@Amethyst_Crystal  
Could also be that one is a meme (or at least a joke comic) someone made with screenshots from a show and put on the internet just for the sake of it, and the other is supposed to be more like a “product” of sorts. A complete package that represents someone’s actual work that week, and it’s considered a job well done.
 
When you think of it that way, with this strip being “the product” presented to us that week in the paper, this is incredibly weak. It barely even qualifies as a joke, which is a problem I’ve noticed with a lot of Garfield strips lately.

@Goddess Erosia  
Perhaps you’ve developed a subconscious bias towards Garfield.  
Or maybe you like the grumpy Rarity eyes.  
And/or Twilight’s smile over Jon’s frown.  
And/or the much more detailed background in the mlp version.

@InuYugiHakusho  
For what it’s worth, the live action Garfield movie was fresh.
 
A fresh piece of shit.

@Goddess Erosia  
Garfield’s been around for over 40 years. It’s hard to keep things fresh when something has had such a long run.

@Background Pony #F513  
I remember when they first started out…. They were actually pretty okay, back when they had a completely different art style. I remember there was also a cartoon in the 80s that was okay, that looked more modern. And there was a few years where the comics had this art style where the humor was still funny, but now it’s like anti-humor.
 
God Jim Davis must be so depressed now, or something. Maybe he just straight up ran out of ideas for the last 10 years.

@Goddess Erosia  
I always say that the true Garfield died when Lorenzo Music died. RIP.

you know it’s weird… I thought this was adorable and endearing, but the source just seems incredibly lazy and stupid to me even though it’s literally the exact same concept.
 
Garfield, at least modern Garfield, is such bottom of the barrel humor now to the point it barely counts as humor. If someone showed me this without the source idea though I wouldn’t have thought anything was wrong. Maybe I just get triggered by Garfield now idk….

I remember that Garfield strip.