1960s

The 1960s were the second decade since William Hanna and Joseph Barbera founded Hanna-Barbera.

Their company was starting to expand in popularity, breaking new ground and becoming a household name with The Flintstones, television's first animated primetime sitcom in 1960, and redefining Saturday morning television with Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! in 1969. The success of The Flintstones led to other primetime series such as Top Cat (1961), The Jetsons (1962), and Jonny Quest (1965). The company also dabbled in new genres such as superheroes, government spies, crime investigations, and the supernatural within these shows. H-B expanded to live-action production in 1968, with the slapstick-musical variety series The Banana Splits Adventure Hour. They also transitioned into full-length feature films with Hey There, It's Yogi Bear and The Man Called Flintstone.

Hanna-Barbera ended its partnership with Screen Gems in 1965, when the former announced their sale to Taft Broadcasting. Taft acquired Hanna-Barbera the following year in 1966, and became their distributor when Taft folded it to their corporate structure in 1967 and 1968. Screen Gems kept the licensing and distribution rights of their previously produced cartoons and trademarks of its characters well into the 1970s and 1980s.

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer also released more Tom and Jerry theatrical shorts, but without the participation of Hanna and Barbera. MGM had two eras of different directors, which included Gene Deitch (under Rembrandt Films in Czechoslovakia) and Chuck Jones (under MGM Animation/Visual Arts), the latter of whom took the series through the majority of the decade, beginning in 1963 and ending in 1967. MGM no longer released new Tom and Jerry theatrical shorts after this.