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| “ | Stupid dog! You make me look bad! | „ |
| ~ Eustace to Courage in the intro of Courage the Cowardly Dog. |
Eustace Bagge is the tritagonist of Courage the Cowardly Dog and a supporting character in the crossover direct-to-video film Straight Outta Nowhere: Scooby-Doo! Meets Courage the Cowardly Dog. He is Muriel's cranky husband and one of Courage's two owners.
He was voiced by Howard Hoffman, the late Lionel G. Wilson, the late Arthur Anderson, and Wallace Shawn, who also portrayed Vizzini in The Princess Bride, Bertram in Family Guy, Dr. Elliot Coleye in My Favorite Martian, and Taotie in Kung Fu Panda: Legends of Awesomeness. He was also voiced by Jeff Bergman in Straight Outta Nowhere: Scooby-Doo! Meets Courage the Cowardly Dog.
Contents
Roles
Despite being a main character, Eustace also has several roles throughout the series where he is the main antagonist. The most notable is in the episode "Ball of Revenge", where he gathers and meets up with the villains that Courage had previously encountered and either outwitted or defeated to get rid of him by challenging him to a game of dodgeball. He almost got Courage killed due to his jealousy of attention gathered by Muriel over himself.
That episode arguably cemented Eustace as a villain and the direct threat and most dangerous enemy to Courage. However, sometimes he teams up with Courage if need be, as seen in a few episodes such as "Bad Hair Day". Another episode where he is the main antagonist is "The Hunchback of Nowhere", where he repeatedly abused and bullied a hunchback that just wants to seek shelter at their house. This is one of the only episodes where he is alarmingly dangerous.
Biography
Eustace was born on an unknown date in a trailer park. He was not well-liked by his mother and he was shown to be a friendlier person than in his later years. He had a brother and father who are implied to be bigger and much more muscular than Eustace. It is implied that his family all wear glasses for unknown reasons (possibly a poor vision trait) and that he was bald since he was a child. Because of the abuse he got at the hands of his family, he become bitter and hateful.
Eustace married Muriel sometime in 1953.
Muriel found Courage as a puppy outside the veterinarian office where his parents were launched into space by the vet for his secret experiment on sending dogs to space (which in the "Remembrance of Courage Past" episode, later failed as they were revealed to be alive, mauling him in the end). Later on, Eustace began to hate Courage as he received more attention from Muriel than Eustace himself.
At certain times, Eustace was subject to many weird and crazy injuries, such as being mummified or exploding and surviving (often saying "OW!" as the explosion happens or afterwards) leaving him as black string wearing glasses.
At times, he helped Courage save Muriel from various things (despite that he at times gets hurt or does not return and besides, who else was going to fix his meals?).
Villainous Acts
- "Courage Meets Bigfoot" - He refused to let Theodore get reunited with his mother before getting chased by a angry mob.
- "Hothead" - He failed to listen to Courage's warning as he keeps on using a hair growth formula and destroys everything every time he rages over something and later on himself when his small hair went flat.
- "King Ramses' Curse" - He Endangered his own family for his own selfish gain and he got himself killed because of his greed
- "The Hunchback of Nowhere" - Criticizing Courage and bullying him at the same time by scaring the dog and calling the hunchback ugly before getting told off by Muriel to eat his breakfast in the henhouse, but that doesn't stop the evil farmer as when Courage gave Hunchie Eustace's raincoat: Eustace Selfishly came and took it and Almost scared courage so much that The poor dog almost fell off the roof.
- "The Precious, Wonderful, Adorable, Lovable Duckling" - This episode was where Eustace was at his extreme worse. While Courage tried to protect Muriel the farmer spent the rest of the day beating up Courage by kicking him out of the house and unfairly blames him for what that duckling did just so Courage can get in trouble. Like Sarah laughing at Eddy getting stabbed in the hand by a cactus on "Sir-Ed-A-Lot". The duckling grabbed Courage and throws him in the bathtub loaded with wet cement and then Eustace stands at the bathroom door laughing like a thug smoking a cigar.
- "The Magic Tree of Nowhere" - Cut's down the magical tree while Courage was out.
- "The Curse of Shirley" - Refuses to make the right choices by trying to prove curses don't exist.
- "The Transplant" - Kidnaps Muriel causing a bunch of mayhem all over the world.
- "Campsite of Terror" - Kidnaps two misunderstood raccoons in order to turn them in to the park ranger.
- "Curtain of Cruelty" - Hunted Courage down to kidnap him before getting arrested and sent to jail to get educated about niceness.
- "Farmer-Hunter, Farmer-Hunted" - Shot two hunters, Courage and some deer in the forest and attempted to kill them before getting blasted by other hunters and renaming himself "Useless the deer".
- "Last of the Starmakers" - Held the star making mother and it's eggs for star making babies against their will. Before getting blasted into the sky by rocket fuel and getting blown up at the same time.
- "Ball of Revenge" - Teams up with Courage's enemies to kill the dog and win Muriel as his slave before getting defeated by Courage and hit in the head by Muriel with a rolling pin. This episode makes Eustace completely out of character as a result of flanderization.
Personality
Eustace is a malicious, ill-tempered, cruel, heartless, egotistical and nasty old farmer who is married to the kindhearted and gentle Muriel despite being her polar opposite.
Throughout the series, Eustace is very ornery, combative, and antagonistic to Courage the Cowardly Dog, having a grudge against Courage, and is basically a cantankerous and argumentative bully who constantly calls Courage a stupid dog, mistreats him, and loves to scare him. Often, his cruelty earns him a bop on the head by Muriel, often followed by him asking "What did I do?". Eustace is also regularly maimed or tortured by the many ghosts and ghouls that haunt Courage.
Eustace's behavior towards Courage seems to stem from jealousy over the attention Courage receives from Muriel and his own mother (who dislikes him intensely yet seems to be very fond of Courage). One of Eustace's favorite tricks is to wait until Courage is in relative peace before he utters his catchphrase of "Stupid dog!" and proceeding to pull out a hideous Voodoo-like mask and yelling, "Ooga booga booga!" to frighten Courage half to death (wow what a dick).
Eustace got disgusted of his nephew by marriage, Freaky Fred as he called him a "freak". He knowledge of Fred as a barber, "A freaky barber, with his own freaky barber shop, where freaky things happen, freaky barber things".
Although almost always an antagonist, Eustace has occasionally worked with Courage to try and overcome some particularly nasty villains. For example, in "Katz Kandy," when Muriel is kidnapped by a candy creation of Katz's and Courage is defeated by him in a staring contest and turned into candy for his loss, it is Eustace who surprisingly saves the day by defeating Katz and throwing him into his own candy-making machine (after Katz tries to do the same to him first).
Nevertheless, these alliances are usually temporary. More often than not, Eustace is a very stubborn and even devious individual. However, it's implied that even Eustace knows there are certain boundaries that he shouldn't cross. When the Cruel Veterinarian made clear his intentions to send Courage to space in a rocket, Eustace fiercely disagrees with him, which means that Eustace may be cruel, but has his kind moments.
As well as his bullying, Eustace has long been established as a very acquisitive and greedy individual who has brought disaster upon himself and others in his stubborn pursuit of riches, showing no sympathy and hesitation to those around him (that he often doesn't deserve). One of the more famous examples of this was Eustace's refusal to give up King Ramses's slab after Eustace finds out its potentially worth a fortune; despite that Ramses continually demands they return the slab between unleashing horrible plagues in warning.
A disturbing fact about Eustace's early life, according to John R. Dilworth, is that back when Eustace and Muriel were young, Muriel was interested in another man, but through some unknown dark deed, Eustace managed to win her love, but what exactly Eustace did to his love rival to get rid of him is beyond anyone's guess (Presumably making the farmer a psychopath).
However, on a positive side, this possibly means that deep inside his heart, Eustace really loves Muriel and during their youth was willing to do whatever he needed to win her affection. Nevertheless, this doesn't prevent Eustace from risking Muriel's life sometimes albeit unknowingly, like when he reunited most of Courage's enemies and didn't do anything when they tried to cook Muriel alive (yet Eustace could have possibly thought they weren't going to kill her or he had asked them offscreen to not kill his wife).
Appearance
Eustace is a tall and thin elderly man with enormous feet (though these pale in comparison to his father's) who walks in a crouch, compared to Muriel, who is short and overweight. He's bald and has squinty little eyes. His arms are spindly, but his hands are large. He has an enormous underbite and false teeth. He wears green overall-like trousers and a short-sleeved yellow shirt along with jam-jar glasses, a brown hat and brown shoes. His usual facial expression is extremely grouchy.
Quotes
| “ | That mattress gave her nightmares well we can't sit here all night. She likes you go see how she is. | „ |
| ~ Eustace worried about Muriel. |
| “ | You never loved me. | „ |
| ~ Eustace talking about how mean his mother was to him. |
| “ | No mama you always looked good to me. | „ |
| ~ Eustace still loves his mother no matter how much she hates him. |
| “ | Hey that's my chair. | „ |
| ~ Eustace vs Katz. |
| “ | I've never been able to grow anything not even weeds. But that stupid dog grows trees. | „ |
| ~ Eustace jealous of Courage. |
| “ | I'm going to the picture show I'm not wanted around here anyway. | „ |
| ~ Eustace upset that Muriel and Courage ignoring him for being mean. |
| “ | Hat well that's not right a little boy should have a hat. | „ |
| ~ Eustace feeling bad for a younger version of himself. |
Trivia
- It has been hinted that Eustace is very cruel and mean and cannot comprehend good. In the episode "Curtain of Cruelty", when Eustace was hit by the object of the same name, he remained mean and nasty and was even named mayor for his behavior. However, once the object was turned into the Curtain of Kindness, Eustace was hit by it but still remained his mean self.
- A second example of this is seen in the episode "The Tower of Dr. Zalost", in which he is hit by one of Dr. Zalost's depression-inducing cannonballs, only for it to have no affect on him. This causes Zalost to exclaim that Eustace "must be immune to emotions".
- In a commercial for Cartoon Network's 20th anniversary, Eustace talks to Muscle Man and tells him about his wife and dog. Shockingly, he uses Courage's name rather than calling him "Stupid Dog" as usual.
- Eustace Bagge could be considered a tragic villain for a few reasons:
- It was seen in a flashback that he was kind as a child; sad, but nice.
- Eustace might have looked up to his parents during childhood, but they never paid attention to him.
- Eustace was nicknamed "Useless" by his brother Horst. Also, his mother nicknamed him "Stupid Boy", this likely being a major part of why he always refers to Courage as "Stupid Dog".
- After years of being rejected, particularly by his mother, Eustace may have been traumatized emotionally, and it is very possible that this was what ultimately led to his cold and bitter personality.
- According to an unknown source, Brian Doyle-Murray (who also voiced the Flying Dutchman and supposedly La Sombra) was contracted by Cartoon Network to voice Eustace in a potential CGI revival or reboot of Courage the Cowardly Dog. However, it remains unknown if a fifth season or a reboot of Courage will be made or not.
- In the episode "Ball of Revenge", Eustace makes his worst antagonistic act and officially defines himself as the main antagonist of the episode. He reunites Katz, Le Quack, the Weremole, The Queen of the Black Puddle, Cajun Fox and Big Toe to get their revenge against Courage. Also, he didn't seem to mind that villains tried to cook Muriel alive with boiling water, ignoring the fact that she is his wife.
- Due to his abusive and mean-spirited nature, many fans consider Eustace as the worst and most hated character in the show.
External Links
 Villains
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Eustace Bagge | Katz | Le Quack | The Chicken from Outer Space | Weremole | Cajun Fox | Rat & Weasel | Mattress Demon | King Ramses | Goose God | Queen of the Black Puddle | The Precious, Wonderful, Adorable, Lovable Duckling | Benton Tarantella | Errol van Volkheim | Big Toe |Snowman | Ma Bagge | Fusilli | Basil | Jeeves Weevil | Dr. Gerbil | Mustafa al Bacterius | Alien Brain Visitor | Alien Brain Boss | The Whip | Spirit of the Harvest Moon | Dr. Zalost | Maria Ladrones | Mecha Courage | Schwick | Velvet Vic | Duck Brothers | Conway the Contaminationist | King Buffo | Tulip | Fishtionary | Stitch Sisters | Evil Eggplants | Windmill Vandals | Big Bayou | Kitty | Mad Dog | Evil Empress | The Military Carrot | Cruel Veterinarian | Perfectionist | Di Lung | ||
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