Mouse into Space is an animated Tom and Jerry short released on April 13th, 1962 by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was directed by Gene Deitch, and produced by Willian L. Snyder.
Tired of Tom repeatedly giving him hell, Jerry decides to leave the house and embark on a space program he reads about in a newspaper. Tom, realizing that he just lost his favorite enemy, falls into depression and walks around a field until he enters a suspiciously open fuel pipe... not realizing that he's about to inadvertently reunite with the mouse in the most unexpected way possible.
This animated feature provides examples of:
- Artistic License – Chemistry: In Real Life, a single spark of fire would be more than enough to ignite an entire body of fuel (including rocket fuel) in mere miliseconds. Yet, in this episode, the chain reaction that begins when the space rocket is starting to lift off is slow enough for Tom (who's inside the rocket's fuel tank) to miraculously yet unrealistically escape it.
- Batman Can Breathe in Space: Tom is more than capable of not only surviving the rocket fuel's ignition after the liftoff, but also running upward through the rocket's outer side when it's already beyond Earth's atmosphere.
- Cartoon Bomb: One of the things Tom tries to defeat Jerry with at the start is a round, dark gray bomb put inside the Mouse Hole. An unfazed Jerry who's reading the newspaper simply pushes the bomb away with his right hand to make it explode near Tom instead.
- Inflating Body Gag: Jerry's body inflates comically when he gets his blood pressure taken during his physical training for the space program.
- Offended by an Enemy's Indifference: Tom, upon seeing Jerry leave the house to enroll into a space program and thus stay away from him after all the mistreatment and harassments received, starts asking him to change his mind by inviting him to take a free payback in various ways: Tom aims a gun at himself (so Jerry can pull the trigger), offers him a hammer aiming at his head (so Jerry can proceed to hit him), and finally puts a Cartoon Bomb on his mouth and gets a match lit (so Jerry can ignite the bomb). But in all cases, Jerry simply ignores Tom and keeps moving on to his destination, which breaks Tom's heart.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: After Jerry's badge turns into a rocket, Tom packs his things and leaves the house.
- Ungrateful Bastard: After Jerry leaves to become an astro-mouse, leaving Tom a drunken wreck, when Tom ends up on Jerry's rocket later after it launches and finds him in the capsule, rather than be happy and apologize for tormenting him, Tom gets into the capsule and decides to continue to torment Jerry while they are in space together.