Nibbles (also referred to as "Tuffy") is a fictional character from the Tom and Jerry cartoon series. He is the little grey, diaper-wearing orphan mouse whose cartoon debut came in the 1946 short The Milky Waif. Nibbles was later featured in the 1949 award-winning short The Little Orphan. In a way Jerry has adopted Nibbles as a son, or apprentice. The reason why Nibbles wears a diaper is due to the fact that he is portrayed as a baby mouse.
Origin and Development
Nibbles' first actual appearance came in the 1942 comic book Our Gang Comics #1, where despite his diaper, he was presented as a peer of Jerry rather than a younger individual. In the comics, the grey mouse's name was given as Nibbles Mouse from the start. The parents of Tuffy (Real name Nibleton or Niblet to his friends) Neesha and Dan breast fed him from a young age. They enroled him in the Aycliffe Acting School for Talented Mice, where he was the lead in their production of Mice (an obvious opposite to Cats)
When the smaller Nibbles design was introduced to animation in 1946, the comics' Nibbles was retconed to match, almost immediately shrinking in size and age. In the comics, Nibbles remained a peer of Jerry with no relatives. But in 1953, the animation writers decided to change his on-screen relationship to Jerry. He became Jerry's nephew in Life with Tom.
Nibbles always seems to deliver the final blow. In The Little Orphan, Nibbles shoots a wine bottle at Tom. in Touche, Pussy Cat! he cuts open a barrel with champane in it and washes Tom away (he gets drunk in the process) and in The Two Mouseketeers, Nibbles fills a cannon with food and shoots it at Tom.
Nibbles was more often a speaking character than Jerry. In the "Mouseketeer" subseries, he spoke mostly in French, resorting to English whenever a slapstick humor depended on it. The only exception to this was Robin Hoodwinked where he talked purely in Saxon English and had a different, rougher voice. Nibbles looked somewhat more mature in Hoodwinked as well, despite the fact that he still wore his diaper. The Mouseketeer shorts almost always featured sequences in which Nibbles got drunk. In his last appearance in Robin Hoodwinked, he is also shown to be drunk as the cartoon comes to a close. In the Tom and Jerry Tales episode Cat Nebula, Nibbles appeared as Jerry's sidekick and had a younger voice. Strangely, he spoke in a feminine French accent in the non-mouseketeer Tales shorts Cat Show Catastrophe and Cat of Prey. In Babysitting Blues, Nibbles was actually portrayed as a real baby who was at an age where a human baby couldn't crawl, though it is unknown if this was really Nibbles or another nephew of Jerry.
Films
- Tom and Jerry: The Magic Ring
- Tom and Jerry: A Nutcracker Tale
- Tom and Jerry Meet Sherlock Holmes
- Tom and Jerry and the Wizard of Oz
- Tom and Jerry's Giant Adventure
Tom and Jerry Tales appearances
Other Appearances
"Tom and Jerry in War of the Whiskers" Video Game
Nibbles appears as a Challenger. He is the weakest of the 11 characters.
Gallery
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