Last year, November, the user, imflameyyyyy (henceforth, Julien) and I (henceforth, Joshua) decided that we were going to set ourselves a task that hasn't gotten much attention in lost media circles: We would attempt to list, and archive all of "The Garfield Shorts" / "Garfield tout court". If you're unaware of what these are, these were a series of short-form content which would accompany episodes of The Garfield Show, and if you want a proper rundown, you can read about them here. You can read week 1 here.
Welcome to week 2. So, while I had initially said every Friday, this has now been moved to every Saturday due to me actually changing my account from Cooljoe01 to GarHalloweenField. Regardless, here we are, and with new information to go!
This week is March 9th, 2024 - March 16th, 2024.
UPDATE: Number of Shorts Theory[]
Julien and I are finally ready to say there are 134 shorts. This comes after we found the official 2024 Mediatoon catalogue which lists The Garfield Shorts as quote, "54 x 40" + 80 songs" (if you're interested in looking yourself, it's on page 99). Thus, we can surmise from this that 134 is the actual official number.
Official Production Numbers[]
Likely the biggest discovery I've ever made, is that using some "backways" on Radio-Canada's official website, I have been able to track down most (eventually all) of the official production numbers, images and French lyrics from said shorts. I'm not going to explain exactly how I found it, but I will definitely link my references on the main wiki article once I find them all, so everyone can have a look. What this means is that presumably by next week, WE WILL HAVE CONFIRMED EVERYTHING.
Concerning S3 and S4 numbers, I'm literally off the bat going to tell you to ignore whatever was said last week. Let me explain why:
For season 4, we were able to archive two shorts (and I found a third and fourth via Radio-Canada's website) which breaks our original theory that only songs from specials were turned into shorts. First found was 'Adopte un vrai chat', which features in Jon 2; we didn't think too much on this find because it was actually featured in an episode. However, the second find was La réclame te réclame, a UNIQUE song from S4. Furthermore, the two songs I found via Radio-Canada is 'Arbores sunt', referred to as 'La Sorcière' on Radio-Canada's website; the way I surmised that it is indeed Arbores sunt is because the video subtitles literally just say ['en Latin'], and a unique S4 song sang by Herman Post called 'C'est mon anniversaire' ('It's My Birthday'), and very notably listed as Short #85.
This previous song being short #85, and yet containing a 2013 copyright date highly affects original estimates of 35 + 45 = 80. This leads me back to having to assume that there ARE INDEED THIRTY SONGS in S3, but it doesn't help that any list we've attempted to make rounds off to 31; even the up-to-date episode list lists 31. The answer honestly rests on what short #84 is, of which at the time of writing, I've unfortunately not been able to find.
Production Order Guesses[]
As you've read above, I managed to find a breakthrough that'll be able to finally reveal EVERY SHORT's production order. Our previous hopes lay on badly-cut videos airing on Radio-Canada, but in the span of a week literally, we're about to know every single one. For me, out of everything we've found so far (this even including all the S4 shorts), I'm willing to personally put it as the biggest find. Also, we've found alternate names for some S1 shorts, and three S2 shorts, so that's great as well.
As of writing, these are the numbers I have and need:
- Season 1 : While I still need to find 8 more links, there are only two or three shorts I'm unsure of.
- Season 2 : Still need 11 more links.
- Season 3 : As per information above, I'll need either 8 or 9 more links;
- Season 4 : I'll need to find a heftier 20 links; However, I can confirm the numbering of at least 4 of those already.
Curiosity: Singers[]
One interesting subject of the shorts is directional choices in voices.
While we're aware that the show's episodes had Mark Evanier as voice director, and that each episode was first recorded in English, and then dubbed in French, this is slightly more dubious with the shorts. It seems to us that the first two seasons were first produced in English, this due to characters actually speaking (at least in S2). However, S3 takes an interesting turn. Most notably, the song names are very strange; It almost feels as if they don't conform to something an English native would find a 'natural' title. This is most apparent with "Chachacat" ("Le cha-cha-chat"): It makes sense in French as it's pronounced as /ʃaʃaˈʃa/ (sha-sha-sha), whereas in English, the sibilant is broken with a stop: /tʃatʃa kæt/ (cha-cha-cat), making its pronunciation awkward.
Perhaps the most interesting thing is Garfield's voice. In French, Gérard Surugue provided the voice of Garfield in literally every aspect of the show. Every S3 song is Surugue. Every S4 song is Surugue. In English, well, it's a problem. Most songs attributed to Garfield in S3 are sang by Ben Bridgen, while most S4 songs are sang by Jon Barnard, with Into the Wild provided by Frank Welker. This means two things: Either Frank Welker was too busy, or they simply didn't favour his singing voice. The most telltale sign would've been the Eddie Gourmand song in English; however, this was never actually provided in English on the Citel DVDs, so we might never know.
Interestingly enough, Marc Saez, the French VA for Nermal and Vito sang those characters' respective songs. This begs the question if Jason Marsden might've sang them in English, and if Wally Wingert provided his voice for Jon and Al.
Discoveries of the Week[]
Summary[]
Though videos weren't discovered en masse, what was discovered this week is huge information, and by next week, I'll definitely attempt to provide EVERY OFFICIAL NUMBER.
- Using Radio-Canada's website, we have found a method to confirm all shorts and their official production numbers.
- Images and lyrics for every short: thus, we can surmise almost all information about the short from these alone.
- Shorts found this week include:
- Two full season 4 shorts: 'Adopte un vrai chat' and 'La réclame te réclame'
- One full season 3 short: 'Changer la tête'
And with that wrapped up, a big thank you for reading! We'll be looking forward to next week, and I wish you ahead a very warm week. Goodbye!