A cartoon series is a set of regularly presented animated television programs with a common series title, usually related to one another. These episodes typically share the same characters and a basic theme. For television broadcasts, programs are created or adapted with a common series title, usually related to one another and can appear as much as up to once a week or daily during a prescribed time slot. Animated cartoon series also apply outside broadcast television, as was the case for the Tom and Jerry short films that appeared in movie theaters from 1961–1962. Series can have either a finite number of episodes like a miniseries, a definite end, or be open-ended, without a predetermined number of episodes.

The duration of each episode varies depending on the individual series. Traditionally, series are produced as complete half-hour programs; however, many cartoon series are produced as animated shorts of 10-11 minutes, which can then paired with other shorts to fill a set time period. Cartoon series are sometimes grouped together according to network programming demands. Thus a particular cartoon series may appear in a number of formats or time block, such as The Batman/Superman Hour.

Mr. Bean is a British comedy television programme series of 14 half-hour episodes written by and starring Rowan Atkinson as the title character. Different episodes were also written by Robin Driscoll, Richard Curtis and one by Ben Elton. The pilot episode was broadcast on ITV on 1 January 1990, with the last television episode, "Goodnight Mr. Bean" broadcast on 31 October 1995. The final episode, "Hair by Mr. Bean of London", was a video exclusive released on 15 November 1995, but not broadcast in the UK until 2006.

Based on a character originally developed by Atkinson while he was studying for his master's degree at Oxford University, the series follows the exploits of Mr. Bean, described by Atkinson as "a child in a grown man's body", in solving various problems presented by everyday tasks and often causing disruption in the process. Bean rarely speaks, and the largely physical humour of the series is derived from his interactions with other people and his unusual solutions to situations. The series was influenced by physical performers such as Jacques Tati and comic actors from silent films.