Jerry's mouse hole connects two homes, with Tom living in one residence, a neighboring cat in the other. Jerry decides the best survival plan is pitting the cats against each other, without their knowledge.
Jerry's a wharf mouse; he sees a load of cheese being loaded onto a cargo ship and tries a variety of tricks to board, but Tom is on guard.
Tom is wooing Toots; he presents her with a present - Jerry. But Toots would rather play mother to Jerry than eat him, much to Tom's annoyance.
Tom and Jerry are on a building construction site. Things explode, Tom loses his fur for a while, Jerry hides in a glove, Tom falls from a great height, and Tom has great trouble with a rock-and-girder see-saw.
Tom chases Jerry around a pool hall. Jerry's fairy godmouse arrives, and Jerry tells the story; she gives him an invisibility potion. Jerry uses this to do some creative barbering on Tom, but when the potion wears off, Tom gets his revenge, and they both have a good laugh.
Jerry is paid a visit by a look-alike magician.
Jerry is chased into a circus, where he removes a tack from the foot of an elephant. This gets him a friend for life, and a powerful ally in the continuing battles with Tom, not that it stops Tom from trying, even when Jerry becomes part of the act.
Tom chases Jerry around a high-rise apartment, and then around the ledge surrounding the building. They torment each other with a compressed air horn. Jerry goes down a drainpipe and Tom follows, stretching himself the length of the pipe (and getting unstuck with help from the air horn).
Tom chases Jerry through city streets, gets run over by a streetcar (twice), and follows Jerry into a department store. In the toy department, they have some fun with radio-controlled cars and a collection of mouse dolls. They move on to sporting goods, where Jerry manages to combine table tennis with croquet.
Perhaps because he's grown weary of chasing Jerry, Tom sets his sights on the house's goldfish. But the female goldfish is a friend of Jerry's, and the little mouse has a crush on her. When Jerry gets involved to rescue his friend, the usual confrontations with Tom begin.
Tom is chasing Jerry through the back yard. Jerry escapes to a bird house. A bit more chasing. Jerry crashes into the wall. Both decide they've had enough, and wave the truce flag; they go to the movies of themselves, which is an excuse for another bargain clip show. The truce doesn't hold, and eventually the characters on screen stop and take notice.
Jerry keeps sleepwalking and doing things unknowingly to Tom. He becomes aware of this and tries to stay awake.
Tom becomes fearless when he feels like going into the eerie castle.
Mammy Two-Shoes threatens to throw Tom out of the house if he makes a mess. Jerry sees an opportunity to rid himself of his feline nemesis.
Tom's day at the beach doesn't start out well. First he gets his swimsuit caught in the door of the beach house, and doesn't realize it until his intended dive in the ocean sends him snapping back and crashing through the door. He runs out and tries again. This time he is so determined to jump in the water that when he does so, he doesn't notice the tide is out and that he is swimming in the sand, which is filled with broken bottles, tin cans and other debris. Later, he tries to win over a beautiful girl on the beach, but, being the boor he is, he annoys her by drinking her soda pop, eating her hot dog and munching loudly as he lays his head in her lap. Suddenly, a tomato flies through the air and lands on his head. So does a banana peel. Tom looks for the culprit and finds him in the girl's picnic basket. Jerry is inside, eating what he wants and tossing out the rest...
Tom and Jerry are in a bowling alley. Both spend a lot of time sliding on the well-polished lanes. Eventually, Jerry takes up residence among the pins and Tom tries to bowl him down.
Mammy Two-Shoes tells Tom and Butch that the cat who gets rid of the icebox-raiding, breadbox-invading mouse (Jerry) is the one who can stay.
Tom's chasing Jerry when he runs right into a sleeping dog and the two of them must work together to fend him off.
Tom, sick of Jerry stealing the milk out of his bowl, poisons it. Instead of killing the mouse, the potion transforms him into a muscular beast.
Jerry runs into a dog pound (and right on top of a napping Spike) to escape a rather mangy-looking Tom. To avoid being ripped to shreds, Tom borrows the head of a nearby dog statue. This easily fools the dogs, but not Jerry, and Tom keeps losing his newfound head...