Odie
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Odie
Odie
First appearance	Garfield comic strip (August 8, 1978)
Created by	Jim Davis
Portrayed by	Gregg Berger (providing his barks and other dog sound effects in animated appearances and Garfield Gets Real) Unnamed real dog(s) in the live-action films
Information
Species	Beagle (Daschund in the live-action films)
Gender	Male
Date of birth	August 8, 1978 (1978-08-08) (age 30)

Odie is a fictional character in the Jim Davis comic strip Garfield. He has also appeared in Garfield and Friends, two live-action feature films, and two CGI films.

He is a kind but dumb yellow-furred, brown-eared beagle. In the live-action films based on the Garfield franchise, he is played by a dachshund. In the comic of August 26, 2007, Garfield describes Odie's species as "purebred clown" after trying to find out what kind of dog Odie is with the help of a book. ¹

Odie usually has a large tongue and slobbers in his appearances. Recently, as of 2000, he is seen walking on two feet instead of all fours, just like Garfield.

In the television series, Odie's appearance is usually announced by the sound of the cavalry's bugling.

History

Odie as seen in early comics.

Odie was based on a car dealership commercial Jim Davis wrote, and it featured Odie the Village Idiot. Davis liked the name Odie and decided to use it again ² (when Garfield was first submitted, Davis called Odie "Spot"; he then visited cartoonist Mort Walker to show him his strips. Walker says "I had a dog named Spot". Davis replies "Really?", then Walker replies "Yes, in Boner's Ark, one of my comic strips". Davis says "Oops!" and changes Odie's name).Odie first appeared in the comic strips on August 8, 1978, which is considered his birthday. There has been only one comic strip that celebrates Odie's birthday, in 1995³. He was originally a pet to Jon Arbuckle's roommate Lyman, but Lyman disappeared from the series after about five years (with the exception of a one-panel cameo appearance in the strip for Garfield's 10th birthday). Odie eventually becomes a pet to Jon. There were some strips stating he was a pet to Jon originally.

In the motion picture, Odie was adopted by Jon at a veterinarian center.

Speaking

Odie in Garfield Gets Real

Odie is the only animal character in the Garfield series without a recurring voice bubble, as he is portrayed as a "normal" house dog. However, he was shown thinking "I'm hungry" in an early strip. ⁴ He also has said "Hi to the people, dummy" and sang "Lady of Spain, I adore you" while Garfield was using him as a ventriloquist's dummy. ⁵⁶ He also said "I don't know, I'm kinda scared," as a "mistake" in the cartoon episode Mistakes Will Happen, and said to Garfield, "No, you're beautiful" in the episode DJ Jon. More recently, he was seen actually speaking in one of Garfield's dream sequences. ⁷ As mentioned before, he sometimes thinks like Garfield. ⁸ On the cartoon, he speaks minor words such as "Ta-da!", "Huh?", or, more commonly, panting "Yeah, yeah, yeah!" He has said more intelligible sentences, such as "No horsey?" on the episode Dessert in the Desert, and on the first episode he even says "Right!" while agreeing with Jon. When he talks on the show, he speaks by actually moving his mouth, although other dogs have also been shown to do so. Odie speaks in a similar manner in Garfield Gets Real and its sequels, frequently saying "My bone!" In the Reading Ring game on the Professor Garfield site, if one manages to get the June 21, 2001 strip strip while facing Dr. Stripp, having the third panel will let the player hear Odie say "Uh-huh!" after Garfield's dialogue. ⁹

Odie's first appearance.

Odie and Garfield

Odie is, to Garfield, a complete slobbering idiot. One strip¹⁰ shows him enjoying classical music on TV with the novel, War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy, nearby after Jon and Garfield leave the house. Another has him lock the others out of the car on a camping trip, where he enjoys the sandwiches, radio, and chips, while the others just get wet. In others he has been seen setting decoys, writing poetry, and finding a complete superhero outfit making Garfield look like a loser in a few seconds.¹¹ One theory is that there are two Odies, a smart one and the more common idiot. In one strip, Garfield went to see what was at the end of Odie's tongue, and it turned out to be a second Odie (which Garfield dismissed as an effect of a bad can of tuna from the previous night).¹² Odie has managed to take revenge on Garfield occasionally, and Garfield sometimes cannot avoid noticing it. Garfield acknowledges this by saying "He's not as dumb as he looks, but then again who could be?" However, Garfield on numerous occasions actually does care a great deal for Odie, most notably in the first Garfield special Here Comes Garfield, in which Odie is briefly captured by the dogcatcher and Garfield realizes through flashbacks of him and Odie playing together and how sad his life would be without him (in these series of flashbacks by Garfield, the song "So Long Old Friend" is played in the background). In one strip ¹³, Garfield states that Odie is made of rubber. Other times Garfield tries to put the blame on Odie for some of the mishaps he has done.

Odie all too often gets kicked off the table by Garfield; once Odie tried to push Garfield off the table, but Garfield was too heavy¹⁴. In addition to getting kicked off the table, Odie is often the victim of Garfield's pranks. Curiously, Garfield has taken offense to others treating Odie in this manner. In one strip, he punches out another cat who beats up on Odie, insisting "Nobody beats up on Odie but me!"¹⁵ Similarly, in Garfield: The Movie after seeing Happy Chapman use a shock collar on Odie, he says, "Hey, nobody gets to mistreat my dog like that except me!"

Odie does manage to get a little revenge on Garfield. Once, Jon accuses Garfield of clearing out his closet except for the T-shirt saying "I love cats." While Garfield professes his innocence, he is hurled out of the house. Comically Odie steps out to laugh at Garfield, wearing a plaid shirt, indicating he framed Garfield.¹⁶ Once, he managed to give Garfield a taste of his own medicine in a strip where Garfield tried to have fun with an Odie mask. Odie wasn't at the edge of the table, and while Garfield wondered where Odie was, he showed up (wearing a Garfield mask) and kicked the tabby off the table.¹⁷ Odie would also commonly do things to Garfield, but he gets his revenge. In one strip series, Garfield gets beat up by a bulldog after kicking him and has to wear a cast for nearly a week.¹⁸ The cast covers Garfield's entire body but his face. Odie torments Garfield throughout the series. In the final strip, though, Garfield tells Jon that he'd like to keep his cast after being asked what he would like to do with it, and strikes Odie with it.¹⁹

References

External links

• Garfield and Friends official site