List of Courage the Cowardly Dog characters
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[edit] Main characters
[edit] Courage
Courage is the main character of the show. He was abandoned as a puppy, left in the cold, and found by Muriel Bagge, who took him in and gave him affection. His origins and the fate of his parents are further detailed in the final episode "Remembrance of Courage Past".
Though he is tagged as a "cowardly dog", he lives up to his name in each episode. He acts as the reluctant hero at great risk to himself. He overcomes his fear of the evil presented in each episode, unenthusiastically sighing and saying, "The things I do for love." His signature is his scream of complete and utter terror in the face of a monster (this scream saved his life at one point). One of Courage's best qualities is that he never gives up.
Courage also has a compassionate side, often showing understanding and friendship to monsters and creatures shunned by most people. He is a certified psychiatrist (certified by his computer, who asked him questions such as, "If Johnny has 2 apples, and Davey has 3 apples, why don't they just shut up and eat???")
Courage speaks in regular English to the viewer, but when he wants to convey a message to the other characters on the show, usually he acts out the message while blabbering high-pitched incomprehensible gibberish. For example, to tell the Bagges that they are in danger of running into a given monster, he will himself temporarily morph into the monster and roar like it. This may possibly be a reference to the Scooby Doo cartoons, where Scooby would act like the monster or apparition he has just seen. Actually, Courage may have spoken in English to Muriel a few times-- but usually he communicates in a manner that is incomprehensible.
Courage is a pink colour. He has 3 black spots and 1 white spot on his back. His 4 paws are quite small and he has a short tail. Courage has a very long tongue, which is often used to pull leavers and open door handles he can't reach. His teeth are fairly white but 1 tooth has a round hole in it.
Courage first appeared on the What a Cartoon! show in an animated short named "The Chicken from Outer Space".
[edit] Catchphrases
- "[action here] or my name is [ridiculous name here] - and it's not." (Only used in season 1)
- "The things I do for love..."
- "WhatdoIdo? WhatdoIdo?!"
- "Oh no!"
- "Yes!" (Whenever something good happens)
[edit] Muriel Bagge
Muriel Bagge, originally voiced by Billie Lou Watt, replaced by Thea White, is Courage's sweet, innocent Scottish-accented grandmother-like owner. She loves to be hospitable, cook and clean, and to sit in her rocking chair, but the one thing she loves the most is Courage, and the feeling is very mutual. She's so sweet and unassuming she has a difficult time telling when danger is approaching, and occasionally invites evil into the house, even as Courage frantically warns her. However, whenever Eustace harms or teases Courage, she hits them over the head with something, usually her rolling-pin. Muriel is also a good cook, whose secret ingredient to everything is vinegar.
In nearly every episode, Muriel is captured or threatened in some way, and Courage is the only one who can save her. Once saved, she is generally none-the-wiser of the risks Courage took.
Muriel and Eustace's ages are unknown. However, it would be a safe bet that Muriel is in her sixties, for in Courage's flashbacks to when he was a baby (in the series finale "Remembrance of Courage Past"), a brunette Muriel found him alone in an alley.
In the episode "Freaky Fred", Muriel was visited by her nephew Fred, a character based on Edgar Allen Poe's poems, who turned out to be a freak hair cutter. Before being caught by medics, he managed to cut off Courage's hair with an exception, the phrase "With Love, Fred" located on his back.
Muriel also plays the sitar.
[edit] Catchphrases
- “Oh my.”
- “Courage! So good to see ya.”
- “Would you like a cup of tea?”
- "Where are your marbles?"
- “Needs more vinegar.”
[edit] Eustace Harold Bagge
Eustace Bagge is Muriel's bad-tempered, anti-social husband, and an absolutely horrible farmer. He doesn't like Courage at all, calling him for the most part a "stupid dog," and enjoys constantly teasing him by putting on a freakish-looking mask and scaring Courage half to death. This rarely ends well for Eustace, as he ends up getting smacked on the head with a rolling pin by Muriel. He only shows concern for his money, his truck, his property, his TV and most of all, his red chair, and greed drives many of his actions. This results in many of the problems Courage must resolve in the show.
In some episodes, Eustace plays the part of the antagonist. At the end of an episode, something bad generally happens to Eustace, such as being blasted to the moon, eaten, zapped, mummified, transformed, possessed, or other misfortunes. While these things would usually kill him, in a manner similar to Kenny McCormick, he appears fine by the next episode.
Lionel Wilson, the original voice of Eustace, died in a transition from the show's seasons. Lionel had retired from the show after a lengthy illness, and was replaced as Eustace's voice by Arthur Anderson.
Despite his selfishness and cruelty, Eustace is shown to love Muriel very much, though he'd never admit it. Eustace is also extremely embarrassed by his baldness. During a name-calling game, repeatedly calling him "bald" will consistently result in victory. Part of his shame comes from the fact his mother is bald as well (she hides it with a wig).
For some reason, Eustace seems immune to anything that alter the person's emotions. He was unaffected by the Curtain of Cruelty (and his clothes were not treated by the fabric softener that protected Murial and Courage) nor he was affected by the Curtain of Kindness that was released later on. He also took multiple shots from Zalost's Unhappy cannonballs, without changing (although a more normal one turned him into dust near the end of the episode).
Despite the fact that he's a farmer, Eustace has never been able to grow a single plant, which may be the reason for his constant bitterness, with the sole exception of one episode where Eustace's sweat helped rejuvanate a dying flower. While Nowhere's soil may be responsible for this, Eustace's attitude is probably just as much to blame, and Muriel or even Courage never seem to have had this same problem. He seems to be in the villain's line of fire more often than his wife.
[edit] Catchphrases
- “Stupid Dog!”
- While wearing his Courage-scaring mask: “Ooga booga booga!”
- When not paying attention to warnings: “Bleh, bleh, bleh.”
- "Where's my chair?"
- "I'm not getting out of this chair."
- When surprised or confused: “What's-huhh?”
- “What did I do?”
- "Who the heck are you?!"
- "Works for me."
- "Muriel, where's my (whatever meal he's talking about)?"
- "Get away from me!" (Towards Courage)
- "We don't want any." (Whenever he answers the door)
- "What's your offer?"
- "Ha Ha Ha"
- "Hungry!"
- "Big deal."
[edit] Computer
Courage's computer, voiced by Simon Prebble, lies in the attic of the farmhouse and can speak on its own with a witty and snide British accent, often calling Courage, or almost anybody, a "twit". When in trouble, Courage constantly asks the computer for information on what do to, and he provides Courage with some very helpful information vital to defeating his foes.
In one episode, Computer was attacked by a virus, which virtualized and kidnapped Muriel. Courage had to virtualize himself via the scanner to get rid of the virus and save Muriel. In another episode, the computer was struck by lightning and came to life. It possessed Muriel and went out into the world to experience life to its fullest, performing death-defying stunts such as getting shot from a cannon to the moon, jumping into the San Andreas Fault during an earthquake, and skiing down the Empire State Building, attracting the attention of the media under the name of "Mega Muriel the Magnificent".
[edit] Dr. Vindaloo
Dr. Vindaloo is the Bagge family doctor who is more of a quack than a physician. His diploma describes him as a certified medical quack. Whenever something bad happens, Courage generally calls upon the Hindu doctor first when his octogenarian owners are ill, injured, or physically misshapen. His main gag within the series was to speak in a comically repetitive manner as in "There will be serious complications, complications". He often says that there's "Nothing to worry about, nothing at all" (sometimes followed by, "but there's nothing I can do.") and to "Just keep soaking it." He often diagnoses one condition as another that it is obviously not, saying "This is the worst case of (random unrelated disease) I have ever seen." Another catchphrase of his is "What is up with that?!" His surname refers to Vindaloo curry.
[edit] Nowhere Newsman
The Nowhere Newsman is a TV Reporter who covers every event he can in Nowhere. He can be seen in several events such as when Mega Muriel attempted her dangerous stunts. He is also the TV announcer in the series' introduction. He appears to resemble the MAD magazine mascot Alfred E. Neuman.
[edit] Main recurring villains
[edit] Katz
Katz is Courage's greatest enemy. He is a red anthropomorphic cat with thin arms, legs and tail and has a devilish appearance, accompanied by distinct and very creepy background music. Katz frequently plans dark schemes in order to lure Courage and his owners into traps in order to stop their meddling in his affairs, something they are rarely aware of. For exampole, he once kidnapped Muriel to prevent her from winning a sweets contest, he was jealous because he'd taken 2nd Place for more than 20 years against her perfect caramel apples. He often acts as a reinforcement to Eustace's antagonic personality and dislike towards Courage, and uses the old man in his plots against the dog. However, his episodes are generally some of the few where nothing bad happens to Eustace. His catchphrase, spoken whenever he is injured somehow, is "I wish you hadn't done that!"
As a cat, he usually has a sign in his buildings that says "No Dogs Allowed." An apparent hobby of his is to come up with businesses that are not consumer safe, such as a motel with man-eating spiders or a spa which transforms its customers into animated household devices so that they might battle each other in a bizarre robot duel in a coliseum. Whenever he first appears, he says his other catchphrase, "Welcome to Katz (name of establishment); I'm Katz." Katz, when confronting Courage, will often have the poor dog compete against him in a game ("a little sport before dying, dear boy?"), and is rarely bested by Courage himself: he has beaten the dog in ‘life-or-death’ dodgeball, ping-pong and staring contests. He is typically thwarted by Muriel during his moment of apparent triumph at the end of each episode, or else falls victim to his own miscalculations. Nobody ever seems to recognize him when he reappears in another episode. Katz first appeared in Episode 1, A Night at the Katz Motel.
[edit] Dr. Le Quack
Dr. Le Quack is a wanted French con-artist duck, who generally attempts various schemes in order to make millions. So far he has attempted to rip off Muriel while she has amnesia, hypnotized Eustace and Muriel into stealing the lottery money, and most recently, attempted to use Muriel to rob Sweden of all its money. Le Quack always calls Courage a "dirty little doggy" and actually called him quite a "Houdini" because of his ridiculous escape plans. He also has a habit of saying "Qu'est que c'est?" which, translated to English means "What is this?" He always ends each episode he appears in by saying, "Wait, you 'ave not seen ze last...of Le Quack."
[edit] The Chicken from Outer Space
The Chicken from Outer Space appeared in the pilot of the same name. There, he planned to use alien eggs to transform humans into giant chickens (which is what happened to Eustace) before roasting himself with his own death ray. He appears again much later (still roasted and with no head) to exact revenge on Courage (and find a new head). He claims Eustace's head through much of the episode before being defeated again by Courage. Unlike Courage's other enemies, the Alien Chicken has little personality and is rather cold and aloof. Eventually, the chicken's (siamese triplet) sons tried getting revenge on Courage, by orders of their mother. But they failed at it; big-hearted Courage though allowed them to get footage of them beating him up for their mother to believe they had succeeded and so she would permit them to return home.
[edit] The Snowman
The Snowman is exactly that-- a living snowman who sounds very much like Sean Connery. He is much more sympathetic than most of Courage's foes, as he is only fighting for his own survival. He is the last of the snowmen and wishes not to melt like his fellow people. Finally, Courage sews up (literally) the hole in the Ozone layer, which resurrects the other snowmen, giving the Snowman a happy ending
[edit] Other characters
[edit] Di Lung
Di Lung is a recurring character, a Malaysian young man who is generally shown as an inventor by trade. Characters usually refer to him as a "punk kid"; his usual quip back is, "Watch where you're goin', ya foo'!" Among his discoveries, Di Lung also grew an extra toe with a magnet and attempted to make a contraption to transform things and people into buffaloes. In one episode, Di Lung played as a villain along with an evil Chinese Queen when they tried to steal Muriel's bones to bring back the Queen's enchanted silkworm. Di Lung is apparently a goofy caricature of the show's chief designer Tim Chi Li and the name itself "dilung" is a naughty Chinese term.
[edit] Mr. Mouse
The delivery mouse of Nowhere, and a personal friend of Courage's. He usually helps Courage out which would usually lead to the dialogue between one another:
Courage: "Thanks, Mr. Mouse!"
Mr. Mouse: "No prob."
His first appearance was in "Dr. Le Quack" in which he ate a piece of smelly cheese. Le Quack was chasing Courage who likely didn't do this himself due to a dog's sensitive nose. He was also featured in the episode, The Mask, where his name is given as "Charlie". Interestingly, Courage doesn't speak English to him in this episode.
[edit] Madame Shirley
Madame Shirley The Medium is an old fortune teller chihuahua and another one of Courage's personal friends. She calls Eustace "The Stupid One" and she always gives out answers to Courage when he is in trouble. She and her magical curses often cause much trouble at the farmhouse. For example, she put a curse on Eustace for being vain and as long as he remained that way, a small storm cloud would follow him everywhere. Most of her spells involve her playing the saxophone.
[edit] Ma Bagge
Ma Bagge is Eustace and his brother Host's mother. She hates Eustace (addressing him as "Stupid boy!") and pretends to love Courage, and does so just to antagonize her son. She lives in a trailer, is allergic to flowers, and dislikes the taste of chocolate. She wears a wig, as she's bald like her son. When her wig is removed she flies into an emotional rampage yelling "I'm ugly, ugly! Ugly!" She also owns a company that makes wigs and she is actually the antagonist in a few episodes when her wig-making schemes interfere with Courage.
Oddly enough, unlike eustace, Ma Bagge still has her teeth, while Eustace's teeth are non-present. Though, she could be wearing dentures.
[edit] The Officer of Nowhere
The Officer of Nowhere is the police officer. He works with an old balding man named Floyd. He seems to hate Nowhere. Although in some episodes, he was seen to be an archaeologist, a captain, or a lieutenant.
[edit] The Army
Two army generals who usually use Nowhere as a target of some sort. They have a tendency to abuse each other spectacularly (with large-scale weaponry in some cases) whenever they're on screen together, with no ill-effect to their relationship or themselves.
[edit] Episodic characters
[edit] Guest voices
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Season One |
Season Two
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Season Three
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Season Four
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