My border collies were very clever, as were my shelties. Most of the rest not so much. But my Havanese has incredible pattern recognition. Daffynition posts tiny gifs and my dog always spots them and goes bonkers. He lies on the end of the hassock with his nose near the TV waiting for a horse or dog to appear. Even a modernistic cartoon animal is recognizable to him. Husband has had to cover up the monitor background of pictures of our old pets as it drives Rory batty.
We have two dogs and four cats. Our one male cat watches the sport of Curling. He will sit in front of the TV and watch an entire match and will leave during commercials to use the litter box then return to finish the match.