Top 20 Scariest Courage The Cowardly Dog Episodes
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Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’re counting down our picks for the most frightening episodes of this beloved animated series featuring everyone’s favorite timid doggo. Be on the lookout for scares and spoilers. Which episode had you screaming along with Courage? Let us know in the comments!
The lengths Courage will do to make his beloved owner Muriel happy is truly next level. Especially if it involves going to save her cranky and mean-spirited husband from a watery grave. When a Siren sets her sights on Eustace, Courage has to dive first into her domain before she makes a meal out of him. The Queen’s hypnotic voice is disconcerting enough, but then she reveals her true form just as she's ready to take a bite out of her prey. You will think twice about ever taking a bath again…
While a living shadow might not sound like the most intimidating of monsters, you’ll be singing a different tune when you see just how far this episode pushed the body horror factor. Tormented by the shapeshifted specter, Courage is forced to descend into the basement to try and save Muriel. Armed only with a flashlight, he, and us, are soon bombarded with some honestly freaky imagery as the Shadow puts on quite the show - displaying the numerous ways that Muriel could die. It’s all in shadow of course, so the impact is lessened, but the implications go well beyond what you thought a cartoon could show!
Nowhere has a pest problem. Well, it has several. But one of the grossest would be that of Jeeves – a giant, talking weevil that dresses like a dapper gentleman. Given that he knows how to turn a phrase, the anthropomorphic bug easily works his way into Eustace and Muriel’s lives. When he’s not acting like the ideal butler, he’s casually feasting on their fluids until they’re husks of themselves. It’s every shade of disgusting. Hopefully Courage invested in extra-large bug spray after this ordeal.
What made Courage the Cowardly Dog such an incredible show was the various avenues it was willing to explore when it came to the strange and horrific. At first, you’d think a tree with a giant humanoid face would be just another monster in need of defeating, but it turns out the tree itself is a pretty sage and friendly entity…so naturally Eustace wants to chop it down with an ax. Honestly, what makes the conclusion so unsettling is that, despite it being hinted that the tree will one day return, Eustace does go through with his plan and destroys something beautiful and unique. Also there’s Courage’s cry of anguish. Chilling.
Like we said – major pest problem. After Muriel is bitten by the world’s scariest mole, she ends up infected, and soon starts to transform into a hungry hybrid. Naturally, Courage has to solve the problem before they all end up getting dragged six feet under. While Monster Muriel trying to take a bite out of Eustace could be seen as more comical, Courage having to use himself as bait in order to attract the original Weremole for the sake of a curse has some real tension behind it. Imagine finding one of these in your garden
Getting a fungal infection on your foot? That’s unfortunate. Having a fungal infection that starts to overtake your body? That’s disgusting. Having said fungus turn sentient and take the form of a bunch of archetypal gangsters? Only in Nowhere. Yeah, this is one of those gross-out episodes. The premise is certainly out there, and we’ll give it credit for creating a villain none of us saw coming. Though by far the scariest aspect of the episode is watching Courage have to defeat the Big Toe lick them out of existence.
Muriel branching out and making new friends sounds like a great idea on paper, but maybe creepy, conniving conjoined twins with murder on their minds was an error in judgment. Turns out Elisa and Eliza’s exclusive Quilt Club isn’t so much about sewing, as it is trapping the souls of their victims and stitching them into fabric to extend their lives – something we get to see in eerie detail. It’s a surprisingly haunting image. Thankfully Courage wasn’t about to settle for Muriel becoming spiritual embroidery for eternity.
The fear factor from this episode doesn’t so much stem from a monster’s appearance or antics, it’s the worry that Courage may legitimately be killed off! Assembling six of the faithful hounds’ greatest enemies, Eustace arranges for the rogue’s gallery to finish Courage once and for all…sure it's via a game of dodgeball, but the level of violence they inflict is so intense its almost hard to watch. If not for Courage unleashing the biggest scream of his life, it could well have been curtains for him. Seriously Muriel, why are you still with Eustace after he pulled a stunt like this?
It was only a matter of time until we got zombies in a Courage the Cowardly Dog episode, and naturally, they added a twist that somehow straddles the line between hammy and genuinely unnerving. When an undead director rolls up into the middle of Nowhere, he ropes Eustace and Muriel into starring in his next film…which to the surprise of no one is just an excuse for him and his fellow zombie filmmaker to chow down on that sweet mortal flesh. The fact the director is also a parody of Quentin Tarantino is just another layer to the macabre fun of it all.
This one is a double whammy. On the one hand, you’ve got a talking alligator who, via some manner of magical theater, turns both Muriel and Eustace as puppets for his collection. Spooky, supernatural stuff. But nothing we haven’t seen Courage deal with before. But that’s not the most insidious part – this was planned as the series’ original end. Yep. Courage would have remained with puppet versions of his owners for the rest of his life, unable to fix them. That is…seriously dark. We’re just happy the show continued and offered a happier future!
When Muriel wins a contest giving her a chance to perform her sitar live, she, Eustace and Courage travel to the Big Apple, only to be greeted by a giant criminal cockroach named Shwick. This creepy crawly sends Courage out to get a mysterious package while keeping Muriel and Eustace hostage to some unseen monster. Courage endures several terrifying experiences on his short journey, including a trek into an abandoned house, home to a girl practicing her violin, who turns around to be revealed as a horrific claymation monster. Courage retrieves the package and makes his way back to Shwick, only for the cockroach to be captured by the police.
After Courage witnesses an asteroid crash near the farm, a mysterious visitor who is very clearly an alien arrives, asking to use the phone. His eerie way of speaking and bulging eyes are scary enough, but when the alien locks Courage in the closet and sucks the kindness out of Muriel by sticking his tentacle arm up her nose, we’d say that took things up to the next level. Muriel swiftly kicks the alien out of the farmhouse, and Courage has to go get Muriel’s kindness back. That’s when we see the alien for what it actually is: a sentient brain with eyes who answers to an even larger sentient brain with eyes. Yikes.
When Eustace and Courage venture out for some food, Eustace stops at a restaurant advertising cheap hamburgers. The diner, run by a pig man named Jean Bon, is suspicious from the get-go, as Courage witnesses a man enter the “bathroom” never to leave, with Jean Bon gathering the man’s belongings. Courage then sees the man’s face in his burger. Eventually, Courage escapes, leaving Eustace behind. It’s revealed that the Pig Man isn’t serving human meat after all, and that the whole thing was a misunderstanding. If you ask us, though, a giant pig running a diner that serves discount hamburgers is horrifying enough as it is.
This episode is scary in several different ways, beginning with the arrival of a disturbing masked cat to the farm, who is violent towards Courage with no warning or reason. The mask features a creepy drawn-on face and is appropriately scary on its own, but the level of violence towards Courage is what really got us. Courage believes the woman, called Kitty, to be evil, so he attempts to get to the police, only to get involved in the affairs of Kitty’s friend Bunny, and her abusive dog boyfriend. It’s a very adult episode for the series, and one that remains scary even today.
Let’s face it, motels can be pretty scary. When they’re run by a murderous psychopath cat with a British accent who keeps giant pet spiders, they are even worse. In the show’s series premiere, Muriel and Eustace settle in for a night at the Katz Motel, with Courage tied up outside due to the motel’s strict no-dog policy. Katz is thankfully prevented from feeding Muriel and Eustace to his spiders after chasing Courage through the motel and being inadvertently knocked out by Muriel, with the family deciding to leave due to “poor service.” The creepy Katz and the heavy inclusion of spiders makes this one of the more menacing “Courage” episodes we remember.
After neglecting their farm work and failing to successfully grow any plants before the harvest, Eustace, Muriel and Courage find themselves haunted by the spirit of the harvest moon. The spirit, represented by a terrifying live-action black-and-white floating head, commands the family to leave the farm; and when they refuse, challenges Eustace to grow a plant in 10 minutes, calling into question his farming abilities. Eustace refuses, but Courage succeeds in growing a plant after the visage shows off his power by raising the heat and causing Eustace to sweat. The spirit leaves the family, but not without leaving a lasting impression on the show’s young viewers.
After ordering a mattress over the phone, Muriel is delivered her new bed by two ghoulish rats riding in an eerie horse-drawn carriage. Despite these glaring warning signs, Muriel sleeps on the mattress and is promptly possessed. The rest of the episode plays out in a clever parody of “The Exorcist,” delivering all kinds of chills to us as children. Muriel develops green skin, red hair a deep voice, and begins spinning her head around before it falls off completely. Um, excuse me? This is still a kids’ show, right? The episode ends with the demon possessing Eustace, who Courage wraps up in the mattress and returns. Goodbye, I guess!
Overall, this final episode is relatively light on scares compared to the others on our list. However, it does contain one of the most iconic and ominous moments of the entire series. After making several mistakes around the farm, an old woman appears to Courage, with Muriel and Eustace unable to see her. The woman, appearing to be a schoolteacher, chastises Courage for his mistakes, attempting to correct all his imperfections. The real kicker comes during a dream Courage has that evening, featuring a CGI-animated fetus creature that delivers a disturbing warning to Courage. This brief moment has stuck out for fans of the series over the years, earning the episode a spot on our list.
When Muriel’s nephew Fred arrives in Nowhere, we aren’t quite sure what it is about him, but something is definitely off. When Eustace locks Courage in the bathroom with Fred, we find out what that is: he’s some sort of weird barber. It doesn’t sound too frightening, but when Freaky Fred starts reciting his poetry detailing the beginnings of his hair-cutting obsession, that’s when things get out of hand. From there, the guy startsv shaving Courage, talking about how he shaved his pet hamster and his ex-girlfriend bald. He eventually gets Courage shaved down to everything but his tail, stating that that would be too weird, even for him.
It’s pretty well agreed-upon by this point that “King Ramses’ Curse” is the series’ most memorable episode, with its crowning achievement of scares. After finding the hidden loot of a pair of robbers, Courage comes into possession of a cursed Egyptian slab once owned by the Pharaoh Ramses. The slab is quickly taken by Eustace when he finds out its value, and Ramses soon arrives to enact his curse. King Ramses’ CGI animation stands in stark contrast to the rest of the show, and it works to great effect. The character, with his terrifying chant and out-of-place animation, remains the show’s best scare.
#20: “Queen of the Black Puddle”
The lengths Courage will do to make his beloved owner Muriel happy is truly next level. Especially if it involves going to save her cranky and mean-spirited husband from a watery grave. When a Siren sets her sights on Eustace, Courage has to dive first into her domain before she makes a meal out of him. The Queen’s hypnotic voice is disconcerting enough, but then she reveals her true form just as she's ready to take a bite out of her prey. You will think twice about ever taking a bath again…
#19: “The Shadow of Courage”
While a living shadow might not sound like the most intimidating of monsters, you’ll be singing a different tune when you see just how far this episode pushed the body horror factor. Tormented by the shapeshifted specter, Courage is forced to descend into the basement to try and save Muriel. Armed only with a flashlight, he, and us, are soon bombarded with some honestly freaky imagery as the Shadow puts on quite the show - displaying the numerous ways that Muriel could die. It’s all in shadow of course, so the impact is lessened, but the implications go well beyond what you thought a cartoon could show!
#18: “Evil Weevil”
Nowhere has a pest problem. Well, it has several. But one of the grossest would be that of Jeeves – a giant, talking weevil that dresses like a dapper gentleman. Given that he knows how to turn a phrase, the anthropomorphic bug easily works his way into Eustace and Muriel’s lives. When he’s not acting like the ideal butler, he’s casually feasting on their fluids until they’re husks of themselves. It’s every shade of disgusting. Hopefully Courage invested in extra-large bug spray after this ordeal.
#17: “The Magic Tree of Nowhere”
What made Courage the Cowardly Dog such an incredible show was the various avenues it was willing to explore when it came to the strange and horrific. At first, you’d think a tree with a giant humanoid face would be just another monster in need of defeating, but it turns out the tree itself is a pretty sage and friendly entity…so naturally Eustace wants to chop it down with an ax. Honestly, what makes the conclusion so unsettling is that, despite it being hinted that the tree will one day return, Eustace does go through with his plan and destroys something beautiful and unique. Also there’s Courage’s cry of anguish. Chilling.
#16: “Night of the Weremole”
Like we said – major pest problem. After Muriel is bitten by the world’s scariest mole, she ends up infected, and soon starts to transform into a hungry hybrid. Naturally, Courage has to solve the problem before they all end up getting dragged six feet under. While Monster Muriel trying to take a bite out of Eustace could be seen as more comical, Courage having to use himself as bait in order to attract the original Weremole for the sake of a curse has some real tension behind it. Imagine finding one of these in your garden
#15: “The Clutching Foot”
Getting a fungal infection on your foot? That’s unfortunate. Having a fungal infection that starts to overtake your body? That’s disgusting. Having said fungus turn sentient and take the form of a bunch of archetypal gangsters? Only in Nowhere. Yeah, this is one of those gross-out episodes. The premise is certainly out there, and we’ll give it credit for creating a villain none of us saw coming. Though by far the scariest aspect of the episode is watching Courage have to defeat the Big Toe lick them out of existence.
#14: “The Quilt Club”
Muriel branching out and making new friends sounds like a great idea on paper, but maybe creepy, conniving conjoined twins with murder on their minds was an error in judgment. Turns out Elisa and Eliza’s exclusive Quilt Club isn’t so much about sewing, as it is trapping the souls of their victims and stitching them into fabric to extend their lives – something we get to see in eerie detail. It’s a surprisingly haunting image. Thankfully Courage wasn’t about to settle for Muriel becoming spiritual embroidery for eternity.
#13: “Ball of Revenge”
The fear factor from this episode doesn’t so much stem from a monster’s appearance or antics, it’s the worry that Courage may legitimately be killed off! Assembling six of the faithful hounds’ greatest enemies, Eustace arranges for the rogue’s gallery to finish Courage once and for all…sure it's via a game of dodgeball, but the level of violence they inflict is so intense its almost hard to watch. If not for Courage unleashing the biggest scream of his life, it could well have been curtains for him. Seriously Muriel, why are you still with Eustace after he pulled a stunt like this?
#12: “Everyone Wants To Direct”
It was only a matter of time until we got zombies in a Courage the Cowardly Dog episode, and naturally, they added a twist that somehow straddles the line between hammy and genuinely unnerving. When an undead director rolls up into the middle of Nowhere, he ropes Eustace and Muriel into starring in his next film…which to the surprise of no one is just an excuse for him and his fellow zombie filmmaker to chow down on that sweet mortal flesh. The fact the director is also a parody of Quentin Tarantino is just another layer to the macabre fun of it all.
#11: “The Great Fusilli”
This one is a double whammy. On the one hand, you’ve got a talking alligator who, via some manner of magical theater, turns both Muriel and Eustace as puppets for his collection. Spooky, supernatural stuff. But nothing we haven’t seen Courage deal with before. But that’s not the most insidious part – this was planned as the series’ original end. Yep. Courage would have remained with puppet versions of his owners for the rest of his life, unable to fix them. That is…seriously dark. We’re just happy the show continued and offered a happier future!
#10: “Courage in the Big, Stinkin' City”
When Muriel wins a contest giving her a chance to perform her sitar live, she, Eustace and Courage travel to the Big Apple, only to be greeted by a giant criminal cockroach named Shwick. This creepy crawly sends Courage out to get a mysterious package while keeping Muriel and Eustace hostage to some unseen monster. Courage endures several terrifying experiences on his short journey, including a trek into an abandoned house, home to a girl practicing her violin, who turns around to be revealed as a horrific claymation monster. Courage retrieves the package and makes his way back to Shwick, only for the cockroach to be captured by the police.
#9: “Car Broke, Phone Yes”
After Courage witnesses an asteroid crash near the farm, a mysterious visitor who is very clearly an alien arrives, asking to use the phone. His eerie way of speaking and bulging eyes are scary enough, but when the alien locks Courage in the closet and sucks the kindness out of Muriel by sticking his tentacle arm up her nose, we’d say that took things up to the next level. Muriel swiftly kicks the alien out of the farmhouse, and Courage has to go get Muriel’s kindness back. That’s when we see the alien for what it actually is: a sentient brain with eyes who answers to an even larger sentient brain with eyes. Yikes.
#8: “Heads of Beef”
When Eustace and Courage venture out for some food, Eustace stops at a restaurant advertising cheap hamburgers. The diner, run by a pig man named Jean Bon, is suspicious from the get-go, as Courage witnesses a man enter the “bathroom” never to leave, with Jean Bon gathering the man’s belongings. Courage then sees the man’s face in his burger. Eventually, Courage escapes, leaving Eustace behind. It’s revealed that the Pig Man isn’t serving human meat after all, and that the whole thing was a misunderstanding. If you ask us, though, a giant pig running a diner that serves discount hamburgers is horrifying enough as it is.
#7: “The Mask”
This episode is scary in several different ways, beginning with the arrival of a disturbing masked cat to the farm, who is violent towards Courage with no warning or reason. The mask features a creepy drawn-on face and is appropriately scary on its own, but the level of violence towards Courage is what really got us. Courage believes the woman, called Kitty, to be evil, so he attempts to get to the police, only to get involved in the affairs of Kitty’s friend Bunny, and her abusive dog boyfriend. It’s a very adult episode for the series, and one that remains scary even today.
#6: “A Night at the Katz Motel”
Let’s face it, motels can be pretty scary. When they’re run by a murderous psychopath cat with a British accent who keeps giant pet spiders, they are even worse. In the show’s series premiere, Muriel and Eustace settle in for a night at the Katz Motel, with Courage tied up outside due to the motel’s strict no-dog policy. Katz is thankfully prevented from feeding Muriel and Eustace to his spiders after chasing Courage through the motel and being inadvertently knocked out by Muriel, with the family deciding to leave due to “poor service.” The creepy Katz and the heavy inclusion of spiders makes this one of the more menacing “Courage” episodes we remember.
#5: “The House of Discontent”
After neglecting their farm work and failing to successfully grow any plants before the harvest, Eustace, Muriel and Courage find themselves haunted by the spirit of the harvest moon. The spirit, represented by a terrifying live-action black-and-white floating head, commands the family to leave the farm; and when they refuse, challenges Eustace to grow a plant in 10 minutes, calling into question his farming abilities. Eustace refuses, but Courage succeeds in growing a plant after the visage shows off his power by raising the heat and causing Eustace to sweat. The spirit leaves the family, but not without leaving a lasting impression on the show’s young viewers.
#4: “The Demon in the Mattress”
After ordering a mattress over the phone, Muriel is delivered her new bed by two ghoulish rats riding in an eerie horse-drawn carriage. Despite these glaring warning signs, Muriel sleeps on the mattress and is promptly possessed. The rest of the episode plays out in a clever parody of “The Exorcist,” delivering all kinds of chills to us as children. Muriel develops green skin, red hair a deep voice, and begins spinning her head around before it falls off completely. Um, excuse me? This is still a kids’ show, right? The episode ends with the demon possessing Eustace, who Courage wraps up in the mattress and returns. Goodbye, I guess!
#3: “Perfect”
Overall, this final episode is relatively light on scares compared to the others on our list. However, it does contain one of the most iconic and ominous moments of the entire series. After making several mistakes around the farm, an old woman appears to Courage, with Muriel and Eustace unable to see her. The woman, appearing to be a schoolteacher, chastises Courage for his mistakes, attempting to correct all his imperfections. The real kicker comes during a dream Courage has that evening, featuring a CGI-animated fetus creature that delivers a disturbing warning to Courage. This brief moment has stuck out for fans of the series over the years, earning the episode a spot on our list.
#2: “Freaky Fred”
When Muriel’s nephew Fred arrives in Nowhere, we aren’t quite sure what it is about him, but something is definitely off. When Eustace locks Courage in the bathroom with Fred, we find out what that is: he’s some sort of weird barber. It doesn’t sound too frightening, but when Freaky Fred starts reciting his poetry detailing the beginnings of his hair-cutting obsession, that’s when things get out of hand. From there, the guy startsv shaving Courage, talking about how he shaved his pet hamster and his ex-girlfriend bald. He eventually gets Courage shaved down to everything but his tail, stating that that would be too weird, even for him.
#1: “King Ramses' Curse”
It’s pretty well agreed-upon by this point that “King Ramses’ Curse” is the series’ most memorable episode, with its crowning achievement of scares. After finding the hidden loot of a pair of robbers, Courage comes into possession of a cursed Egyptian slab once owned by the Pharaoh Ramses. The slab is quickly taken by Eustace when he finds out its value, and Ramses soon arrives to enact his curse. King Ramses’ CGI animation stands in stark contrast to the rest of the show, and it works to great effect. The character, with his terrifying chant and out-of-place animation, remains the show’s best scare.
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