What ever happened to Lyman?

Lyman's whereabouts are a mystery and often a cause of discussion of Garfield fans. The comic never said what happened. He appeared in the April 24th 1983 strip, and then...he was just gone.

There are a few explanations for where he is though:

"Jim Davis has jokingly explained Lyman's sudden disappearance and long absence from the strip on different occasions either by saying that Lyman joined the Peace Corps and was then never heard from again or by saying, "Don't look in Jon's basement.""-Garfield Wikia

The basement part is most likely just a joke, and the peace corps one is meant as a serious answer. Besides some of the stuff he's done to Odie, Lyman is a pretty sweet man, and the Peace Corps seem like a possibility.

However the Scary Scavenger hunt games seem to bring up some possibilities (One of them "supporting" the "Don't look in Jon's basement" joke.)

   (Source: Mobygames.com)

Garfield isn't surprised to see Jon's old friend chained in the basement, he has this expression the whole game.

The second game is much worse though.

   What is this implying? Has Garfield's hunger gotten to this point?

The Garfield Show also tackled this as well. In this he was a nature photographer in Australia, which is actually really cool. I mean he's shown interest in animals (mainly dogs) and we didn't learn a lot about his interests in the comic (Besides things like Disco,Tennis and jogging), so perhaps photography was one of them

 

   (Source: Garfield wikia)

Whatever you choose to believe, whether it's listed here or not, it seems Lyman had interesting encounters afterwards.