Courage The Cowardly Dog / Tropes A to M

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A

• Accent Depundent: In-Universe; when Courage asks for help regarding a mummy, Computer thinks he means mommy, since "mummy" is the British way of writing it.
  Computer: If your mummy is coming for a visit, then give her flowers, you twit.
  Courage: (frowns, retypes)
  Computer: Oh, a mummy, that's much worse.
• Acme Products: "Dil" Products, actually. It applies to certain things like blowtorches, vacuum cleaners, alkaline batteries, power cables and in one case, a grocery store.
• Affably Evil: Freaky Fred. A psychopathic man with a Slasher Smile, but his amusing rhyming makes him one of the more entertaining villains. Besides, all he really does is shave people and animals bald.
• Affectionate Parody: "Cajun Granny Stew" is an affectionate send-up to Looney Tunes.
• Alien Animals: The Space Chicken and his family qualify as aliens resembling animals.
• All for Nothing: In "Nowhere TV", Eustace has entered the Lottery and is positive he will win the jackpot. When the lottery numbers were announced at the end of the episode, Eustace has the winning card and wins the jackpot but due to a robbery earlier in the episode by Muriel and Eustace since Le Quack hypnotized them on their TV to steal the lottery money for him, the lottery is down to pocket change which causes Eustace to become furious and throws out the TV.
• All Just a Dream: The main story of "Cowboy Courage" is Courage dreaming as Muriel reads him a story.
• Always Someone Better: Eustace's brother Horst, who was better at everything.
• An Aesop: If there's any message in this show, it's that "courage" isn't necessarily synonymous with "fearlessness". Courage at least means being willing to challenge one's own fears instead of running away, and doing the right thing no matter how difficult it may seem.
  • "The Tree of Nowhere" is a perfect example of courage in the face of utter demise.
  • Also in the final episode, "Perfect", Courage has to learn to accept his personal imperfections.
• And I'm the Queen of Sheba: Such an exchange occurs in the episode "House of Discontent".
  Spirit of the Harvest Moon: I am the Spirit of the Harvest Moon.
  Eustace: And I'm a bucket of sardines.
• Animation Bump: For a brief period towards the end of "Squatting Tiger, Hidden Dog", Courage and the evil Empress suddenly get a rapidly-animated fight that has probably some of the most fluid animation in the entire series, even though it lasts about fifteen seconds.
• Annoyingly Repetitive Child: In "Little Muriel", Muriel is turned into a toddler. Throughout the episode, she bugs him this way, such as listing things she wants, yelling that she's hungry and thirsty several times in a row, and bouncing on an unconscious Eustace while yelling "I want an Easter egg!" at breakneck speeds.
• Anti-Villain: A good number of creatures are this — if so, Courage will usually befriend them in the end.
• Aroused by Their Voice: Katz, captivating his victims with his smooth, sexy voice before he, you know, kills them.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: In "Big Ball of Revenge", at the climax Katz pulls out a flamethrower, the Big Toe is wielding a spiked club, Cajun Fox has a cleaver, the Queen of the Black Puddle has a conch shell with a missile inside, and the were-mole... has a flyswatter.
• Art Evolution:
  • The animation in the earliest few shorts could get jerky at times and wasn't consistently fluid, though the show got the hang of that rather quickly.
  • While the series's look and style as a whole remains completely consistent from the first episode to the last, the last two seasons (Season 4 in particular) makes more use of lighting and atmosphere, and the characters' coloring reflects such, making them really look like they're in that environment, as opposed to just using their standard color schemes.
• Art Shift: Two notable instances happen in the last two episodes:
  • In "Remembrance of Courage Past", Courage's backstory is shown through a series of flashbacks which resemble crudely-drawn crayon art that children usually make.
  • In the series finale "Perfect", Courage has several nightmares, with each one being drawn in a different style of animation, such as CGI for one that features a creepy blue trumpet thing and stopmotion for another that has Courage performing in a talent show.
• Artist and the Band: "Record Deal" has a voice on Eustace's car radio mention a band called Johnny and the Dilltones.
• Artistic License – Biology: According to the episode "Cabaret Courage", if you feel sufficiently disgusted by other people's selfishness, you can become an ulcer in your own digestive tract, which will grow large enough to engulf an entire theater.
• Ascended Fanboy: Doubly so! Michael Sporn, whom Dilworth worked with on Sesame Street and greatly admired, loved Courage and was later invited to write and animate the flashbacks for "Remembrance of Courage Past."
• Ask a Stupid Question...: Courage always does this with the computer, though he isn't really asking a stupid question, it's how the computer interprets it. Here's an example:
  Courage: Computer. How do you get rid of bad eggplants?
  Computer: Throw them in the garbage. You twit.
• As Long as It Sounds Foreign: Dr. Vindaloo.
• Ass Shove: The Cajun Fox tosses Courage onto a fountain of a mermaid, and said mermaid's hand seems to be stuck up Courage's ass, particularly because of his mouth serving as a water spout.
• Asshole Victim: Eustace tends to get what he deserves for being a jerk, many episodes even ending with him getting killed. But the ones who are even more so are Bunny's abusive boyfriend Mad Dog in "The Mask" and the evil vet who sent Courage's parents to the moon when he was a puppy in "Remembrance of Courage Past".
• Atrocious Arthropods:
  • "Evil Weevil": Jeeves Weevil is a giant weevil who takes a job as Eustace and Muriel's butler with the intent of eating them.
  • Straight Outta Nowhere: Scooby-Doo! meets Courage the Cowardly Dog: Nowhere is being plagued by giant cicadas who provide the main conflict in the story.
• Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: Eustace and Muriel sometimes show that they actually do care for one another, such as seeking marriage counseling in "The McPhearson Phantom". They also got a sweet moment in "The Mask".

B

• Bald of Evil: Eustace and his mother lack hair, although it's really more bald of Jerkass.
• Bankruptcy Barrel: In "Swindlin' Wind", Shirley the Medium places a curse on Eustace and Muriel that makes them swindle each other. Eventually, Muriel ends up wearing nothing but a cardboard box while Eustace is left wearing a barrel. Despite the fact that they were in a swindling match against each other.
• Bathroom Control: In "Swindlin' Wind", Eustace tricks Muriel into overindulging herself on tea and then puts a toll booth ahead of their bathroom. He says he will not let her through until she gives her favorite rocking chair to him, and she reluctantly complies.
• Big Damn Heroes: Eustace, of all people, actually gets a few. He flies past the sun Courage and Muriel are on riding a comet which lets them all get back to Earth, and in another episode saves the day against Katz.
• Big "NO!": One of Eustace's catch phrases is to yell "No".
• Big, Screwed-Up Family: The Bagges who are a whole villainous family of abusive jerks. Ma Bagge is not only a bully but also a Corrupt Corporate Executive who threatens lives, Horst hunts sentient deer and throws goats of a cliff to make bucks, and Eustace is as ready to do any dirty work for enough money as the rest of his family. Oh, and he also starts hunting deer to prove himself to Horst. Muriel is really the only person in the family who isn't completely screwed up, if you don't count Courage. Even Fred, Muriel's nephew, is insane and has an almost fetishistic compulsion to shave people. He gets locked up in an asylum at the end of his episode.
• Bittersweet Ending:
  • "Courage the Fly": Courage prevents the satellite from crushing the farmhouse, but he's still a fly.
  • "The Great Fusilli": Fusilli falls victim to his own stage, but Eustace and Muriel have been turned into lifeless puppets.
  • "King of Flan": Courage is able to break the spell on everyone who saw the King's commercial, but now he's addicted to flan.
• Black Comedy: This show loves using dark humor, especially when it comes to Eustace's numerous deaths (and to a lesser extent, the literal pain that Courage keeps going through).
• Body Horror: There are quite a lot of episodes that have anatomy being distorted, changed, or whatever in really disturbing ways. However, the episode that provokes this the most is the episode "Cabaret Courage", with a Hollywood bigshot who has become one with his cabaret and turned into a talking terratoma.
• Body Uploading: In "Hard Drive Courage", Muriel is sucked into the computer. Courage chases after her by scanning his body in the printer.
• Borrowed Catchphrase: At least three antagonists have borrowed Eustace's catchphrase of calling Courage a "stupid dog".
  • King Buffo from "Feast of the Bullfrogs" yells "Stupid dog!" as he leaves after his defeat.
  • Jeeves Weevil from "Evil Weevil" is defeated when Courage tricks him into sucking his own body fat and making him shrink to the size of a normal insect. The villain responds by kicking Courage in the shin and yelling "Stupid dog!" in a high-pitched voice.
  • After Dr. Zalost's tower is demolished, the furious and scorched doctor emerges with a single cannonball meant for Courage and in his fury calls him this as well, prompting an unwitting Eustace to lampshade that this is what he keeps telling him all the time and Zalost to laugh hysterically.
• Brain with a Manual Control: In the episode "Mission to the Sun", a thumb-sized bacteria is shown getting inside Muriel's brain and messing with the controls found inside, which initially results in Muriel behaving in an insane way, until finally she starts destroying the spaceship's machinery and talking with the bacteria's voice. Eustace is shown also having the bacteria in his brain at the very end.
• Bratty Food Demand: In "Little Muriel", Muriel is turned into a little girl and demands that Courage make her macaroni cheese with more cheese, less macaroni, etc., and when he finally makes some macaroni and cheese that she deems perfect, she throws it at him and says, "I hate macaroni and cheese."
• Brawn Hilda: Muriel gets mistaken for a Valkyrie by a race of Brïnnhilde-esque Valkyries. The Valkyrie the sisters thought Muriel was, is actually named Brïnnhilde.
• Broken Record: Bushwick's Suspiciously Specific Denial and Accidental Misnaming routine are always spoken with the same words every time.

C

• Carnivore Confusion: Done hilariously in the episode "Fishy Business", where Muriel serves sushi and raw fish for dinner — as Courage starts to help himself, a new goldfish the Bagges just happen to have now gives him a look of horror, causing Courage to change his mind. After the Bagges leave with the Fishonary, the goldfish hops out of the bowl, and appears to mourn over the sushi, before looking around, whipping out a pair of chopsticks, and happily helping himself to some.
• Casting Gag: The European Spanish voice actors for Eustace and Muriel (Rafael de Penagos and María Romero) had previously played a bickering married couple of polar opposites in the dub of George & Mildred. They were also reportedly quite close in Real Life.
• Cerebus Retcon: Part of the series finale, "Remembrance of Courage Past", does this to the opening: Courage wasn't exactly "abandoned as a pup". His parents were specifically taken from him by a crazed vet and sent on a rocket into space.
• Cerebus Rollercoaster: The show switching between a serious tone and a more humorous tone becomes more frequent in the last couple of seasons, sometimes episode to episode, and other times within the same episode, such as "The Mask", which is full of Mood Whiplash.
• Character Catchphrase:
  • Usually using the same sound clip. Some like "The things I do for love!" and "What do I do? What do I do!?!" for Courage.
    • He has another one that tends to go something like "Something weird's going on here, or my name's (strange, non-sequitir, or just plain incorrect name)! ...And it's not."
    • Also, variations of "I'm not going to like this..." usually: "I just know I'm not gonna like this..."
  • Eustace has several that also use the same sound clip which include "Stupid Dog!", "Blah blah blah", and "What's yer offer!"
  • Muriel typically utters "Oh my!" at least once an episode.
  • Katz has "I (really) wish you hadn't done that."
  • Di Lung often says "Watch where you're going, ya fool!"
  • And, of course, the Computer. "You twit."
• Chekhov's Gun: Believe it or not, this particular example took several seasons to develop. It's his uncanny ability to scream, which he uses to defeat the villains, who themselves forced Courage into developing his "talent" for years.
  • The Happy Plums from "Tower of Dr. Zalost" end up making Dr. Zalost happy and convincing him to stop being evil.
  • The Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich (with just a 'wee' dash of vinegar) from "Tulip's Worm" is used to make the titular worm regurgitate out Courage, Muriel, and the teddy bears.
  • Muriel's tears in "Queen Of The Black Puddle" allow Courage and Eustace to escape the titular Queen of the Black Puddle.
  • Muriel's homemade fabric softener in "Curtain of Cruelty" ends up making Muriel and Courage immune to Floyd's Cruelty Curtain. Courage also ends up using it to reverse the effects and make everyone affected by the Cruelty Curtain nice again.
  • Eustace's memory quilt in "The Quilt Club" is used in defeating the Stitch sisters.
  • Muriel's vinegar gelatin that was rejected by Eustace in "Hard Drive Courage" ends up being used to cure the sick computer virus that was holding her prisoner.
• Chew-Out Fake-Out: In "Curtain of Cruelty", a man in a suit affected by the titular Cruelty Curtain catches Eustace replacing his car's stolen wheels by stealing wheels from a baby carriage. After it looks like the man is going to reprimand Eustace for his actions, it instead turns out that the man is impressed that Eustace would stoop to such a low and rallies everyone into making Eustace their new mayor.
• Chubby Mama, Skinny Papa: Muriel and Eustace are technically this, since Muriel is overweight and Eustace is skinny as a rail, and they're both surrogate parents to Courage, Muriel moreso.
• Cloudcuckoolander:
  • Basil is a burglar who flips back and forth between robbing Courage, Muriel, and Eustace and thinking they're his family. After they convince Basil to give up crime, he ends up becoming a licensed masseuse for electric eels. There's also his tendency to slap people with a fish.
  • Fred has a weird obsession with shaving people and animals and has a tendency to described his actions as "naughty".
  • Dr. Vindaloo is pretty eccentric, mainly due to his obvious shortcomings and incompetence as a medical professional.
• Collapsing Lair: "The Tower of Dr. Zalost".
• Come Back, My Pet!: Courage routinely does this for Eustace, who routinely scares and abuses him. However, it's less out of the goodness of his heart (though there are cases of this) and more because of his devotion to Eustace's wife Muriel.
• Comic-Book Adaptation: Several comic stories based on Courage the Cowardly Dog appeared in Cartoon Cartoons and Cartoon Network Block Party, which were two of several comic books consisting of comic adaptations of Cartoon Network shows published by DC Comics.
• Companion Cube: Computer. While his speaking isn't just Courage's delusion, and it may be treated as a living character, it's still a computer.
• Computer Viruses Are Computer Illnesses: In "Hard Drive Courage", Courage accidentally downloads a virus while trying to download an artichoke syrup soup recipe. Soon after, Muriel is sucked into the computer, forcing Courage to digitize himself to go after her, where it turns out the virus has a cold and intended on using Muriel as a new motherboard until he recovers.
• Context-Sensitive Button: Goes on all the time.
• Continuity Cavalcade: "Ball of Revenge" involves Eustace recruiting villains from previous episodes.
• Continuity Nod: The events that happened in "The Snowman Cometh", "Freaky Fred", and "The Queen of the Black Puddle" were mentioned in the episode "Mega Muriel the Magnificent".
• Cool and Unusual Punishment: In a number of episodes. For example, in "Ball of Revenge", Katz puts colour and white clothing together in the washing machine. Muriel's screaming ensues.
• Cool Car: Di Lung has an impressive car.
• Cool Shades: The Cajun Fox wears sunglasses over his huge eyes.
• Counting Sheep: In "The Sandman Sleeps", it is shown that the Sandman has unsuccessfully tried to cure his insomnia by having sheep jump onto his bed so he can count them. They get bored and one even bleats "Just go to sleep already!"
• Covert Pervert: Courage is a Nice Guy for the most part, but he is occasionally hinted to have a perverted side. In "Remembrances of Courage Past", a flashback to when he was a puppy has him stumble upon a woman showering while opening doors to look for his parents. He gleefully looks a second time before moving on in his search. It is also implied in "Hard Drive Courage" that he has a collection of porn on his computer.
• Cowardly Lion/The So-Called Coward: Courage may be scared to death of pretty much everything that comes his way, but he deserves at least some credit for not letting his fear deter him from rescuing the Bagges and anyone else who may be in danger.
• Crapsack World: It's hard to expect any good definition to come out of "The Middle of Nowhere", but any backwater in a horror plot is screwed, guaranteed.
• Creator Cameo: Dilworth himself makes appearances in many of the still photographs that pop up here and there in the show.
• Cunning Like a Fox: The Cajun Fox tries to outwit Courage in order to keep him from rescuing Muriel.
• Curse of the Pharaoh: There's an episode about a mummy of a pharaoh cursing Courage's home with three plagues (a flood, a loud song playing non-stop, and locusts) when Eustace refuses to give a stone slab back to him.
• Cut His Heart Out with a Spoon:
  • In "Watch the Birdies", the baby birds' mother threatens to eat Muriel with a cereal spoon if she returns to find even one feather on their heads out of place.
  • In "Courage Under the Volcano", Chief Wiki Wiki is angered by the volcano erupting and assumes that it's because Courage interfered with sacrificing Muriel to the volcano god. He informs Courage that he intends to tattoo the dog's face if they survive the eruption.
• Cyber Space: Played straight in "Hard Drive Courage". Cyberspace is depicted as the actual inside of a computer. You know, chips, motherboards, the usual. Plus a lot of green binary code.

D

• Dark Is Not Evil: Not all the monsters Courage meets are Always Chaotic Evil or hostile - some of them are just neutral or even friendly. In fact in some cases they even need Courage's help.
• Darker and Edgier: This could be disputed, as the entire series was darker than most other animated series; however, most episodes from the final season are significantly more dramatic in nature compared to other seasons, especially the third. "The Mask" is the best example of this.
  • The two Half Hour episodes - "The Tower of Dr. Zalost" and "The Mask" - deviate dramatically from the usual Monster of the Week formula, dealing with much more realistic horrors such as depression and abusive relationships respectively.
• Dark and Troubled Past: When Nowhere is attacked by a doctor who fired unhappy cannonballs on people, Eustace isn't affected like everybody else. Instead of becoming unhappy, he is turned to ash, indicating that he couldn't be any more unhappy then he already is. Other episodes hint at his terrible childhood, though no events from it are shown. Apparently his mother and brother were very cruel to him growing up.
• Deadpan Snarker: Courage's Computer, as well as Shirley the Medium, both tend to make sardonic remarks.
  • Katz can be rather snarky as well. "Pity..."
• Deal with the Devil: "Muted Muriel," one of the few times Courage brings the monster down on himself. Muriel has become an Elective Mute, so Courage goes to Shirley the Medium for help to get her speaking again. Shirley's solution is...rather drastic, summoning a giant monster starfish that will level the farm if Muriel doesn't talk.
• Death by Cameo: Among his many cameos in the show, John Dilworth's name appears on the list of people who checked into the Katz Motel.
• Deranged Animation: Where do we begin, CGI fetus with realistic face, Synchro-Vox faced tree and moon, and the Stop Motion violin girl, in addition to the already creepy characters in the series. This show is just full of disturbing animated sequences.
• Designated Victim: If the Monster of the Week can terrorize Muriel in any way, it will.
  • Eustace is also a likely target. Unlike Muriel, he's also less likely to be saved from said monster or disaster.
• Determinator: Courage himself. On the long run, he faces uncountable nemesis and supernatural weirdness, and yet he stands by Muriel out of feelings of love and gratitude. This is even more obvious on the Mecha-Courage episode, where he squares-off against a robotic version of himself said to be better in everything. Despite getting brutally beaten over and over again by the robot, Courage just stays there, taking it all, and indeed that's exactly what enables him to win. Justified, as the one time he did run away from those he cared for, he lost them. Forever.
• Diabolus ex Nihilo: This trope is commom through the series, as some monsters and other threats normally appear in the farmhouse without any explict reason.
• Didn't Think This Through: In "Shirley the Medium", the titular fortune teller warns Eustace not to open his deceased brother's box, which is said to contain his entire fortune. At the end, he opens it anyway, and ends up getting trapped inside of it. Regardless, he does indeed gain access to all of his brother's money, but suddenly realizes that he can't even use any of it because he's still trapped in the box.
  Eustace: Hey...where am I going to spend it?
• Disproportionate Retribution: The evil librarian from "Wrath of the Librarian" torments Courage and transforms Eustace and Muriel into characters from his overdue library book just because he can't afford to pay the fine.
• Disrupting the Theater: In one episode, Eustace goes to a theater to watch a movie, but he ends up blocking the screen for other people because of a curse inflicted on him that has a raincloud over his head, which also gets their popcorn wet. When he rudely refuses to move after they politely ask him to, he is thrown out of the theater.
• A Dog Named "Dog": Dr. Zalost's rat assistant is named Rat.
• Dogs Love Fire Hydrants: In one of the flashbacks of when Courage was a puppy in "Remembrance of Courage Past", Courage's parents are shown playing catch with him, with Courage getting his head stuck in a gate because his parents were distracted by admiring a fire hydrant.
• Downer Ending: These occur from time to time, but due to Negative Continuity, they don't stick and the Reset Button is always pressed. For example, in "Muriel Blows Up", Courage fails to stop Eustace from eating an explosive carrot, and rushes back to find a gigantic Muriel feasting on a whole patch of them.
• Dramatically Missing the Point: Pretty much anytime Courage tries to tell Muriel or Eustace about a monster has them fail to understand that Courage is trying to warn them.
  Eustace: Did you break that door?!
  Courage: Ooooh, forget the door!

E

• Early-Installment Weirdness:
  • A small number of the first season episodes have a lot of traditional cartoon antics (chases scenes, slapstick violence, etc.), and can actually become quite goofy at times, with John Dilworth himself admitting a number of the earlier episodes were "cartoon filler". "Cajun Granny Stew" is easily the most stand-out episode of this.
  • Muriel's Scottish accent is slightly more pronounced in earlier episodes as well.
  • Some of the earlier episodes, such as "A Night at the Katz Motel" and "The Shadow of Courage", appear to vaguely imply that Eustace and Muriel can understand Courage, when the rest of the series has Courage incapable of speaking in anything other than complete gibberish in front of the Bagges and the Bagges consequently ignoring his attempts at warning them of danger.
  • Muriel thought the idea of including vinegar as an ingredient in a recipe (specifically raspberry jam) was unusual, and Courage's unfavorable reaction to sampling such seemed to confirm such. Then again, she did think the jam tasted heavenly afterwards, so it's possible this is what drove her to including vinegar in all of her recipes.
• Eat the Camera: Courage does one at the end of the intro sequence as Eustace frightens him with his mask, bringing forward the creator's credit.
• Eldritch Location: Nowhere is a town in Kansas that has a lot of strangeness to it, mainly in the number of monsters and supernatural creatures that keep popping up - whatever the case, one may argue there's something seriously wrong with this place. It's not very often the default setting of a show is one.
• Ending Theme: An utterly hilarious one, and it culminates with Eustace exclaiming "Stupid dog!".
• "Everybody Laughs" Ending: Not everybody, but a vast majority of the episodes end with this schtick of Courage, or whichever character, looking into the camera, and letting out a goofy and idiotic-sounding laugh, before we iris out.
• Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": Eustace Bagge is often referred to as "The Farmer" by characters on the show. The episode descriptions for the first two seasons (aside from "A Night at the Katz Motel") on Netflix exclusively refer to him as such.
• Everyone Hates Mimes: Before Fred arrives in "Freaky Fred," Courage imagines him as all sorts of monsters such as a giant anthropomorphic bug (whose design would later be reused for the weevil), a Frankenstein-like being...and a mime.
• Everytown, America: The series is set in the town of Nowhere, Kansas.
• Evil Laugh: Quite a few villains have evil laughs.
  • The King of Flan has an epic one.
  • Dr. Zalost gets a good one, too.
  • Katz has a great sadistic one.
  • Le Quack has a French version of one.
• Evil Matriarch: Eustace's mother is a pretty awful person, though her first appearance did portray her as sympathetic after Eustace comforts her when she loses her hair.
• Evil Old Folks: Eustace is more of a grumpy, crabby Jerkass than actually evil, but he definitely fits the bill in "Ball of Revenge", orchestrating a Villain Team-Up to kill Courage.
• Expositron 9000: The computer's usual role is to give Courage information about the monsters that threaten him and the Bagges as well as how he can deal with them.
• Extra-Long Episode: While most episodes follow the Two Shorts format, with each short being 11 minutes long, some episodes, such as "The Tower of Dr. Zalost" and "The Mask", are full 22-minute episodes.
• Eye on a Stalk: The Alien from "Car Broke, Phone Yes" has two eyestalks jutting from his brain-like head.
• Eye Pop: When he sees the eponymous brothers abduct Muriel in "The Duck Brothers", Courage's eyes jump out of his head completely and bounce away on the bedroom floor.

F

• Fantasy Kitchen Sink: Courage encounters creatures and people that seem to come from many horror, sci-fi, fantasy, and mythology-based origins.
• Feathered Fiend: Besides the multiple avian villains detailed on the Characters page, in a few gag scenes, Courage gets harassed by a mean bird for no reason.
• Felony Misdemeanor:
  • From "The Mask":
    Muriel: But my dear, we all must face reality.
    Kitty: Really? Like how you sneak extra sweets when no one is looking!?
    Muriel: [gasps in horror and shame]

    Although considering Kitty's history, it's kind of understandable.

  • The show does a pretty good job turning a mad barber's obsession with shaving hair into full-blown horror. It's apparently a big enough problem in universe that there's even a "Home for Freaky Barbers" that Fred is a resident of.
• Formula-Breaking Episode: The show is most known for its various monsters, but certain episodes go for other genres, such as a Miyazaki-esque angle ("The Last of the Starmakers"), gangland drama ("The Mask"), or mundane family issues ("Mother's Day").
• Fountain of Youth: "Little Muriel" has a tornado cause Muriel to become three years old again.
• Funny Animal: Oddly enough, Courage does some very human-like things and can apparently talk (mostly to the audience, but also to other characters in the first season), but he usually gets treated as a normal dog. By comparison, there are several equally anthropomorphic characters, like Shirley, who get treated as humans without comment). This is lampshaded in some small, throwaway moments. For example, at the beginning of "The Last of the Starmakers", Courage is on the porch and picks up the newspaper with his hand before putting it in his mouth and giving it to Eustace.

G

• The Ghost: Several times, Muriel mentions relatives that we never see. For instance, she mistakes a police officer for her Cousin Harold in "Muriel Meets Her Match", and she mentions a sister named Dorothy in "Angry Nasty People".
• Good Is Dumb: Every single good guy in the series other than Courage, with only a few exceptions, is a complete idiot, to the point where they even ignore neon signs pointing at the villain.
• G-Rated Drug: "The God Bone". According to an unseen narrator, no dog can cease licking the God Bone once they've started — "It's just that good!"
• Greater-Scope Villain: The Bagge Family, Ma Bagge in particular. Eustace in his youth was actually a pretty nice but sad kid, but he had a Big Brother Bully in Horst, and his mother treated him like dirt, more or less leading to Eustace becoming the grumpy and cruel Jerkass that he is.
• Gypsy Curse: Shirley puts them on people who are rude to her. Though since she's actually not a mean person, she normally leaves a loophole to escape or undo the curse if she feels they learned their lesson.

H

• Heroic Canines, Villainous Felines:
  • Courage is a cowardly but heroic and good-hearted dog. Shirley is a chihuahua and lends a helping hand to Courage from time to time. Katz, who is the villain who appears most frequently, is a sadistic and evil cat.
  • "The Mask" explores this trope and subverts it. The stranger who torments Courage because he is a dog is eventually revealed to be a cat named Kitty, who resents dogs because her best friend Bunny is trapped in an abusive relationship with the evil Mad Dog. Courage eventually saves Bunny from Mad Dog and the girls reunite. Kitty recognizes Courage's kindness and heroism and admits that not all dogs are bad.
• Hypocritical Humor:
  • Eustace always refers to Courage as a "stupid dog" even though he himself isn't aware of the dangers that goes around in Nowhere, and Courage is the one who usually has to save him and Muriel.
  • Eustace is also responsible for a more specific example in the aftermath of saying "no" to Flantasy Flan:
    Eustace: What happened to you, woman?! You look like a house!
    Muriel: Well! Look who calls the kettle black!

    Follow-up: Courage fixes everyone's Flantasy Flan addiction, except his.

    Courage: Well, it's showbiz!

  • Also Di Lung's catchphrase of "Watch where you're going, you fool", since he is too self-absorbed and scornful to realize his own mistakes.

I

• Identical Grandson: Eustace and his father look the same, except Eustace's father had a beard.
• Impossible Shadow Puppets: Courage sometimes does this; one episode even has a Living Shadow that "projects" itself to scare him.
• Incorruptible Pure Pureness: When all have lost their minds, or been corrupted, or transformed into monsters, one thing always remains no matter what the circumstances, Courage's love and devotion for Muriel.
• Intercontinuity Crossover: In one Halloween event in-between commercials, the Scooby Gang stopped at the cottage when their car broke down; leaving them with nothing to do but tell ghost stories.
• Invisible Main Character: "Invisible Muriel" has Muriel become invisible.
• Invisible Stomach, Visible Food: Comes up in the episode "Invisible Muriel". Eustace doesn't seem to notice Muriel is invisible, but can clearly see her swallowing a mouthful of pancakes, prompting him to tell her to close her mouth when she chews.
• Iris Out: All of the episodes end with an iris out, except for "Freaky Fred", where the last shot is a close-up of an unshaved part of Courage's behind that reads "With Love Fred", later fading to black. It has also been played with in a few episodes:
  • At the end of "Dr. Le Quack, Amnesia Specialist", Le Quack keeps the iris out open to inform the audience that they have not seen the last of him, and the iris out closes on his beak as he does his Evil Laugh, which he then pulls away for it to close completely.
  • "The Chicken from Outer Space" and its sequel both end with a terrified Courage screaming as the iris out is about to close, only for him to keep it open so he can say "This shouldn't happen to a dog!", after which the iris out closes hard on his nose, causing him to yelp in pain. The latter instance has him saying "This still shouldn't happen to a dog!".
  • "The Great Fusilli" ends in the same manner as the previously-mentioned episodes, but with Courage saying his catchphrase, "The things I do for love...". The iris out then closes, this time not snapping on Courage's nose.
  • "Cowboy Courage" also ends in pretty much the same way, only this time Courage puts on his cowboy hat from his Fantasy Sequence as he says "Well, here we go again, partner!" in a cowboy-like voice and lets out a horse's neigh. The iris out does not close in this one.
• It Makes Sense in Context: A majority of the plot devices fall under this. Most memorably, an episode which takes place in an Old West setting has Courage, who takes the role as sheriff, bribe the military to send in a stealth bomber to drop a piano on a zombified outlaw.

K

• Kangaroo Pouch Ride: In "The Transplant", Eustace carries Muriel in his pouch after he first becomes a giant kangaroo monster.
• Kaiju: Both Eustace and Courage become giant kangaroo monsters in "The Transplant".

L

• Language Fluency Denial: Courage can talk just fine, but communicates with his owners Muriel and Eustace through babbles and charades. Downplayed since he doesn't hide his ability to understand what they're saying.
• Lean and Mean: Eustace, as well as Katz and the Cajun Fox, are all skinny and mean characters.
• Leitmotif:
  • On occasion rather loud accordion music can be heard from Muriel's radio.
  • Almost every character in the show has their own theme music. Sometimes, different characters share the same leitmotif.
    • Muriel has soft piano music.
    • Shirley's sounds Romani.
    • The Weremole has a rather haunting piano piece.
• Lions and Tigers and Humans... Oh, My!: Humans and anthropomorphic animals coexist in this setting. See Katz, LeQuack Shirley the Chihuahua Medium, the Pig Butcher, etc. Oddly, Courage is still considered a pet first and foremost, even if he's capable of human mannerisms.
• Literal Metaphor: Here, living in the middle of nowhere isn't just a figure of speech. They actually live in the middle of a place called Nowhere.
• Living Drawing: In the episode "So in Louvre Are We Two", the paintings and statues in the museum come to life. Mona Lisa leaves her framed picture and traps Muriel inside.
• Living Shadow: The Shadow from "The Shadow of Courage" is a sentient shadow.
• The Load: Eustace's stubbornness and greed alongside Muriel's innocent yet ignorant behavior turns them into this at times. Though on occasion they help Courage more actively.
• Losing Your Head: In "Windmill Vandals", the Windmill Vandals end up non-fatally decapitating Eustace, Muriel, and Courage. Being a (very scary) comedy, the only harm that comes about is having their heads on the wrong bodies.
• Loud of War: Courage employs this in "Ball of Revenge", screaming so loud that it blows away Eustace and all the villains he brought back.

M

• Made a Slave: Enslavement happens to Courage and his family at times. Notable slavemakers include a giant alien robot and a clan of bullfrogs.
• Malicious Misnaming: Eustace always addresses Courage as "stupid dog" or a description synonymous with such. In fact, Eustace has only mentioned his name twice in the show's entire run. The second time is only to mock Muriel's love for the dog ("'Courage, Courage, Courage!' That stupid dog gets all the good stuff around here!"), so the first time is the only time that actually has him address Courage by his name.
• Man of a Thousand Voices: Paul Schoeffler alone voices Katz, Cajun Fox, Le Quack, Freaky Fred, Dr. Vindaloo, Snowman, and many other one-shot characters. Just listen to all of them very carefully, they all start sounding the same after a while.
• Mass Hypnosis: "King of Flan" has the title antagonist use hypnotic ads to make everyone addicted to his flan.
• The Mind Is a Plaything of the Body: When he's turned into a fly in "Courage the Fly", Courage keeps getting attracted to sources of bright light, and flies into glass a couple of times as well.
• Misplaced Retribution: Quite often, Eustace's Jerkassery results in Muriel and/or Courage being punished by the people he's slighted when they did nothing blameworthy. Steal the "Forbidden Hat of Gold" and refuse to give it up? Muriel gets dragged away to be sacrificed. Swindle Shirley over a necklace? Both Eustace and Muriel get cursed for it. Refuse to return an Egyptian slab? King Ramses doesn't care that Courage and Muriel are caught up in it until Eustace is finally on his own. Almost every single time he makes a selfish decision, the whole family suffers for it in spades with Eustace occasionally being a Karma Houdini while Courage has to save the household.
• Monster of the Week: The whole show is about a dog having to confront a new monster or villain in every episode.
• Mood Whiplash: Masterfully. Depending on the episode, it switches from depressing or nightmarish to hilarious in the blink of an eye. For example, there's the "Last of the Starmakers" for the former, where Courage saves the last batch of space squid babies, interspersed with moments of useless henchman and rollerskating military generals.
• Mundane Made Awesome: A Running Gag is that when Courage confronts the villains, they rarely actually fight. Instead, they often decide who wins via some otherwise casual competition like handball or thumb-wrestling, made epic with with close-up shots of desperate, perspiring faces, Scare Chords, cutaways to the people in danger, and other devices to emphasize drama.
• My Instincts Are Showing: Courage will sometimes act like a normal dog at inconvenient times.
  Courage: [long howl] Man, I gotta stop that. I'm beginning to like it.

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