10 Perfect Garfield Comics That Just Turned 40

Garfield is approaching 50th anniversary territory; in celebration, let's go back and look at some unforgettable stretches from the comic's decades-long run. This time, we're jumping in the wayback machine and heading to 1986. At the time Garfield was firing on all cylinders. It had been a staple of the funny pages for almost ten years, and wasn't going anywhere anytime soon.

Garfield actually started as Jon in 1976, making 2026 fifty years since creator Jim Davis launched what would become an iconic franchise, and one of the greatest comic strips ever.

The comic was renamed Garfield in '77, and went national in '78. In 1986, we catch up with Garfield after it has already become beloved.

First Published: April 13, 1986

This classic extra-length Garfield Sunday strip showcases the orange tabby at his smartest. Or at least, savviest. Of course, Garfield doesn't need to be a genius to outwit Odie, he just needs to stay one step ahead. Here, he starts with a pun, shouting "now that's what I call a window of opportunity" upon spotting a pie cooling on a windowsill.

After a brief struggle, Garfield switches tactics and convinces Odie they should work together and share the pie. Except it's a double cross. Garfield gets the pie thanks to Odie's help, and then scarfs the whole thing. "Sometimes the old axioms work best," he concludes, "like 'there's a sucker born every minute.'"

9 Garfield's Attempt At Making History Just Makes Jon Arbuckle Angry

First Published: April 12, 1986

This strip finds Garfield goofing off, and Jon Arbuckle swooping in to be the buzz kill. To be fair, Jon is acting like a normal cat parent when their cat has something in its mouth. In this case, that "something" is three tennis balls, and while Jon is only looking at it as a choking hazard, Garfield sees it as "a new world record."

"Some people have no sense of history," Garfield says, skulking off after Jon scolds him, demanding he "spit those out this very instant." Rest assured, it might not have been the next day (because Garfield was busy stealing a pie with Odie), or the day after that, but sooner or later, Garfield got Jon back for yelling at him.

8 Jon Arbuckle Messes With Garfield And Pays Dearly For It

First Published: April 10, 1986

Actually, if Jon was short-tempered with Garfield, can you really blame him after seeing strips like this one? Here, Jon tries to pull a power move, sitting in his armchair and reading the newspaper while Garfield looks at him expectantly, wanting to be let back inside. If he'd just ignored his cat, maybe things would've turned out different.

Instead, Jon pushes his luck. "I'll let you in when I'm good and ready," he says, prompting an irate Garfield to pop his claws and scratch the glass. The horrifying noise makes Jon's hair stand on end. "I'm ready," he says as he begrudgingly opens the window. "Good and," Garfield thinks as he cheerfully leaps into the house.

7 An Iconic Garfield Take On How The Weather Effects Your Mood

First Published: April 7, 1986

Part of what has made Garfield a global phenomenon for decades is that its starring character is more than just a character. Garfield is a whole vibe. There's a reason drawings of the cat like this one, with his eyes narrowed, a frown on his furry face, and his body language firmly saying "don't bother me," can stand alone on a t-shirt, or bumper sticker, or coffee mug, and tell the world exactly how someone feels.

This is one of those strips that completely embodies that vibe. "I hate partly cloudy days," Garfield thinks, forlornly sitting by a window. He explains that his mood is so drastically effected by the weather that partial cloudy conditions totally throw him for a loop. "On a partly cloudy day I can use up weeks worth of moods," Garfield says, hitting a pitch-perfect note for the character.

6 Garfield Gets In A Jam With Some Rats

First Published: April 4, 1986

Garfield often ran week-long arcs, starting on Monday and culminating on Friday. Meaning a story would play out over fifteen panels, separated into units of three. For context, this cartoon is the final strip published in the sequence published the first week of April 1986. Spoilers, but Garfield not only fails to get rid of the mice he let into the house, but he actually starts a band with them.

That's the hilarious swerve that comes after Garfield gets the bright idea to pull "the old 'pied piper' play" on the vermin. He pulls out his flute and starts shredding, in the hopes that they rats will be enchanted by the music and follow him. They do, but not in the way he intended. Instead of leading them out of the house, Garfield becomes the front-feline of an all-rat backing band.

5 Garfield Offers A Hilariously Hard Truth About Starting A Diet

First Published: March 29

Here's another bit of the wisdom, or rather, wise-cracking, that made Garfield famous. "On which day are most diets begun?" Garfield asks, while relaxing with his feet up in a blue reclining chair. "Wrong," he says in the next frame, responding to an off-panel answer from the audience. "Monday is the second most popular day."

That is, people tend to start a new diet at the beginning of the work week. But there's an even more common answer to the question: "tomorrow." There will always be a greater ratio of people planning to start a diet to the number of people actually starting diets, a truth Garfield nails in this highly amusing cartoon.

4 Garfield's Dream Of Being A Great Writer Gets Unexpected Help From Jon Arbuckle

First Published: March 15, 1986

Here's another Friday Garfield for you. The recurring plot of this week in March '86 was that Garfield has decided that he wants to be the next great American novelist. He proceeds to spend the rest of the week procrastinating, avoiding working on a book while having delusions of literary grandeur. In this strip, the storyline ends with an unexpected bang, rather than a whimper.

That is, as Garfield is walking along musing that he "must suffer in order to write a great novel," Jon Arbuckle carelessly throws open the front door and totally takes out Garfield. Yet rather than being upset, the bruised and dazed Garfield is grateful, having gotten the suffering he needed. "I'll remember you in my acceptance speech for the Nobel Prize," he tells Jon.

3 Some Things Are Just Sacred, Even To Garfield

First Published: February 25, 1986

Another day, another pie, another chapter in the saga of Garfield's love/hate relationship with Odie. In the first panel of this comic, Garfield walks up to Odie, carrying a pie over his head, a diabolical look on his face. Sweetheart that he is, Odie doesn't suspect anything amiss. Then in the middle frame, Garfield stops what he's about to do and gets a strange look in his eye.

The punchline in the third panel is that Garfield changes his mind, turns on his heel, and marches away with the pie. "I have more respect for food than that," he thinks, as he goes off to, presumably, eat the pie instead. Meanwhile, Odie is left drooling, totally unfazed by the entire interaction. Classic Odie.

2 Jon Arbuckle Speaks For Pet Owners Everywhere In This Classic Garfield Comic

First Published: February 13, 1986

Another day, another attempt by Jon Arbuckle to chill thwarted by Garfield. "My cat isn't perfect," Jon says in a monologue to the reader. He admits that Garfield is lazy, but explains that this is how he likes his cat. Why is that? The answer will be familiar to anyone who has had a cat, or a rambunctious dog, or any kind of pet that could get into trouble if activated.

He "encourage[s] [Garfield] to lie around a lot," Jon says wearily, "because every time he moves he destroys something." The last panel "pans over" to show Garfield climbing up the curtains. It's a hilarious reveal, and you can literally feel Jon Arbuckle's spirit being crushed, and all hope of relaxing fading, just from looking at the illustration.

1 Garfield's "Cameo Appearances" At Dinner Time Made Him A Morning Newspaper Legend

First Published: February 11, 1986

"Some people love to linger over dinner..." Jon Arbuckle says in the first panel of this strip. In the frame with him is Garfield's food bowl, freshly filled up over the brim. It's a great joke from the jump, because any self-respecting Garfield fan knows exactly how it is going to play out.

The second panel features a "ZOOM!" onomatopoeia straight ouf of a Flash comic. The final frame shows a demolished food bowl, as Jon completes his thought from panel one: "...Garfield makes cameo appearances." The deadpan delivery is peak Jon, and in turn, this is one of the best Garfield cartoons from early 1986.