Here are a few of the highlights:
"Is There A Doctor In The Mouse" - This familiar retelling of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde that quickly devolves into a Road Runner and Coyote type of episode. This theme is very common for the first few shorts. Tom is usually trying to set a trap for Jerry that ends up backfiring on him. This short is remarkable in that you start to see facial expression on Tom that will make him look more and more like The Grinch as the series progresses. I love the clever use of sizes here. The Jekyll and Hyde bit lets Jones use all the different combinations of big/small cats and big/small mice.
Some of these shorts will feel repetitive. Both "Pent House Mouse" and "Bad Day at Cat Rock" take place on a construction site. "Ah Sweet Mouse - Story Of Life" and "Tom-ic Energy" both are set in a high rise building. Remember, these were theatrical shorts, so they were not being viewed like we are seeing them today. The moviegoer may not see every MGM film release and would miss some of these or see them over the span of months.
"Snowbody Loves Me" - This is the first short where I realized the quality of the music in these shorts. Being made for the theaters, the music is worthy of both the swinging time of the mid-'60s and of the MGM films that it would be playing in front of. This short is set in the snow with a frozen Jerry wanting cheese inside the warm house. And the reversal with Tom. When we see Tom going down the chimney, it is a direct antecedent of what will be The Grinch's trip down a chimney a few years later.
"The Brothers Carry-Mouse Off" - About a third of the way through the shorts and Jerry starts to get a little more malicious in these episodes. This has the feel of the later Speedy Gonzales and Daffy Duck shorts at Warners. But what really comes to mind are the "Itchy and Scratchy" shorts from "The Simpsons". Here, Tom gets deformed, flattened, and elongated throughout. That's almost a trademark of these Tom and Jerry cartoons from Chuck Jones, the characters are almost always getting deformed by explosions or heavy things falling on them.
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