The Flop House - Ep.#454 - The Garfield Movie

Episode Date: June 21, 2025

Ah, here he comes, that son of a gun, that cat, that Garfield, that gigantic thing -- except... There's something different about him. It's weird. He just doesn't seem very... Garfield-y? Anyway, in honor of the birthday of one of our great Americans, Garfield the cat, and also maybe one other guy, we take on 2024's The Garfield Movie.Wikipedia page for The Garfield MovieRecommended in this episode:Dan: The Thief and the Cobbler "Recobbled Cut" (1993)Stu: Jack's Back (1988)Elliott: An Actor's Revenge (1963)Head to squarespace.com/FLOP for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, use OFFER CODE: FLOP to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.

On this episode we discuss the Garfield movie. The story of a farm boy who rose to become America's president before being filled by a madman's bullet. Love lasagna, 8's Mondays. Hey everyone, I'm Dan McCoy. Hey, I'm Stuart Wellington. My name's Elliot Kalin. Sorry, I was just laughing at the way Stuart said his name, which seems like you put a little extra sauce on it. Yeah.

Put some stank on it. That's what Dan told me to do. Yeah, I said make it extra stanky. Ask and shall receive. He was my favorite of the original Little Rascals, extra stanky. Pull that bottle that says stanky off of the counter and squirt it all over that bad boy. Put a little extra on there. This is a podcast where we watch a bad movie then we talk about it. And this time around, always, so it's a well-known thing in Dan McCoy lore. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Check the fucking Wiki. It's a well-known thing in Dan McCoy lore that my birthday is also the birthday of one Garfield tea cat. What's the T stand for? The. Oh. And not just, you know, like not just the day, but the first Garfield strip was on the day I was born and he celebrates his birthday every

year on my birthday. So it's an extra treat. I open the newspaper. I'll be like what sort of half joke exists here? What non-humorous, but you know, sort of slightly smile inducing thing has Garfield done? Pleasant, mostly pleasant. Yeah, you're really celebrating Garfield already.

Except for that, oh, I thought you were talking about your birthday. No, no, I like my birthday. That your birthday is mostly pleasant, kind of a half joke, you know. I mean, other than, you know, the march to the grave that it represents, I'm a big fan. Um, but uh, yeah. Yeah, but March to the Grave is a great title for your metal album, Dan. Mm-hmm, March to the Grave. So, uh, this episode will be coming out a couple days after, but it's close, and I said,

hey guys. A couple days after, but it's close, and I said, hey guys. A couple days after your birthday. Yeah, yeah. Because the audience doesn't know, unless the audience already knows the date of the first Garfield strip or your birthday, they don't know that this is topical. Is Juneteenth, a more significant holiday

than either my or Garfield's birthday. I don't know, Dan, you do have an NAACP Image Award. Not a joke. That is not a joke. I got it from writing for Trevor Noah. You. Not a joke. That is not a joke You're saying that Juneteenth is not Commemorating the day when the the last enslaved people of the United States saw Garfield for the first time No, no, no more may know to fucking flip their legs. Yeah Far more significant holiday, but yeah, that's that's the date, that's the day of my birth.

I was not born on Juneteenth itself. That would make me very old. Very old, yeah. Very, very old. But I said, hey, there was a new Garfield movie out. You know, just why don't you pander to me guys for once, for once in your lives. Let's do this Garfield. Yeah.

You really had to twist our arms. You really had to bleed. Yeah. Yeah. The man who I think sent out our arms. You really had to bleed, yeah. Yeah, the man who I think sent out his birthday RSVP three months ago. Hey, you know why that is though? I know so many people who have birthdays within like 10 days of mine, so I really need to stake a claim.

You really need to stake a claim on people's Juneteenth plans. Yeah. Because he didn't want them to celebrate freedom when they could be celebrating Dan McCoy. We're not doing it on a date. That would be crazy. It's a Thursday. No, no. Yeah, he needs maximum attendance so that people can fawn all over him. Okay, alright. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You don't like attention, Stuart. I love it. This is when the cracks start to show. Yeah, this is, who knew that this was gonna be the thing

that drove us apart was the existence of Dan's birthday? Honestly, guys, can I, before we get into the summary of Garfield the movie. The Garfield movie. Can I, can I give a little bit of a set up here? Okay. It's been a really long week for me. I've been working a lot at my various bars.

I'm physically exhausted. I'm also emotionally exhausted from looking at my little rectangular glass thing in my pocket that shows me images of, yeah, my... That's what you're talking about. I thought you meant your scrying glass that shows you the future of the people you meet. I call it a palantir, but yeah, you can call it a scrying glass.

You approached it in the most obvious way. I look at it and it, you know, it shows me way. I thought you meant one of Father and Erie's mirrors that you carry with you, yeah. Yeah, it shows me- Wait, what? You haven't read those books, Dan, you haven't read those books. Okay, sorry. You know, showing me constant images of war crimes

and civil unrest and just the worst people in the world stoking tensions on the world to enrich themselves, coupled with various other capitalism type stuff, things that bum me out. And for me, movies are an escape. So, firing up the Garfield movie, I see filmmakers take the simplest idea, a cat that is very lazy, likes to eat and is sarcastic.

And somehow they deliver what might be one of the most soulless things I've seen. Just such a fundamental misunderstanding of a very simple character. Yeah. And. You're saying, wait, so you're saying that when you imagined a Garfield movie,

a character that the audience knows well This character has been around for nearly 50 years at this point You didn't think the best story for Garfield lazy orange cat is to Sneak into a dairy in order to reunite two cows that have fallen in love. I have this a problem Despite having no particular love for Garfield other than a fondness, you know For birthday and growing up in the 80s reasons just like a vague sort of warm feeling Despite having no particular love for Garfield other than a fondness, you know, for a birthday and growing up in the 80s reasons, just like a vague sort of warm feeling,

I don't think it's a funny strip. I don't particularly like it, but I have a fondness for him. So I still have the same problem. It's certainly no mutts. It's no mutts by Patrick McDonald, that's for sure. I definitely have the same problem that Stuart had when I'm like. He's more of a shoe guy.

Yeah, Dan loves shoe. This is a very simple premise that this movie seems to have no interest in. I will argue with you on one thing. I don't know that people know, like youngsters know Garfield these days, Elliot. Not the same way that they. Like no young person is reading the comics page.

Certainly not the same way they did when I was a kid, where every year that new Garfield collection would come out and it was the top seller of the Scholastic Book Fair at school, everyone was buying it, Garfield was everywhere, certainly Garfield is not- He was sitting around the house, you know? Certainly Garfield mania is not what it once was. But that being said, if you're gonna make a movie for kids

about a lazy orange cat that loves to eat, this is, as original IP, this is not the movie that you make, yeah. We should say, like Elliot, you know, for the young people in the audience, Elliot is not overstating the popularity of Garfield. There was a time in which you could not pass a car without seeing that furry orange cat suctioned to the back car.

Garfield was very close to being elected President of the United States, I feel like. Yeah, I mean, there was a president named Garfield, but I guess being elected president of the United States, I feel like. Yeah, I mean there was a president named Garfield, but I guess they can have two, right? The Bushes did it. We could do it. Yeah, there's two Adams, two Bushes. There were two Adams? Scott Adams was president? Yeah, Dilbert's Scott Adams was president.

Ugh, what a terrible president he would make. Not that different from the current one. Exactly. Anyway, but he'd be like, if our current president was a vegetarian, that's basically the only difference. But yeah, because Garfield the Cat was the son of James Garfield, the original president, so it would have been similar. But you know, Garfield was the most popular comic strip

other than Peanuts for years and years, right guys? I feel like other than the Charlie Brown characters, there was no one more recognizable on the comics page than Garfield. You know, and television specials, we watched the TV show. We had whole TV series, Garfield and Friends, which is a great cartoon show.

Yeah, with US Acres, yeah, hell yeah. Yeah, the US Acres, the cartoons, which were like, it's like they were just saying to America, hey kids, use the bathroom for a little bit, now's your chance. The Macy's Thanksgiving day balloon with the meme that I love of whoever the announcer was saying, ah, here comes that son of a gun,

that cat, that Garfield, that gigantic thing. Part of it is, I think for me, the Jim Davis is a really fucking talented draftsman. Like he's delivering super crisp, clean art that I found very appealing. Well, his assistants are now delivering that. Whoever's working for Jim Davis is doing a great job. At the beginning. Yeah, okay, yeah.

Like you're not gonna knock various manga artists because they have a league of uncredited assistants. I laugh at the idea that Jim Davis has drawn a Garfield strip since I don't know. But I mean, I'm like, he probably drew some of the ones in the 80s. Yes, for sure. For sure.

For sure. But this is not a Charles Shultz level of devotion to making it a single man's artistic statement. I mean, he wasn't in the fucking movie programming the digital models and stuff. That's a good point. That's a very good point. He was like, how can I make this look worse

than my drawings? I mean, again, a fondness for Garfield, and Garfield has a second life now, I think, in like mean stuff like Garfield without Garfields, and like early. Yeah, because he's such an enormous cultural artifact. But he did start out too, like, Stewart has praised Jim Davis.

Now I come to bury him. Like he designed Garfield. The stated purpose of Garfield was what would be good for merchandising. He looked around. He was like, OK, well, there's a dog. There's no big cat, you know, and he's like, let me give it a few traits that will be good for, you know, coffee mugs and whatnot. I may have read this wrong, but I read somewhere, I think that it was either inspired by Charles Schultz or Charles Schultz giving him this advice

that it was like, you should have Garfield stand on two legs because in those early Garfield strips, he stands like a cat, he's on four legs all the time. And then it was like a lightning bolt, inspiration, revelation, that if he stands on two feet, he can be that much more kind of like smaller, rounder, expressive, cuter, you know, that's part of the secret.

He's a bipedal cat, you know. Guys, let's get into the Garfield movie and find out why it has upset Stuart so much, why this might have been the thing that broke Stuart Wellington. We're gonna find out. And we should make it very clear, we're not talking about Garfield the movie from 2004,

that is a 21 year old live action movie, that's somewhere Bill Murray does the voice about Garfield the movie from 2004 that is a 21 year old live-action movie That's where Bill Murray does the voice of Garfield. It was that was the movie which while promoting it with Jennifer love who it went on the Daily Show and and John made her feel bad by accident by talking about what a dumb movie But uh, but this is the this is the Garfield movie not Garfield's the movie And we should and and Stuart to set the stage for Stuart's madness, and not my madness, I don't mean insanity, I mean his anger.

Could be both. Yeah, it did drive it. He did call me up after watching it and say something about how he could see the fnords, and there was non-Euclidean geometry all around him, and I was like, this movie's driven you mad, Stuart. There's some very key things about Garfield. Garfield is lazy, Garfield is sarcastic,

Garfield does not particularly seem to like his owner, John. These are all things that are not true of this movie's Garfield rule. So they touch on it briefly. Garfield, he's lazy, he's gluttonous, he loves lasagna, he hates Mondays, he hates spiders, he hates this cute cat named Nermal, and he is very condescending towards his sensible owner.

He is clearly the one who runs the house. And that's, yeah, that's Garfield. Like that's it. That's all of what's Garfield. That's Garfield. Yeah, that's what Garfield means to me. When a cat hits your eye with like a big lasagna pie, that's Garfield.

So, and this movie kind of hits some of those bullet points early on and then is like, forget everything you knew about Garfield. Time to do something different. Yeah, so before we get a bunch of backstory we see like Garfield lives with John they live in a house He lives they also have a dog named Odie now Odie is one of I would say the biggest care of mischaracterizations In the movie smart in this movie. Yes. Yes, and they make them, you know compatriots rather than,

Garfield tolerates Odie at best. Yeah, I feel like the running gag is him kicking Odie. Yes, indeed. And also that Garfield uses a phone for quite a bit of the opening of this movie, which seems like a real fuck you to the audience. Like, hey, guess what? You're gonna go out to this character

just using a screen for a little bit. So then we get a little bit of backstory. How did we get here? How did we get ourselves in this mess where this cat is running this man's life? Well, it begins with Garfield as a baby, which I'm like, already we have a baby, a cute baby Garfield.

And I'm like, that was fucking Nermal, dude. And the whole existence of Nermal was Garfield hating him. Like, why do we have like a cute version, a cuter version of Garfield? Because we've gotal was Garfield hating him. Like, why do we have like a cute version, a cuter version of Garfield? Because we've got to make Garfield this incredibly popular character for 40 years. We got to make him likeable, Stu. We got to get the audience on his side. We got to give Nicholas Holt more chances to the voice of John Arbuckle with,

I have to say, one of the stranger performances that I've seen from Nicholas Holt, who is an actor I love. I've seen so many great performances. I've seen from Nicholas Holt, who is an actor I love. I've seen him do so many great performances. I've seen him do so many different interesting voices. And this whole time I was like, this is not the best use of Nicholas Holt. Well, also we have to see Garfield as a kid so we can give him daddy issues,

which is the only thing that Hollywood understands. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Daddy issues or, actually that's true. It's two kinds of daddy issues. Either your dad left you or you're a dad and you don't have time for your kids because you're working all the time. Those are two things that Hollywood understands.

The only daddy issues I like are the People Magazine special issue focusing on Pedro Pascal. So that was much more wholesome than I thought. Yeah, I thought it was going to be much more much more overtly sexual. Yeah. It's don't ask you about his bear issues. So you're stealing my honey. So in Garfield's backstory, he has a father who is a large alley cat named Vic

who abandons him in an alleyway. Go on. I don't want to stop you right away, but I will. And so the cat, Garfield's voice, as all voices are these days, is Chris Pratt. And the dad is Samuel L. Jackson. And I was torn between being like, well, I'm pro colorblind casting,

and being like, is it racist that we're giving him a black sounding father who abandoned, like the deadbeat dad is his black father of a white cat Wow this Dan you are you are noticing a problematic thing that I feel bad I did not pay attention to maybe because I was already so not not looking for meaning in a Garfield Yeah, I will say Chris Pratt has a hard hard has got a hard Row to hoe here because Garfield's voice. It's a couple different people have done the job But for me it will still always be Lorenzo Music,

who did his voice in the early specials. It gets a little Easter egg in the back story. There's a music store in the back called Lorenzo's Music. Which I had to explain to Charlene and she, her eyes glazed over immediately. She was like, wait, Lorenzo Music? You mean Carlton, your doorman? And you go, oh, he was more things

than just wrote as doorman. She's like the voice of Peter Fankman in the real Ghostbusters. Exactly. But yeah, it's how do you guys feel about Chris Pratt's performance as Garfield? He's really putting on an interesting new voice, right? He is not. I you know, I just doing his regular voice. Like Chris Pratt has done good voice performances in the past. Yeah, drop a couple on us. No, the Lego movie I think is good. And then like I was not, you know,

I did not really care about like the whole like Mario controversy. I'm like, eh, whatever. It's like it's not great, but like... Pratt is an Italian American name, right? Well, I mean, I think the fact that to be honest, the Mario character as a New York Italian American probably does sound more like Chris Pratt than it's some me, Mario, which is not a,

which is itself a cartoonishly Italian voice. I'm just saying that like, I don't think it was like a great voice performance, but it was certainly, it certainly had energy, whereas this has to my mind, very little energy. Yeah. Which I mean, on some level fits the character Garfield. Yeah, but not, it doesn't seem intentionally lazy but when he is surfing on food being delivered by a drone

because he's fighting evil dogs on top of a train, you do want a little bit of energy from the character. Okay, so... Oh, by the way, I watched this movie with my younger son. Remind me when we get to the later movie to tell you about when my younger son pitched a punch up on one of the jokes in it that I thought was much better than what they had in the movie. I was very proud of him, yeah.

So we get some backstory, a baby Garfield goes looking for food, he finds what? Mama Leoni's pizzeria, he sees John Arbuckle about to tuck into some food, and he is like licking the window. John Arbuckle is noticeably sad when he sees the families at Mama Leoni's and he's all by himself. Yeah, he's a lone diner.

And I mean, I feel like that's also like a kind of a weird restaurant to go eat by yourself. Like go sit at the bar. A family to go to the place from Nighthawk, from Nighthawk's the painting. Like that's where you go when you're lonely, is an Edward Hopper restaurant. Yeah.

But he, you know, he takes pity on this baby cat. Or go to Nighthawk, the movie theater. Why not? It's a great theater. Yeah, why not? Edward Hopper never painted it, but that doesn't mean it's bad. Yeah, you can just order food in the movie and then leave when you're done eating. Yeah, no one sees you're alone because the movie's going on and it's dark in there. Especially like if you eat gross like Dan does sometimes. What? It means it's dark. No one can see you. Especially like if you eat gross like Dan does sometimes. What?

It means it's dark, no one can see you. I'm just joking, we all eat gross sometimes. I mean, when you're watching the substance, you gotta eat gross, right? Yeah, that's the special ad with the substance, gross. Eat gross the way you want to at the substance. Okay, so there's some like hijinks in the restaurant where Garfield's eating everybody's food,

doesn't matter, John takes him home, he's like, maybe I'll give this cat up, and Garfield some like, hijinks in the restaurant where Garfield's eating everybody's food. Doesn't matter. John takes him home. He's like, he's like, maybe I'll give this cat up. And Garfield's like, no, no, no, they love each other. Take him home. The scene where Garfield is eating all the food and John is trying to stop people from noticing it, I turned to my son and I said, so is this funny to you? Like, do you find this funny?

Are you laughing? Is this like a clown? Does it amuse you? And he just turned to me and shrugged me and went, eh. It's like, I don't think he knew that it was supposed to be funny. Like that's how not successful it is as like a joke. So it does highlight kind of the general like scene structure in a lot of this movie is just make it fast.

Make a lot of stuff happening fast, which I feel like on some level it goes against a very lazy cat like Garfield. Now can I mention that the director of this picture, so on the low end... Sydney Lumet? Yeah. Lumet? Oh, how continental of you.

On the low end directed Chicken Little, on sort of the neutral end Cat's Don't Dance, and on the high end Emperor's New Groove. And asked Green and on the high end, Emperor's New Groove. And- Green screenwriter too, right, for Emperor's New Groove? I don't know, I don't know about that. And he was, this guy, he was, it's Mark Dindal, he's a long time Disney animator. Yeah, and I think that this movie

has some moments of like successful slapstick, and the problem is it's just tied into a movie that it should not be part of. There's stuff in here that I'm like, well, I could see myself enjoying this if this was not a Garfield movie, which is part of the problem with like the obsession with IP, because like this doesn't feel

like a Garfield movie in the first place. So if it's just an unrelated kids movie, I'd be like, yeah, whatever. I mean, it's not really for me, but there's a couple of like laughs in there kids would like it if it was called you know son or something like that yeah junior cat Williams something like that yeah mm-hmm and there's a part at the end where Garfield keeps stepping in the way of traffic and all the cars have to stop short and they're getting annoyed

Adam that's a funny part that was timed really well you know yeah but it doesn't feel like Garfield it feels like it's something a different character would do so we see the passage of time they move a John moves out of an apartment moves into a house They have they gain a dog named Odie We see them getting into all kinds of goofy situations where Garfield basically is now running this house He has a nice big lazy boy all this stuff this this shows you this is another thing I feel like I feel like people who make the obviously adults make these movies not kids I think they sometimes don't really get what kids will be interested in because the the transition from an apartment to a two-bedroom

Two-bathroom house is something that I don't think kids need mentioned or to see necessarily John I'll cook just be in a house the whole time. It's not something that you're coming cares about You're coming out in favor of child labor. You're saying that more children should have been involved. Yes, very much so. Exactly. With their little hands, they can draw things better. Dude, all we need to do, I think it's pretty straightforward. We take kids, we shove them in front of that Zoltar machine, whatever, make them big.

OK, then they can give us their fucking ideas. And we can make them get around. Child labor laws that way. That's Roger, Roger... Roger Loja. Robert Loja knew what was going on there. Robert Loja knows. That's how you get good toys. It's like there was a, in the Dog Man movie,

which we did not do for this podcast, I believe, but which I saw with my children, there's a... Should have done it. Yeah, yeah, give us a, missed that movie. I kind of stopped paying attention partway through, but it's fine. I mean, the Dog Man books, I came to really appreciate eventually. They get very emotionally rich at a certain point

but that but the Supporting character who eventually becomes King of the North from the first law series by Joe Abercrombie exactly. Yeah, exactly that's what it's but that the the but there's a part in it where dog man is like sad because His before he became a dog man He had a girlfriend and now she has left him. And I was like, what kid cares about this? Like what kid wants there to be a romantic subplot in their movie about a cop with a dog's head

who fights a cat and makes robots? Like come on. Well, there is like, as soon as they start giving us backstory about how Garfield was abandoned as a child, I'm like, what the fuck are you doing, movie? Like we don't need this. And what we also don't need is a sequence where Garfield explains why he hates Mondays.

Like, bitch, part of what makes Garfield so approachable is that he hates, this dude doesn't even have a job and he hates Mondays. The thing is, everybody identifies with that. Everybody on the planet hates fucking Mondays. Yeah, this is not certainly a unique observation. I believe I've seen this out in the universe, but it is odd that Garfield hates Mondays,

seeing that he does not have a job. And the reason most people hate Mondays is that they work a regular work week, not everyone, but many people, and so Monday represents. That makes sense, that makes sense that makes sense Dan But if I could ask you just one question isn't there something inherently comical in a cat hating Mondays when it does not have a job Isn't it almost a ridiculous juxtaposition leading to a humorous?

reaction or an ironic so much of Garfield is Listen a like a gentle nod and being like, yeah Garfield, food is delicious. I don't know. Whatever. Mondays are bad. I don't feel like the comic ever makes that sort of connection though. No, you're right, that makes sense.

That makes sense. Comics are better when they explain the jokes and they don't let the audience find them. Yeah, like it's Agni-Navarro. I mean, maybe I'm poisoned by knowing that Jim Davis wanted this to be a merchandising bonanza, but I feel like it's hatred of Mondays. It's like acting out the water.

It feels like something that is just like, this would be good for posters. You're right, you're right. Merchandising is always bad. Like, don't the peanuts shill for MetLife, Daniel? Don't you love them? But that's not part of the strip there. Like, Snoopy isn't going up to like Shermie. Like, you gotta get a policy.

Yeah, that's right, that's right. Because Garfield does a lot of product placement in its comic strip. You make a good point. You make a good point. No, my point is the Monday thing is from the comics. But yeah, so do you think it's being paid by the No Mondays Council?

Like, I understand. I'm saying, like, this'll be a good thing to put on a shirt or whatever. Because art that seeks to connect with humans based on their own personal frustrations, that's bad. I guess that's bad. You know, Columbo, you're getting really irritated. Wow, it sounds like one of the most famous person

in the cast, he was clearly the murderer. Columbo, you're getting really annoyed. You know, Lieutenant, this is getting a little annoying right now. You're picking apart everything. You're right, Dick Van Patten, you're right, and I shouldn't be asking you all these questions. Okay.

Columbo, could you just go? I don't want to be in this conversation anymore. I literally can't, I'm investigating a crime, and you're the suspect. Okay, well. No, but that makes sense, that makes sense. I'm investigating a crime and you're the suspect. Okay, well. Okay, so Garfield, Nody... No, but that makes sense. That makes sense. I should stop investigating the crime and do something else as a police detective. Garfield, Nody...

Maybe I should stop reviewing restaurants. You're right. You're right. I guess you went to Garfield. Garfield, Nody, go to get... I'm still on my first plot card. Yeah, there's not a plot to this thing. Whoa. There's too much. Someone say too much for a Garfield movie. I 100% would say that. I feel like if this is a movie, this should have just been a collection of incidents.

Too much, but we can bullet point it. I think a collection of incidents would be harder to... anyway. Well, that's... I mean, that's basically what the Garfield collections were in those things. Rocked my shit. I should have bet. I'm just saying it's harder to summarize something when nothing's important.

So, uh, so Garfield and Odie are trying to get Garfield a late night snack, and when they get kidnapped by Roland, Nolan, and Barry, a large Shar-Pei, a Whippet, and a Bird, who are goons, it's always goons around the Flophouse, should be called the Goon House. That's a different podcast. bird who are goons, it's always goons around the flop house. Should be called the goon house. That's a different podcast.

Okay. It's mostly about lube. Yep. They, I mean, there's a lot to talk about there, but they are kidnapping. Yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. It's a complicated subject.

They kidnap Garfield and Odie for their master jinx. A, what kind of cat is that? It's a white Persian cat. they kidnapped Garfield and Odie for their master jinx, a, what kind of cat is that? It's a white Persian cat. White Persian cat voiced by Hannah Waddington. Now these are all celebrity voices, because Roland is Brett Goldstein, Nolan is Bowen Yang. Like, some would say that there are

unnecessarily famous voices, as with many animated movies. Now I thought you were gonna point out these are all new characters instead of hanging around with Garfield and Odie and John and Liz, the veterinarian that John annoys. What about Arlene? Arlene, yeah, the waitress, right? Yeah.

Oh no, that's just his girlfriend, right? His cat girlfriend, yeah. His cat girlfriend, but yeah, there's also a waitress. Like any of these characters, it's just like, no, no, no, no. Here's a bunch of other characters from whatever unrelated script this started out as. Now I would say-

Well, we'll address each of these characters in turn, I'm sure. We'll give them a real ranking. And I would say, as much as- A real hot or not ranking, yeah. As much as giving Garfield a sad backstory, I think is a misstep. This is where the movie really, I was like,

oh, okay, I don't know what this movie is gonna be. Like, I don't know what's going on here. When Garfield and Odie are kidnapped by these genuinely, like genuinely menacing, unpleasant characters. Garfield and Odie get kidnapped by Jinx using her through her henchmen as an attempt to draw out Garfield's absentee father, Vic, who is some kind of like ne'er-do-well type scoundrel cat.

A real macavity. Yeah. Well, he's like a low-level macavity, maybe even more of a Bustopher Jones. Now, Vic is the absentee father who abandoned baby Garf and Garf found John. Jinx needs them to- We've done jokes about the world according to Garf at some point, right?

Yeah, of course. Now, also there's some additional backstory where we learn that Jinx wanted to be like a special cat but wasn't successful and then fell in with a bad crowd stealing things. This is all dumb bullshit. Unnecessary. So much backstory.

Just to be a villainous cat. We don't need to know the tragic reasons that pushed this cat towards crime. I do like some of the character design on Jinx. I like the way that she has, I like her kind of like bell-shaped body and I like that she has this like string of gems that glow different colors based on her mood.

I think that's interesting. They do some, I mean. Everything else I don't like. Every time she switches from friendly to evil very quickly and back, the lighting changes, that all looks really cool. I think it's fun, yeah. Yeah, it does feel like a character from a different movie, but it looks cool, yeah. And they occasionally like play that up

by like showing her henchmen actually using like a flashlight to cause lighting effects. I think that's fun. Yeah. but it looks cool, yeah. And they occasionally like play that up by like showing your henchmen actually using like a flashlight to cause lighting effects. I think that's fun. But Jinx needs, Jinx spends- Do you ever wonder how they, like how they made their base in this abandoned mall and how they got Garfield Nody hanging,

it seems 200 feet in the air, you know, from the ceiling of this mall. I did not wonder that despite my- Love the shit. The lies that you say about how I love backstory Jink stuff you must know excited about it is not wondering about any of it. I just accepted it because it was a cartoon so in part of her backstory Jinx was running around with Vic and

Committing crimes and while she was betrayed by Vic when they were trying to steal some milk from, what, Lactose Farms is the name of the thing. And as a lactose intolerant person, I am not a fan of this. This makes me upset. Also, it makes me upset to see a cat drinking milk all the time, because I know that gives cats diarrhea. Yeah, it's bad for cats, but I mean, I would think that you're happy that this milk

is being stolen and thus taken out of the e-kits. That's true, yeah, it's less likely to go. I mean I know this is all Humans who can process lactose probably we're gonna get some of this milk. Yeah, no, I'm saying won't go to Stu Yeah, we'll go If cats aren't stealing it out of the factory Stu has to drink it So she... That's... The deal...

Whenever America and Russia signed the first salt treaty, Stu always lactose tasting. That stated that, Stuart, to keep peace between the two nations, Stuart had to drink a lot of milk, yeah. You know. It's always a man for you, yeah. So using some questionable leverage at this point, Jinx convinces Vic, Garfield, and Odie

to go back to Lactose Farms and steal a very large quantity of milk as kind of payment for the time she spent in the pound. This was something that my younger son also explained to me was that he said, why does she want all that milk? It's gonna go bad before she can drink it. And like, that's a good point. Very good point.

You can't one can't drink that much milk. No, it's not. It's not the most shelf stable treasure. Well, also, the street value of milk is almost nothing, because if someone tries to sell you some milk in the street, you're like, where did this milk come from? Well, it's like the cart. The minute you take it off the lot,

the blue book value goes way down, just drops. So, our heroes set off, riding the rails, they sneak aboard a train car. Yep, Dan? Now, this was like the moment in my life where I felt the most like the comic book guy, like the nerd. I guess it wasn't the comic book guy, but it was in the one Simpsons episode

where it's like you hit the skeleton in the same place and it made two different sounds. I hope someone got inspired over that. Yeah, I was watching this, there's a part where Garfield is shot from like a tree limb through the train. He goes through an open train car, goes out the other side and then bounces back and goes through the same train car.

I'm like, no, that train car would have gone forward. Yeah. Like there's no way he could go through the same train car. And I was, and then I was like, what am I doing? Why do I care? Dan, I hate to say it, I had the exact same thought process where I was like, what am I doing? Why do I care? Dan, I hate to say it, I had the exact same thought process. Where I was like, he wouldn't have been able to fly back to the same train, but then I was like, you know, it doesn't matter.

It's the Garfield movie. Yeah. So yeah, as we address, he flies through the same train car multiple times. It's totally hilarious. This is one of the times when I started to say it also, and my younger son turned to me and he goes, he goes, don't just complain through the whole movie. Don't just tell me you don't like the movie. And then he wasn't enjoying it. When it was over, I was like, how was it? He goes, eh.

But he was like, don't just tell me what's wrong with the movie. Oh, wow. Yeah. So your son's a Midwestern, a polite Midwesterner who doesn't want to speak up. Exactly. You got to break him to that habit. Okay. Oh, trust me. to speak up. Exactly. You got to break him to that habit. Okay. Oh, trust me. He speaks up. So we arrive at the farm, Lactose Farm. Unfortunately, security has increased quite a bit since the last time Vic was here.

It's all high tech and intense. Luckily, they meet Otto, a purple bull, who I thought was a yak for a while, but I think he's a bull. The former Ving Rhames, who I can guarantee you recorded all his lines while seated. And while wearing a cool hat. But I'll say this, I think my favorite performance in the whole movie.

I think he does. I think you're right. The funniest voice performance, for sure. So this character was the former mascot of Lactose Farms, Otto the Bull, who it was him and a cow, Ethel, and they were deeply in love, but something happened and he got kicked out and she remains, I guess,

under lock and key by the farm. Is that correct? So they wanna heist the milk and he's gonna help them if they can heist the cow as well, essentially. Why heist the cow if you can heist the milk for free? That's a good point. While they're training and preparing, while they train and prepare,

Vic, I think we get Vic's backstory here. I think this was involved, they get tied up to a tree and Garfield and his dad get in an argument and we get Vick's backstory where he didn't actually abandon Garfield. He went off trying to get food, but then he showed up too late and then he saw Garfield with John

and like, it's fucking stupid. And he was like, oh, I guess my son's better off with this human Which is like yeah, he probably is Yeah, you can buy food Yeah, then having to scavenge it But I I don't know like he'll probably get fixed in so much as anything in the Garfield movie elicited Any sort of pathos for me? There were some mild twinges when I saw

the dad being like, looking at Garfield, being adopted basically in front of his eyes, and being like, huh, I guess it is for the best. Mm-hmm, yeah, yeah. Yeah, not since the story of Moses. Has someone had to see their son be taken for their own safety and it had such a pathos to it, and such importance.

Yep, Garfield. Sort of the Moses of cats. be taken for their own safety and it had such pathos to it, and such importance. Yep. Sort of the Moses of cats. So Otto, who has an understanding of the layout, but is much too large to sneak in, stays back. They all put acorns in their ears, which work as like radios. Yeah, like little walkie talkies. Our cats and dog friend all sneak in

pretending to be backpacks. They go around inside this high tech facility, which is very much like a bunch of modern animation bullshit. Like there's a scene where like Garfield is almost getting chopped up or shredded like cheese. And you're like, it's all the fucking mayhem conveyor belt sequence from episode two, Attack the Clones, right? Where stuff's about to smash them all the time. I got so mad, he's on a big block of cheese and these big cleavers are chopping it up

and he keeps running back and forth along the block of cheese and I was like, Garfield, you exist in three dimensions. Go forward off the cheese. Get out so you're not within the reach of the blades and I was like just can't hear you I kept shouting and shouting but he couldn't hear me Danny come here I'm like I was worried about him and I'm like at what we have strayed so far from the just sarcastic cat who sits around complaining about shit the fact that he is running through a high tech action sequence.

Oh, I hate it. Meanwhile, Jinx makes a phone call to Marge Malone, the head of security at Lactose Farms, voiced by Cecily Strong, who, you know, gives a pretty fun performance, I guess. She's fun. She's fine. And using a phone app that will be used repeatedly

throughout the movie where the cats and dogs can change their voice to sound like a human voice. So here's the thing, and this really got to me because what this means is when Garfield is talking, he's talking, like he's speaking out loud. And in the Garfield comics, again, I hate to be the comic book guy, Garfield, John cannot understand Garfield.

Garfield doesn't, when he can speak to other animals or spiders or whatever while he's thinking. But the idea that if the animals can use this app to change their voices, why doesn't he just talk to John? Why doesn't he talk to any human being? Part of the joy is that- Humans can use it to translate the animals, yeah. And part of the joy is that John,

like it's Garfield reacting to John being an idiot. Like it's him running a monologue and talking shit. Well also, I understand why the security person needs to be able to translate this for plot reasons, but it was a much funnier joke, I mean not that I was like ha ha ha ha ha, but it was a much funnier joke. I mean, not that I was like, ha ha ha ha ha, but it was a much funnier joke when the jinx is calling up and trying to frame the cat,

and then you cut to the person on the other line and they just hear meow meow meow meow meow. But this app, it fundamentally changes the nature of human animal relations in a way that this movie, it's like in Zookeeper, how we talked about how the lion is like, we could always talk, we just don't say it because it freaks people out. It's like, really, you don't want to tell people

to stop killing you and putting you in zoos? Because it seems like that's a good use of language. But it's a- One of the top uses. No, yeah, they don't, being freaked out is worse. It's a little bit like watching a romantic comedy. If there's a romantic comedy where the guy's like, I really got to impress my date.

And he goes, I guess I'll fly. And he just starts flying through the air. I would be like, whoa, whoa, whoa. This movie has just fundamentally changed what it's about. I can no longer care whether these two get together now that I know that man has conquered gravity in this movie. So yeah, they infiltrate the complex.

They think they're about to close in on the keys, but it turns out that Marge Malone, head of security, is there. She talks some shit, and then Vic manages to snatch the keys and leave Garfield and Odie behind. He betrays them, and he drives away with the milk truck. Again, questions of how a cat is able to drive a car is not really addressed, but that's fine. It seems like he's big enough to fit in the seat and and hit the pedals and then we and also the truck itself this

Milk truck it looks like at one of the war so the size of the cat was the issue for you I'll have the fact that the cat knows how to This point if at this point I gotta buy a certain I know it bothered me that it bothered me that you have an animal Translating app and it has not revolutionized human society But at a certain point it is a cartoon and I got some things I got to just buy go along with you know It bothered me that you have an animal translating app and it has not revolutionized human society, but at a certain point it is a cartoon and I got some things I gotta just go along with. The, I mean, well, I'm sure we'll talk about

each of these OCs in time, but I do wanna point out that I think it's a mistake. Original characters. Okay. Oh. Yeah, is the, I think it is a design flaw to make Garfield's dad just bigger than Garfield. Garfield should be the biggest of them.

He should not be- It certainly makes Garfield look less like a lazy, out of shape cat if his dad is, if he's one of the smaller characters in the movie. Yes. Yeah. Okay, so they're- I will say it is a little weird also that Garfield at the end of the movie, cooks dinner for everybody,

and John is not like, holy shit, my cat is cooking. And then it turns into one froggy evening. He opens a restaurant. My cat can cook. You've got to see this cooking cat. He won't do it for anybody else, yeah. Not on Mondays, John.

What? Oh, that's a good joke. We shouldn't have called the restaurant Mondays, the restaurant that's only open Mondays, John. What? Oh, that's a good joke. We shouldn't have called the restaurant Mondays, the restaurant that's only open Mondays. So... TGI Mondays. For their crimes, Garfield and Odie are stuck in the Pound.

And they, while they're in the Pound, they connect with a few of Vic's former crew who are all there, all voiced by more celebrity voices. Yep, Snoop Dogg is one of them. You got Snoop Dogg, you got Janelle James, and you got Angus Cloud RIP in a final performance, which is wild. And that basically just kind of fills out

a little more of Vic's backstory. More time spent talking about a character that isn't Garfield. The John shows up and he springs Garfield and Odie from the pound. They're about to tuck into a massive lasagna feast that John has prepared. He had been going out of his mind missing his pets, which I understand. If my pets were missing, I would be devastated. And that's when Garfield pauses. He stops eating lasagna for a moment

because he remembers the words that Vic may have been watching him while he was growing up. So he goes out to the tree that he believes Vic was hanging out in, and he sees a plethora of hash marks that Vic had made every single time he came to visit his son,

which is also a weird thing to do, that every time he came to watch Garfield, he put a slash and then he would bundle his sticks. He would do full like fives as a bundle all over this tree. This is how long I've been in prison, Mark. Yeah, it's kind of wild Well, he was always he was like there's a cut scene where he talks about how much he was influenced by the Batman villain's as Yeah, so that's why he loves those hash marks. Yeah. Yeah, if you were to if you were to shave

Vic you would see that his body's covered in this. Oh, I mean like yeah, I Get that he's like supposed to be ashamed of everything or whatever and he wants to keep his, he doesn't wanna confuse Garfield maybe by re-entering his life, but this revelation feels pretty empty. Like, oh, oh, he was here watching me from a distance this whole time, never making contact. Great, that shows he loves me.

Not since the story of Moses, when Moses' own mother was, I guess, I believe hired as his nursemaid and could not reveal her identity to him, you know, I would say the idea of a shameful cat father is Fundamentally not cat like no I feel like cats are that's part of Garfield's appeal is that cats are kind of jerks I love him for it. I just like I love Garfield

But cats are not like that's more of of jerks. I love them for it, just like I love Garfield. But cats are not like, that's more of a dog treat. I, what I think is really the bad thing is that they didn't take this opportunity to do a parody of the song, Somebody's Watching Me by Rockwell called Some Daddy's Watching Me, which I think would have fit this scene perfectly. Or a cats in the cradle bit, cause you know, they're cats. Cats, yeah. Dan, other songs that could have fit this? They could have changed it to Gar a cats in the cradle bit, because you know they're cats. Cats, yeah.

Dan, other songs that could have fit this? They could have changed it to Garfs in the Cradle. I was too busy internally arguing with the idea that cats are jerks. You know, they, you know. And the Nermal Smoot. You have to meet them at their level. They're not going to give their love unconditional.

Feline eyes are watching you. That could be another one. Yeah, it took you a little while, but you got there. Yeah, I got there. It took me a little bit of time to think out about it. So with this revelation that Vic actually loves him and was a good dad, not a bad dad, soccer dad. Well, not a good dad, but that he cared about him.

So they rush over to the mall that was Jinx's hideout and using the evidence dungeon that Jinx had left, they discover that Jinx's plan is to get on a train and throw Vic off of a bridge. Off the Mile High Bridge. What a clever plan. Also but it's playing off of the famous Garfield landmark, the Mile High Bridge. We remember all the amazing Garfield stories that are set around this famously high bridge,

right? Mm-hmm. So they, using their acorn earpieces, they contact Otto the Bull, and they get Otto to agree to help them save Vic by doing a train job. Otto's help seems not really necessary, and here's one of the things about this. Until the very end. Until the very end. But they wouldn't have known that was going to happen. So he's like, you're gonna get on that train and then just as it hits the bridge,

you'll jump out with your dad and you'll land in a net that Odie is tying. And while they get on the train, it takes them a little bit of time to get to the bridge. So I was like, why don't they just jump off the train before they get to the bridge so they don't have to fall a mile into a net? That seems like a better plan in some ways, you know?

So this leads to a bunch of action and silliness. High drinks. And Garfield saves the day by calling in 6,000 food delivery drones. So he's like surfing around on pizza boxes and eating, I think he eats hot sauce and breeds fire on people. This is really just a holding action though, because by the time he's done with this whole action sequence

of using food as weapons Everything is exactly back where it started. He's still dealing with the same bad guys on the train So he's really he's accomplished very little with this. Yeah, there's a lot of also a product placement in this film at the end I believe he like or like like explicitly orders Online from like like FedEx delivers it and yes yes it's like a there's like it's a Walmart I don't forget what like Target or something like it's all branded very obviously for a an animated movie and all that free advertising for Mama Leone's pizza sure that is that a real pizzeria okay no I

don't think so you never know man I don't I don't know I don't think so. You never know, man. I don't know all the flyover states. Yeah, you don't know where the cool cats eat. Okay, so by the end of this train adventure, Jinx's goons turn on her. They don't want to do her dirty work no mo. In what some would call an arbitrary plot twist. I just want to highlight that I teased to you guys on text that there was one time when I actually laughed out loud. It was when they jump off the thing, the train, they go to the net and they said like Garfield

meets Vic on the, like Vic is bouncing back up and they meet in the middle and he goes net's too tight or something like that and they both just like go right back onto the train after onto the train after escaping the train. I thought that was a funny bit. It was funny. Yeah. One time I did not laugh was when Garfield goes,

that's right, I do my own stunts. And then pause. And me and Tom Cruise. And it was like, yeah, like it's not funny to say Tom Cruise does his own stunts. Like that's not a joke. That's just a- Yeah, did you just put that in there in case Tom Cruise is watching

Yeah, so he would then after the movie go up to somebody some employee at the movie at the AMC and be like hey They mentioned me in the movies Like a madman you see Garfield the Garfield movie talk about me He'd have to go to David Miscavige's like, did you see Garfield? The Garfield movie talks about me. He'd have to go to David Miscavige and say, make all the Scientologists go see the Garfield movie. They mentioned my name in it. If you're gonna do that joke,

make a joke about an actor who you don't expect to do all their own stunts. That would be, that's a joke, you know. Yeah, who'd that be, Dan? Oh, I don't know, Paul G. Mahoney. I mean, Paul G. Mahoney can do anything. I feel like he might do it, actually. But if he was like, I do all my own stunts.

Me and Tyne Daly. I'd be like, okay, that's a joke. Okay, so in the process, not only do they survive... I apologize. We missed where I want to tell you about my son's punch-up. Oh, yeah, please. I was fucking aching for this one. Yeah, sorry. Garfield is about to... Otto is about to launch Garfield onto the train and Garfield says to him,

if I don't make it back, tell my story. Which is kind of like, okay, it's kind of a boilerplate line. My son turned to me and he goes, he should have said, if I don't make it back, serve lasagna at my funeral. I was like, that's a much better line. Yeah. It's a better line.

It's more Garfield, yeah. So they managed to, in the process, they survive and they capture Jinx. They trade Jinx to Marge Malone, again using the voice changer app. This amazing animal translating voice changer app. They trade this criminal cat in exchange for the cow mascot, Ethel, for some,

this is a wild idea that the head of security's like, okay, yeah, you can have this cow because I need to punish this cat. You can have the mascot of the company, whose worth is, you know, must be in the millions. It's a big company. Millions, yeah. In exchange for this criminal cat who I'm going to do what with?

Why is this of use to me? Yep, so of course they they trade the the they trade Ethel the cow who walks over there sees Otto And then let's get it on plays and we're like, I guess they're fucking yeah. Yeah, that's what they're doing All right getting it on. I mean, yeah, I get it Like again being Reims gives a really good performance and I mean, I'd say that's a pretty hot cow I mean, I guess I don't have pretty hot cow. I mean, I guess. I don't have. I've seen hotter, I've seen less hot, you know.

Thank you. Okay, and then, so they get back home with John and after a moment's hesitation, Garfield invites Vic to live with them. So now we have this new character all the fucking time. Yeah, yeah. That really blew my mind. Again, I have like this base level of familiarity fondness with Garfield, but I

don't really give like a shit about Garfield as like an artistic endeavor because I don't believe it is, but it's still about my Garfield. That's a pretty that's a good one. That's actually good. They do some strange things with that book. Yeah, but it blew my fucking mind that this movie ends with like, and now this new character, Garfield's dad, lives with them. You're gonna love this. It's canon. And there's, in the like montage,

there's the briefest moment where you see Nermal, and I'm like, where the fuck was Nermal this whole movie? Yeah. Why, they, okay. There's a part where they're eating cereal, and it's- Abu Dhabi, probably. yeah, he's still coming back from Abu Dhabi Yeah, there's a part of eating cereal and binky the clown is on the cereal box And I'm like can't wait to see that clown in this oh wait

No, not gonna happen out of the movie so strike for the fans so again normal's barely in it We get none of the US acre dudes including that fucking shell with the legs sticking out So let's talk about the OCs, okay? I'm assuming these are all original characters. Take us Orson, I know that. So we have Vic. What are our thoughts on Vicks? I've already said, I don't like him.

I think he should be bigger than Garfield. I don't care for Vic. I mean, like, it's not Vic's fault so much, it's just like, I don't like this, like, oh, we got to have a dad problem who has Much time if it's a Garfield movie Why are you introducing a new character and making them giving them kind of equal weight with the main character? Like why are you doing that?

We got It's a very Walter situation very much with like hey people love the Muppets You know who they want to see a new character who's not even a fucking animal. You got Roland and Nolan, the two goons. They're like Sharpay and the Whippet. I mean, I'll give them credit for having one big guy, one little guy. Like that's a classic comedy, physical dynamic. Otherwise, they seem to have very little personality.

There's nothing particularly funny about them. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, like, it's kind of a first thought Idea to have Brett Goldstein to be like a growly character, but he did a good job at it Ray Winstone wasn't available. Yeah Nolan. I feel like is a is a sub Weasel from Roger Rabbit type of villain. Yeah, I mean, but those are I mean those are fucking Yeah, those are like they're up there with Salacious Crumb when it comes to bad guys.

If those guys showed up in almost any movie, I'd be like, hell yeah. You're watching Offenheimer, we only got the scientists for the project, and it's those weasels from Roger Rabbit. I mean, those suits would fit, dude. This is the time period. They would fit right in there.

We need these suits and weasels. Like they would get along so well with fucking Robert Downey Jr.'s character. For sure. Do we really need the one who's just brandishing a straight razor all the time? You know we do. He's going to use that to split an atom. Yeah, of course. Oh, god damn it.

And you know, when they show up in any movie, I'd be like, Shar, Shar, Shar. I know we're watching Portrait of a Lady on Fire, but the weasels just showed up. Paul Giamatti, there's a couple students you have to chaperone over Christmas at the school. Oh no, it's those weasels. Even the one that's just laughing and bonking himself on the head all the time.

Oh, yeah. The one with the beanie. Sure, yeah. Yeah. They're all students at this private boarding school, yeah. Yeah, oh man. If you've got rich weasel parents, you can get in anywhere, no matter how goofy or.

And most of them end up leaving, so it's just Paul Giamatti and that one weasel. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sure. Just the one weasel. Yes, a name. Okay, so we've talked about them. What about. I feel like this is a whole mini we should do

is just inserting those weasels into other movies. What about Otto and Ethel, our cow characters? Get to know Ethel that much, but I'm sure she's wonderful because I'm fond of Otto. Ving Rhames' performance is strong. I feel like they do not belong in this movie. Yeah. No, but his performance is strong. I feel like they do not belong in this movie. Yeah. No, but his performance is strong.

And also, I will say this, Otto's personality, which is kind of like bitter and resentful and sarcastic and condescending, that fits in a Garfield story. Like that's the kind of personality that Garfield should have, as opposed to smiling all the time and being like, I love my life, I'm Garfield.

But I think that Otto, at least it doesn't make sense for them to be helping, again, for them to be helping a bull rescue his girlfriend from a lactose, from a milk farm, doesn't make sense to me, Derry. But his personality, at least, I could see a couple weeks. Yeah, like a sub-Aardman animation style milk factory. Yes, very sub. Yeah, but I could see a couple weeks

of the Garfield strip where they like go to a farm and Garfield is dealing with Otto the Bull for whatever reason. Like either on vacation or something like that. Yeah. You know. And I think, oh, I guess, and Jinx the cat. I've mentioned, I like some of the design elements of Jinx, but also very unnecessary character.

Very secret life of pets, rather than Garfield. Yep, yep. Yeah, this is like a, I don't know, this is like a Beverly Hills chihuahua, but a cat and mean. Yeah. So I think it's time for, what's that, Dan? It's final judgments, whether this was a good bad movie, a bad bad movie, or a movie we kinda liked.

a bad bad movie or a movie we kind of liked. I'm gonna say Bad Bad, it is not a Garfield movie, let alone the Garfield movie. Dan, check the poster. It's the Garfield movie. And again, I think if it wasn't billed as a Garfield movie, I'd be a little easier on it, just because I have no preconceived notions about what something should be. And normally I don't really care, but it's like, why do it this

way? Why approach it this way? It's so weird. There's stuff in here that I'm like, oh, you know, this would be perfectly fine for a small child. There's nothing offensive in here. There's some fun slapstick stuff. But for full know, for a full grown man such as us, who should not be watching it anyway, I say it's a bad, bad movie. We're all big boys here. We're grown ups. Beep-y boys. Yeah, so I don't, you know, I don't I don't work in animation. I don't have a lot of experience working in animated things

that might involve talking animals. Of the three of us, I have the least experience with that. But there was just something that felt so like they took Garfield, a character that I really cared about a lot for some weird reason. And obviously I know it's like, it's a brand. Garfield is this weird cultural icon, but it just feels so strange to see this,

like, just to see this character misrepresented this way, and this character just kind of like stuck into a movie that he does not belong, and he is not, it's like, it'd be one thing if it was like, we're gonna take Garfield, but we're gonna put him in like Barry Lyndon or something. I'm like, well, he doesn't fit in there, but it's still Garfield.

But like, he's not, he doesn't feel like Garfield. But if you put those weasels in Barry Lyndon, oh man. Oh my God, they would fit perfectly. Okay, so yeah, this is a bad, bad movie, and I don't know, like, it just feels so emblematic of like an industry that is built around like, cut and paste style stories and just like churning out garbage.

That's what it felt like. Like not to be too cruel to the people making it. No, yeah, no churning out garbage. I think that sounded very constructive criticism. I feel like the people who worked on it, I feel like there is most likely an executive department that is more to blame than the people who worked on it, I feel like there is most likely an executive department that is more to blame than the people who worked on it. Oh, almost certainly.

So I will, I'm also gonna call this a bad bad movie. You know, like Dan's saying, it's not offensive. I don't love, like there's not that much of like, here's a joke for the grownups, wink wink in it. Yeah, yeah. It just, it feels like a misreading of what the things that people like about Garfield, the character are. Now, I could be wrong.

Again, the movie made, according to Wikipedia, it made $250 million of the box office. What? $60 million budget. So, we did okay. There were no other kids' movies that same weekend. Probably. Probably. But judging also by my...

So like, my older son, he was with us when he was little, when we did the Boss Baby family business movie. He really enjoyed that. My younger son really enjoys that movie. I don't love it, but they really enjoyed it. This one watching with my younger son, he just was not that into it.

It was not that entertaining to him. It was not that funny to him. So I could almost buy it on the level of, it's not for me, but a kid would like it. If I saw a kid liking it that it feels like it it didn't reach that bar either and so again it's not it's not so offensively bad that I'm like but it just it it fails to justify its existence in a way other than that there's money to be had in

Garfield so next time Hollywood when you do Garfield movie maybe just trying to make it more Garfield II like it time Hollywood, when you do a Garfield movie, maybe just try to make it more Garfield-y. Like it doesn't need a big backstory, don't need big action stakes. Paul Giamatti would be a great Garfield. Paul Giamatti would be a great Garfield. Don't animate him, put him in a cat suit. Who would fucking do that shit?

Live action Paul Giamatti Garfield, it's right on the shelf there with the Wallace Shawn Ziggy that they should have made. Paul Giamatti would be aatti Garfield. It's right on the shelf there with the Wallace Shawn Ziggy that they should have made. Like, Paul Giamatti would be a great Garfield. Yeah. Hi everybody, it's Ellen Weatherford. And Christian Weatherford. People say not to judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree. But we can judge a snake by its ability to fly or a spider by its ability to dive. Or a dung beetle by its ability to navigate with the starlight of the Milky Way galaxy. On Just the Zoo of Us we rate our favorite animals out of

ten in the categories of physical effectiveness, behavioral ingenuity, and of course, aesthetics. Guest experts like biologists, ecologists, musicians, comedians, and more join us to share their unique insights into the animal kingdom. Listen with the whole family on MaximumFun.org or wherever you get your podcasts. The wizards answer eight by eight. The cornclaves call to demonstrate their arcane gift, their single spell. They number sixty-four until a conflagration. Sixty-three and sixty-two they soon shall be, as one by one the wizards die, till one remains to reign on high.

Join us for Taz Royale, an oops all wizards battle royale season of The Adventure Zone every other Thursday on MaximumFun.org or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, this podcast is brought to you overwhelmingly by the support of listeners like you who are members at MaximumFun.org, but we do also have a sponsor this week and it is Squarespace. Maybe you want a website, maybe like Garfield without Garfield has already been done, but maybe Garfield with extra Garfields, like just stick a ton of more Garfields in this trip.

You could do that with Squarespace, which gives you everything you need to offer services and get paid all in one place. Now I don't know how you're going to get paid from this extra Garfield situation, especially because that's IP, it's not owned by you. You can't get sued, yeah, yeah. No, but you can think of an idea

that's almost as good as that. Like a pizzeria restaurant that's Garfield themed? Again, that was shut down for copyright reasons. But you can get paid on time with professional on-brand invoices and online payments. You can streamline your workflow with stuff like appointment scheduling built right in and email marketing tools. And also, you don't have to know how to design something. You can be as lazy as Garfield

because Squarespace also offers a complete library of professionally designed award-winning website templates with options for every category and use, drag and drop editing, styling options, visual design effects, no experience required. So head to squarespace.com slash flop for a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use offer code FLOP to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Elliot, you do a lot of stuff. I bet there's something you want to mention.

Oh, on Squarespace? Well, just your own personal blog. Oh, just the stuff that I do. Yeah I'll just plug the same stuff I've been plugging you know. I got my there's a picture book I have out now called Sadie Mouse Wrecks the House. It's a fun romp for kids of all ages and if you like that one maybe you like to try one of my other picture books that I've been out for a little bit. Horse Meets Dog or Sharko and Hippo but Sadie Mouse Wrecks the House is a new one. Also I still have Harley Quinn coming out

from DC Comics every month. I've been enjoying writing that. I just handed in a script for what's going to be the 200th issue of all, if you combined all of Harley Quinn's series together. And it made me realize that this is already the longest run I've got to do on a series. And if you keep buying them,

I'll just be able to keep doing them. So I'm excited to be on a book for a fair amount of time. And I also have another book coming out in November, but I'll talk more about that later in the year. Heh heh heh, Stuart, what about you? What do you have to promote? Well, I'll always promote my three bars here in Brooklyn, New York.

That's Hinterland's Bar, Minnie's Bar, and now Commonwealth Bar. And also, if you are interested in kind of like hanging out chill zone style, I do a regular weekly painting stream on Twitch, usually at one o'clock p.m. New York time, where I just hang out on Twitch and I paint little Warhammer guys and I yap for a while

and I answer questions in the chat and it's a nice, fun, chill afternoon. And my Twitch name is Stuart Wellington. You still remember. Sometimes I'll throw that on just so I can hear Stuart's, my friend Stuart's voice. Yeah, it's nice. Being like, and Dan did this, and I was like, what? And I'm sure, Dan, you also throw on my other podcast,

Smartless Presents Clueless, to hear my voice, right? Yeah, sure. Yeah, Smartless Presents Clueless, my puzzle podcast that I host and Sean Hayes is the star of. That's right, Sean Hayes from Will and Grace and Smartless. And the episodes are only about 12 to 15 minutes long and it comes out twice a week, although I think we're going to a once a week schedule. Check out that one too, if you like puzzle podcasts.

Guys, I need to have something else going on. You do, we've told you that. I mean, it's not like I'm not trying, but maybe we can figure something out. Maybe we can brainstorm. I mean, maybe you can use Squarespace to make a website where you just insert those weasels into all the different movies. Oh, extra weasels. I still think you should do a series of cooking videos on TikTok.

Yeah, I think you should do that. That's the route to success for me. I mean, it's either that or videos where you eat ice cream out of a toilet and people don't realize it's a joke and they get really mad about it online. There's gold to be had in that toilet. I mean, it's a very popular genre of video. How did I cut off the names of these people who... That's a good question who sent us letters.

I mean, usually we just say the first name. No, I know, but... Did Cher send in the letters? So you don't know how to say last name with health because there's no last name? No, I just, I... Madonna. When I cut and pasted this, this time around,

I somehow did not get the names in here. What's going on, guys. What's going on guys? What's going on with my brain? What happened to it? Oh boy. That's the side text that Elliot and I have. Okay, well, maybe you can let me in on what conclusions you've come to.

So far it's just been a lot of question marks. I apologize. And shrug emojis. I apologize very much to people who are not gonna get their proper credit. But so this first letter is from Question Mark. Question Mark, Question Mark, if this is you, feel free to give us a zero star review.

Question Mark. Hi, Floppers. I'm a faithful Flop listener since 2014. And as a Parisian resident, I was so excited when I saw your Under Paris episode drop into my feed. At one point, you were all wondering. What did we get wrong about Paris? Oh boy. No, no, no.

At one point, you were all wondering if Jaws ever got released in France, and Stuart posited that it was called Le Jaws. It's actually known as Dente de la Mer, which you could translate literally as the teeth of the sea. Ooh. Pretty cool. Anyway, the real mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, took a swim in the Seine to prove to everyone

that the river is swimmable, as it would be the site of the triathlon for the upcoming Olympic and Paralympic Games. Afterward, a newspaper ran a picture of her coming out of the water with a particularly toothy smile on her face. The headline read, Les Dentes de la Mer, spelled M-A-I-R-E, meaning mayor. So question, what's the best or worst pun you've ever seen from a movie critic about Mayor so damn question What's the best or worst pun you've ever seen from a movie critic about a movie they've seen or do you have any?

Punny headlines for any of your floppy saved gene shallot headline Thanks for a decade of great content here once and more to this one here's ten more come to Paris We should do a come to Paris. We should do a show in Paris, yeah. Yeah, what's stopping us? I have to start finding venues in Paris to reach out to you. If any venue in Paris would like to pay our travel fees and have us come over, we'll be happy to do it. Do a show in the catacombs.

Yeah, that'd be super cool. I don't know that I have actually an answer to this, but this is pretty... I'm a sucker for all pun related news or reviews. So do you remember any? No, I'm an idiot. I also, yeah, I'm also having trouble remembering ones. I kind of assumed you guys would be all over this shit, because you're like pun maniacs. I think the one that sticks with me the most, I don't know about the family.

I feel like your eulogies are going to be filled with puns. Probably, yeah. I mean, we're not giving our own eulogies, but I'm giving Dan's and Dan's giving mine. Yeah, we'll swap eulogies. Crisscross. Crisscross. No motives. They can't catch who's eulogy is who's. I remember when I was a kid and I was a huge fan of those Ninja Turtles, I really loved them, the Ninja Turtles movie came out and I cut out one of the newspaper ads because

back in the old days kids, if you wanted to know when a movie was playing, you had to look in the listings in the newspaper and there'd be little ads. Next to Garfield. Yeah, next to Garfield. And there'd be little ads for each of the movies that would have quotes on them. And one of the quotes was from, I think, Joel Siegel for the Ninja Turtles movie, and I cut out and it said,

like, a shell of a good time. And as a kid, I didn't quite get it. So was he saying it was negatively? No, no, he's saying it's a hell of a good time. Okay, because the pun, it seems like a shell of a good time would mean it's's a hell of a good time. Okay, because like, you know, the pun, like it seems like a shell of a good time would mean like it's a husk of a good time. It's not actually a good time. I don't think anyone was thinking that deeply about it.

Yeah. But that's the one that sticks in my mind the most just because I think I had it on my room, on the wall of my room when I was a kid. Yeah. Well, that works. Did you learn the whole ninja rap when you were a kid or no?

No, I did not learn the whole ninja rap. By that point, I think I was no longer such, I mean, I did go see it in the theaters multiple times. With your grandma, right? Yeah, I made her go to see it when I wanted to see it a third time, I think. But I did not memorize, even by the time the ninja rap came on, I was like, this is not what I come to the Ninja Turtles for, is Vanell Ice rapping this song. Now I love it though.

Come to this place for Ninja Turtles. Yeah, yeah. Somehow raps about ninjas feel good in a place like this. Okay, well, again, apologies. This is from a question mark. And I just wanna mention, again, this is not a matter of editorial control. This is not because we don't wanna say your names.

This is merely that Dan made a mistake. Yeah, and I could not find, I did make an effort to try and find the unedited emails. Afterwards, he's gonna have to, well, we're taping right now. He sort of wanted to keep us moving. Does that last one seem like there was very, some specific French words you could have searched for

and not a lot of emails would have come up? Yeah, after this, he's gonna have to put on the Flophouse official hair shirt. Yeah, write in guys. What's that thing where you have to sit on the like- On a pole in the desert? Yeah, or like, and they put weights on your ankles. Oh, that's a different thing.

If these emails are from you, please write in and I will rectify it later on. Someone could get some stolen valor, write in and say it was their email and really it wasn't, yeah. I wanted to write in forever as your podcast was one of my saving graces when I was getting chemo for Hodgkin's disease in my late 20s.

And again, when I required mental health services, it truly helped me through some trying times and I've wanted to thank you for years. I really appreciate that we could be there for you. I hope you're feeling better now. And I just wish you had a name that we could know about. It's just too bad your identity is lost to history. Obviously, we've played a very meaningful part in your life and that means a lot to

me. It really makes my heart swell. And I just wish that Dan felt the same amount of importance towards you. I couldn't even remember to put your name in. Uh-huh. Uh, I'm really, uh, let's see, uh... Oh, now he's, uh, now he's, he's spiraling, dude. Oh, no. I can't find it. I mean, here's, here's the real reason. I, like, I,

we have so much mail in the inbox that I need to clear it out, and once I do a letter, it gets deleted. So that's, I thought maybe it'd be safe. Whoever you are, I can't wait to hear the rest of your letter and thank you very much for listening to us during those times. I'm glad that we could help you through them. Guess it was.

I just wish, I just wish that we could ever find who this person was. I appreciated hearing this so much and I feel so bad. Anyway, unfortunately, I felt that I needed to tie that into these things into a real question, which I could never come up with. I finally got it, Roy Scheider,

or more precisely, Scheider had an epic run in the 19. More precisely, Shoy Ryder, his mirror name. Scheider had an epic run in the 70s with Clute, the 7-Ups, the French Connection, the Marathon Man, Jaws, Sorcerer, and all that jazz. Perhaps my favorite film. I don't feel that he's ever really gotten his due for that. Do you folks? Can you think of any other actors or actresses with so much greatness and so little recognition?

I actually just recently watched the Seven Ups for the first time and saw the amazing car chase sequence in that thing. Like I think I liked it more than like the famous like bullet and French connection ones actually and I had the same thought I was like oh Roy Scheider was on fire for like a very like this like span of time and I don't think he's like talked about I can see in your eyes how you're imagining Roy Scheider literally being on fire.

I just remember when they put him in NBA game. Yeah, Roy Scheider in turbo mode was on fire, yeah. Yeah, he's crazy. But I had the same thought, like, he isn't really talked about the same way. I was literally just talking to one of my bar regulars today. He was, I think he was either a camera operator or a PA on something with Roy Scheider.

And he was talking about how Roy Scheider was very professional and like, he was very calm. Like he was a very still guy on set until the action rolled. My regular was really impressed working with him. I mean, I think it's a, there's, I think what it speaks to partly is how many movies used to get made and how many different kinds of movies and the different kinds of people who could be movie stars. Not that Roy Scheiber is not, he's a handsome white man who does adventure movies a lot

of the time. Like, it's not like he's that breaking the mold that much, but that you had so many movies. Like, can you imagine, like, I don't like I don't have someone in particular who comes to mind that answers the question exactly, you know, because there are a number of actors who had a great run and I feel like as they get towards the end of their lives, they start to get a little more recognition, you know, like I feel like people didn't talk about Gene Hackman

for a while and then he passed and then suddenly it was, people were talking about what an amazing actor he was in his run of movies. But like, something you hear a lot is, maybe not as much as it used to, was, can you believe that Elliot Gould used to be a, like a star who would carry movies? This guy?

And you watch those movies and you're like, yeah, I can believe it, he's amazing. He's an amazing actor, he's got amazing charisma, like he has a great run of movies, so I can believe it. Yeah, but he's just, you know, he's just the dad of Ross and Monica. That's surely his crowning achievement. I mean, here's the thing, but that's specifically about, let's be clear, Elliot Gould is a handsome man

with a lot of charisma, but he's handsome in a very specific, kind of goofier way that I think people are talking about. Now, big movie stars have to be beautiful. Leading men movie stars have to be beautiful. But there's a, I don't know, not always. Not always, no, but I think that that's what people are saying, they're not like,

do you believe this guy? This is the charmless hunk of me. No, but it's never, or they'll say the same thing about Donald Sutherland, who also, you know, passed relatively recently. Where it's like, instead of saying, it's, I feel like it often gets said, and it's a different point than the question is making.

Instead of saying, oh man, things were so much, the variety of movies we had when these guys were big movie stars, instead it comes off as like, can you believe there was a time when people would settle for Donald Sutherland or Elliot Gould when they could have had a Harrison Ford? Like, come on guys, when it's, which is, I think is not the right way to look at it. But it's, there's a, I mean, that's the nature of,

you could say it's the nature of fame, you know? It's, you know, it's the bitch goddess. It's, it gives you, it gives and then it takes away and you can't guarantee you're going to be around forever. Yeah. Well, it was like, there was a a during the third season of the White Lotus, there is some discourse, some weird discourse on the internet about dudes being like, Walton, you think Walton Goggins is a sex symbol?

I'm like, yeah, dude. Look at that guy. Yeah, I mean, well, I think that also just straight men being straight men, like, can't wrap their heads around the idea of like charisma, not just being like, oh, this is the handsomest man, this is the most clearly handsome man. I mean, like he's a handsome guy.

I'm not saying that he isn't, but like there's something interesting about him in the same way that like, you know, I think it's obvious for us, like you're not just attracted to, like, the most obviously beautiful person. There's someone who's interesting. Yeah, it's like when I was watching,

the other day when I was watching Fatal Beauty, directed by Tom Holland, friend of the show, Tom Holland, and Sam Elliott gives... Spider-Man himself. Yeah, Whoopi Goldberg, and Sam Elliott plays the love interest. And Sam Elliott is so fucking hot in this movie.

He really is. It's like. Well, but that's the thing, Sam Elliott is hot. I mean, that's the, like he's. But like it's more than just him being attract, like being like good looking. He just like, he sells this shit so well. Like he's got so much fucking charm.

Yeah, this warmth that oozes. It's like oozing out so much fucking charm just yeah this laptop screen okay well sorry again about the names please write in but now we'll move on sorry about not really answering that last question but it's okay and you know we talked about something yeah you wouldn't and I got to talk about Sam Elliott being super hot as our as friends at Jordan and Jesse go say, what is a podcast if not saying words? And we certainly did that.

Yeah. But let's recommend some movies, movies that maybe would be a better use of your time. Hey, I have an animated movie to recommend. I actually highlighted this in... Legend of the Overfiend. I mentioned this in Flop Secrets. Dan's like, I saw something that I just found,

it just felt like it was really saying something to me about the human condition. It's called Ninja Scroll. No, I want to recommend a movie by legendary animator, Richard Williams, The Thief and the Cobbler. I watched the recobbled cut. I had seen huge, huge chunks of this before, but I don't think I'd ever sat down and watched it,

you know, all the way through. And part of that's because, so this was a project that he worked on for decades and decades, and it originally was released in a chopped up version that he did not like at all by Miramax. It was like taken away from him. And then there was this recoupled cut,

which is fan cut putting together, you know, the best elements that exist to get it closer to what Williams intended. And when I say best elements, like say best elements, some of it is literally just like animatics or sketches. But what exists is astounding still. It is like he was a genius animator and it doesn't really work that well as a narrative,

but as a work of visual beauty and animation skill, it's amazing. So that's what I'm recommending. I'm recommending a movie by one Rowdy Harrington, 1988's Jack's Back. This is the movie before Roadhouse. And I would say it is not as good as Roadhouse. I'm not gonna go out there and make crazy claims.

But this is a movie set in Los Angeles where there is a serial killer going around on the 100 year anniversary of the Jack the Ripper crimes, committing mirror crimes, but in Los Angeles, which is weird. The movie kind of abandons that part of the premise about halfway through. James Spader is in it and he's, you know,

James Spader-ing it up. There's a surprise twins reveal, not the movie twins, but characters that are twins. It is a- Oh, they don't reveal that they're actually in the movie twins. It is a, I mean,, maybe it's a wild ride. Yeah, do the weasels show up?

The weasels, I think they do. I'd have to go frame by frame. I will point out that Robert Picardo is in it, playing like a psychologist, and man, there's somebody else that was in it that was really great. Everyone's favorite Gremlin love object. Oh yeah, Chris Mulkey's in it.

Oh man, yeah, two thumbs up. Yeah, exactly. Mr. Greta Gremlin himself, Robert Picardo. So what I would say is, it's not Roadhouse, but it's still a fun time at the movies. Go check out Jack's Back. I'm going to recommend another fun time at the movies. This is a Japanese movie from 1963 called An Actor's Revenge

directed by Kon Ichikawa. This is one I'd been looking forward to seeing for a long time and had never gotten around to it. And I finally watched it and it's super fun. It's set in 19th century Japan, or maybe it's early 20th, no, I think it's late 19th century Japan. And the main character is an actor

who specializes in female roles and always has kind of like a feminine kind of like a carriage to him, carries himself as a woman most of the time. But secretly, despite being an acclaimed actor, he is also on a mission of vengeance against the three men who ruined his father and drove his father and mother to insanity and death. And so he is now in the town where these three men are, and he's going to use all of his wiles and cunning in order to bring them to an end and there's also a bunch of different there's a bunch of different thieves running around who all have different gimmicks and are very fun.

Elliot you have sold this movie so hard. It's great and it all and it is it looks beautiful it's got it's this 60s color it's very non-naturalistic it's very kind of expressive and it's, it's this 60s color, it's very non-naturalistic, it's very kind of expressive, and it's just, it's a super fun movie, but it also has a serious message about the emptiness of spending your life seeking vengeance against people. So that's an actor's revenge, I really enjoyed it. I highly recommend it.

Well, that's been it. Another episode of the Flophouse, that is. It's time to unroll that anchovy can and climb into it and put on our little acorn caps. Yeah, we use a dust bunny as a stuffy. If you enjoy this podcast, why not check out MaximumFun.org, where there's a ton of other great podcasts on our same network. where there's a ton of other great podcasts on our same network. Thanks to them for supporting us. Thanks to you for supporting us.

Thanks to our producer, Alex, for supporting us by editing the thing and making it sound good. Uh-huh. He goes by Howl Doddy on the internet. Yeah. But for The Flophouse, I've been Dan McCoy. I'm Stuart Wellington. And I'm Elliott Kalin. And we are... The Flophouse, I've been Dan McCoy. I'm Stuart Wellington. And I'm Elliott Cailin.

And we are... The Flophouse? And I'm Elliott Cailin. And I'm Stuart Wellington. And I'm Dan McCoy. Produced by... Alex Smith. On Maximum Fun.

Oodles of casts for your noodle. Bye! Just fucking grip it and rip it, baby. Let's grip that and then also let's rip that. Let's both grip and rip, but first let me say to you, one. Two. Three.

We gripped it and it was ripped. Yep, those ring numbers were gripped and ripped. Let's kick some tires, light some fires. Sure, I guess. And here we go. It starts like this.