It probably left them in quite the pickle.

That explains a lot! I was a HUGE fan of Tom and Jerry growing up and I absolutely hated the Gene Deitch episodes. I knew all of the directors and writers by the quality of the cartoons, and I just couldn't understand how Gene could make such miserable cartoons. Having animators who didn't know the characters…

Ahh-iggit. Blah.

I was a fan of his early work, but then he seemed to get stuck in a rut and kind of rusty.

Apple product placement. In everything. No matter how small of the PC market they owned over the years almost EVERY show with a computer showed that damned logo prominently. I swear they just bankrolled whole series and movies. And it worked. I so hate humanity because of that.