Garfield vs. Heathcliff (... vs. ...)

 

“Gentlemen, I'm afraid we are at a stand-still. There is only one fair way to settle this argument: CAT FIGHT!” –Judge, Cat Court segment from Robot Chicken

Garfield, Jon Arbuckle's lasagna-loving tubby tabby.

Heathcliff, the Nutmeg family's city terrorizing sassy catty.

Felis catus. As one of the more controversial pets, there are plenty of split opinions on cats. Some like them for their independence, not needing (and for some, not wanting) constant attention like dogs do. Others dislike them, considering them pretty rude and destructive and not liking cats' inability to listen. Whatever you think of cats, you can't deny that our combatants here certainly fit both of those descriptions, for better or for worse.

With dogs being the main animal companions or stars in comics, these cats are notable for breaking from that trend. However, with two orange cats in the comic, there's bound to be some discussion like: Who copied who? Which cat is funnier? And most importantly for this blog, which one would win in a fight? Would Garfield be able to taste victory and avoid a permanent slumber or would Heathcliff be able to add another animal to the endless list of those he's defeated? That's what we're here to find out today!

Before We Begin...

(Credit to Garfield artist @garybakercartoonist)

While I have done a similar one in the past, I didn't delve too deeply into Heathcliff's various cartoons and I didn't even mention any of his games. I only watched like one episode of Catillac Cats and that's kind of it. I felt like I did a disservice to Heathcliff when looking back on it so, I watched every Heathcliff series, tried to find some of his Sunday comics, and analyzed both his and Garfield's various gaming outings.

 

For this blog, we'll be using media from both series that are both official and "canon" (though there arguably isn't one for either).

For Garfield:

• Garfield (comic strip)
• U.S. Acres (comic strip)
• Garfield cartoons:
• Garfield & Friends
• The Garfield Show
• Garfield Originals
• Garfield Specials
• Garfield (KaBoom comics)
• Video Games

For Heathcliff:

• Heathcliff (comic strip)
• Heathcliff cartoons:
• Heathcliff and Dingbat
• Heathcliff and Marmaduke
• Heathcliff and the Catillac Cats
• Heathcliff comic books
• Heathcliff (Star Comics)
• Heathcliff's Funhouse
• Video Games

Unfortunately, since Garzooka from Garfield's Pet Force is from an alternate universe, no feats he performs will be included in this analysis. Additionally, both of the Garfield movies and any related media (games, Baby Garfield comics, commercials) are excluded since they take place in a different universe.

I'd also like to thank VintageHeathcliff and Heathcliff.ai for helping me with some of Heathcliff's earlier weekday comics, since they are all harder to find. (Though since they only had weekdays, I find to struggle to find the Sundays, but I've read at least 90% of Heathcliff's comic strips for research)

Also, for anyone tries to do research on Garfield and other characters (or try to mention anything I missed), here's a tip. I've seen plenty of sites use edited images of Garfield comics for research, including another VS Battle Blog also doing a Garfield matchup and those edited images usuallly come from this site. Square Root of Minus Garfield is a fan-site where people can submit an edited Garfield comic for others to see. Some examples of edits from this site that have mistakenly been confused for legit comics and used in research are this one that's an edit of the November 10, 2013 comic by Vellidragon (commonly used to upgrade Garfield's regeneration further) and this one that's an edit of the January 21, 1991 comic by Quaternion that's based on a Doctor Who special (used either to give him Immeasurable speed or to give him Time Manipulation (even though Garfield has actual Time Manipulation/Immeasurable Speed Feats)). Make sure to double check your sources, everyone

Background

Garfield

"I love cats. I wanted a cat... so what do I do? I go to the pet store and ask for a cat. What do they give me? ... A lasagna with fur and fangs"

Age: 48

Species: Cat

Aliases: The Caped Avenger, The Mad Doofer, Amoeba Man, Garfello, etc.

Likes: Lasagna, sleeping, Pooky, kicking Odie, abusing mailmen

Dislikes: Mondays, February, Dogs, Nermal, Raisins

On January 8th, 1976 June 19, 1978, a little (at the time) orange tabby cat named Garfield was born in the kitchen of Mamma Leoni's Italian Restaurant. However, almost at once, the cat ate through the entirety of the restaurant's food, leaving its owners bankrupt and leading them to put Garfield up for adoption. After a heartfelt goodbye to his mother, Garfield was placed in a pet shop, waiting for the lucky (or unlucky, depending on how you see it) fellow who would pick Garfield up. That fellow would be the cartoonist Jon Arbuckle, who loved cats and chose to adopt Garfield as a pet.

After being adopted, Garfield quickly got adjusted to his new home, in the worst way possible. His appetite certainly didn't decrease, with Jon claiming once that he could eat 10 times his body weight (though Garfield was only able to stomach 219 pounds of lasagna then.), and Garfield grew to be a lot more cynical and rude. He enjoys causing physical harm to his puppy frenemy, Odie, like kicking him off tables and frequently making fun of Jon for his dorky behavior or his inability to get a date to save his life. Garfield grew to be lazier as well, spending his time watching TV and sleeping, and has shown to be able to sleep several years if uninterrupted.

However, in spite of his cruelty and taking life for granted, Garfield truly does love both Jon and Odie. Deep inside, Garfield's greatest fear is loneliness, and would gladly give up breakfast if it meant being with them. Garfield has even fought bulldogs and huge panthers just to protect his owner and friends. After all, even if he seems rude, if Garfield didn't kick dogs off the table or steal Jon's food, he wouldn't be a cat.

Heathcliff

"We never wanted to tell you... but, yes, you're adopted."

Age: 53

Species: Cat

Aliases: The Cat Burglar, The Masked Moocher, Thing 3, Cat Burglar, etc.

Likes: Fish, Ham, Milk, Punching Dogs, Garbage

Dislikes: Dogs, Dry Food, Root Vegetables, Pills, Policemen

One day (while the comic started on September 3, 1973, the Heathcliff series is inconsistent on what day Heathcliff the cat was born), Heathcliff was born on the wrong side of town. At a young age, his father was locked up and his mother had vanished, leaving poor Heathcliff all alone to fend for himself. He grew up quick, and he grew up mean, Eventually, Heathcliff was found by the Nutmeg family and was brought into their loving home. However, those years spent alone let an impact on the poor feline and even though he now has a new home, Heathcliff's meaner attributes never went away.

Heathcliff is really egotistical and sees himself as the star of the neighborhood, and he's able to prove it too. Ever since he moved in with the Nutmeg, Heathcliff has made it a hobby to terrify the neighborhood. Any dogs who even dare to look in his direction would soon become subservant to the feline. Any poor sod who run a fish store or deliver milk would soon find their stock swiped by the clever kitty. Not even his owners were able to keep him out of trouble, soon becoming used to Heathcliff's crude and frankly bizarre antics. This eventually leads to Heathcliff getting arrested several times, much like his father.

Ultimately, in spite of his cruel behavior, he does care for those close to him, specifically girlfriend Sonja and especially his new owners (even Grandpa, despite treating him the worst out of his owners). In fact, at times he's even willing to work with his enemies if the situation calls for it. Heathcliff may be enjoy terrifying the neighborhood and pranking everyone, at the end of the day, he cares about others more than he lets on.

Arsenal

Due to how many items they've amassed over the years, I admittedly did limit the duo's arsenals a bit (for my sake). Any items stolen from others are included as long as they aren't returned and/or they play a prominent part in the episode/comic they're introduced in. Borrowed items or items willingly given to them by a third party (like the Animator's Pencil or Briefcase), however, aren't subject to these restrictions.

Garfield

Newspapers

Mostly used by Garfield to swat at particularly annoying flies and spiders, though it has been used to beat up Jon in his training to make him and Odie hate Mondays.

Flyswatters

Also mostly used for killing flies but also shown to be used on other characters, like swatting his owner Jon when he angers him.

Dogswatters

Invented with the assistance of his loyal friend Odie, squishing his top half like one would a fly. In spite of its name, it likely also works on other animals.

    Other basic weaponry

Baseball Bats, Mallets, Chainsaws, Flamethrowers, Acetylene Torches, Trap Doors, Bear Traps, Flares, etc.

    Robot Doubles

Used as a decoy, pretending to be real Garfield so the actual one could steal food.

Radio-Controlled Toy Tanks

Exactly what the name suggests. In spite of being toys, they pack actual ammunition, being used to blow up Jon’s food and Garfield’s former toy car

Calendars

Altering the year can turn everyone younger and tearing off Mondays from it (and presumably other days) causes the universe to end or the concept of Mondays to cease to exist. However, one should note that this affects everyone, including Garfield himself.

TV Remotes

These remotes can change the weather, the seasons, mute people, transform people and even affect the comic strip itself as if they were all channels on TV. Additionally, the April 17, 1988 comic also shows that Garfield has a huge version of said remote, even equipped with tank treads that can mow through walls.

Coffee

Even a sip of some coffee makes the lazy cat incredibly energetic, even able to bounce off the walls. Some brewings of coffee can even transform Garfield into a beast with longer claws and fur. Notably, Garfield’s coffee can also melt through tables and can bend and disintegrate spoons.

Peruvian Death Pepper

A super spicy pepper that, when eaten, causes Garfield to breathes out fire forwards, unable to handle the spice.

Pencils

While not on the level of the below Animator’s Pencil, Garfield can still use a seemingly regular pencil to draw anything to life, using it to draw a safe on the wall, which becomes real and has a pie inside.

Animator's Pencil

Given to him by the animator themself, Garfield can use it to erase anything, doing so to the villains of the cartoon and the wormhole they came from.

Book of Spells

As the name suggests, it’s a book of spells, mostly of transforming ones. It was originally owned by a fraud fortune teller, who curses Garfield to become a wolf creature at a full moon after he gets her arrested. After being convinced to turn Garfield back to normal, she uses the book to find the counter-curse and use it on Garfield. After that, Garfield takes the book from her and places a curse onto her, turning her into a mime, the most horrifying creature of all. Since Garfield doesn’t return it to her by the end of the episode, I feel it’s fair to say it’s part of his arsenal. Alongside the wolf and mime curses, Garfield mentions curses to transform people into monsters, demons, frogs and door-to-door salesmen.

Schlocko Robo-Remote

This remote is powerful enough to manipulate and control any electronic device, like messing with traffic lights, activating various construction-related machinery and, at episode’s end, Garfield uses it to turn the viewer’s TV off so they won’t see him and Odie get punished.

Stopwatch

This can pause and unpause time, Twilight Zone-style. However, overuse can cause it to stop working, trapping Garfield in suspended animation. Additionally, breaking the device can reverse time, though this also affects the user as well, seemingly the only way to reverse the permanent frozen time.

Time Machine

Stolen from scientist Professor Bonkers, it does exactly what one would expect a time machine to do, travel through time. Nermal originally used it to go back in time to prevent Garfield from being adopted by Jon but Garfield then takes Bonkers’ time machine and uses it to revert things back to normal, only for the two cats to end up messing things up further, so they use it again to set everything right.

Disintegration Ray

Created by Garfield’s evil boy genius neighbor Nathan, it does exactly what its name suggests, instantly disintegrates whatever the laser it fires hits. Nathan initially uses it against Garfield and Odie, but after Garfield mind-controls him (which a mind-control ray Nathan invented), Garfield takes it, using it to disintegrate the mind-control ray so Nathan won’t use it when it wears off in a week and plans to keep it to use on Aunt Ivy.

Clone Ray

Used by Garfield so he can avoid doing things he doesn’t want to. Clones whoever and whatever is targeted by its beam, though the clones will disappear after a while. 

Telepathic Helmet

When worn, it allows the wearer to read the minds of anyone around, so long as they have a brain to read. This item can even read the thoughts of aliens, allowing Garfield to realize that some humans are actually aliens in disguise.

Garfield Kart Items

Everyone's favorite Mario Kart ripoff has a whole lot of items that we can also consider a part of Garfield's kit.

Name	Image	Description
Pies		(also appears in various Garfield comics, cartoons and Garfield Defense) - Standard projectile, made for some zany hijinks. Certain ones can track opponents down.
Spring		Launches the user high up, allowing the user to skip parts of tracks.
Klopman Diamond		A rare and priceless gem, as well as a pointless running gag on a popular Saturday morning cartoon series. In spite of its appearance, it functions as an explosive, the user throws it at an opponent, causing it to stick on them, exploding after a few seconds.
Magic Wand		Switches the user’s position with whoever was hit with its blast.
Perfume		Grants temporary invincibility and a speed boost.
Pillow		Slows down the other opponents by putting them to sleep.
UFO		Fires out three UFOs at the player in first place before emitting rays at them. One of the UFOs’ rays won’t harm the opponent but the others will.

Garfield's Defense Skills

In Garfield's Defense, Garfield defends his house using Skills, summonable items used to attack the aliens trying to raid his home. This also includes some important Support items that Garfield can use in this game too.

Name	Image	Description
Boxing Glove		Garfield kicks a box forwards with a spring-loaded boxing glove inside, punching whoever it hits.
Toy Cars		Garfield summons four toy cars forwards, knocking over whoever it hits.
Toy Planes		Garfield summons some toy planes forwards, which do a loop-de-loop as it dives to the nearest opponent.
Books		Garfield summons a stack of books before kicking it, causing it to knock over and hurting anyone in its way
Watermelon Seeds		Garfield eats a watermelon before firing a barrage of seeds forwards.
Beehive		Garfield throws the beehive forwards, causing the bees to exit and attack his opponent.
Trumpets		Instead of attacking, this can either spawn friends/allies near Garfield or restore health

Name	Image	Description
Garfield's Suit-Up Box		Grants temporary invincibility to the user (lasts for 15 seconds)
Rolling Pin/Frying Pan		Standard, yet strong battering items, buffs to his standard rolled-up newspaper weapon.
Popcorn (and related items)		Garfield gradually gets more popcorn in this popcorn machine as a battle goes on. He can use the popcorn to summon some allies or upgrade his defenses.
Pizza/Super Pie		Instead of attacking, these can heal Garfield. Specifically, the Super Pie can heal Garfield to full Health and the Pizza can recover all friends (including Garfield) to half health.
Fortune Cookie		An item from the sequel that increases Garfield's chances of getting items from his opponents.
Worms		An item from the sequel that automatically picks up any dropped items from his opponents.
Speed Up Booster		An item from the sequel that can increase the speed of Garfield and his allies when used.

Vacuum Cleaner (Garfield (2004 game)

In spite of its small size, it can suck up any item of any size, even those bigger than itself. However, it can only hold up to three items, no matter the size.

Special Food Powers (Garfield: Saving Arlene)

Name	Image	Description
Ingredients		Garfield uses these to make the below foods. In spite of only being tomato, meat, and cheese, etc., Garfield can make a whole lot of dishes without having any tools to properly prepare the food. Can’t be used on their own.
Big Kicking Burger		Makes Garfield’s kicks stronger, and in-game, allowing him to launch Odie farther distances.
Cheesecake		Allows Garfield to do a floaty, extended jump.
Lasagna		Restores Garfield’s health.
Vanilla Milk Shake		Makes Garfield run twice as fast.
Chilli Con Carne		Eating this makes Garfield breathe fire briefly.

Heathcliff

Bubble Gum

A recurring item in the Heathcliff comics, surprisingly enough. Mostly used to carry Heathcliff into the air but also sees use in taking and carrying around phones, remotes and other smaller objects. Heathcliff can also use it as a weapon, blowing it bigger to invade Grandpa Nutmeg’s personal space.

Wands

Another one of Heathcliff’s recurring items. Can lift objects and people, shrink and grow people, create food, fire, create a dragon from said fire, shapeshift another being, alter a person’s emotions, do a kid's homework and fix the plumbing.

Ham Car

Used to travel way over the ham limit. Seems to travel at speeds comparable to actual cars.

Cat Car

Another vehicle Heathcliff owns. The car can also transform into a Transformers-like creature, a helicopter, a motorcycle, a hot-dog cart and a jet-ski. However, it is shown to be able to make hairballs, which can clog up the engine.

Other basic weaponry

Chainsaws, Baseball Bats, TNT/Dynamite, Katanas, Flamethrower, Rockets, Cannons, The Meat Tank, Shields, Mallets, Trapdoors, Leaf Blowers, Wrecking Balls, etc.

TV Remote

While not as versatile as Garfield’s remote, the above comic shows that Heathcliff can use his remote to turn a cuckoo-clock’s bird into a hand holding a bottle, like the one shown on TV.

Hang Glider

Do Hang-Gliders count as vehicles? Well, whether or not, Heathcliff still owns one, using it to float over mountain tops and spew fire at dogs from above.

Swinging Rope

As the Cat Burglar, Heathcliff sneaks into people’s houses to steal their garbage or fish. To do this, he uses a rope in the sky to swing to other locations, much like Spider-Man and his web-slingling.

Drone

A remote controlled drone, used both as a way to annoy his owners and as a makeshift hoverboard, as shown above.

Jetpack

Another recurring item. Like how most people would use one, Heathcliff uses this as a method of aerial travel, specifically doing so to escape dog lovers, escape from a fish store as the Cat Burglar, travel to the Vet and make a fantastic exit.

Other vehicles

Hot Air Balloons, Helicopters, Parade Floats, Segways, Garbage Car, etc.

Weather App

As shown in the above comic, Heathcliff’s phone’s weather app can summon rain clouds over his enemies.

Pug Call

Summons pugs, who can cause a pug-pede (stampede of pugs) and create a pug-alanche (avalanche of pugs).

Plants

Heathcliff has had several, seemingly alive, plants on his side. Alongside the Audrey II-like plant above, he's also created steroid-induced sunflowers by spitting out sunflower seeds and steroids.

Teeth-Whitening Strips

Used by Heathcliff to make his teeth white enough to completely blind anyone he doesn't like.

Ray Guns

Given to him by an alien and used to stun a dog bothering him.

Coffee

Similarly to Garfield's extreme reactions to coffee, drinking some can make him hyperactive enough to turn his body into a tornado and, when combined with his cat breath, gives him fire breath.

Time Machines

Self-explanatory. Heathcliff uses this to travel to the prehistoric times with dinosaurs, to 2500 B.C. when the sphinx was built, to the Roman Empire and back home.

Hot Sauce

Drinking some allows Heathcliff to breathe out fire, able to incinerate dogs and scare away birds.

Vacuum Cleaner

Heathcliff uses it to catch some mice, and it can suck up the entire bottom floor of Heathcliff’s house in seconds. Despite its small size, it can suck up lamps, pianos and even Heathcliff himself.

Inflatable Heathcliff Doll

A realistic looking decoy, though it’ll never replace the real thing. Heathcliff uses it to trick Spike into catching it instead of him. The doll can fly several meters into the sky while Spike, a huge bull dog, holds onto it.

Briefcase

Given to him so he can assist in delivering a letter, this briefcase can house a whole lot of items, like disguises, a power drill, a mini-jet ski to speed across water, a propeller that can allow him to fly through the air, a parachute, a skateboard and a jet engine to move faster on said skateboard.

X-14

Cat food that, when devoured, allows Heathcliff to stretch his body to ridiculous lengths (like the height of a clock tower) and allows him to shapeshift into various things (like hot-air balloons, basketballs, hammers, paper airplanes, birds and planes.) This only lasts for a few moments.

Super Vitamin Doughnuts

According to the scientist who made it, it multiplies an existing person’s abilities by 100. Eating it makes Heathcliff significantly stronger (tearing through walls and carrying large fishes), faster (empties out the back of a supermarket in seconds) and allows him to fly. However, this effect is temporary and only lasts for a little under a day.

Disappearing Ink

Turns Heathcliff himself completely invisible, though it will wear off after a while.

Anti-Gravity Ray

Originally owned by some aliens, Heathcliff is given it as a gift for saving the day. It makes anything targeted by the ray weightless, from milk-trucks to dogs to Heathcliff himself, removing its gravity and making it float into the air until the ray turns off.

Heathcliff: The Fast and the Furriest

This was the hardest part since there isn't really a complete list of items online so I had to watch a playthrough of it and try to see any items. (I excluded it from the original analysis for this reason and I excluded Garfield Kart as well to make it more fair)

Name	Image	Description
Watermelon		The user tosses a watermelon bomb forwards, which explodes, spraying watermelon juice or whatever you call it all over.
Ghost		Much like the Boo item in Mario Kart, it turns the user invisible, preventing them from being attacked.
Shields		Summons a force field that protects its user from any attacks while it's out.
Hearts		Works the same as the Shield but will refill Heathcliff’s hearts after being used (in-game, Heathcliff loses one out of three hearts when hit, and this refills his hearts completely)
Missile		Targets the nearest opponent before launching a homing missile towards them.
Pumpkin		The user tosses a pumpkin on the ground behind them and whoever runs into it gets the pumpkin placed on their heads, obscuring their view for a short time.
Music Box		Plays out a sick tune from a boombox, dazing those who get close.
Machine Gun		Holy shit, he has a gun! This fires a barrage of bullets forwards.

Abilities

Garfield

Claws

As sharp as they come, these claws are pretty good for shredding through furniture, turning them into statues, cutting through food, climbing up walls and ceilings and, of course, mauling his enemies viciously. 

Body Stretching

Garfield has, surprisingly, shown to have a somewhat consistent power of stretching himself. Garfield can stretch his lips to eat the lasagna Jon set as bait from his hiding spot and, as shown above, is able to stretch his limbs long enough to grab Jon’s plate of cookies and to try to take milk out of the neighbor's fridge.

Detachable Body Parts

Garfield is able to remove his limbs, tail and head from his body, which were still able to move whilst detached, in order to not be labeled as overweight by a scale.

Shapeshifting (?)

Garfield can shapeshift (?) his body, turning from cat, to a puddle (for lack of a better term), to a laying cat, in order to show to Jon that he shouldn’t tempt fate when it comes to Garfield’s ability to be relaxed. Garfield can also turn the fat in his stomach into a fist to strangle Jon with. Additionally, with a vampire costume, Garfield can also turn into a bat and fly.

Mind Reading/Manipulation

Garfield has shown to be able to read the minds of other beings, even those who aren't the typical animals he can telephatically communicate with. Alongside that, Garfield can also alter other people's thoughts, doing so to remind Jon to feed him and eating the cake in Odie's fantasies, leaving only an empty plate once he leaves.

Hypnotism

Garfield can also hypnotize people using only his eyes, able to weaken his victim's will just by staring at them.

Fourth Wall Breaking

Garfield, as a character and a series loves breaking the fourth wall. Outside of Garfield talking to the viewer/readers several times and few of the other aforementioned fourth wall breaks (changing the comic strip, using the animator’s pencil, turning the viewer’s TV off, and the later mentioned plot manipulation), Garfield can smell food being eaten by a reader outside the comic, has shown to be fat enough to bend the comic panels, has accidentally broken out of the comic (hitting the border of the panel and falling into the Gutter Space), tossed his own Z balloon at Jon, stole Jon’s ‘Z’ balloon so he himself can get to sleep [at Jon’s expense], wrote ‘BARK!’ on Odie’s speech bubble when Odie forgets what he was going to say and knows where you live.

Regeneration

As with most cartoon characters, Garfield has shown to be able to recover from seemingly any types of damage that would be fatal to a normal person, let alone a cat. Garfield can even revive from being reduced to a skeleton, bringing himself back from death. He similarly returns to normal after melting into a puddle and drunk coffee that blew his facial features off and tore off the top of his head and was still alive and able to put his face back together.

Teleportation

Various Garfield cartoons show him teleporting around to be even more of a nuisance. He has teleported between trash cans, popped out of a pizza box Jon ordered, teleported into a restaurant after the owner barricades the entrances (to prevent specifically him from entering) and teleports inside of the box that he (disguised as a mailman) gave to a witch in order to free Odie.

Gravity Manipulation

Garfield, by viewing the world upside down (doing a headstand), can alter the direction of gravity, with Jon falling ‘up’ due to Garfield seeing the “ceiling [as] the floor and the floor [as] the ceiling”

Non-Physical Interaction

Garfield has been shown to be able to kill ghosts, killing the ghost of a spider with the ghost of a rolled-up newspaper and eating/killing the ghost of a hamburger he once ate… and then eating/killing the ghost of a ghost of the hamburger.

Sound Manipulation

Garfield can sing at a note so high that it can shatter the paper the comic strip itself is on.

Speed Manipulation

As shown in the above comic, Garfield is able to slow his move speed to extreme extents, even moving slowly through the air while leaping for food.

Levitation

Garfield can halt himself in mid-air to obey Jon and can walk in mid-air in order to obey a ‘KEEP OFF THE GRASS’ sign.

Sleep Manipulation

As shown above, Garfield can cause the people in the nearest vicinity to immediately fall asleep, just by yawning while walking by them. Similarly, his laziness also contagious, so contagious in fact that it can bypass the fourth wall and infect the artist of the comic himself, causing the strip to become progressively more and more poorly drawn.

Weather Manipulation

Garfield can also alter the weather itself through various means. Garfield can summon rainfall indoors just by sneezing, turn a sunny Summer day into a snow-filled Winter just by wanting Summer to 'knock it off', stop snowfall just by yelling and send a snowflake back up to the sky just by glaring at it. Similarly, Garfield intimidates sunlight (or even the sun itself) to stay still so it can cover him while he's sleeping.

Dimensional Travel

Garfield has also been shown to be able to freely travel to other comic strips, traveling to Blondie’s comic whilst their house's paint dries and asks Snoopy if he could join Peanuts after Jon ruins his peaceful night.

Imagination

Garfield is able to make his dreams real, dreaming of snow in the above strip, only for the snow to become real and fall on him once he wakes up. Similarly, he has his nightmare monsters come to life and uses them to scare Jon. Garfield is also able to eat his shoulder donuts (representing his conscience/shoulder devil and shoulder angel), leaving real crumbs on the table.

Wish Granting

On a somewhat similar note, Garfield can grant his own wishes. However, it does seem that Garfield doesn’t have much control over the way his wishes are granted, being crushed by a piano after wishing for after-dinner music.

Plot Manipulation/Reality Warping

Alongside the Animator’s Pencil and his ability to make his dreams come to life, in the 16th issue of the KaBoom comics, Garfield (upset at Jon’s story for his comic book not matching with reality) decides to rewrite the story to be about himself, altering reality to having Vito give him many pizzas, having Arlene being madly in love with him and making Nermal no longer exist, literal plot manipulation. Garfield also does a similar thing in the 32nd issue, pulling a Duck Amuck and trapping Nermal in several Three Little Bears-like stories. The ending outright says that Garfield is reality-bending as well and in Garfield's Big Fat Hairy Adventure, writing an ending to the comic (since the author didn't finish it, he's visiting her house and found her sketches) to escape a time-loop.

Resistances

• Extreme heat: Stood next to the sun and survived
• Extreme cold: Survived getting his upper body frozen
• Cosmic Radiation: Has survived in space without a spacesuit
• Minor resistance to poison: Survived eating Raymond the Poisonous Toad (though he was still affected by it)

Heathcliff

Wall/Ceiling Climbing

Much like his opponent, Heathcliff can also walk on walls and on ceilings, presumably also using his claws.

Size Manipulation

As shown above, Heathcliff can grow humongous, being taller than the buildings in the background and terrifying the locals.

Hypnotism

Heathcliff can use only his eyes to hypnotize, attempting to do to several guests in his house. This also seems to give him resistance to hypnotism, as he is completely unaffected by Iggy hypnotizing him before turning it back at him.

Fire Breathing

While Heathcliff does have various items that can allow him to do something similar, as shown above, training with the recurring fire-breathing chihuahua allowed Heathcliff to learn to breathe fire by himself.

Frog Tongue

Similarly, training with Jimmy allows Heathcliff to use his tongue like a frog would, extending it to attack at a farther distance.

Laser Eyes

After a visit from the eye surgeon, Heathcliff can fire lasers from his eyes, using them to strike a dog.

Nine Lives/Cloning

As all cats do, Heathcliff has nine lives. In fact, he is able to turn each of his nine lives into nine identical clones of himself. Speaking of cloning, Heathcliff is able to split into seven smaller Heathcliffs that share his strength after being shattered by a strong punch, allowing him another brief chance at life.

Hulk Transformation

You won't like him when he's angry, since if he's angered enough, Heathcliff can turn into his own version of the Hulk. Outside of shattering an alarm clock in one strip, it's never shown attacking a living being but it certainly does increase his strength significantly.

Levitation

As shown in several comics, Heathcliff can levitate, using it to hide his poker cards or to show off his advanced yoga or meditation techniques. Heathcliff is also capable of rocket-like flight, typically done after receiving a kiss from his girlfriend Sonja. He can also gain flight by flapping his arms like a bird, allowing him to catch up to an eagle in flight.

Teleportation

Heathcliff has also shown teleporting in various cartoons. Heathcliff has teleported from one shoe to another whilst hiding from a Dalmatian that he upset and has run offscreen to the left only to suddenly re-appear on the right in a mail truck.

The Force

In spite of claims that his Jedi powers are "ineffective", Heathcliff has shown to be proficient user of The Force several times. He has shown to be able to use it to levitate a trash can and knock it over like he usually does as well as using it to lift up a newspaper and toss it at his owners. Heathcliff has also been described by a raccoon as a Garbage Master after lifting another trash can.

Mind Reading

Heathcliff is able to read minds, allowing him to attack Grandpa Nutmeg before he gives him a bath.

Kisses

Similarly to the iconic Princess and the Frog story, Heathcliff’s kisses can do a whole lot of things. Outside of turning frogs into dog catchers, baseball players, Godzilla, and cats, his kisses can also enlarge the person he kissed and can turn himself into a frog. This has only been shown to work on frogs, however. However, something that has shown to work on non-frog creatures is blowing a kiss as a ranged projectile.

Breath

Heathcliff's terrible breath is also extremely versatile, being able to turn into a fist to punch people and wake any poor sop up, summon a huge muscled cat that can knock out anyone threatening Heathcliff, summon a breath-clone of Heathcliff that seemingly shares his strength, create fog, ghosts, dragons and obscures visibility. It has also been nasty enough to knock out ghosts, King Kong and Godzilla. 

Reality Warping

In the above comic, Heathcliff is shown with Anthony Fermont’s powers from The Twilight Zone episode “It’s a Good Life”, turning the grandpa character into a jack-in-the-box and being asked to wish him into the cornfield (it’s unclear in the episode on what being sent to “the cornfield” entails but it seems to be a fate worse than death)

Shapeshifting

While Heathcliff's X-14 allows for greater shapeshifting, Heathcliff can still do so normally, transforming himself into a lion in the above clip.

Hydrokinesis

Heathcliff has been shown to be able to control flowing water using a baton, making it fly towards the person he wants to attack.

Hives

As shown in the Heathcliff and Dingbat episode "Hives", being in the presence of Heathcliff whilst he’s causing chaos can give people hives, though it can go away after a while as long as the victim gets away from Heathcliff. Additionally, this isn’t an instant illness as Heathcliff gets in the dogcatchers’ proximity several times without them getting hives (in fact, one of the dogcatchers only gets it when he mentions the illness itself).

Resistances

• Extreme cold: Survived getting his entire body frozen
• Cosmic Radiation: Has survived in space without a spacesuit
• Electrification: Survives being shocked by electric eels
• Hypnotism: As mentioned above, he wasn't phased by Iggy hypnotizing him

Support

Garfield

To assist in stopping the aliens from destroying his house in Garfield's Defense, Garfield enlists the help from his friends and enemies. Some of their feats (specifically Jon, Odie and the U.S. Acres gang) will be mentioned in the scaling section.

Odie

Garfield’s dimwitted frenemy. He attacks opponents in Defense by using his tongue to lick them. The Garfield Show episode The Control Freak also shows that Odie is immune to mind control.

Orson Pig

Co-star of Garfield and Friends and star of U.S. Acres. He attacks opponents in Defense by swinging a baseball bat at them.

Arlene

Garfield’s on-and-off girlfriend. She doesn't attack in Garfield’s Defense, but can heal Garfield or friends constantly to keep them in battle longer.

Wade Duck

U.S. Acres’ panophobic duck, though he can get over his fears and fight if he wants to. He attacks opponents in Defense by swinging a broomstick at his opponents.

Nermal

Garfield's cat frenemy (emphasis on enemy, but they have worked together). He attacks opponents in Defense with a ball of yarn. Nermal has survived being abused by Garfield several times, and has come out on top in a few fights with him.

Roy Rooster

U.S. Acres’ prank-loving rooster. He attacks opponents in Defense by hitting enemies with roller skates and is among the fastest in the game.

Dino Odie

One of Odie’s ancestors, who took the life of Garfield’s first life in Garfield: His 9 Lives. He attacks opponents in Defense just like Odie, using his tongue to lick them. Outside of presumably sharing feats with his predecessor Odie, Big Bob is humongous (five times the size of Garfield) and was able to tear out a tree from the ground to play fetch with.

Booker and Sheldon

Orson’s chicken children. Booker attacks opponents in Defense by throwing baseballs and Sheldon does so by bashing into enemies with his shell.

Squeak

In spite of being a cat, Garfield doesn’t chase mice unless forced to, and prefers to befriend the like he did with Squeak. Squeak is a support character who launches bread at the aliens, damaging them slightly. The mice in the house are able to keep pace with Garfield and in one comic, Squeak is shown to be stronger than Garfield, beating him in an arm-wrestling contest.

Lanolin

U.S. Acres’ tough lamb, who is the only person who can put Roy in his place. She functions as a support character, being an upgraded version of Squeak and throwing barrels instead.

Jon Arbuckle

Garfield’s owner (though Garfield considers himself as Jon’s owner). As a support, Jon can wipe out all enemies on the screen with a vacuum cleaner (or a flyswatter in the sequel), at least those who cannot withstand his unbelievable attack. When maxed out, he can even one-shot anything that isn't the Meatball Spider.

Liz Wilson

Jon's girlfriend and Garfield's vet. In Garfield's Defense 2, she is also a support like Jon and functions very similar to him, only she's stronger, has higher HP and uses a syringe to attack instead of a flyswatter.

Schlocko Laundro-Mutt

Getting past the helpers from Garfield's Defense, this robot is programmed to do a thorough scrubbing and cleaning of anyone or anything that gets messy, so long as they're wearing a specialized collar for it. This was originally bought by Jon to clean Odie, which Garfield quickly took advantage of, but Odie eventually put the collar on Garfield and got him to take the wash instead. This robot can tear through doors and can even carry grown men, as shown when Garfield and Odie teamed up to put Jon through this.

TI-D 7000

Similarly to the above, this robot is made to keep houses completely clean. While it mostly sweeps up houses and vacuums up dust, it can also target specific beings (whether it be pet, pet owner or salesmen) to clean up. When a target is inputted into the keyboard in its head, it immediately seeks it out using a targeting system before either a claw to pick up closer creatures or using a powerful vacuum to suck it up as well as anything in its path, storing them inside its stomach before spitting them out into the nearest trash can. This thing is fast enough to keep up with Garfield and Jon.

In Garfield's Escape, this is called the Bath-o-Matic and functions slightly differently, and much more like the above Laundro-Mutt, placing a collar on someone before chasing them down if they get filthy.

Heathcliff

The Sun

Yes, Heathcliff is close friends with the Sun itself. Due to this, Heathcliff can simply ask the sun to do things like getting a cloud to cover his owner's bodies while the rest at a beach.

Genies

It seems like almost everything in Heathcliff's world has a genie associated with it. From garbage genies, to spray cheese genies, a sunflower seed genie, even one for pasteurized milk. It seems from the above comic that those genies mostly grant wishes related to whatever they came from, though Heathcliff has encountered a few other traditional genies in regular lamps.

Man-Eating Giant

He's a giant, who eats men. Kinda self-explanatory.

Musk-Ox

Used to rush over to a hot dog broth stand and to destroy a poor dog’s ‘Beware of Dog’ sign by running it over.

Robots

He's got a loyal following of robots as well. These robots tend to be taller than buildings, seemingly used to advertise the meat store that Heathcliff likes but they can breathe fire and fire lasers from their eyes. While they are remote-controlled, they have been shown to be faulty at times, with various comics having Heathcliff trying (to no avail) to use a remote to fix them.

Fairy Godmother

He can also summon his fairy godmother who is able to protect him from attack, but it’s unclear how she can. However, the May 15, 2024 comic does show her levitating some garbage like Heathcliff’s wand and the January 16, 2022 comic shows that she can grant his wishes, doing so by creating a garbage can for him to eat.

Robot Cats

While it’s nowhere near the size of Heathcliff’s other robots, the robot cats are still significantly taller than Heathcliff. These can do Heathcliff’s bidding, like stealing fish and milk or just picking up his opponents and flicking them away. However, if the remote is broken, the robots are uncontrollable and can attack friend and foe.

Super M.A.C.

Originally designed to catch animals, Heathcliff re-wired the robot to assist him. It usually rides a machine that’s able to immediately locate any animal in the vicinity with a camera (even using X-Ray vision to look inside hiding places), and use claws, nets, animal-catching globes (which are small, but can carry even a big bulldog) and mallets to take down and defeat whatever is in its sight. However, this machine was destroyed by the time Heathcliff wired the robot so it's likely that it wouldn't have access to it here. The machine is also fast enough to briefly keep up with Heathcliff.

Do-It-Yourself Robot Cat

A robot version of Heathcliff. Originally built by his rival Spike in order to best him, this robot cat is just as smart as the real thing. By episode’s end, Heathcliff rewires the robot to be loyal to him and chase dogs.

Feats

Garfield

Overall

• Have bested Jon Arbuckle, Odie, Nermal and various mailmen
• Defeated Glitch, Master Control, Vivacia, King Glorm and the Space Lasagna
• Elected into the Bad Habits Hall of Fame
• Won the Household Cat Division of a Cat Show
• Won another cat show (after sabotaging the competion)
• Elected mayor, won in a landslide against Jon
• Invented the sponge shoes, yo-yo yarn, and the pie-cake-pie
• Robbed a bank, a hot dog cart and stole an ice cream truck
• Has plans to lead cats to world domination

Power

• Tore off a chunk of the moon and ate it like a pizza slice [20.9 Ronnatons of TNT]
• Fat enough to sink an entire continent [17.1 Petatons of TNT]
• Punched Odie to the moon and threw Nermal to the moon [10.258 Megatons of TNT; Debatable, see Before the Verdicts]
• Destroyed his entire house just by slamming a window too hard
• Dented an ice cream truck in one punch.
• Garfield's burps are able to launch Odie and Jon out of their house, tear off the house's door, knock over the house's gates and peel their sidewalk.
• Kicked Odie hard enough to literally send him into next week [Immeasurable, Debatable (could just be hax)]
• Whilst fishing, accidentally pulls the fishing rod hard enough to pull out the fish’s bones (and it’s implied this isn’t the first time this has happened)
• Rips the entire axle (including the back wheels) off of a moving car with his teeth after he chases and catches up to it

Speed

• Is faster than the speed of dark, outpacing the light in his room turning off [Relativistic-Relavistic+, possibly FTL]
• Remember that electricity isn't 100% the speed of light. FTL is a high-ball and Relativistic-Relavistic+ is the (more plausible) lowball.
• Catches a laser point's dot while it's in motion [93.08% SoL, see Before the Verdicts]
• Dodges two laser-like projectiles shot at him [Debatable, See Before the Verdicts]
• Dodges a pie that moved fast enough to to reach the moon and knock it over [9.6% SoL]
• Steals and eats Jon’s burger (out of his hands no less, Jon was just a few seconds away from eating it) faster than Jon can even see.
• According to Garfield’s law, depending on the amount of food at their destination, he and the other cats in the Garfield series are able to go faster than the speed of sound.
• Garfield later proves it, breaking the sound barrier while rushing to some lasagna.
• Similarly, Garfield also unleashes a sonic boom dashing towards his food.
• Eats five pizzas faster than the reader can flip the page [Immeasurable]
• Does so again, only with a hamburger [Immeasurable]

Durability

• Has survived being mauled by various dogs.
• Survived being crushed by a wrecking ball
• Survived falls from various heights that cause him to leave deep holes in the ground upon landing
• Survives being used as a battering ram to tear down a concrete wall.
• Survives having his house collapse on him.
• Survived a landmine’s explosion to the face
• Survived launching himself out of a cannon, hitting a tree branch and getting stuck in it.
• Survived being crushed by pianos

Heathcliff

Overall

• Has defeated Spike, the Catillac Cats, several milkmen and fish sellers, Lefty, Knuckles, Raul, Evilla the Witch and various aliens
• Would've been in the Cartoon Hall of Fame if he hadn't bet on baseball
• Got the 1st place trophy in the Westfinster Cat Show
• Bros with Felix the Cat, Tigger, and the Sun
• Knows and is friends with almost every cartoon character (including Garfield!)
• Apparently invented the speedo
• His bail is set at $15,000 (around $91,111.06 in 2026)
• Proved that cats are number one
• Goes way over the ham limit (not sure of the yam limit, though)

Power

• Punches dogs and full trash cans high into the air consistently
• On a similar note, he once punched a trash can with enough strength for it to flatten once it landed.
• Batted a baseball several miles away to a fish shop and to his own house
• Threw a fish several miles away from his house into a pond. 
• Carried three cats and three trash cans on one hand
• Spin tossed Mungo (a huge cat) with no issues
• Knocked down a tree with one karate chop
• Can lift a dumbbell that’s heavy enough to leave a manhole-sized crater in the ground after being thrown [Class 10 Lifting Strength at the lowest]
• Swings a mallet hard enough to destroy some hardened cement [0.0003 Tons of TNT]

Speed

• Outrun several cats, dogs and men in Abraham Lincoln cosplay.
• Dodges Cupid’s arrows three times
• Spins Spike fast enough to create a functional tornado (which generated enough wind to pull in the entirety of Heathcliff mini-club)
• Has the ‘fastest paw in the west’, reacting to a water gun spraying at him and deflecting it before it sprays him
• Dodges several water-gun sprays and water balloons tossed at him
• Swipes Grandpa and an impostor with enough speed to light their pants on fire.
• Heathcliff runs fast enough to leave a trail of fire on the ground [1,715 m/s]
• Runs across town to his house in a few seconds
• Heathcliff reacts to a laser being shot at him and deflects it [45.7% SoL, Debatable, See Before the Verdicts]

Durability

• Survived the explosion of a TNT truck, launching him out of the computer he was put in
• Survived launching himself out of cannons several times
• Heathcliff also survived an explosive candle’s… well, explosion to the face
• Heathcliff survives the explosion from his failed attempt to harness the power of cat breath
• Similarly, he also survives standing next to the explosion of a scale 
• Survives being run over and flattened by a truck.
• Survives being flattened by a treadmill

Scaling

Garfield

It shouldn't really be a surprise that Garfield, being the star of the show, would have scaled to various other characters from his series, having fought with them and against them several times. Additionally, as mentioned above, a lot of these below characters have fought alongside Garfield in the Garfield's Defense games.

Jon and Odie

Garfield's owner and his best frenemy. What with Garfield loving to beat up on them, it's only naturally that he should scale to the two of them, especially with them fighting on par with each other several times.

• Jon also used plot manipulation, altering the world to favor him.
• Odie once pulled a fire hydrant out of the ground with his teeth.
• Odie assisted Garfield with destroying their entire living room in the span of a single second.
• Jon rips off the nose of clown-shaped drive through speaker
• Jon survived being dragged by a plane en route to Italy
• Odie has uprooted a tree at Garfield's request
• Odie has survived being crushed by a safe.
• Jon threw the continent sinking Garfield out of a window
• Jon survived Garfield cannonball-ing into his swimming pool, leaving a huge crater in the ground

U.S. Acres Cast

The co-stars of Garfield and Friends and Jim Davis' other comic strip. While it's not outright shown in the comics, Garfield's Christmas Tales shows that Orson and Friends live in the same universe as Garfield, being next door to Jon's family farm. With them fighting with Garfield in Defense, it should make sense that Garfield could be comparable to them.

Orson Pig has...

• Survived being erased from existence.
• Used his imagination to create literally anything, even able to affect the setting of the world, including flipping it upside down and create various creatures just by reading a book.
• Survived being hit by his own explosion

Roy Rooster has...

• Survived being shoved into his bugle
• Survived having his beak punched to the moon
• Survived being struck by lightning

Wade Duck has...

• Run fast enough to run on water
• Survived being run over by a big tractor
• Survived being struck by lightning
• Survived being crushed by a flying elephant
• Survived being crushed by a piano

Lanolin Sheep has...

• Yelled loud enough to blow Roy’s feathers off
• Yelled loud enough to destroy a house just by BAA-ing
• Punched Wade’s beak hard enough to make it and Wade fly off into the distance
• Knocked Roy out in one punch
• Punched Roy’s beak to the moon
• Summoned rain by just yelling that she washed her car.

Other U.S. Acres character's feats...

• Bo Sheep has survived being struck by lightning
• Bo Sheep can exit the comic itself
• Booker can grab stars (At Least Large Star Level)
• Taking a star from the sky must have been pretty fast too. (MFTL+)
• Booker and the Worm have survived falls that leave impacts in the ground
• Booker and Sheldon have reacted to a star racing towards them
• Max the Skateboarding Bird is able to skateboard around the Earth in a few seconds (0.8c)

Antagonists

• Glitch was able to seal Garfield inside a TV and create 6 worlds inside said TV. (Multiversal)
• Master Control was able to kidnap and replace almost everyone in the world, including Jim Davis, the creator of Garfield and his universe.
• King Glorm and his army were able to use rays to control everyone in the world, including the writers of the cartoon.

Heathcliff

Crossover Scaling

While the other characters in his series are lacking in any feats to scale too, Heathcliff is a very referencial series, so it's only reasonable for him to scale to them. For this, I'm only scaling Heathcliff to those he shares some powers with. Heathcliff has met a multitude of other fictional characters (including Garfield), but he hasn't really shown to fight against or alongside them, so Heathcliff can't really get any scaling from that.

The Hulk has...

• Destroyed an entire universe during a battle with the Hameless One
• Destroyed a planet during his clash with Red She-Hulk
• Broke the unbreakable chains of eternity [Immeasurable]
• Pushed back against a wave that repelled reality itself and everything in the crossroads of infinity

In Star Wars, The Force has...

• Lifted and hurled away a Giant of Living Stone.
• Lifted and fractured mountainous megaliths 
• Pulled down a Star Destroyer with the Force (13.6 Megatons of TNT)
• Ripped apart an AT-AT Walker
• Made a crevice

Weaknesses

Garfield

As almost everyone knows, Garfield is incredibly lazy. He easily can get tired of doing something for too long. Garfield is also incredibly overconfident, often picking fights with those who are stronger than him. Not to mention, despite knowing 'fast and furious', Garfield is far from a skilled fighter, with most of his brawls being one-sided stomps in his opponent's favor. Also, if it's Monday, Garfield's luck takes a huge nosedive, with everything seemingly out to get him.

Heathcliff

Unlike his opponent, Heathcliff doesn't necessarily have a clear cut weakness. However, his overconfidence and ego has gotten in his way countless times, with him occasionally acting without using his superior mental agility. In fact, you might even say that he sometimes acts a little stupid (just don't say it to his face.)

Before the Verdict

General Feats

Laser-Dodging Feats

Both Garfield and Heathcliff have feats involving them reacting to and dodging lasers, with would bring give both of them Relativistic speeds. However, with how both lasers act in their series, it's likely that neither are true lasers.

In the case of Garfield, in The Garfield Show, he dodges what seem to be lasers fired by robots trying to destroy him. This one is relatively easy to argue against: we don’t actually know if they’re real lasers or not, as it’s not elaborated anywhere in the cartoon. They might look like lasers and travel in a straight line, but aside from that, we don’t have any other evidence to say they’re lasers. Additionally, the way these "lasers" knock over a dog's food bowl is unnatural for real lasers anyways.

Another similar feat is in a 2020s comic, in which Garfield catches light from a laser pointer. The laser pointer behaves realistically and one could reasonably say he's catching light. However, the punchline (Garfield placing the killed light on a trophy stand) does muddy things up, since it implies the laser pointer's light is tangible and isn't light speed.

For Heathcliff, this is a bit more interesting. The lasers he deflects are explicitly called that by a narrator, but they act completely differently otherwise. Heathcliff deflects said lasers using a soggy flower, whereas real lasers can only be deflected by reflective surfaces or certain deflectors. Additionally, the way it fell after being hit implies it had some mass to it, whereas real lasers do not. Due to this, these likely aren't real lasers, and reacting to them wouldn’t make any one faster than light either.

Garfield

Moon Tossing Feats

In the January 17, 1982 comic, Garfield punches Odie hard enough to send him flying offscreen before claiming that he sent him to the moon. Similarly, in the October 23, 1982 comic, Garfield throws Nermal into the distance after he (Nermal) insults him (Garfield) for the umpteenth time, also claiming to be sending him to the moon. Both of these have their character's landing point happen offscreen, so should we take Garfield at his word and assume he knocked them to the moon? Well, not exactly. Garfield is an unreliable narrator and he could be simply exaggerating how far he launched them. Garfield can scale to some moon-punching feats with Lanolin but he himself has never shown to be able to punch or throw people to the moon.

Heathcliff

Hulk-cliff's Abilities

As stated above, Heathcliff's Hulk form has never exerted its abilities outside of smashing an alarm clock, so it's not known what he can do with it. Through his clock smashing, I feel it's clear that Heathcliff does get a strength boost with this form, but that's really it and it's not even clear how strong he is now. It's not shown if Hulk-cliff has any of the Hulk's other abilities, especially his regeneration. For this analysis, I think it'd be best to just say that Hulk-cliff is only extremely strong, with no other abilities.

Verdict

When discussing a fight against two cartoon characters, it's only logical that these result would be incredibly interesting to talk about, especially with the various forms of media these two have been in. With them both having three cartoons each (with Garfield having a fourth on the way), various comic books and having existed for over 40 years, it's only logical that they'd have a lot up their nonexistent sleeves.

Stats

Both Garfield and Heathcliff have a fair bit in terms of stats to cover, so let’s jump right into it.

Starting with their stats, Heathcliff can lift a dumbbell heavy enough to sink through a sidewalk (giving him around Class 10 Lifting Strength at the lowest) and destroy some cement covering a guy in one wooden hammer swing (a destructive force of at least 0.0003 Tons of TNT). Speed-wise, Heathcliff's best non-debatable speed feat has him running fast enough to light the ground beneath him on fire, putting him at Hypersonic speed at the lowest. Pretty impressive all things considered, but, in spite of one may suspect, Garfield has superior feats across the board. 

Garfield can tear off one-eighth of the moon like pizza, a feat that would require a force of over 20 Ronnatons of TNT at minimum, several times stronger than concrete smashing swings and sidewalk-sinking dumbbells. Speed-wise, Garfield can dodge pies that can travel to the moon in seconds and move faster than darkness, dashing to his bed before his light could turn off, putting Garfield at Relativistic to potential Faster than Light speeds (factoring in the fact that electricity isn't 100% light speed), both ends significantly faster than Heathcliff's Hypersonic speed feats. Additionally, Garfield can scale to Faster than Light feats from Booker and he himself can move and eat faster than a reader could flip a page, which would bring him to Immeasurable speeds, furthering their speed gap.

Garfield also has arguments for Immeasurable Strength and Attack Speed too, what with him kicking Odie through time. However, it's unclear on if it was the force of the kick that launched Odie to next week, or if it was Garfield exterting an odd ability (we've already covered a whole lot of them so time manipulation is not entirely out of the question). Garfield is significantly stronger and faster than base Heathcliff anyways, including a more believable Immeasurable General Speed feat, so he wouldn't really need any immeasurable feats anyhow.

In conclusion, Garfield is stronger, more durable by proxy and much faster than Heathcliff, meaning he easily takes the stat trinity.

Arsenal & Abilities

Garfield may take stats, but this could change with their arsenals and abilities. This is where this really start picking up in this matchup. With so many items and abilities, that could make Garfield's strength and speed a moot point. 

As a starting point, both cats' set of abilities are quite similar in fact and could likely counter each other. Outside of their reality-warping, both have mallets, chainsaws, flamethrowers, tanks, explosives, robots and powerful vacuums and both have the ability to read minds, stretch their bodies out, levitate, teleport, breathe fire, cast spells, hypnotize and clone themselves. While some of their shared abilities are through one (or both) using an external item, both cats can use hammerspace (summoning any item they want from nowhere), so it's not a huge advantage if one has an innate ability. Additionally, both can replenish or repair their lost items at any time, such as Heathcliff wishing for more items with his genies and fairy godmother or Garfield being capable of wishing for more items, drawing more items with his pencils or imagining the item he desires before making it real (or having Orson do so) so both are gonna be geared up regardless of how long this fight lasts.

Let’s cover their individual advantages or counters to each other’s tools to see how well they could hold out in a large-scale fight such as this.

Heathcliff's Advantages

Starting with Heathcliff, since he's currently at a massive disadvantage, one of his best tools here is his wands (mostly through their versatility). These can do a variety of things, including powers that Garfield can't easily counter with any of his available equipment, like being shrunk to the size of a mouse or creating a dragon from some fire. Garfield can potentially counter some of the wand's powers like transmutation (Book of Spells) or fire creating (Death Pepper/Chili Con) but it’s definitely useful that Heathcliff would have the equivalent of multiple of Garfield's abilities and then some within a single wand.

On a similar note, X-14 is similarly versatile and also adds a bit of unpredictability. While Garfield and X-14 Heathcliff could likely stretch similar distances, what Garfield doesn't have is the quick and versatile shapeshifting that X-14 gives Heathcliff. After eating X-14, Heathcliff can transform into a functional plane, a mouse or even hammers for offense, shapeshifting in various ways that Garfield would be unable to predict.

Heathcliff's robots are also pretty useful for offense. Most of them are gigantic and significantly taller than Garfield and can breathe fire or shoot lasers from their eyes, providing some unpredictability here too. However, it is worth noting that Garfield can counter them with his Schlocko Robo Remote, which can mess with any electronics, most likely including Heathcliff's robot allies. The remote was even potent enough to affect the TV of the person watching the cartoon, so it would have no problems taking care of Heathcliff's robots, especially since they've shown to be faulty in the past.

With Heathcliff at a massive stat disadvantage, having items like his Vitamin Donuts that can boost his stats are a huge benefit. As stated by the scientist who created them, it gives a 100x multiplier to each of Heathcliff's stats. Through this, Heathcliff's strength can get up to Class K with Attack Potency worth at least 0.03 Tons of TNT and he's now fast enough to reach High Hypersonic+ at the lowest. In spite of the obvious benefit these donuts would give him, however, they wouldn't allow him to get anywhere close to Garfield's moon-ripping strength and relativistic to faster than light speeds. To make things worse, Garfield also has items to increase his strength and speed through the Special Food Items. While Garfield would need to prepare these beforehand, he's significantly faster and, as we'll see below, can incapacitate Heathcliff, meaning that this would likely be a non-issue. Garfield is already significantly stronger and faster than Heathcliff, with some immeasurable strength and speed arguments to boot, so him having the ability to increase his already impressive stats is a poor sign for Heathcliff. 

However, not all hope is lost in terms of Heathcliff's strength. When made angry enough, Heathcliff can turn into Hulkcliff, a significantly stronger form. While this form has never shown fighting a living thing, it's likely that we can scale it to The Hulk himself. Through scaling, this form could likely give Heathcliff an opportunity to surpass Garfield's strength, being given the strength to destroy universes and break the unbreakable. Even if we consider Garfield kicking Odie through time as immeasurable, Hulkcliff scaling to its inspiration would still give Garfield a run for his money. Of course, due to Hulkcliff never showing its true potential, it's unclear if it shares any of The Hulk's other abilities, including his regeneration, which will become an important point soon.

This is obviously a lot, but let’s flip things around and see Garfield’s own advantages against Heathcliff (excluding the ones mentioned above).

Garfield's Advantages

Both cats have weather manipulation on their sides, with Garfield being able to do so on his own and with his TV Remote and Heathcliff being able to summon rainclouds with his Weather App. However, Garfield is actually able to alter the weather itself, stopping and creating snowfall in an instant, whereas Heathcliff has only been shown summoning small rainclouds over a dog's head. Through Garfield's rain manipulation, he could potentially use it to short out Heathcliff's robots, but Heathcliff's Hydrokinesis can just redirect the rain back at him, potentially shorting out Garfield's robots as well. 

While it's nowhere near the level of Heathcliff's wand, Garfield's TV Remote still offers plenty of abilities for him to use. For one, it can mute people, which can prevent Heathcliff from making wishes with his genies and his fairy godmother. Additionally, as mentioned before, it can alter the weather and seasons at a much great AoE than Heathcliff's Weather App or even his wands. It also offers minor transformation/mutation of another person, able to transform Heathcliff into, say, Binky the Clown.

While Heathcliff can get significantly stronger with his arsenal and abilities, Garfield has several items that can just instantly kill Heathcliff, bypassing any strength or durability he may have. The Disintegrator Ray, for instance, can immediately reduce Heathcliff and his arsenal to dust as long as they're hit by its blast. The Animator's Pencil would also easily be able to erase Heathcliff from existence with its eraser. Garfield's Calendar is also able to remove a day from existence and potentially kill Heathcliff that way, but it would also take Garfield with him, so Garfield wouldn't be able to benefit as much from that. Either way, even with Heathcliff's various buffs, Garfield's weaponry would easily be able to instantly defeat Heathcliff should he get the chance.

And it's extremely likely that Garfield would be able to get that chance since he also has various ways to incapacitate Heathcliff. For one, Garfield can use his sleep manipulation on Heathcliff (or using the similar Pillow item) to put Heathcliff down. Similarly, Garfield's contagious laziness was potent enough to affect the creator of his comic, meaning it would have no problem taking care of Heathcliff. Most importantly, Garfield has his Stopwatch, which can stop time and render any of Heathcliff's speed feats a moot point. Due to this, no matter the scenario, Garfield would have various ways to prevent Heathcliff from attacking and instantly kill him with his powerful items.

But even if Heathcliff were able to power through Garfield's offense and land a powerful blow, it wouldn't be over for Garfield. You see, Garfield is just really hard to kill. Thanks to the benefits of being a cartoon character, Garfield’s regeneration makes him really hard to put down through any conventional means. While Heathcliff can split into seven when shattered, Garfield's regeneration is ultimately superior, what with it being able to revive Garfield after being reduced to a skeleton or being melted down, whereas Heathcliff's splitting seems to only function if he and his body parts are separated. Due to this, Heathcliff's only way to put Garfield down for good with his standard equipment would be through wishing for him to just not exist from his various wish-granting allies. However, unlike Garfield with his incapacitating items, Heathcliff has no way to guarantee an opportunity to do so, especially with Garfield's massive speed advantage.

Reality Warping

I didn't really know where else to mention this, especially with how powerful they make these characters. Both characters have the ability to warp reality, granting them almost complete control over the setting.

For Garfield, he can use his plot manipulation, rewriting reality to suit him. As shown the comic books, Garfield is able to completely alter a person's personality, using it to make Odie not want to lick him and making Arlene maddeningly in love with him, completely change the setting, as he did with Nermal in the Three Bears story, and create or summon anything he wants, like Vito with a lot of pizzas or the antagonists Nermal faced during the Bears story. Most importantly, however, is his ability to erase people from existence, doing so to Nermal while taking over for the comic book. Garfield has ultimate control over his setting and the people within it, able to trip up Heathcliff and erase him from existence when he decides he wants to end the fight.

For Heathcliff, he has Anthony Fermont's powers from The Twilight Zone. While Anthony has a multitude of powers, I'll limit Heathcliff to only have the abilities we see him do and what he's implied to do, and even still, he's very powerful. Heathcliff is able to transmutate a person, killing Grandpa Nutmeg by turning him into a jack-in-the-box and is implied to be able to wish anyone into the cornfield, which is ambiguous in the show of origin, but is essentially treated as a fate worse than death. This ability is extremely useful for Heathcliff, since Garfield's regeneration means he can't killed by Heathcliff's standard moves, so having to ways to instantly defeat him would be incredibly useful for him.

With this, I actually feel like they're evenly matched. Both cats are able to warp reality and can instantly kill a person with a single thought, so I feel it's hard to say one cat is better than the other in this one. Heathcliff can use his ability at all times, but, Garfield being significantly faster and having the ability to stop time with the Stopwatch means that they'd have about the same time to use their powers.

Win Conditions

So, with all of their items and abilities taken into account, Garfield seems to have the better set to guarantee a kill. Garfield has plenty of items to instantly defeat Heathcliff without even having to look into his plot manipulation, like with the Disintegrator Ray or the Animator's Pencil. Even if he had trouble landing a hit with one of these, Garfield can simply put Heathcliff to sleep or freeze him in time before using his items. On the flip-side, Garfield's regeneration means that Heathcliff has less consistent ways of putting Garfield down for good. The only things Heathcliff has that could likely kill Garfield are through wishing with his genies or just using his reality warping to deal with him. However, Heathcliff has no ways to actually ensure that he can actually do so, unlike Garfield who has various ways to incapacitate his opponent.

It’s a very close category, with a lot of advantages on either side, but the way I see it, Garfield takes the edge here too, with him having more significantly more ways to ensure a victory than Heathcliff does.

Skill and Experience

Finally, let's talk about their respective skills and talents. In terms of combative skill, Heathcliff easily takes the edge over Garfield. As shown in the Heathcliff and Marmaduke episode 'A New Kit on the Block', Heathcliff has been fighting the neighborhood dogs since he was a kitten, and throughout his various series, Heathcliff has beaten various cats, dogs, aliens and other antagonists several times with very few scoring victories against him. Meanwhile, Garfield, in spite of knowing 'fast and furious', certainly isn't skilled at fighting, and he has lost fights against several dogs, cats, and even his usual victims [Odie, Jon, Nermal and the mailmen] have kicked his ass several times.

Naturally, one would expect Heathcliff to take experience too, and Heathcliff has fought creatures for longer, both in-universe (as stated above, he fought dogs since he was a kitten, while Garfield's exploits mostly happened when he was already an adult) and out (Heathcliff has been in comics, and by proxy, have fought, 3 years before Garfield's debut appearance in Jon). However, I'd actually argue Garfield has the better experience. Both have fought similar creatures in the past (cats, dogs, aliens, witches, robots, etc.), but Garfield has won against creatures with even greater power than them, like Glitch (who can create entire worlds and trap Garfield inside a TV) or King Glorm (a sloth who was able to turn the entire world lazy, including the people making the cartoon). Meanwhile, outside of the aliens and witches mentioned before, Heathcliff hasn't fought any creatures more powerful than a dog or a human.

Ultimately, while Heathcliff is the more skilled fighter of the two, Garfield has better experience in using his wit and skills in fights against powerful opponents, so this category is a tie.

Conclusion

"If you like this show, tell a friend. If you don't like it, my name is Heathcliff."

Advantages:

• Significantly stronger and more durable.
• Superior overall speed (in both measurable and immeasurable ends), making it difficult for Heathcliff to keep up with/hit him 
• Larger AoE
• Has various instant battle-enders (Calendar, plot manipulation, Disintegration Ray, Animator’s Pencil) 
• Is much more likely to use his win conditions than Heathcliff
• Various disarming moves (Sleep Manipulation, Time Stop, Pillow) 
• Weather manipulation can counter Heathcliff’s fire attacks… 
• Schlocko Remote can take control of Heathcliff’s robots 
• Superior regeneration
• Funnier earlier comics and cartoons
• More experienced
• Better archives of the comics

Disadvantages:

• Lazier without coffee
• Less skill in battle
• ... But Heathcliff's Hydrokinesis can redirect the rain
• Later comics aren't as funny
• Mondays

"It is HEATHCLIFF's opinion that the universe is not big enough for both Garfield and HEATHCLIFF. Well, the HEATHCLIFF comic book isn’t, anyway."

Advantages:

• Vitamin Donuts can give Heathcliff extreme buffs… 
• X-14’s stretching is superior to Garfield’s base stretching (Garfield stretching to neighbor’s house < Heathcliff stretching taller than clock towers) and shapeshifting 
• Hulk form can surpass Garfield’s strength… 
• More skilled fighter overall
• Water Manipulation could counter Garfield’s rain summoning
• Funnier modern comics
• Sounds like Bugs Bunny

Disadvantages:

• … but the buffs they give can’t make up for his stat disadvantage
• … presumably (assuming it does match Hulk’s strength), not to mention it’s unknown if it shares Hulk’s other abilities
• Less experienced
• Inferior regeneration
• Worse archives of pre-2020 comics (especially the Sundays)

Overall, this was a closer matchup than one would probably expect [though this is solely due to the arsenal and abilities], considering Heathcliff's known for being an excellent fighter while Garfield is clearly not. However, in spite of that, Garfield should have the advantage more often than not. Garfield is significantly stronger and faster, whether or not one buys his immeasurable feats, essentially meaning Heathcliff would struggle greatly to land a blow on him. Additionally, Garfield's regeneration means that even if Heathcliff manages to hurt him, it's unlikely he could kill him for good with any of his basic kit. Heathcliff has a few ways to defeat Garfield but Garfield can either counter them or just simply prevent Heathcliff from using them and Garfield's significant speed advantage means he'd likely use his instant-killing moves first.

While Heathcliff is certainly the more skilled one of the two and has pretty good weaponry on his side, Garfield's strength, speed and lethal weaponry and abilities ultimately allow him to claw his way to victory. This fight may be cat-astrophic, but the winner is Garfield.

This remake honestly took a lot of work to do, especially with this being my first ever G1-style blog. I didn't even intend to make this a blog, as I wanted to make it a Reddit post like my previous one, but I released it would be too huge to write in a Reddit post, so I decided to do this instead. Of course, due to the transition to a blog, I had to add some new stuff, like full descriptions to all of their items and abilities as well as some background for each cat (and I'm not really a fan of either of the backgrounds I wrote but I wanted to get into the actual things as quickly as possible) and actually calculate some stuff (please forgive me if I got anything wrong). Ultimately, this was a lot and I'm glad to finally be done and I hope you enjoyed this. I don't plan on doing more, but if I do, it'll likely be Bowser vs. Dedede next (and maybe next time, I'll be bothered to include their skill and experience).

Also Heathcliff and Marmaduke's theme song is peak and better than the Catillac Cats theme song and I will die on this hill.