#garfieldandme

[garfieldandmeblog]

Farewell, or, The End of Garfield and Me

Just over a year ago, as a global pandemic kept everyone inside for an as yet unknown period of time, JK approached (via FaceTime) me with a proposal for a joint venture into art criticism. Garfield and Me was an experiment. An absurd method of navigating one of America’s most absurd icons, an icon whom neither of us really had any prior knowledge about.

During the past year, we’ve discovered so much about this orange cat and the culture that surrounds him. From Nermal to Pooky, Jim Davis to Nathen Mazri; there’s so much rich history and personality here. I even found myself to have grown particularly attached to Garfield and, while I rail against the passionless direction he’s been taken in over the years, I genuinely love the Garfield comic strip.

The Tumblr community, too, is filled with such creative minds! Going into this, I thought we would be the only Garfield blog around, but I’ve been happy to come across plenty of other Garfield blogs, along with other blogs that engage with other fandoms, media, and memes in ways that I never could have imagined. Thank you, to each and everyone of you for following us on this strange, strange journey, and for being the wonderful people you all are.

Now, what’s the future look like? We’re not entirely sure. Both JK and I are busy with other creative pursuits (JK is a poet, and I’m a comic book writer), work, and just plain ol’ life. So for now, Garfield and Me is going to be on an indefinite hiatus. But! If you have some new insight or thought on Garfield, art, or anything else, feel free to reach out! And hey, if we see a particular Garfield strip that strikes our fancy, we’ll come back and share it with you all too. For the most part, though, we will be stepping away from this blog for a good long while.

Again, thank you, all of you.

-AM

Sayonara, Garfield.

[garfieldandmeblog]

August 11, 1986

AM: This one’s really good actually. The first panel is just so much intensity so quickly, and Odie’s lifeless body in panel 2 is hilarious. Normally I hate the “I hate Mondays” bit, but this takes it to a level that I can respect.

JK: Garfield has us all trained on hating Mondays. 

[garfieldandmeblog]

June 9, 1987

JK: WOOAHH! Garfield! Watch where you’re going!

AM: Garfield is really cute in this one, he should walk on all four legs more often. That’s all I have to say about this strip.

[garfieldandmeblog]

June 30, 1995

AM: I somehow only realized this year that June only has 30 days in it. Why do different months have a different number of days? Couldn’t we just… change that? Why are there leapyears? That’s just such a nonsensical thing. I propose a calendar where every month has 32 days. There, easy and done. Call me, Joe.

JK: ok joe

[garfieldandmeblog]

Garfield: The Movie

AM: There’s an interesting writing choice in Garfield: The Movie regarding the setting. It begins in a cul-de-sac, just a few miles from a large city. For Garfield, the cul de sac is safe; he knows the ins and outs, all of the neighboring cats and dogs, and it’s where he always gets his way. Anything beyond the cul de sac, however, is dangerous, unknown, even hostile, and that’s not even mentioning the city. With all of this emphasis placed on place, one begins to wonder where exactly the film takes place. One would assume that it takes place in Garfield creator Jim Davis’ home state of Indiana. Wikipedia, however, claims that it takes place in Los Angeles of all places. What’s interesting, though, is that the movie does everything its power to obscure the actual setting from the viewer. There are no signs anywhere in this film that say “Los Angeles,” no one mentions living in L.A., and there’s just no defining characteristics. It’s not even a matter of the camera crew just choosing not to shoot things that screamed L.A.; things are deliberately edited to obscure that fact. There’s a scene towards the end of Act 2 where Garfield has to go to the city to rescue Odie from the clutches of an evil infomercial personailty. On the freeway, we get a shot of the city skyline and a freeway exit sign—which reads, not Los Angeles, but “The City.” A bus’s destination sign reads “City Center.” The so-called “Los Angeles” looks more like a movie set for a film taking place in New York. You would think that, taking place in L.A., the movie would have taken the golden opportunity to take Garfield to L.A.’s iconic locales. Garfield in front of the Grauman Theatre. Garfield at the Hollywood sign. Garfield at Dodger’s Stadium. But no, none of that.

Garfield: The Movie’s setting is strange because they don’t utilize it for what you might expect. The effort the filmmakers went through to hide the truth about the setting is rather impressive, I’ll say that. It doesn’t seem like it ultimately accomplished anything though. And so, ultimately, the choices made regarding the setting resulted in an affect that is neither good, nor bad, just… there. Much like the film itself.

I give this movie 5 out of 10 lasagnas.

JK: For my final official critique here at Garfieldandme.com LLC, I will be reviewing Garfield the Movie. How did it make me feel? How does Garfield make me feel at this point? I thought I knew, but as of right now… It’s mixed.

I thought I didn’t like Garfield. I thought it would be funny to employ irony against the fat cat. When I began writing about Garfield, the original mission was to find a way in, primarily through cruel joking and punching down, every week and that was it; that was going to be the focus of this project.

But finding a way through… It requires energy. It requires an actual interest in whatever you’re writing about, whatever you’re exploring. And as the project went on and on, my interest and energy waned. It became increasingly difficult to talk Garf. The ratio of good ideas/fun writing sessions to phoning it in grew smaller and smaller. Part of the fun, at first, was acknowledging the pure magnitude of syndication Garfield has amassed. But, diving into it, getting deep, it’s hard to keep a smiling face when the material brings so little to you. Life is short, and Garf is long.

There are hidden gems in the bog of never-ending Mondays. There are glimpses of Jim Davis giving a shit. And those moments, when they come up, are worth cherishing. It compelled me to write knowing the cat was acting in an interesting way. It gave me material to work with. It gave me hope.

And then, we’d get another week of duds. Then, another. It’d go on, and I’d feel frustration, apathy, devastation, etc. over and over again. It became routine.

So, Garfield the Movie. What makes Garfield the Movie interesting? It’s Garfield’s first live-action adaptation. It stars… movie stars. Garfield is CGI. These elements are all fine. The whole movie is just fine. And that complete milquetoast quality makes the film, ironically, a great Garfield adaptation. There were times I was watching the screen and I hoped the movie would be worse, more blatantly disgusting or bold. Maybe then I could write about it.  But no, from start time to end, this movie is okay.

Bill Murray sounds like the voice Davis and Co. settled on when they brought Garf to the home television. Jon is whatever. You can have a discarded Chik Fil A wrapper replace Jon in this movie and nothing would change. Odie is lovable and fun (maybe the highlight). Jennifer Love Hewitt.. I mean, c’mon. Liz was hot already, but…

…

There’s nothing really deep here.

The only redeeming portion of the whole film is the credits. I’m serious. There, it tells another story. Comics and largely comic strips are a medium of sole ownership. Charles Schultz storyboards, Schultz draws, he signs his name in the bottom left corner. And that’s it. Film, in this critic’s opinion, is one of the most collaborative mediums of expression out there. On even the worst films (and I’m not saying Garfield runs in this camp), there are probably five or more people who gave up hours of their lives in an attempt to make you smile, to entertain you for a little bit. It’s interesting to see this many people interpreting Davis’s cat. This bird’s eye view perspective, however, does not negate how bored I felt during the film. And my opinion doesn’t really matter. The best of them, working on this project, hopefully made this to make a child (or the rare Garf fan) happy. Or they were miserable. Regardless, they all made the film. I spent an hour of my life watching. We are in this together.

We reflect whatever we spend time with. If you spend hours with the cat, you become the cat. You spend time working overtime at a job you hate, and suddenly you hate yourself. You spend the night out, maybe drinking wine with friends on a weekend, at a little bar on the outside of town. It’s August. The night is air is warm, and it looks like no one is on Wilshire tonight. Except you and people you love. You laugh and really feel it in your chest, in your stomach. You look at everyone and, maybe it’s the light, maybe it’s the Merlot, but they emanate a soft golden glow covering their forearms to their rears to their legs to their feet. You look down at yourself, and you’re glowing too.

Was it Anne Dillard who wrote “How we spend our days, of course, is how we spend our lives”? Am I remembering that correctly? What year is it? What was I doing about this? How does Garfield make me feel? How am I feeling right now? Stepping away from the cat is not easy, and in a sense, this gesture feels like stepping away from this past year in its good and nasty. I want to change my life, and so I’ll change my relationship with him. It’s small, but why not. Life is short, and Garf is long. Thanks for spending this time with me, I’ll never forget it.

Two lasagnas out of five.

[garfieldandmeblog]

June 19, 1978

AM: In honor of Garfield’s anniversary, and Garfield’s birthday, I’d like to take a look at the very first Garfield strip. Everything about this one is fantastic. Garf’s proportions are outrageous and silly, Jon’s face is so long, and both of them have normal sized eyes. We see Jim Davis insert himself into the story here by having Jim be a cartoonist. In doing so, Garfield’s statement in panel 2 breaks the fourth wall. If Jon is Jim, Garfield is acknowledging that he is indeed an illustrated character.

JK: The premise for Garfield is all here. A man and his cat. 

AM: The third panel comes off as sort of detached from everything at first. Jon doesn’t seem to be reacting to Garf’s comment, he’s simply continuing with the introduction. The joke of panels 1 & 2 doesn’t continue though. Instead, we’re treated to some really great interplay between the words and the symbols inherent to the form of comics. Jon says “Our only thought is to entertain you.” That’s a weird way of saying it, but ok Jon, thanks. Then Garf, thinks “Feed me.” We know that he’s thinking because of the thought bubble. If Garfield had simply been a talking cat, and he said “Feed me.” in a normal speech bubble, the joke would have been a two-dimensional good. The thought bubble though… this is a work of genius. The work of someone who really understands how comics work. We’ve strayed too far from this.

[garfieldandmeblog]

July 16, 1979

AM: See July 14, 2015

JK: See above

[garfieldandmeblog]

July 14, 2015

AM: I love Garfield’s confident smile in the first two panels. He’s a cat who always thinks he has everything under control when, really, he gets himself into more trouble than he realizes. Tree climbing is his vice, an addiction that he simply cannot stop. I wish I could help you, Garfield, I really do.

JK: SILLY. 

[garfieldandmeblog]

August 4, 1993

AM: Garfield is absolutely euphoric! Look at him. Garfield’s life is one so bereft of excitement or meaning that even the smallest thing sends him to climax. His chin, rising straight up in the air, his fist aloft, but clenched. He can’t control his body. Garfield himself has gone over the top.

JK: I like how mundanity is a spectrum, and that Garfield is aware of it. He can find elation in the new heights of boring Jon brings. 

[garfieldandmeblog]

May 26, 1984

AM: I get that Garfield is supposed to be overweight—a “fat cat” if you will—but it’s hard to tell if it’s really much of a problem for him. I mean, he walks on two feet just fine, obviously the weight isn’t holding him down or affecting his health that much. I’m more concerned about how the walking on two feet is affecting his spine. Cats just aren’t built for walking like that.

JK: AYIEEEEE! is really good. This is pretty classic. Garfield is America’s wallpaper.

[garfieldandmeblog]

August 13, 1990

AM: Ok, Garfield. Go get a job.

JK: Sorry folks, I couldn’t post this one on time. Enjoy it a day late. 

AM: Shoot, I’m sorry Garfield. I just get so wrapped up in SOCIETY and its expectations sometimes. I thought about it and I really disagree with what Jon says. “Nothing will ever become of you lying there like that,” he says. Well, who gets to decide that, Jon? And what’s wrong with never becoming of anything? We’re all just living, going through the same day to day stuff, and for some reason, just because someone somewhere said so, we have to be heading somewhere. As though there’s an arc to the story of our lives, as though we’re characters who have to go through some immense conflict in order to find ourselves. In the grand scheme of things, none of that matters. We’re all just going to die and the sun will explode and completely burn away any trace of human and cat existence. So why should Garfield get up? If he wants to, he could lay there for the rest of his 9 lives. And the same goes for you, reader. Keep reading Garfield, keep following this blog. It might all be stupid and fruitless, but that’s ok. You have nothing to prove to anyone.

[garfieldandmeblog]

July 7, 2001

AM: The outfit makes Jon look like an incel.

JK: As an incel, I

[garfieldandmeblog]

August 6, 2018

AM: These 2010s strips are always bad. Garfield isn’t doing anything annoying here, he’s just vibing with Pooky. Jon’s anger is completely unfounded. And, as flawed as Jon is, he’s not normally one to get angry with zero provocation. No, this isn’t an issue of character; it’s an issue of lazy writing.

JK: Jon is acting out. I assume he hates how smug Garfield looks. It’s such a subtle thing that only avid Garfield readers can really pick out. It’s fucking frustrating that I know this, because I’ve spent the better half of a year doing this. I hate the fucking look Garfield is giving. I hate all of it. ... No. I’m Jon. 

[garfieldandmeblog]

May 10, 1979

JK: A late one for all you Garfheads. This may be the best Garfield strip I’ve ever seen.  

AM: Haha! Look at all that playfulness! Garf’s big ol’ eyes and smile in the first panel are so fun. And then his scrunched up little body in the final panel. So good. Garf really comes across as a young and rambunctious cat here. This is fun. There’s life here.

[garfieldandmeblog]

September 15, 2020

JK: Ah, a bacon joke in 2020. You never change, do you Garfield?

AM: This strip came out the day after we started this blog... and it's a fitting strip for our anniversary. The Garfield Watches TV subgenre of Garfield is bad, plain and simple. All three panels are copy/pasted, just cropped differently and with Garf’s stupid smile at the end. On top of all that, the joke isn’t even good. This is Garfield at its absolute worst. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

[garfieldandmeblog]

June 14, 2020

JK: Uh oh, 

AM: I really hated this at first. Odie does NOT look ok walking on his hind legs, what the heck is going on with that stray white line in the first panel, and why is Garfield running away instead of just kicking Odie like he always does? BUT that final panel, man, it’s so freakin’ good.