Fridge / Garfield: His 9 Lives

• Fridge Brilliance:
  • In the prologue to the book, God tries to give Cat eight eyes, but is told they have only "two eyes left". Cats were the final act of creation that God had to do.
  • In addition, when a caveman stubs his toe and yells, "CAT!", the narration explains that "cat" was caveman talk for "darn it"... which is almost certainly a Tactful Translation.
  • From "The Garden", while Garfield and Chloe both obey Uncle Todd's command of never opening the box and live on happily in the garden, this was still Garfield's third life so it must have ended somehow. In both versions, Garfield says that he grew old physically but remained young in spirit so he probably died peacefully of old age.
• Fridge Horror: In the book only, Garfield may have actually killed his previous owner in one of his past lives! And who's to say that he stopped there?!
  • Alternate interpretation: He attacked his owner, possibly under the influence of rabies, and was put down.
  • The rabies theory actually does hold water if you know what to look for; the entity coming out of Tigger's water bowl could symbolize hydrophobia, or the fierce adversity to water that is a main characteristic of the virus. Him spazzing out on the floor and attacking his owner were telltale signs that everyone is familiar with when it comes to rabies, but those claws coming out of the water would be a clever tidbit.