Courage the Cowardly Dog

Courage the Cowardly Dog
Stupid dog! You make me look bad! OOGA BOOGA BOOGA -Eustace Bagge.
Genre: Slapstick Comedy Horror Running Time: 22 minutes Country: United States Release Date: November 12, 1999 – November 22, 2002 Network(s): Cartoon Network (Worldwide) Boomerang (Worldwide) Created by: John R. Dilworth Distributed by: Warner Bros. Television Distribution Starring: Marty Grabstein Thea White Lionel Wilson (Seasons 1-3) Arthur Anderson (Season 4) Simon Prebble Paul Schoeffler Seasons: 4 Episodes: 52

Courage the Cowardly Dog is an American animated horror comedy television series created by John R. Dilworth for Cartoon Network as part of the network's Cartoon Cartoons block.

Plot

Courage is a timid pink dog with paranoia problems. He and his owners live on a farm in the middle of Nowhere... literally. Despite being far away from everything and everyone, that doesn't stop a whole bunch of bizarre adversaries from turning up like living nightmares. Courage must overcome his fear and help save his owners, Eustace and Muriel, from ghosts and paranormal spirits living on the farm. Although Muriel loves Courage, Eustace loves to tease him and scare him.

Why It Fills You With Courage

1. It's one of Cartoon Network's original first series.
2. It handles dark subject matters extremely well, such as domestic abuse, lesbianism, and implied prostitution.
3. Amazing sense of horror, as the villains in the show are delightfully creepy for its rating.
4. Great and creative character designs.
5. Likable and memorable characters, such as the main characters Courage, Eustace Bagge (despite his flaws), and Muriel are very protective of each other.
6. Memorable creatures and villains, such as The Computer, Shirley, Katz, Le Quack, Freaky Fred, Benton Tarantella, The Snowman, and most notably, King Ramses.
7. Amazing soundtrack, such as the background music playing in the intro and theme songs of various characters (such as Katz).
8. Unique humor and slapstick.
9. The funniest thing that always happens is when Eustace gets his comeuppance almost in every episode was the funniest thing throughout the entire series.
10. Many Memorable quotes such as "The things I do for love." "Ooooooooo!", "Oh my." "Stupid dog!","Ooga Booga Booga!" "What did I do?" and more.
11. Amazing animation and art style that was done by Wang Film Productions/Cuckoo's Nest (which also worked on Garfield and Friends), especially by 1999 standards, due to how amazing it looks today, it has aged well, especially for people and viewers who like the show, the color palette is oddly beautiful and very nice to see, the CGI is downright creative and unique they seem if they got it right.
12. Interesting and smart writing that mixes horror with comedy.
13. Top-notch voice acting, especially from Marty Grabstein, who voices Courage, where they put a lot of effort into expressing their characters and it feels like they want to do it at all.
14. Beautifully detailed background design.
15. It got a 2014 revival special titled "The Fog of Courage" and a crossover movie with Scooby-Doo in 2021 titled Straight Outta Nowhere: Scooby-Doo! Meets Courage the Cowardly Dog which were well received.
16. The show is a throwback to cartoons and animators from the Golden Age of Animation such as Tex Avery, Bob Clampett, Chuck Jones, Ward Kimball, Max and Dave Fleischer, as well as a few others.
17. Lots of memorable episodes such as:
    • A Night at the Katz Motel (Where first impressions of the series were positive)
    • Dr. Le Quack: Amnesia Specialist
    • King Ramses' Curse
    • Angry Nasty People
    • Courage the Fly
    • Cajun Granny Stew
    • Scuba, Scuba Doo
    • The Duck Brothers
    • The Demon in the Mattress
    • The Tower of Dr. Zalost
    • The Mask
    • The Nutcracker
    • Remembrance of Courage Past
    • The Hunchback of Nowhere
    • Perfect (A great conclusion to the series)

Fearful Qualities

1. Although this is a nitpick, this show contains scenes that are way too scary and disturbing for kids, such as the infamous "Violin Girl Scene" or "You're not perfect" scene in the series finale. It also got up to the point where adults have claimed that they had nightmares and that the show got banned or censored in some countries, most notably China, the United Kingdom, Malaysia, MENA countries, and so on.
2. There are some bad episodes such as:
   • Hothead (Arguably the worst episode of the entire series)
   • Heads of Beef
   • The Curse of Shirley
   • Evil Weevil
   • Curtain of Cruelty
   • So in Louvre Are We Two
   • Swindlin' Wind
   • Muriel Blows Up
   • Son of the Chicken from Outer Space
   • Ball of Revenge (Also counts as worst)
   • Muted Muriel
   • Goat Pain
3. The animation and CGI, while amazing, can be very ugly and grotesque at times, even by late 1999 standards, with the worst offender being the blue bugle in “Perfect”.
4. Some characteristics are not done well:
   • Eustace Bagge, one of Courage's owners, always teases and scares Courage using his mask for absolutely no good reason.
   • Ma Bagge, Eustace's abusive mother and the one person Muriel dislikes.
   • Di Lung, who created a robot in one episode to replace and sadistically beat up Courage.
5. Courage, the main protagonist has less dialogue after the first season.
6. Plot Hole: Throughout the show, Eustace is seen speaking proper dialogue, even though he has no teeth. In real life, having no teeth means old people cannot say dialogue properly.
7. The Stretch Films logo can be a nightmare fuel to some people.

Trivia

• The names Muriel and Eustace are taken from the middle names of Chandler Bing and Ross Geller of Friends (1994).
• Courage's dialogue decreased after the first season. This is because the executives at Cartoon Network thought Courage "talked too much" and wanted his dialogue cut short.
• Lionel Wilson (Eustace) quit halfway through the series before his death on April 30, 2003, and was replaced by Arthur Anderson.
  • Thea White (Muriel) also died on July 31, 2021.
• This was voice director Peter Fernandez's favorite show that he worked on.
• Tim Chi Ly, who voices the recurring character Di Lung, was one of the show's animators.
• Throughout the show, John Dilworth's name was somewhere seen in the environment.
  • In addition to hiding his name (or DIL) in every episode, a sketch of creator John Dilworth can be seen throughout most episodes in various locations (predominantly on the wall near the stairs in the house).
• Courage originated as a side character called Hamilton in a grotesquely animated short called "Smart Talk with Raisin" that first aired as a segment in episode 1 of season 3 of MTV's "Liquid Television" animated anthology series. The character was then completely reworked and renamed to star in a short called "The Chicken from Outer Space" which aired as an episode of season 1 of "The Cartoon Cartoon Show" and became the de facto pilot for *"Courage the Cowardly Dog" series which was animated and written in the same fashion and tone. There was one more Courage the Cowardly Dog short called "The Fog of Courage" that was released in 2014 as a proposed CGI pilot for the revival of the show, and it's also designed and written in the same tone as the original show.
• In 2021, the show received a crossover movie with Scooby-Doo! titled "Straight Outta Nowhere: Scooby-Doo! Meets Courage the Cowardly Dog."

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