Pink Panther is a fictional animated character who appeared in the opening and closing credit sequences of every film in The Pink Panther series except for A Shot in the Dark and Inspector Clouseau. The cartoon character's popularity spawned a series of theatrical shorts, merchandise, a comic book, and television cartoons. He starred in 124 short films, 10 television shows and three prime time specials. The character is closely associated with the evocative Pink Panther Theme.In the story line of the original film "The Pink Panther", which was the name of a valuable pink diamond.  In the film's animated credits this was humorously translated to a "real" pink panther. "The Pink Panther" (1964) the movie, starred Peter Sellers as a Blundering French policeman named "Inspector Clueso", who is searching for a diamond named the The Pink Panther. In 1963, movie director Blake Edwards asked David H. DePatie and Friz Freleng (who had just opened their cartoon studio, DePatie-Freleng) to design a character for the opening titles of his movie, "The Pink Panther". Out of many drawings, Edwards selected the cool design by Hawley Pratt. The opening of the movie became so famous that United Artists, the distributor of the movie, told them to make a cartoon series with the character.

Pink Panther cartoon series started in 1964 and became very successful, the first short called "The Pink Phink" won an Academy Award.  Due to the Immense positive feedback from audiences in regards to the animated pink cat, DePatie and Freleng immediately began working on a series of animated shorts featuring the Pink Panther as the main character. With no dialog, just the Silky Smooth saxophone playing of Henry Mancini, the cartoon gained a following, and landed a Saturday morning slot in the 1970's. After the success of the Pink Panther cartoons, DePatie and Freleng introduced other cartoon series like "The Inspector" and "Roland and Rattfink", however, none of them became as famous as their first creation. The last theatrically released Pink Panther cartoon, Therapeutic Pink, was made in 1977. More cartoons were made in 1978-1979, for television distribution. In 1984, DePatie-Freleng was already gone, so Hanna-Barbera made a new cartoon series "The Pink Panther and Sons". It wasn't successful and it was soon cancelled.

Pink Panther cartoon series reappeared in September 1993 as a new half-hour series made for syndication by MGM Television Animation premiered. It was simply called The Pink Panther . In these new cartoons, Pink Panther spoke. He was voiced by Matt Frewer. In this show, two other classic DePatie-Freleng cartoons, The Ant and the Aardvark and The Dogfather were revived. New characters, Voodoo Man and Manly Man were introduced. This show ended in May 1995, after only two seasons. In July 2007, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. and Jordan's Rubicon animation company began co-production of the animated series Pink Panther and Pals portraying a teenager panther and his friends. The 26 episode TV series premiered worldwide in spring 2010 on Cartoon Network. In 2011, a new 22-minute holiday special entitled A Very Pink Christmas aired on ABC Family and later Boomerang in the U.S., YTV in Canada, and Boomerang in the U.K. in December.