Garfield and Friends: Never meant to be funny?

It's no secret that little kids have a terrible sense of humor. I mean, come on - they think knock knock jokes are funny. And although Slate alleges that Garfield was never meant to be funny, generations of kids have gleefully supported the Garfield empire.

When I was a little kid I had a pretty substantial collection of Garfield books, myself. But one Garfield product I missed out on was Garfield & Friends, the animated series. I was a senior in high school by the time the first Garfield animated show made it to the air. Having just watched an episode on Netflix Streaming, I have to count myself lucky.

The show features terrible artwork, broken physics, and constant intrusive background music. The inked backgrounds are splotchy, the linework is off-kilter, and the colors are inconsistent from one scene to the next. Let's just say the quality control is sorely lacking.

Check out the image I captured from the episode at random (above). It's probably supposed to look as if Garfield is resting his elbow on his knee, but that's not what's happening. He has one fat arm and one thin arm. It looks like the lines were inked on damp paper. And the watercolor background work is amateurish at best. In places, the background looks like the paper had buckled pretty badly.

Mainly, the cartoon showcases Garfield's constant, blandly smiling face. His expression rarely changes, even when - particularly when - he is saying something mildly sarcastic (Garfield's stock in trade).

At the script level, the episode is virtually incoherent. Garfield enters in a cat show after learning that his nemesis Nermal has won several blue ribbons. Garfield makes it to the final round, going head to head against Nermal, while several more attractive cats are cut. Inexplicably, the cat show includes a talent show, an obedience competition, and then a "demonstration of special ability" (i.e. a second talent show). No mention is made of feline beauty standards, which is weird, because that's the only thing that a real-world cat show is about.

I would say that this is a terrible show that doesn't hold up to time. But I'm about 30 years older than the show's target market, and if you have any Garfield-loving kids in your household, it's definitely worth setting them on it. Four of the show's seven seasons are currently available on Netflix Streaming.

Image copyright Garfield And Friends/20th Century FOX Television