The Two Mouseketeers Tom and Jerry series
Directed by	William Hanna Joseph Barbera
Produced by	Fred Quimby
Story by	William Hanna Joseph Barbera
Voices by	Francoise Brun-Cottan
Music by	Scott Bradley
Animation by	Ed Barge Kenneth Muse Irven Spence
Distributed by	Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Release date(s)	March 15, 1952
Color process	Technicolor
Running time	7' 21"
Language	English
Preceded by	The Duck Doctor
Followed by	Smitten Kitten

The Two Mouseketeers is a 1952 one-reel animated cartoon and is the 65th Tom and Jerry short, produced in Technicolor and released to theatres on March 15, 1952 by Metro-Goldwyn Mayer. It was produced by Fred Quimby and directed by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, with musical supervision by Scott Bradley. The cartoon was animated by Ed Barge, Kenneth Muse and Irven Spence. The character of Nibbles was voiced by Francoise Brun-Cottan, then six years old. The Two Mouseketeers won the 1951 Academy Award for Best Short Subject: Cartoons. Such was the cartoon's success, that Hanna and Barbera created a total of four adventures in the Mouseketeers series, the second of the tetralogy, 1954's Touché, Pussy Cat! also getting an Oscar nomination (though unlike The Two Mouseketeers, it did not win the award).

[edit] Plot

Tom looks around for Jerry and Nibbles.

In the cartoon, Jerry and Nibbles are two mouseketeers who decide to help themselves to a lavish banquet, which Tom has been ordered to guard from the King's Mouseketeers with his very life; failure to do so, and "off comes ze head." Jerry and Nibbles enter the castle hall through a stained glass window and a suit of armor and parachute down to the table. They unsuspectingly catch Tom's attention by hitting the cat in the face with a champagne cork.

Later, Nibbles is helping himself to some of the food while singing Alouette to himself, when Tom emerges behind him and pokes him with his sword. The little mouse yells angrily "Hey, attention-la! Vous pourriez faire mal a quelqu'un, Monsieur pussycat! ... Pussycat?! Au secours! Au secours! Le pussycat! Le pussycat!" (Hey! Watch it! You could hurt someone with that, Mister Pussycat. Pussycat!? Help! Help! The pussycat! The pussycat!)

Tom impales Nibbles' cape on his sword.

Before Nibbles can get away, Tom impales the little mouse's cape with his rapier. Jerry manages to stab Tom in the rear-end and rescue Nibbles. Then Jerry puts custard in Tom's face launching a swashbuckling fencing display against Tom. Then Tom catches Jerry. Then Nibbles launches an axe toward Tom and it slices off half of Tom's back. Then Nibbles hides in some fruit and runs away and falls into a drink. Jerry saves him by hurling a tomato at Tom. Then he hurls lots of food at him and Tom impales all of them with his rapier, heats them up and eats them like a barbecued shishkebab. Nibbles comes out of the drink, drunk and pokes Tom in the bottom. Tom screams in pain and jumps up. Nibbles waves his sword while saying, "Touche, pussy cat!" Then he runs away and Tom catches him. Then Jerry makes the save by hitting Tom on the head so much that Tom falls through the table. Then Jerry has a sword fight with Tom. While this goes on, Nibbles brings along a cannon and stuffs it completely full with food, in fact, everything that is on the banquet table. He lights the cannon and it explodes.

As the smoke disappears, we see Jerry and Nibbles walking triumphantly down the street with stolen banquet food. Suddenly, in an unusually morbid ending, they see a guillotine blade coming down, strongly suggesting that Tom was actually executed (cuts Tom's head off), though off-screen in compliance with the Production Code. Both mice gulp, and then Nibbles sighs, "Pauvre, pauvre, pussycat", (Poor, poor pussycat) and shrugs: "C'est la guerre." (That's war.) Then the two Mouseketeers resume their victorious march off into the distance.

[edit] Goofs

• On the Latin American dubbing of this cartoon, after Tom's presumed execution, Nibbles says Buenos dias señor gatito ( "Good Morning, pussycat" in English) rather than "pauvre, pauvre pussycat"

[edit] Trivia

• This is one of five cartoons (the others being The Yankee Doodle Mouse, Heavenly Puss, Mouse Trouble, Safety Second, The Duck Doctor, and Blue Cat Blues) in which Tom actually dies (apparently) on-screen.

[edit] Censorship

• Syndicated TV prints of this cartoon edit out the shot of the guillotine rising and falling, which implied that Tom had been beheaded.

[edit] Cultural influence

• In The Simpsons episode Bart Gets an F Bart and Lisa are watching an Itchy & Scratchy cartoon where the characters are fighting each other in musketeer outfits, in a parody of Tom & Jerry's musketeer cartoon shorts. Itchy & Scratchy themselves are a violent parody of Tom & Jerry.

[edit] Sequels

• There are three follow-ups that was released. The prequelled shorts are Touché, Pussy Cat!, Tom and Chérie, and Royal Cat Nap.