Trivia / The Garfield Movie

• Casting Gag:
  • Harvey Guillén voices Odie who is not very bright but is a very friendly dog and best friends with an orange cat.
  • This is not the first time Samuel L. Jackson plays a deadbeat dad who reunites with his son whom he calls "Junior" while in conflict with an old enemy.
    • Also, not the first time he voiced an animated cat in general.
• Channel Hop: The previous theatrical Garfield movies were produced by Davis Entertainment and released by Twentieth Century Fox. This film is produced by Alcon Entertainment and will be released by Columbia Pictures. (Nickelodeon/what is now Paramount purchased the Garfield franchise after the film went into production, so unless the contract Alcon signed had a sequel provision the next Garfield film will probably be based at Paramount Pictures.)
• Cowboy Be Bop At His Computer: The film is often listed as a Sony Pictures Animation work, while the film was actually released under the Columbia Pictures banner and produced by DNEG Animation.
• Creator Backlash: Frank Welker, who's voiced Garfield since 2007, admitted that while he loves Chris Pratt, he was disappointed that he wasn't asked to return as Garfield.
• Early-Bird Release: The film will release in certain territories such as Europe and Latin America during the last weeks of April and the first few weeks of May 2024.
• Fake American: British actor Nicholas Hoult provides the voice of the American-accented Jon Arbuckle in this film.
• Irony As He Is Cast: The second trailer lampshades the fact that Snoop Dogg is playing a cat.
• Meaningful Release Date: Garfield famously hates Mondays, especially Monday the 13th. So it's incredibly ironic that the first trailer was released on a Monday the 13th—November 13th, 2023. The second trailer also dropped on another Monday—March 4, 2024.
• Milestone Celebration: Comes out twenty years since the live action movie that featured Bill Murray.
• Official Fan-Submitted Content: At the end of the Internet version of the first trailer is an ad inviting fans to submit videos of their cats acting like Garfield (dogs are welcome too) for use in the film's marketing campaign.
• The Other Darrin:
  • Chris Pratt replaces Frank Welker as Garfield.
  • Nicholas Hoult replaces Wally Wingert as Jon Arbuckle.
  • For the first time, Gregg Berger does not voice Odie with Harvey Guillén taking the reins this time.
• Playing Against Type: Particularly as a voice actor, Chris Pratt almost invariably lends his talent to optimistic, high-energy, selfless characters such as Emmet Brickowski and Mario, quite the opposite of Garfield's signature snark, arrogance, and lethargy.
• Production Posse: Director Mark Dindal and screenwriter David Reynolds previously collaborated on The Emperor's New Groove.
• Revival by Commercialization: If you actually listened to the entirety of the An Evening with Silk Sonic album after it dropped in late 2021^note Silk Sonic being the tandem of Bruno Mars and Anderson .Paak and not just "Leave the Door Open" and "Smokin' Out the Window", you probably recognized "Fly As Me" from the first two trailers. It's been used in a vast majority of the ads for the film since and can basically be considered a de-facto theme song for the film.
  • The same can be said for "edamame" by bbno$ and Rich Brian, which dropped in mid-2021 but was used in the second trailer and much like "Fly As Me" has been used in many of the ads following it.
• Those Two Actors:
  • Chris Pratt (Garfield) and Samuel L. Jackson (Vic) previously appeared together in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, specifically in the films Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame^note though they never actually interacted or shared screentime in either film. Jackson only had a cameo role in both while Pratt was a main character.
    • For fans of Pulp Fiction, Jackson has even reunited with Ving Rhames.
  • Cast members Hannah Waddingham and Brett Goldstein famously appeared together in the sports dramedy series Ted Lasso.
• You Sound Familiar:
  • In the Latin American Spanish dub, Garfield's father Vic is voiced by Sandro Larenas who is Garfield's original and most recurring voice actor.

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