The Tom & Jerry series of cartoon shorts is arguably one of the finest series of cartoons ever created. They were unspeakably violent and often hilarious, and were around in an age where cartoons had to be incredible to get shown due to the stunning quality of cartoons being produced by most companies involved, such as Warner Brothers, Disney, and, of course, the Hanna-Barbara line which spawned Tom & Jerry. But something often sticks in my mind when I watch these cartoons… the supposed "protagonist", Jerry Mouse, was a complete jerk.

Take, for example, 1947′s The Cat Concerto, where Tom is performing at a massive sold out concert, with thousands there to see him play the piano. But Jerry, long-known for his general vagrancy, is asleep in Tom’s piano, and Tom’s performance disturbs him, which sends him on a rampage and ruins the concert. Now, this begs the question… why exactly was Jerry sleeping in the piano to start with? Furthermore, thousands of people filed in to see a cat playing piano, but that doesn’t matter to Jerry. His sleep has been disturbed, and he wants REVENGE. What an asshole.

How about 1944′s The Million Dollar Cat, where Tom inherits a million dollars on the condition that he doesn’t harm anyone? Sure, at the beginning of the film, Tom is throwing darts at Jerry, but there had been thirteen cartoons before that establishing Jerry as being a complete douchebag, so it’s forgivable that Tom wants revenge. So Tom decides he’s going to move to a penthouse but Jerry’s not satisfied with that, oh no. He follows Tom and destroys his life (instead of just making Tom live up to the stipulation of the inheritance and simply forcing Tom to treat him nicely, thus resulting in both benefiting from the inheritance, so it shows Jerry is really stupid, too)! When Tom finally can’t take any more of Jerry’s abuse, he snaps and throws away the money to beat the shit out of Jerry. This is notable because Tom finally wins in the end, but even when he wins, he loses.

Let’s also not forget that Jerry is a complete coward, as evidenced by 1945′s Quiet Please!, in which Spike threatens Tom with a huge amount of punishment if there is any noise that disturbs his sleep. Jerry, unable to defeat Tom himself, then focuses on trying to get Spike woken up so Spike will maim Tom, even enticing Tom to chase him just so Jerry will make noise. Are there any depths this mouse won’t stoop to in order to torment this poor cat?

Even worse was when Jerry received further assistance from his extremely annoying nephew, Nibbles. The most horrendous occurrence was in 1952′s The Two Mouseketeers, where Tom is ordered to protected a banquet by a king. Jerry and Nibbles could have gotten food anywhere they would have liked, but nooooo, they chose to ruin a banquet and abused Tom in the process. What’s worse is that Tom didn’t just get abused by the mice… he was actually sent to the guillotine and executed (albeit off-screen)! Obviously the depths Jerry will go to includes murder.

Simply put, Jerry was a menace to cartoondom and any short which features him losing in the end should be celebrates as a gift from the cartoon gods. It is stunning that so many people see Jerry as nothing more than a cute little mouse, when he is a sadistic and horrible creature who thrives on abusing Tom, but somehow Tom is painted as the antagonist of the series. For shame.

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