Butch (animated character)
Butch is an animated cartoon character created by American animator Tex Avery for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Portrayed as an anthropomorphic Irish bulldog, the character was a recurring antagonist in the Droopy shorts, and appeared in his own series of solo shorts as well.
History
A prototype of Butch first appeared in the 1949 short Bad Luck Blackie directed by Tex Avery where he antagonises a small kitten. In this short, he was designed as a large grey bulldog with a spiky collar and a hench build similar to that of Spike from the Tom and Jerry [Tom and Jerry Mouse|Jerry filmography|shorts]. He would officially debut in the same year in the short Wags to Riches in his finalised design, being tan colored and slightly more anthropomorphised, where he would take on the role as Droopy's rival. From there on, Avery would continue regularly pitting the character against Droopy as well as featuring him in his own shorts such as being pitted against Blackie Cat, a gopher and keeping watch of a sleeping bear. His name was officially changed to Butch in 1955's Deputy Droopy as he was occasionally referred to as Spike. This change was made to avoid confusion with Spike from the Tom and Jerry cartoons. All of the original 1940s and 1950s shorts were directed by Avery and Michael Lah at the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer cartoon studio. Butch would not appear in new material again until Tom and Jerry: The Magic Ring in 2002.Later appearances
Butch would re-appear in the Tom and Jerry direct-to-DVD films throughout the 2000s such as Tom and Jerry: The Magic Ring as an antagonist and ''Tom and Jerry Meet Sherlock Holmes, alongside Droopy.His latest appearance was in 2014's [The Tom Cat|Tom and Jerry Show (2014 TV series)|The Tom and Jerry Show]''. He appeared in the episode "Double Dog Trouble", where Spike and Butch are two separate characters who are twins, in order to poke at the character's retitling, while detectives Tom and Jerry mistake each one for the other after Spike buys a room at the town's motel.