It’s time for my first daily post and I’m starting off with one of my favorite cartoon characters of all time: Garfield.

Jim Davis has been drawing Garfield comics since before I was born, so I essentially grew up with the antics of the orange fat cat kicking Odie off of tables, shipping Nermal to Abu Dhabi, and dealing with Jon’s loneliness. In recent years, Davis has stopped producing new Garfield anthologies and focused on movie making.

The latest installments into the Garfield universe come in the form of computer-generated films called Garfield Gets Real and Garfield’s Fun Fest, bringing Garfield and the gang into 3D graphics, rather than the 2D look we’re used to. Both movies are armed with a unique spin that places Garfield, Jon, Nermal, Odie, Arlene, and loads of new characters into a setting where Garfield is the star of his own comic and reports to a studio every day to shoot new strips along with his fellow actors.

Before I continue with my thoughts, here are the trailers for both films:

Garfield Gets Real

Garfield’s Fun Fest

The plot of Garfield living in a town where he’s a comic star allows for a new kind of interaction between familiar characters. While traditionally in the Garfield comics and television show, Jon and other humans don’t actually understand what Garfield says, in Gets Real and Fun Fest, all characters, animal or human, speak by moving their mouths and can fully communicate with each other.

As a huge Garfield fan, I was initially taken aback by Garfield’s ability to actually hold a conversation with Jon and other humans. But as I was pulled further into the films, I realized that this new version of Garfield opens up a whole new dimension (pun intended) to his character. One major complaint of Garfield non-fans is that the jokes have gotten stale over the years. Garfield eats lasagna. Garfield sleeps a lot. Jon fails on yet another date. These two films provide a new angle from which Davis can approach his beloved characters. One of my favorite scenes Gets Real involves showing how the 2D comic strips are shot, rather than drawn, with characters posing and performing in front of backdrops, like a movie would be in our world.

Both movies are intended for children and have plenty of jokes aimed at younger audiences. However, they’re not non-stop parties as previous Garfield television shows have been.  Each of these films has lessons to be learned about appreciating friends and family and believing in yourself.  Garfield has become much more than a one-dimensional cartoon cat, adding layers of emotions including betrayal, jealousy, embarrassment, and even sadness.  While the movies are filled with humor, they never lose sight of the important themes behind them.

Visually, the film looks correct to be part of the Garfield universe. While the computer graphics used are not state-of-the-art (in fact, they look quite dated), the character design is about 98% accurate to what you’d imagine Garfield looking like in three dimensions. It is not at all like the horrid Garfield live action films from a few years ago in which Garfield barely resembled his cartoon self and Odie was portrayed by a real dog.

Voice acting legend Frank Welker (Transformers, Inspector Gadget, Scooby-Doo, and many, many others) takes over for the late Lorenzo Music as the voice of Garfield and does a fantastic job at it. In fact, all of the voices are fitting for their roles, though Jon sounds a bit younger than in his previous television cartoon life on Garfield and Friends.

While I enjoyed Garfield Gets Real more than Garfield’s Fun Fest, I’d recommend both for any avid Garfield fan. For those who are only casual Garfield readers, these films may be too much of a departure from the usual Garfield strips for you to fully enjoy. It’s almost necessary to see Gets Real before Fun Fest, as the introduction of the comic strip studio presented in the former and audiences are expected to know about it in the latter.

The two films are available on Amazon.com individually (here and here) or as a two-pack here.

More information about both movies can be found at Garfield.com.

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