Garfield's Ghost Stories is a collection of illustrated short stories set in the Garfield universe.
The cat is best known for naps, lasagna and kicking Odie. But can he handle real ghosts?
Tropes for these stories include
- All Just a Dream: The ghost trying to skin Garfield in "Terror in the Mirror" is actually one of his nightmares. Or Is It A Dream when he wakes up and half of his fur is shaved.
- Been There, Shaped History: Subverted. It turns out that Shamus Arbuckle wasn't a sea captain that defeated Blackbeard; he was a pirate cook for Edward Teach, and a terrible one at that. Garfield wisely decides to never tell Jon that tidbit.
- Casual Danger Dialogue: With Blackbeard and Khufu, Garfield can't stop wisecracking. It helps that once he reasons with them, the ghost and mummy respectively back down.
- Maintain the Lie: Garfield and Odie smudge the inscription on Shamus's toy sword so that Jon never knows that his ancestor was a fraud.
- Nobody Calls Me "Chicken"!: In "The Well-Fed Phantom," Nermal dares Garfield to go into a haunted house. Much later, Garfield wonders why he let Nermal talk him into doing such a thing.
- Out-of-Genre Experience: Each story is a homage to ghost stories, with "The Lady of the Mist" in particular being more melancholy than usual Garfield stories.
- Poke the Poodle: Subverted with the Well-Fed Phantom. He says he doesn't want to hurt Garfield but would rather get his midnight snack. When he finds out that Garfield has eaten all the food in his fridge, however, he tries to eat the cat. Garfield sensibly tails it out of there.
- Properly Paranoid: Garfield finds it Too Good to Be True that a random woman is interested in Jon and not scared off by him. He was right; Emily was a ghost that craved company.
- Spanner in the Works: If Garfield hadn't been insulting Blackbeard while wielding his sword, or so he thinks, the pirate wouldn't have appeared and revealed in turn that Shamus was a fraud.
- There Is Only One Bed: Defied; Jon gives Emily the bed in "The Lady in the Mist" and goes to sleep with the pets on the floor.
- What You Are in the Dark: When they find out Shamus was a fraud, and his cutlass was actually a vintage toy, Garfield and Odie decide to hide the inscription on it that would reveal it as a toy. They don't want Jon's feelings to be hurt.
- Wrong Genre Savvy: Zigzagged; Garfield acts like he's in a movie when encountering the mummy Khufu. It does keep him alive long enough to find the pharaoh's real mummified cat and to get Khufu off his back.
- Yank the Dog's Chain: Jon meets a lady named Emily who doesn't find him a horrifying, disco-loving geek, and they have a lovely night together. He even chivalrously gives her the bed in his cabin and goes to sleep with the pets. It turns out Emily is a ghost who visits passerby in the park when she's lonely, and she only appears on misty night. Jon is understandably crushed.
- You Are Not Alone: When Jon moans about having fallen for a ghost in "Lady of the Mist," Odie and Garfield immediately give him cuddles, to remind him that he isn't alone and never will be.
