Tom And Jerry are one of the world's best known double acts there cartoons have entertained millions of people across several decades and they are still going strong so it only makes sense that for this Cartoon History we take a look at the worlds best known cat and mouse.
Now we all know that the creators of The Flintstones also created Tom And Jerry but what you might not know is the duo were actually forced to work together since the company that owned the duo MGM had a failing animation division since alot of there cartoons were failing at the box office so for their first cartoon they chose a cat and mouse because as Barbera once said in an interview "We knew we needed two characters. We thought we needed conflict, and chase and action. And a cat after a mouse seemed like a good, basic thought," and in 1940 the duo premiered the first ever Tom And Jerry cartoon called "Puss Gets The Boot".
The look of the characters is very well known but what isn't that well known is that for the first batch of cartoons the duo actually looked more like a cat and mouse i don't know why they chose to redesign the characters but i am glad that they did it since only someone who loves to hurt animals would find it funny that a cat is being abused.
Puss Gets The Boot was such a success that Fred Quimby who ran the animation division pulled the two from other stand alone cartoons to get them to work on more Tom And Jerry cartoons. Now since Tom was originally called Jasper in the debut cartoon Hanna and Barbera held a contest within the studio to name the pair with the prize being $50 and the winner was animator John Carr with the next Tom And Jerry cartoon coming out in 1941 being called "The Midnight Snack" but it still featured the more animal based designs for the characters.
The duo would continue working on until the studio closed down there animation division in 1957 which was a shame because not only was Tom And Jerry a popular series for the studio but they also won alot of awards with seven of their cartoons winning in the short subject category at the Academy Awards.
All was not lost tho as in 1961 MGM brought the characters back this time being animated by a European company called Rembrandt Films and all thirteen of these new shorts were directed by Gene Deitch who also wrote a lot of the shorts as well. These new shorts didn't have a big budget the studio only had $10,000 which meant a lot of the cartoon became more surreal and there was also a downgrade in the quality of animation. Despite all of these setbacks the shorts were from a financial stand point successful but over time they have come to be known as the worst Tom And Jerry cartoons ever made but they do still have there fans Gene and his team only lasted one year with the characters but next in line was some one more Looney.
Chuck Jones had just been fired from his thirty year post at Warner Bros.s when he and partner Les Goldman formed there own studio called Sib Tower 12 Productions which was later renamed MGM Animation/Visual Arts. Starting and in 1963 Jones and crew would go on to produce over thirty more cartoons featuring the duo but tho the duo would go through another change this time looking more in line with Jones's work on the Looney Tunes and more in keeping with his own style of animation Chuck would go on to produce the new cartoons until 1967 but it wouldn't be long before Tom And Jerry made a comeback.
Now here things get a interesting and it's all because of the character Mammy Two Shoes becaise in 1965 the cartoons started airing on CBS but they were heavily edited and because Chuck was required to featuring the character and replace her completely some times she was an overweight white Irish woman and other times she was a skinny white teenager but either way she was voiced by the late June Foray the series lasted until 1972 when Tom And Jerry would return home.
In 1975 Hanna-Barbera would produce a new Tom And Jerry series called The Tom & Jerry Show the half hour series was set years after the shorts and mainly featured the duo as friends you only have to see a certain movie featuring the pair to know why that doesn't work but this series didn't last long tho and the duo soon found a new home and a new series.
The Tom and Jerry Comedy Show debuted in 1980 and was animated Filmation and from what information i can gather the show was more of a verity show and it was the first time that the characters were paired with Droopy and for about ten years this would be the last new Tom And Jerry product.
For there third run with the characters Hanna-Barbera made Tom & Jerry Kids which as the title would suggest featured younger versions of the characters and like the previous series it would also feature the character of Droopy and it ran for seasons but during it's run something terrible happend.
In 1992 Film Roman made Tom and Jerry: The Movie i couldn't find anything about the making of this film but i have a feeling that the makers of the film didn't understand the fact the characters don't talk and they don't become friends it's a simple thing and this movie didn't do it thank god they only made one of these.
As of 2006's Tom and Jerry Tales the duo have been with Warner Bros Animation that series only lasted until 2008 before the Kids WB block was shut down but once again the duo would return with there current series The Tom and Jerry Show which as of this writing is still on the air.
Since 2002 there has been a steady stream of Direct To DVD Movies featuring the duo with the latest one being Tom and Jerry: Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory there's a new film out almost every year but sometimes there's a three year gap between the films but at least there's still new Tom and Jerry content.
Tom And Jerry are legends in the cartoon world and with all this new content there legend will live on forever more.