Garfield Gets Real

Plot

Garfield (Frank Welker) lives with canine Odie (Gregg Berger) and Jon (Wally Wingert) in a what appears to be a suburban town inhabited by cartoon characters (known as Comic Strip World). Garfield and the gang work at Comic studios with other comic characters. The comic strip is made in Comic Strip world, and sent to "The Real World" where it is made in the newspaper.

Garfield is tired of the same old jokes his friends crack and is bored with life in Comic Strip World and longs to go to The Real World. The Comic Strip requires a bone for Odie, but Odie does not want to give back the bone, and looks for a place to hide it. But he accidentally makes the bone go through the screen in the studio and it is sucked into the Real World.

Eli explains to the comic characters that the screen separates Comic Strip World and The Real World, with no way back. Garfield sees his chance and goes through the screen without anyone noticing. Later on, the comic characters realize Garfield is in the real world, and Eli blocks the patch in the screen that separates the real world by taping special tape on it, so no one can gain access to the real world (Odie jumps onto the screen trying to get his bone which is on the screen but actually is in the real world, and gets sucked into the real world as well.).

Garfield tries to throw Odie back to Comic Strip World, but fails. Odie gets his bone back and he and Garfield go find some dinner. Garfield meets a cat named Shecky, and as they chat, Odie is chased by a gang of Chihuahuas who want his bone. To save Odie, Garfield grabs the bone and runs through a hole in a tree which is too small for the Chihuahua's fat owner (who was walking the gang of Chihuahuas) to get through.

Shecky gets dinner by annoying the people who live in a building and the people start throwing food at Shecky. After dinner, Shecky brings Garfield and Odie to their new home, an abandoned hotel called Hotel Muncie. The next day, Garfield realizes that his comic will be cancelled unless Garfield returns to the comic. Garfield finds an article in the newspaper asking people to try out and replace Garfield. Garfield and Odie head for the place where they are doing try-outs and try to impress the judges, but fail, and the judges are more impressed in Hale and Hardy, a muscular cat and equally muscular dog. The judges give Garfield one more chance: If Garfield does not make it back to the paper in 24 hours, Hale and Hardy will replace them. Garfield has an idea of building a big tunnel that can go through the screen and shares the idea with his friends back in comic strip world. Later that night, Hale and Hardy tie Garfield, Odie and Shecky up and set the hotel on fire. Billy Bear, Wally and Jon go save the three friends, but the entire hotel is on fire and all the exits are blocked. Luckily, Shecky finds a fire proof trash cart, and Jon, Wally, Odie, Garfield and Shecky jump in and Billy Bear is about to push the cart when Odie realizes his bone is missing and finds the bone lying on a chandelier and Odie jumps onto the chandelier. Garfield grabs Odie's paw on the second floor, and tries to pull him onto the cart, but Odie pulls Garfield onto the chandelier instead. Just then, the chandelier is almost going to collapse. Garfield grabs Jon's hand and the entire cart is flung into the air, and the chandelier collapses, causing the cart to fall to the ground with chandelier on it. The cart crashes out of the hotel, and the six are flung into the big tunnel (Wally built it, he calls it the "Bonitanator" because the nose of the contraption reminds him of his wife, Bonita's unusually large and point nose) and the door of the tunnel closes and the tunnel disappears and is transported back to Comic Strip World. The comic characters celebrate the return of Garfield at the end of the film.

Cameos

Similar to the 1988 film Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Garfield Gets Real has cameo appearances by other comic strip characters:

Snoopy of the Peanuts fame is mentioned.

Future

It has been announced that there will be a series of fully-CG Garfield theatrical films following the success of Garfield Gets Real, and its sequels Garfield's Fun Fest and Garfield's Pet Force.