994.Tom & Jerry Kids was the lastTom and Jerry cartoon series produced in 4:3 (full screen) aspect ratio.
One-off productions (2001; 2005)
In 2001, a new television special titledTom and Jerry: The Mansion Cat premiered onBoomerang. It featured Joe Barbera (who was also a creative consultant) as the voice of Tom's owner, whose face is never seen. In this cartoon, Jerry, housed in ahabitrail, is as much of a house pet as Tom is, and their owner has to remind Tom to not "blame everything on the mouse".
In 2005, a newTom and Jerry theatrical short, titledThe Karate Guard, which had been written and directed by Barbera and Spike Brandt,storyboarded by Joseph Barbera andIwao Takamoto and produced by Joseph Barbera, Spike Brandt, and Tony Cervone premiered in Los Angeles cinemas on September 27, 2005, as part of the celebration ofTom and Jerry's sixty-fifth anniversary. This marked Barbera's first return as a writer, director and storyboard artist on the series since his and Hanna's original MGM cartoon shorts, and last overall. He died shortly after production ended. Director/animator, Spike Brandt was nominated for an Annie award for best character animation. The short debuted on the Cartoon Network on January 27, 2006. The short was filmed in the standard Academy ratio and format.
Warner Bros. era (2006–present)
In 1996, Turner merged withTime Warner, the parent company ofWarner Bros. The characters from the MGM library, includingTom and Jerry, were placed under the control ofWarner Bros. Animation. A relaunch of the theatrical shorts series was planned for 2003 alongside a similar relaunch of theLooney Tunes theatrical shorts, but was canceled after the financial failure ofLooney Tunes: Back in Action.
In 2006, a new series calledTom and Jerry Tales premiered. Thirteen half-hour episodes each consisting of three shorts were produced. Some of the segments, likeThe Karate Guard, had originally been produced and completed in 2003 and/or 2005 as part of the planned theatrical cartoon relaunch. The show debuted in markets outside the US and UK, before premiering in February 2006 on the UK version ofBoomerang, and the following autumn in the US onKids' WB onThe CW.[45]Tales is the firstTom and Jerry TV series that utilizes the original style of the classic shorts, along with the slapstick.Tales is the firstTom and Jerry production produced in 16:9 widescreen aspect ratio, but was cropped to 4:3 fullscreen aspect ratio when initially aired on in the United States. The series was canceled in 2008, shortly before the Kids' WB block shut down.
The Tom and Jerry Show logo
Cartoon Network, which began rerunningTom and Jerry Tales in January 2012, subsequently launched a series titledThe Tom and Jerry Show consisting of two 11-minute shorts, later produced as separate 7-minutes length episodes, per episode that likewise sought to maintain the look, core characters and sensibility of the original theatrical shorts. Similar to other reboot works likeScooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated andNew Looney Tunes, several episodes the new series broughtTom and Jerry into contemporary environments, telling new stories and relocating the characters to more fantastic worlds, from a medieval castle to a mad scientist's lab. The series was produced by Warner Bros. Animation, withSam Register serving as executive producer in collaboration withDarrell Van Citters andAshley Postlewaite atRenegade Animation. Originally slated for a 2013 Cartoon Network premiere,[46] the series was pushed back to April 9, 2014. It is the secondTom and Jerry production presented in 16:9 widescreen aspect ratio.[47]
In November 2014, a two-minute sketch was shown as part of theChildren in Need telethon in the United Kingdom. The sketch was produced as a collaboration with Warner Bros.[48]
In May 2016,WB Kids began releasing excerpts from variousTom and Jerry works to the online platformYouTube.[49][50][51] By January 2017, compilation videos of theTom and Jerry franchise began to be released by WB Kids on the platform.[52][53][54]
A newTom and Jerry series made its debut on July 1, 2021, as aMax Original on HBO Max, calledTom and Jerry in New York, which basically served as a spin-off ofThe Tom and Jerry Show by having the exact same animation style and slapstick, except that the events take place in the city ofNew York City. It was loosely based on the 2021 film, as the humans in the series were shown with the faces intact.
On November 11, 2022,Cartoon Network in Japan premiered a new series of animated shorts,Tom and Jerry (Japanese:とむとじぇりー,romanized: Tomu to Jerī[a]), marking the first Japanese production based on the property.[58][59] Featuring the voices of Megumi Aratake (as Tom), Aya Yonekura (as Jerry) and Eri Tanaka and Nana Kumagai (asTuffy), the shorts were animated byFanworks in co-operation with Studio Nanahoshi. Ayu handled the character design and Captain Mirai composed the musical scores.[60] The November 11, 2022 premiere coincided with Cartoon Network's celebration of Cheese Day, which is organized by cheese industry in Japan.[58][59] In 2025, the series was renamedTom and Jerry Gokko (Japanese:とむとじぇりーごっこ,romanized: Tomu to Jerī Gokko.[61][62]
On July 25, 2023, theSoutheast Asian version ofTom and Jerry animated shorts was announced, to be presented onCartoon Network Asia alongsideHBO Asia streaming platformHBO GO before it was aired globally. The animated shorts, which were set inSingapore, were produced byWarner Bros. Discovery Asia-Pacific's director of original kids content Carlene Tan, with animation by Aum Animation Studios India alongside Singapore-based Robot Playground Media and Chips and Toon Studios for both the stories and designs.[63][64]
When shown on terrestrial television in the United Kingdom, from April 1967 to February 2001, usually on theBBC,Tom and Jerry cartoons were not edited for violence, and Mammy was retained. As well as having regular slots, mainly after the evening BBC News with around two shorts shown every evening and occasionally shown on children's networkCBBC in the morning,Tom and Jerry served the BBC in another way. When faced with disruption to the schedules, for example when live broadcasts overran, the BBC would invariably turn toTom and Jerry to fill any gaps, confident that it would retain much of an audience that might otherwise channel hop. This proved particularly helpful in 1993, whenNoel's House Party had to be cancelled due to anIRA bomb scare atBBC Television Centre.Tom and Jerry was shown instead, bridging the gap until the next programme.[65] In 2006, a mother complained toOfcom about the smoking shown in the cartoons, since Tom often attempts to impress love interests with the habit, resulting in reports that the smoking scenes inTom and Jerry films may be subject to censorship.[66]
Due to its very limited use of dialogue,Tom and Jerry was easily translated into various foreign languages.Tom and Jerry began broadcast in Japan in 1965. A 2005 nationwide survey taken in Japan byTV Asahi, sampling age groups from teenagers to adults in their sixties, rankedTom and Jerry No. 85 in a list of the top 100 "anime" of all time. Their web poll taken after the airing of the list ranked it at No. 58 – the only non-Japanese animation on the list, and beating anime classics likeTsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle,A Little Princess Sara, and the ultra-classicsMacross andGhost in the Shell. In Japan, the word "anime" refers toall animation regardless of origin, not just Japanese animation.[67]
Tom and Jerry have long since been popular in Germany. The different shorts are usually linked together with key scenes fromJerry's Diary (1949), in which Tom reads about his and Jerry's past adventures. The cartoons are introduced with rhymingGerman language verse, and when necessary, a German voice spoke the translations of English labels on items and similar information.
The show was aired in mainland China byCCTV in the mid-1980s to the early 1990s and was extremely popular at the time. Collections of the show are still a prominent feature in Chinese book stores.
In the Philippines, the series was aired onABS-CBN from 1966 until its closure due to the country's declaration of martial law in 1972, with the later Hanna-Barbera shorts from Barbecue Brawl to Tot Watchers and all of Gene Deitch and Chuck Jones shorts.RPN aired most of Hanna-Barbera shorts from 1977 until 1989. ABS-CBN would later return to the air after therestoration of democracy in 1986 and air the same shorts as in the pre-martial law era. This lasted until the end of 1988.
In Indonesia, the series was aired on TPI (later re-branded asMNCTV) from the mid-1990s to early 2010s andRCTI during 2000s.
Even thoughGene Deitch's shorts were created in Czechoslovakia (1960–1962), the first official TV release ofTom and Jerry were in 1988. It was one of the few cartoons of western origin broadcast in Czechoslovakia (1988) and Romania (until 1989) before the fall of the Soviet Union in 1989.
Tom and Jerry's first feature film appearance was in the 1945 MGM musicalAnchors Aweigh, in which Jerry performs a dance number withGene Kelly. In this scene, Tom made a cameo as a servant. Filmmakers had wantedMickey Mouse for the scene, butWalt Disney had rejected the deal, as theDisney studio was focusing on its own cartoons to help pay off its debts afterWorld War II.[68] William Hanna and Joe Barbera supervised animation for the scene.
In 1953,Tom and Jerry's second feature film appearance was swimming withEsther Williams in a dream sequence in another MGM musical,Dangerous When Wet.
In 2001, Warner Bros., which had, by then, merged with Turner and assumed its properties, released the duo's first direct-to-video film,Tom and Jerry: The Magic Ring, in which Tom covets a ring that grants mystical powers to the wearer, and has become accidentally stuck on Jerry's head. It was the last time Hanna and Barbera co-produced aTom and Jerry cartoon together, as William Hanna died shortly afterThe Magic Ring was released.
Tom and Jerry: The Magic Ring logo
Four years later,Bill Kopp scripted and directed two moreTom and Jerry DTV features for the studio,Tom and Jerry: Blast Off to Mars andTom and Jerry: The Fast and the Furry, the latter one based on a story by Barbera. Both were released on DVD in 2005, marking the celebration ofTom and Jerry's 65th anniversary. In 2006, another direct-to-video film,Tom and Jerry: Shiver Me Whiskers, tells the story about the pair having to work together to find the treasure. Joe came up with the storyline for the next film,Tom and Jerry: A Nutcracker Tale, as well as the initial idea of synchronizing the on-screen actions to music from Tchaikovsky'sNutcracker Suite. This DTV film, directed bySpike Brandt andTony Cervone, was Joe Barbera's lastTom and Jerry project due to his death in December 2006. The holiday-set animated film was released on DVD in late 2007 and dedicated to Barbera.
A new direct-to-video film,Tom and Jerry Meet Sherlock Holmes, was released on August 24, 2010. It is the first made-for-videoTom and Jerry film produced without any of the characters' original creators. The next direct-to-video film,Tom and Jerry and the Wizard of Oz, was released on August 23, 2011, and was the first made-for-videoTom and Jerry film made forBlu-ray. It had a preview showing on Cartoon Network.Robin Hood and His Merry Mouse was released on Blu-ray and DVD on October 2, 2012.[71]
A feature-length computer-animated film titledTom and Jerry: Forbidden Compass (Chinese:猫和老鼠:星盘奇缘), directed by Zhang Gang and co-produced by China and the United States, premiered at the 27thShanghai International Film Festival on June 21, 2025, and is set for general release in China on August 9, 2025.[86][87][88]
Controversies
A frame from the shortThe Truce Hurts. The characters in this shot have turned into black stereotypes after a passing car splashed mud on their faces. Scenes such as this are frequently highly edited or cut from modern broadcasts ofTom and Jerry.
Like many animated cartoons from the 1930s to the 1950s,Tom and Jerry featured racial stereotypes.[14] After explosions, for example, characters with blasted faces would resembleblackface stereotypes, with large lips and bow-tied hair. Perhaps the most controversial element of the show is the character Mammy Two Shoes, a poor black maid who speaks in a stereotypical "black accent". Today, the blackface gags are often censored when these shots are aired.
Following the 1949 re-issue of the 1943Tom and Jerry shortThe Lonesome Mouse, theNAACP, which had begun protesting stereotypical and racist depictions of African-Americans in Hollywood cinema, began a campaign against the use of the maid character in theTom and Jerry shorts.[15] Lillian Randolph left her role as the voice of Mammy Two Shoes in 1952 to instead take a job on television inAmos & Andy, and Hanna and Barbera retired the character at that time.[15]
In the 1960s, shorts featuring Mammy Two Shoes were re-animated in part by Chuck Jones' team at MGM, alongside their work on the newer entries produced by Jones, in order to be shown on television. These versions of the shorts replace the African-American maid with a white woman, voiced byJune Foray with an Irish accent.[89] These versions of theTom and Jerry shorts were broadcast on television until the MGM catalog's acquisition by Turner in 1986. Turner redubbed Mammy Two Shoes' voice in these shorts in the mid-1990s to make the character sound less stereotypical.
Two shorts –His Mouse Friday, which depicts cannibals, andA Mouse in the House, which shows Mammy getting spanked repeatedly by Tom and Butch in the end resulting inracial abuse – have been removed from circulation. Two others in particular –Casanova Cat, which features a scene where Jerry's face is blackened by Tom with cigar smoke and he is forced to perform aminstrel dance, andMouse Cleaning, where Tom is shown with blackface speaking in a stereotypical "Negro dialect" – were omitted from DVD/Blu-ray releases. Notably the other two –Fraidy Cat, showed Tom biting Mammy in the rear near the end, andThe Mouse Comes to Dinner, including Jerry briefly dressing up as a Native American stereotype during the beginning – have Mammy edited in complete absence.
At the start of the 2005Tom and Jerry Spotlight Collection: Vol 2. DVD set, a disclaimer by actress and comedianWhoopi Goldberg warns viewers about the potentially offensive material in the cartoons. Goldberg's disclaimer emphasizes that the racial and ethnic stereotypes present in the shorts were "wrong then and they are wrong today", borrowing a phrase used in disclaimers done for Warner Bros.Looney Tunes Golden Collection DVD sets. This disclaimer is also used in theTom and Jerry Golden Collection: Volume 1 Blu-ray/DVD/digital release as well.
Mammy Two Shoes in a scene from theTom and Jerry shortSaturday Evening Puss, in which her full face was shown for the first time
The cartoons you are about to see are products of their time. They may depict some of the ethnic and racial prejudices that were commonplace in U.S. society. These depictions were wrong then and they are wrong today. While the following does not represent the Warner Bros. view of today's society, these cartoons are being presented as they were originally created, because to do otherwise would be the same as claiming that these prejudices never existed.
Since 2020, all episodes featuring Mammy Two Shoes are no longer seen onCartoon Network andBoomerang and are removed from the Boomerang app. There are other shorts (The Lonesome Mouse,[b]Blue Cat Blues,[c] andThe Mouse from H.U.N.G.E.R.[d]) that are found inappropriate for the intended audiences rather than just having racist contents and are censored from the two channels as well.
In 2006, theBritish version of the Boomerang channel made plans to editTom and Jerry cartoons being aired in the UK where the characters were seen to be smoking. There was a subsequent investigation by UK media watchdog Ofcom.[66] It has also taken the U.S. approach by censoring blackface gags, though this seems to be random as not all scenes of this type are cut. One Gene Deitch-era short,Buddies Thicker Than Water, is shortened as one scene involvesdrunkenness.
In 2013, it was reported thatCartoon Network of Brazil censored 27 shorts on the grounds of being "politically incorrect".[91] In an official release, the channel confirmed that it had censored only two shorts,The Two Mouseketeers[e] andHeavenly Puss[f] "by editorial issues and appropriateness of the content to the target audience—children of 7 to 11 years".[92]
In other media
Comic books
Tom and Jerry by Chhay Hak Books, featuring Tom Cat chasing Jerry Mouse
Tom and Jerry began appearing incomic books in 1942, as one of the features inDell Comics'Our Gang Comics. In 1949, with MGM's live-actionOur Gang shorts having ceased production five years earlier, the series was renamedTom and Jerry Comics. That title ran 212 issues with Dell before being handed off toWestern Publishing, where it ran until issue #344 in 1984.Tom and Jerry continued to appear in various comic books for the rest of the 20th century.[93]Tom and Jerry comics were also extremely popular in Norway, Germany, Sweden, the UK, the Netherlands, Yugoslavia and Australia.[94][95] A licensed European version has been drawn by Spanish artist Oscar Martin since 1986. Another licensed version was published in Yugoslavia, started in 1983 and drawn by a number of artists, including Zoran Kovačević, Bojan Đukić,Zdravko Zupan and Dušan Reljić.[95]
ATom and Jerrycomic strip was syndicated from 1950 to 1952. Although credited to MGM animation studio headFred Quimby, experts believe the strips wereghosted by Gene Hazelton and possibly Ernie Stanzoni and Dan Gormley.[96]Tom and Jerry was revived as a comic strip from 1989 to 1994, syndicated to the South American market byEditors Press Service. The strip was produced by Kelley Jarvis[97] during this era, with the exception of a short period in 1990–1991 when it was done byPaul Kupperberg & Rich Maurizio.[98]
Tom to Jerry: Nanairo (Japanese:とむとじぇりーナナイロ,romanized: Tomu to Jerī Nanairo,lit.'Tom and Jerry: Seven Colors') is a short-lived series of Japanese comics authored by Chara Chara Makiart as a spin-off ofTom and Jerry. It was first featured in the August 2021 issue of theNakayoshi magazine.[99]Nanairo, along with Chara Chara Makiart's other projectHarapeko Penguin Cafe, was cancelled in December 2021 asKodansha (Nakayoshi's publisher) has terminated its contract with the creative unit after one of Makiart members was found guilty for sexually assaulting a minor.[100][101][102]
A musical, ormusic drama (音楽劇,ongaku geki), adaptation of the cartoon series, titledTom and Jerry: Purr-Chance to Dream (トムとジェリー 夢よもう一度,Tomu to Jerī Yume yo Mōichido), debuted in Japan in 2019 in advance of the series' upcoming 80th anniversary.[103][104] The musical was composed byMasataka Matsutoya, staged by Seiji Nozoe, and written by Shigeki Motoiki.[105]
Cultural influences
Jerry Mouse balloon on 4th of July Independence Parade fromMacy's in 2013
Throughout the years, the term and titleTom and Jerry became practically synonymous with never-ending rivalry, as much as the related "cat and mouse fight" metaphor has. Yet inTom and Jerry it was not the more powerful Tom who usually came out on top. In 2005, TV Asahi rankedTom and Jerry as 58th of the Top 100 Animated TV Series in Japan overall, outranking titles likeRurouni Kenshin,Initial D, and evenMacross.[106] In January 2009, IGN namedTom and Jerry as the 66th best in the Top 100 Animated TV Shows.[107]
In an interview found on the DVD releases, severalMad TV cast members stated thatTom and Jerry is one of their biggest influences for slapstick comedy. Also in theCartoon Network showMAD,Tom and Jerry appear in three segments: "Celebrity Birthdays", "Mickey Mouse Exterminator Service", and "Tom and Jury".Johnny Knoxville fromJackass has stated that watchingTom and Jerry inspired many of the stunts in the films.[117]
In 2003, British agencyOgilvy & Mather produced a 40-minuteFord UK commercial promoting their then-recentFord Mondeo, which featuredTom and Jerry. In the commercial, the characters break out of a television, wrecking the living room, and eventually breaking the door and going outside. Jerry then enters the Ford Mondeo via the exhaust pipe, and Tom gets chased away by a bulldog.[118][119][120][121] The commercial was directed by Jeff Stark, written by Dale Winton,[118] drafted by Paul Frost,[122][123] and produced by Kim Parrot and Cathy Green.[124] Animation was done by Jerry Forder at Icepics Animation Studios,[118][125] with backgrounds by Monica Herman[126] and art direction by Hamish Pinnell and John Bramble.[118][122][123] Sound design was done by James Saunders.[124] The music was composed by Goldstein.[127] Post-production was done by Paul Hannaford at Rushes.[118][128]
Thesupreme leader of Iran,Ali Khamenei likened therivalry between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran toTom and Jerry, with the United States in the role of Tom and Iran in the role of Jerry.[129]Time Magazine noted that late Palestinian leaderYasser Arafat admiredTom and Jerry because, in his view, the mouse always outwits the cat—mirroring how Palestinians, seen as the underdog, persist despite adversity.[130][131]
In the pre-video era,Tom and Jerry cartoons were a popular subject for8mm home movies, with the UK-based Walton Films issuing dozens of titles as colour one-reel Super 8 films, in both silent and sound editions. Walton's agreement with MGM obligated them to release the films in slightly edited form, even though the single-reel format would have comfortably accommodated the cartoons' seven to eight minute running time. These releases were discontinued before the dawn of the 1980s.
Tom and Jerry Cartoon Festival marks their video debut.
As early as 1981,MGM/CBS releasedTom and Jerry Cartoon Festival,[134] the very firstTom and Jerry release on numerous home video formats, includingVHS,Betamax,CED Videodisc, andLaserdisc, and mostly consisted the original Hanna-Barbera-era shorts (excluding the CinemaScope cartoons). The VHS and Beta versions released a total of four volumes up through 1984, while releases on the other two formats were discontinued after the second volume due to marketing difficulties of Laserdisc and CED players during that time period.
Between the late 1980s and early 1990s,MGM/UA Home Video released a series ofTom and Jerry VHS tapes under theirCartoon Movie Stars banner. Also in the early 1990s, MGM/UA released a released three volumes ofLaserdisc box sets for collectors, entitledThe Art of Tom & Jerry. Volumes 1 and 2 contain all of the Hanna and Barbera era shorts in chronological order, with the CinemaScope shorts being presented inletterboxed versions. The cartoons were mostly presented uncut with three exceptions:His Mouse Friday, where the cannibal's dialogue had been removed,Saturday Evening Puss, which is the re-drawn version with June Foray's voice added, andThe Framed Cat where Mammy-Two Shoes' dialogue had been redubbed. A third volume toThe Art of Tom & Jerry was released and contains all of the Chuck Jones-eraTom and Jerry shorts; however, it omitted any of the Gene Deitch-era shorts. This was the final home media release ofTom and Jerry release by MGM.
In 1999, three years afterTime Warner's acquisition ofTurner Broadcasting, the rights toTom and Jerry (along with the rest of MGM's Pre-1986 library) moved from MGM toWarner Bros. withWarner Home Video handling all future releases.[135] DVD and Blu-Ray releases ofTom and Jerry have encountered difficulties in terms of restoration, due to most of the originalfilm negatives being destroyed in a vault fire in the 1970s, leaving only inferior duplicate copies.
In April 2004, Warner Home Video releasedTom and Jerry: The Classic Collection inRegions 2 and 4; a six disc double-sided DVD box-set in the United Kingdom, and 12 single-layer individual DVD volumes issued throughout Western Europe and Australia. The set includes almost every singleTom and Jerry cartoon released between 1940 and 1967 in chronological order; with the exceptions ofThe Million Dollar Cat andBusy Buddies, which were not included for unexplained reasons. The cartoons on this set were sourced from unrestored 1980s Turner broadcast prints as seen onTNT andCartoon Network, and therefore many of the shorts were censored: with manyblackface gags being cut (includingHis Mouse Friday being heavily edited) and almost all of Mammy Two Shoes' dialogue being redubbed byThea Vidale.[43] Also the CinemaScope cartoons were presented in 4:3pan and scan, with the exceptions ofThe Egg and Jerry,Tops with Pops andFeedin' the Kiddie which were released in non-anamorphic widescreen as seen onThe Art of Tom and Jerry laserdiscs.The Classic Collection also contained no bonus material. Unlike the U.S. DVDs however,Mouse Cleaning andCasanova Cat were included on these sets and were presented uncut.
There have been severalTom and Jerry DVDs released inRegion 1 (United States and Canada), such as theTom and Jerry's Greatest Chases DVDs. In October 2004, Warner Home Video released the first volume ofTom and Jerry Spotlight Collection; a two-disc set with an assortment ofTom and Jerry cartoons presented in random order. Much like the U.KClassic Collection, most of the cartoons were unrestored and sourced from the '80s Turner prints, however the CinemaScope cartoons were restored in their correct 2.35:1 aspect ratios and released in 16:9 anamorphic widescreen. TheSpotlight Collection also contained numerousspecial features. In October 2005, Volume 2 of theSpotlight Collection was released - which much like the first volume had a random assortment of cartoons, sourced from unrestored Turner Prints (except the CinemaScope cartoons), and contained numerous extras - including an introduction byWhoopi Goldberg about thepolitically incorrect content in some cartoons. Despite this however, some of the cartoons on Volumes 1 & 2 were censored: having cuts and redubbed Mammy Two Shoes dialogue. Warner Home Video eventually offered a disc replacement program offering fixing these errors, and modern pressings of Volumes 1 & 2 present the cartoons uncut. A third and final volume of theSpotlight Collection was released in September 2007 - bringing a total of 112 of the 114 original Hanna and Barbera-eraTom and Jerry shorts having been released. Volume 3 received a negative response from fans due toHis Mouse Friday being edited (with an extreme zoom-in towards the end to avoid showing a pygmy cannibal), the CinemaScope cartoonPup on a Picnic being cropped to 16:9, and the cartoonsMouse Cleaning andCasanova Cat being excluded from these sets due to brief blackface gags.
In October 2011,Warner Home Video released the first volume of theTom and Jerry Golden Collection on DVD and Blu-ray.[137] Unlike theSpotlight Collections, theGolden Collections were aimed at adult collectors. This time the cartoons were presented uncut, in chronological order and restored fromCRI negative elements resulting in a much more pristine image quality. Despite this however, 12 cartoons (Puss n' Toots,The Bowling Alley Cat,Sufferin' Cats!,The Lonesome Mouse,The Zoot Cat,The Million-Dollar Cat,Puttin' on the Dog,Mouse Trouble,Quiet Please!,The Milky Waif,Heavenly Puss andJerry's Diary) were sourced from 1960sMetrocolor prints, resulting in a washed out image, which drew some criticism from fans and collectors.[138][139] A second volume of theGolden Collection series was scheduled to be released in June 2013. However, in February 2013, it was announced byTVShowsOnDVD.com that, much like theSpotlight Collections,Mouse Cleaning andCasanova Cat would not be included. The product received negative reviews on Amazon and various other websites, which eventually led Warner Home Video to cancel Volume 2 and theGolden Collection series.[140] The transfers made for Volume 2 (excludingMouse Cleaning andCasanova Cat) were eventually made available on theITunes Store andYouTube Movies. Prior to 2015, the Gene Deitch-eraTom and Jerry shorts saw limited availability on home media, with the most notable release being on the U.K.Classic Collection box-set.
In February 2025, to coincide withTom and Jerry's 85th Anniversary,Warner Archive Collection releasedTom and Jerry: The Complete CinemaScope Collection, a single disc Blu-Ray set which contained all 23 CinemaScopeTom and Jerry cartoons presented in their correct aspect ratios - includingPup on a Picnic. The set also included three non-Tom and Jerry CinemaScope cartoons by Hanna and Barbera -Good Will to Men (1955),Give and Tyke andScat Cats (both 1957) - which were included as extras. This set received mostly positive feedback from fans and collectors.[141][142]
In September 2025, Warner Archive announcedTom and Jerry: The Golden Era Anthology, a multi-disc Blu Ray set collecting the entirety of the original 114 Hanna-Barbera era shorts - uncut and restored - includingMouse Cleaning andCasanova Cat, as well as an unedited version ofHis Mouse Friday. The set will also feature brand new transfers of 12 cartoons previously sourced from inferior MetroColor prints on the previousGolden Collection Blu-Rays. The set will include over 3 hours of bonus material (including two new featurettes) and a 28-page booklet.Tom and Jerry: The Golden Era Anthology is scheduled for a December 2, 2025 release.[143][144][145]
Tommies andJerries, respective nicknames for generic British and German soldiers during the World Wars.
Notes
^Generally, loanwords and non-Japanese names are transliterated inkatakana, likeトム (Tom) andジェリー (Jerry). However, the series' title useshiragana to spell out the names of Tom (とむ) and Jerry (じぇりー).[58]
^This short, which was released duringWorld War II (1943) contains a reference where Jerry paint marks on a picture of Tom's face likeAdolf Hitler and then spits on it. This scene is cut out of reruns
^The subplot of this short is considered dark since it had references ofalcoholism andsuicide.
^The beginning of this short containsrapid flickering from the projector, which this technique was notorious for inducingepileptic seizures.
^This short has a dark offscreen ending where Tom wasguillotined.
^The subplot of this short is considered dark since it had a reference ofdamnation inHell.
^abcLehman, Christopher P. (2007).The Colored cartoon: Black representation in American animated short films, 1907-1954. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press. pp. 97–99.ISBN978-1-61376-119-9.OCLC794701592.
^Adams, T. R. (1991).Tom and Jerry: fifty years of cat and mouse. London: Pyramid Books.ISBN978-1-85510-086-2.
^abcdP. Lehman, Christopher (2007). "The Cartoons of 1961–1962".American Animated Cartoons of the Vietnam Era: A Study of Social Commentary in Films and Television Programs, 1961–1973.McFarland & Company. pp. 23–24.ISBN978-0-7864-2818-2.
^Erickson, Hal (2005).Television Cartoon Shows: An Illustrated Encyclopedia, 1949 Through 2003 (2nd ed.). McFarland & Co. pp. 858–862.ISBN978-1476665993.
^Bob Thomas.Building a Company: Roy O. Disney and the Creation of an Entertainment Empire. Eventually Disneys lent out their effects wizardJoshua Meador to spruce up MGM's 1956Forbidden Planet.
^Cohen, Karl F. (1997).Forbidden animation: censored cartoons and blacklisted animators in America. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Co. p. 57.ISBN0-7864-0395-0.OCLC37246766.
^音楽劇「トムとジェリー 夢よもう一度」 (August 31, 2019).音楽劇「トムとジェリー 夢よもう一度」9月東京公演／10月大阪公演 [Music Drama "Tom and Jerry: Purr-Chance to Dream" Tokyo Performance in September / Osaka Performance in October] (in Japanese).YouTube. Archived fromthe original on October 28, 2021. RetrievedSeptember 25, 2019.
^"Pac Man: 40 years later, creator Toru Iwatani speaks".The Washington Post.Iwatani says the ghosts were inspired by manga artists and Casper the Friendly Ghost, while their back-and-forth hostility with Pac-Man was inspired by Tom and Jerry episodes. "I designed Pac-Man to be simple to the point that he doesn't have eyes or any other adornments," Iwatani said.
^Vallance, Tom (December 20, 2006). "Joseph Barbera: Animation pioneer whose creations with William Hanna included the Flintstones and Tom and Jerry".The Independent (London).
Beck, Jerry; Maltin, Leonard (1987).Of Mice and Magic: A History of American Animated Cartoons, Revised and Updated Edition. Plume.ISBN978-0-452-25993-5.
Further reading
Adams, T.R. (1991).Tom and Jerry: Fifty Years of Cat and Mouse. Crescent Books.ISBN0-517-05688-7.
Aravind, Aju.Mammy Two Shoes: Subversion and Reaffirmation of Racial Stereotypes in Tom and Jerry. The IUP Journal of History and Culture, Vol. V, No. 3, July 2011. Pp. 76–83.ISSN0973-8517.
Barrier, Michael (1999).Hollywood Cartoons: American Animation in Its Golden Age. Oxford: Oxford University Press.ISBN0-19-503759-6.
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