The Garfield Show



The Garfield Show was another animated series based on the comic strips of Jim Davis. Unlike Garfield and Friends, however, this series was CGI-animated, and without U.S. Acres, Davis' less-known comic strip which was also featured in Garfield and Friends. The series was launched in 2009.

The titular lazy, orange-furred feline, Garfield, makes his return to the TV screen, with wacky hijinks galore. His owner, Jon Arbuckle, and the long-tongued yellow dog, Odie, are also main characters.

"Jon, seeing Garfield and Odie stuck in a tree: Garfield! Odie! You're stuck in a tree! Garfield: And the grass is green, Captain Obvious."
 * Attractive Bent Gender: One episode has Nermal becoming smitten by Garfield after the latter got dressed up by Jon's Bratty Half-Pint nieces. Luckily for Nermal he never finds out the truth.
 * A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Night of the Apparatuses
 * The T3000.
 * Berserk Button: Don't call Nermal mangy.
 * Big Eater: Garfield (as usual).
 * Bratty Half-Pint: Two of them: Drusila and Minerva, Jon's twin nieces.
 * Breaking the Fourth Wall: In the 2nd season, Garfield completely tosses out the 4th wall, completely aware that the show is in its 2nd season and that everyone is part of a TV show.
 * It comes to a head when Squeak can effectively predict the future because he's watching the episode (it's a rerun, but no one realizes it). It involves him catching up to himself and helping Garfield pretend to be psychic. Unfortunately, he accidentally deletes the episode when Garfield is about to prove his powers to the public.
 * Butt Monkey: The Mailman
 * Naturally Jon and Garfield as usual, albeit not quite as much as in the comics.
 * Camp Gay: Eddie Gourmand
 * Captain Obvious: Jon gets called out as this in the following:


 * Cargo Ship: In-Universe, in one episode, Odie falls in love with a brush.
 * Christmas Special: "Home for the Holidays", written by the strip's creator, Jim Davis
 * City of Adventure: Cheese Land
 * Con Man: Dr. Whipple, a recurring villain who tries to convince people to buy his products. Which normally involve serious animal abuse.
 * Cut a Slice, Take the Rest: In one episode, after Vito gives Odie lasagna, Jon tells Garfield to give Odie his fair share. Guess what Garfield does next?
 * Deadpan Snarker: Garfield, as expected.
 * Demoted to Extra: Arlene, despite being present in the intro sequence, shows up only in a handful of first-season episodes and is thus far absent in the second season.
 * Do Not Explain the Joke: Garfield is especially guilty of this. Just one example would be the Theme Tune Cameo in "Unfair Weather".
 * Easy Amnesia: This happens to Garfield in one episode when a bowling ball drops to his head.
 * Elephant in the Living Room: The Kiss Me Girl from Virtualodean.
 * Played with later with a literal elephant in the living room that it takes Jon a few moments to actually notice is out of place.
 * Engineered Public Confession: Dr. Whipple's first downfall occurs when Garfield tricks him into admitting that his pet training business is a huge con and how he thinks the public is stupid...while the live television audience and viewers are listening to his every word.
 * Fake Ultimate Hero: Professor Bonkers
 * Foot Focus
 * Four Legs Good, Two Legs Better: The cats usually assume an upright stance but the dogs usually don't.
 * Freaky Friday Flip: Between Garfield and Odie in one episode.
 * Incredible Shrinking Cat: Nathan, the Mad Scientist kid from an earlier episode, does this to Garfield in a later episode.
 * Jerkass: Jon's aunt Ivy.
 * Karma Houdini: Played straight by Nermal in one episode (if only one). Garfield isn't as lucky in this series, however, partly due to Jon being quick to suspect him -- and he's often right.
 * Bernard Scanberry steals Jon's millions, and gets away to Brazil.
 * Leaning on the Fourth Wall / Opening Shout-Out: In the first half of "Unfair Weather" Jon's ringtone is the show's main theme. Garfield even says it sounds familiar.
 * Lighter and Softer: Somewhat less cynical than the comics or even the previous animated installments. Garfield is more genuinely sympathetic, Jon is slightly less of a loser and there are more frequent heartwarming moments.
 * Mythology Gag: In the 2nd season, Jon asks Garfield if he'd like to watch Binky the Clown on TV. Garfield responds by saying that Binky is contractually obligated to never show up in this series.
 * No Fourth Wall: In the 2nd season.
 * Not So Harmless: The first time we see Nathan, a kid in the same neighborhood as Jon, he appears quite friendly.
 * Perpetual Frowner / The Eeyore: A parrot Jon's editor entrusts to Jon in one episode, with more than enough Wangst for anyone around it. In a separate short, a black cat Garfield encounters is also this, plus he somehow makes everyone he comes across unlucky -- and he knows it.
 * Pounds Are Animal Prisons: A bumbling Animal Control officer is a regular antagonist.
 * The Professor: Professor Bonkers
 * Rube Goldberg Device: Played straight when Garfield employs one early in an episode to catapult Nermal from a reclining chair into a trash can outside. Subverted toward the end of the same episode when Garfield catapults Nermal from the same chair into a cardboard box outside without using complex contraption.
 * Set Right What Once Went Wrong: Several episodes, mostly involving Garfield having to rectify his mistakes earlier (especially if food is at stake).
 * Shout-Out: Dr. Whipple gets traumatized by the wacky events in an episode enough to fear dogs briefly, during which he sees a dog and runs away shrieking "Who let the dog out?" while the dog he sees barks.
 * To Bernie Madeoff of all people.
 * Sphere Eyes
 * Stupid Evil: After reclaiming his elephant (which Garfield had been hiding due to the abuse it suffers), Dr Whipple immediately begins tearing into it, threatening to starve it and otherwise make it's life hell, right in front of a group of police (who naturally arrest him on the spot).
 * Tempting Fate: When Odie gets past the first round of a pet pageant (with Garfield's "help"), Garfield expresses confidence that "we can't lose." Then cue the announcer stating that the second round would be a talent contest. Garfield's reaction: "Boy, can we lose."
 * Too Dumb to Live: In one episode a mouse refuses to believe that Garfield is nice to mice and doesn't eat them, so he repeatedly tries to get Garfield to eat him just to prove he's right.
 * Took a Level in Jerkass: Unlike earlier incarnations, this Nermal has a far more insufferable ego and annoys Garfield intentionally.
 * Took a Level In Kindness: Garfield in comparison is slightly more benevolent than in the comics, while still a gluttoness snarker, he goes out of his way to help people more and bullies Jon and Odie a lot less. Most of the individuals Garfield does victimize are far more provocative than in the comics (see above).