Quote Originally Posted by Animeniax
Nothing you said discounts what I said. Regardless of the poor animation, Jon talking to a real cat or a stuffed cat amounts to the same thing: he's talking to himself.
Yeah, I suppose the author purposefully made the (real) cat especially static so that it enhances the feeling the cat is in reality taking no part in the conversations. However, taken too far that's not particularly realistic, either, which is what I meant, like Xan said. While cats don't understand the words and sentences, they still react and get some meanings (mainly: There's food for you. Although this was partly accounted for in the strips).

I have to actually say I never read the original Garfield thinking all the cat's "lines" are nothing but Jon's imagination. It'd indeed be too sad.