I’ve been reading the archives of Garfield, and I’ve noticed that while he has a cat and dog, and feeds them regularly, not to mention himself, as well as going to the vet and going out on dates and to the diner, not once do we see him go to any job, nor do we see Garfield or Odie react in any way to him getting home after a day at work.
So what is it? Rich uncle? Trust fund? Or Jim Davis not thinking about it?
According to the very first Garfield cartoon, which ran on June 19, 1978 (Garfield’s “birthday”), Jon is a cartoonist. Whether or not he still is, I’m not sure. I’m guessing that aspect of Jon went the way of Lyman.
It’s been shown several times that he’s a cartoonist, IIRC. Not so much recently, but a lot in the early days.
And speaking of Garfield, I don’t read it a lot anymore, but I have noticed Jon is going on a LOT more dates with the vet. Are he and her officially an item now, after some twenty-odd years?
I miss Lyman, he gave the strip a certain something. I find it interesting how some of his foibles (like wearing ridiculous outfits when he went out to impress women) were transferred to John after his disappearance.
I have a few Garfield collections, one is a reissue of the first three, another is “Garfield’s 9 lives” and I believe was all entirely new content (nothing from actual papers), the 5th treasury, and one or two others from back in the day. I liked the strip, but am wholly in the camp of those who feel that it’s been a long time since Davis was at his peak. To this day most of my favorite stuff is from that “fat-cat 3 pack” (the aforementioned first three collections).
Incidentally, anyone here ever seen the strips where someone edited out all of Garfield’s word balloons? I think it was here that I first saw the link to them. It becomes a dark, surrealist comic about a man who’s insane, and Garfield’s mugging to the audience often comes off as kind of creepy. It’s fun to read, and fascinating how simply removing the cat’s “dialogue” changes so much about the work.
I can’t find them, but I’ve seen strips with Garfield removed entirely. Jon comes across as totally insane. I couldn’t stop laughing when I first saw them.
One of my favourite Garfield spoofs is “Barfield loses his lunch” Barfield Loses His Lunch It gets raunchier as the strips go on - I bust a gut not trying to giggle at some of them at work. Warning - in poor taste, and very juvenile!