What is Garfield?

 Garfield iis a daily-syndicated comic strip created by Jim Davis. Published since June 19, 1978, it chronicles the life of the title character, the cat Garfield (named for Davis' grandfather); his owner, Jon Arbuckle; and the dog, Odie. As of 2007, it is syndicated in roughly 2,580 newspapers and journals and currently holds the Guinness World Record for being the world's most widely syndicated comic strip.

Though never mentioned in print, Garfield is set in Muncie, Indiana, according to the television special Garfield Goes Hollywood. Common themes in the strip include Garfield's laziness, obsessive eating, and hate of Mondays and diets. The strip's focus is mostly on the interactions between Garfield, Jon, and Odie; recurring minor characters appear as well.

Originally created with the intentions to "come up with a good, marketable character", Garfield has become commercially successful, with merchandise earning $750 million to $1 billion annually. In addition to the various merchandise and commercial tie-ins, the strip has spawned several animated television specials, two animated television series, two theatrical feature-length live-action films and three CGI animated direct-to-video movies. Part of the strip's broad appeal is due to its lack of social or political commentary; though this was Davis's original intention, he also admitted that his "grasp of politics isn't strong".

The Main Characters

Garfield

First appearance: June 19, 1978

Garfield was born in the kitchen of an Italian restaurant (later revealed in the television special Garfield: His Nine Lives to be Mama Leoni's Italian Restaurant) and subsequently developed a taste for lasagna. Gags in the strips commonly deal with Garfield's obesity (in one strip, Jon jokes, "I wouldn't say Garfield is fat, but the last time he got on a Ferris wheel, the two guys on top starved to death"), and his hatred of exercise (or any form of work), diets, and Mondays. (Yet he is known for saying breathing is exercise.) In addition to being portrayed as lazy and fat, Garfield is also pessimistic, cynical, sarcastic and sardonic. He enjoys destroying things, mauling the mailman, and tormenting Odie; he also makes snide comments, usually about Jon's inability to get a date (in one strip, when Jon moans the fact that no one will go out with him on New Year's, Garfield replies, "Don't feel bad Jon. They wouldn't go out with you even if it weren't New Year's.") 

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Jon Arbuckle 

First appearance: June 19, 1978

 Jon (Jonathan Q. Arbuckle) is Garfield's owner, usually depicted as an awkward geek who has trouble finding a date. Jon loves (or occasionally hates) Garfield and all cats. Many gags focus on this; his inability to get a date is usually attributed to his lack of social skills, his poor taste in clothes (Garfield remarked in one strip after seeing his closet that "two hundred moths committed suicide"; in another, the "geek police" ordered Jon to "throw out his tie"), and his eccentric interests which range from stamp collecting to measuring the growth of his toenails to watching movies with "polka ninjas". Other strips portray him as having a lack of intelligence (he is seen reading a pop-up book in one strip).

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Odie

First appearance: August 8, 1978

Odie, a yellow, long-eared beagle who drools and walks on all four legs, was originally owned by Jon’s friend Lyman, though Jon adopted him after Lyman was written out of the strip. Odie is mostly portrayed as naive and unintelligent, though one strip showed him reading War and Peace and watching a television program, An Evening With Mozart, after Jon and Garfield had left the house. Odie is often subjected to physical abuse by Garfield (a running gag in the strip is Garfield kicking Odie off a table).