Garfield is the titular character of the newspaper comic strip Garfield, as well as the television shows and films based on it. He is a lazy, overweight, cynical orange cat who lives with his nerdy owner Jon Arbuckle and his dim-witted dog Odie. Born in the kitchen of Mama Leoni's Italian Restaurant in 1978, Garfield enjoys sleeping all the time and eating all the food he can get his hands on, especially lasagna.
Appearances in Christmas specials
Garfield's first animated Christmas production came in the form of the prime-time special A Garfield Christmas Special, which premiered nine years following his debut. The special finds Garfield having to spend Christmas at the Arbuckle family's farmhouse, something he is initially not looking forward to, as he always hates having to visit Jon's family. However, over the course of the special, he gradually comes to enjoy spending the holidays with Jon's family.
Two years later, Garfield starred in "Heatwave Holiday", a Christmas-themed segment in the second season of Garfield and Friends. In this episode, Garfield manages to beat the July heat by using Jon's refrigerator to cover the backyard with snow and then convinces Jon to put up their Christmas decorations. This results in the whole neighborhood mistakenly believing Christmas has come early, to the point that even Garfield begins to think Christmas has come early.
Over two decades later, Garfield's next Christmas production came in "Caroling Capers", the first Christmas episode of The Garfield Show. This episode finds Garfield, unable to wait a few hours for the turkey dinner that Jon is making, going around town singing Christmas carols in hopes of being given food in response. This, however, proves to be a difficult task, since none of the people he sings to like his singing, and to make matters worse for him, Odie and Nermal start outshining him in the act. After several failed attempts to improve his singing voice, though, Garfield manages to get some food by using tin cans for drums as musical accompaniment to Odie and Nermal.
Garfield and Odie in "Home for the Holidays".
To date, Garfield's most recent Christmas production (outside of the comic strip, of course) was The Garfield Show's second Christmas episode, "Home for the Holidays". When his on-again, off-again girlfriend Arlene reminds him about the meaning of Christmas, Garfield opts to help her find homes for some homeless pets she's been helping.