They occasionally end up being friends, although within this set of stories, the truce is often ruined by some last minute event. Occasionally and ironically, sometimes they both lose, like when Jerry's final trap or attack on Tom backfires or he overlooks something, like in Filet Meow, Jerry orders a shark from the pet store to scare Tom away from eating a goldfish, but finds himself entirely intimidated as well. In Timid Tabby, Tom's look-alike cousin pushes Jerry over the edge.
However, there are rare occasions where Tom triumphs over Jerry, mostly when the latter pushes Tom a little too far, such as in The Million Dollar Cat, where Jerry learns that Tom will lose his newly acquired wealth if he harms any animal, "including mice", he then torments Tom a little too much until he retaliates.
By the final "fade-out" of each cartoon, Jerry usually gets the best of Tom. Although cats usually chase mice to eat them, it is quite rare for Tom to actually try to eat Jerry, but to either compete with Jerry as usual to taunt him (even as revenge), to obtain a reward from a human (including his owner(s) or master(s)) for catching him, or for generally doing his job as a house cat well. Jerry also possesses surprising strength for his size, sometimes even stronger than Tom's, being able to lift items such as anvils with relative ease, able to withstand big impacts. Despite being very energetic, determined, and much larger, Tom is no match for Jerry's wits. He is usually, but not always, portrayed as living a comfortable and pampered life, while Jerry (originally called "Jinx"), a young brown house mouse, always living in close proximity to Tom. Tom (originally called "Jasper") is an adult blue/grey who is often believed to be either a Russian Blue or a domestic shorthair cat.