More than 30 years have passed since Tom and Jerry last battled for supremacy, but a new cartoon will show that nothing has changed.
The first cartoon since 1967 featuring the warring cat and mouse will be shown on television on New Year’s Day when one of the greatest double acts of all time will wreak their usual havoc in classic style. The pair star in a seven-minute special, Mansion Cat, featuring an animated Joe Barbera, who created the cartoon with Bill Hanna.The routine is much the same – mouse annoys cat, cat chases mouse, cat gets hurt Badly. But instead of the traditional weapons of falling anvils, mousetraps and buckets of water, Jerry has a sophisticated armoury of modern gadgets such as a video recorder, microwave, coffee machine and dishwasher. The wily mouse even turns Tom into a video cassette using the TV remote.The battle lines are drawn when Barbera leaves Tom in charge of his house, telling him: “The house is spick and span and I want it that way when we get back. And don’t try and blame the mouse like you did last time.” Of course the place is soon in ruins as theyburst a waterbed, destroy the vacuum cleaner and break several antiques.Few characters from the golden age of cartoons have proved as enduring as Tom and Jerry, who won seven Oscars. The pair began in aone-shot MGM short called Puss Gets The Boot, released to cinemas in February 1940 and featuring a cat called Jasper.

By 1967 there were 161 adventures, each lasting seven minutes or so.A spokeswoman for The Cartoon Network, which will air the new cartoon four times on 1 January, said it was a one-off. “Joe Barbera is 89 and Bill Hanna is in his 90s, so we don’t know if they will make another film,” she said. “Tom and Jerry remains one of the most popular cartoons they made, along with The Flintstones and Scooby Doo.”She said there were no plans at the moment to show the cartoon on terrestrial television.. Broadcasters rejected claims by the Channel 4 News presenter Jon Snow that senior TV executives were “relatively socially dysfunctional” – despite strong backing from viewers’ and children’s groups over his belief that too little attention is paid to the effects of programming on children. Broadcasters rejected claims by the Channel 4 News presenter Jon Snow that senior TV executives were “relatively socially dysfunctional” – despite strong backing from viewers’ and children’s groups over his belief that too little attention is paid to the effects of programming on children.
Mr Snow criticised TV chiefs during a lecture on Thursday by alleging that they see the 9pm watershed for child-friendly broadcasting as a defunct constraint to be surmounted.

He accused them of “never thinking about children”.The BBC said it made complying with the watershed – the convention designed to stop sex, violence or bad language appearing during the early evening – a priority. But itstressed that it was parents’ responsibility to monitor what their children saw after 9pm.A spokesman said: “The watershed is a contract between broadcasters and parents. The BBC is very careful to ensure that programmes before 9pm are suitable for children. The watershed is also not a ‘waterfall’ – unsuitable material is not broadcast the minute 9pm passes. There is a gradual approach but what children watch after the watershed is the responsibility of parents.”Mr Snow, delivering the Young Minds annual lecture at the Institute of Child Health, had said that the labour-intensive lifestyle of senior broadcasters made them unsuitable to judge what constituted acceptable mainstream television.He said: “Because their hours are so anti-social, very few people are connected to the community They are relatively socially dysfunctional. Most live a singular life or a partnered one that has no contact with children and that makes for very little sympathy with how the product may affect the child.”Channel 4, and the two main ITV firms, Carlton and Granada, would not comment on the allegations but senior sources at the ITV network said the claims bore little relation to reality.

One executive said: “The job of a programme commissioner or network controller is to make sure that what is broadcast entertains and informs without breaking the rules. The idea that we all work 20-hour days and then sit in Soho bars is rubbish. Television would not work if that was the case.”Lorraine Heggessey, the controller of BBC1, admitted the type of executive referred to by Mr Snow did existbut saidthe industry was changing.The recently appointed channel chief, who has two children aged seven and 11, said: “I do recognise the people Jon Snow is talking about. You do make better judgements if you lead the same sort of life as the viewers.”A coalition of television viewers’ groups and welfare workers backed Mr Snow’s criticism that the industry paid too little attention to the impact of programming on youngsters.Voice of the Listener and Viewer, a licence-payers’ watchdog, said Britain’s workaholic culture was divorcing those at the top of national institutions, including broadcasting, from the rest of society.Jocelyn Hay, chairwoman of the group, described senior executives as “very hard-working, fast-moving .. driven by competition. What they need to do is force themselves into the shoes of ordinary people a little more,” she said.The group said the newscaster’s concerns reflected their own belief that broadcasters were ignoring the interests of younger viewers in the search for higher ratings.It has written to Chris Smith, the Culture Secretary, calling for a national taskforce to look into the effects on youngsters of the mass media culture from television to the internet.Ms Hay said: “We have a situation at present where the most watched programme by children is the National Lottery draw. There is not enough material broadcast to broaden the outlook of youngsters.”The National Viewers’ and Listeners’ Association denied that the working lives of TV executives made them “dysfunctional” but said the watershed looked increasingly forgotten.John Milton-Whatmore, the chairman and a former producer and director for Central TV, said: “The idea of the watershed is .. becoming more and more marginalised.

There is no point in having such a concept if it is not observed.”. The television programme Crossroads will return without many of its defining features – from the woolly-hatted character Benny to the credits rolling diagonally across the screen – but events this week suggest hitches during filming are not all in the past. The television programme Crossroads will return without many of its defining features – from the woolly-hatted character Benny to the credits rolling diagonally across the screen – but events this week suggest hitches during filming are not all in the past.
Despite having ploughed millions into a custom-built set in Nottingham, Carlton TV will also be filming from Wednesday in the idyllic Leicestershire village of Redmile, where it will run into a campaign of fierce resistance. Redmile is the new setting for the soap’s fictional Kings Oak village.Such is the zest for a remake of the old ATV soap that 240 episodes have been commissioned. That will probably bring Carlton TV to the village every week for a year.But the people who live there are not pleased with the razzmatazz.