Couch theater — DVD previews

Humans crave news and entertainment, and there’s no better place to get it than your local newspaper. Alongside stories of this and that, you get recipes and notices of sales, puzzles and games, and of course, the comics section. Comic strips have fascinated us since the earliest days of The Yellow Kid, a simple gag panel featuring a bald boy in a yellow nightdress. Who knew? But these artful characters and situations draw us in, and delight and connect us. Here are six comic strips that jumped off the funny pages to the big screen!

“Garfield” -- America’s favorite lasagna-loving cat enjoys napping and eating while tolerating dim-witted but sweet Odie. In the 2004 movie version, Jon is talked into adopting a dog (Odie) who the local weather anchor plots to steal, forcing Garfield (voiced by Bill Murray) to reluctantly save him. Garfield is CGI, but the rest of the gang is live action, including Breckin Meyer as Jon and Stephen Tobolowsky as the villainous Happy Chapman. My children love this movie and I have seen it 4,000 times.

“Dick Tracy” -- Warren Beatty’s hard-boiled detective movie featured iconic art direction and faithfulness to the characters and tone of the strip, but it didn’t wow audiences at the time -- even with Madonna as Breathless Mahoney, the songstress dame who may be a witness against crime boss Big Boy (Al Pacino off his rocker), but who expends a lot of energy trying to tempt Tracy away from Tess, his girlfriend.