The Bugle Monster is a nightmarish, humanoid creature that appeared in Courage's first nightmare in the series finale episode "Perfect". Little is known about the creature itself, other than it being a monstrous manifestation of Eustace's broken bugle, and its infamy among fans of the show.
Perfect"
Eustace opens his bugle from its packaging.
The bugle makes its appearance at the beginning of the episode, where it is delivered to Eustace in the mail, but it appears to have been damaged in the package while it was shipped to Nowhere. Eustace attempts to play it, only for it to emit a dreadful, off-key sound. Eustace notices the big crack on it, and goes to fix it, but he apparently never does, (possibly because he couldn't find anything to fix it with) due to it still maintaining the crack on it as Eustace is seen sleeping with it like a teddy bear.
Courage's Nightmare
"You're not perfect..."
After a long, stressful day of being taught by the Perfectionist, Courage attempts to fall asleep "perfectly" as he was instructed. Suddenly, Courage gets his first nightmare: the bugle as a deformed blue humanoid with a distorted human face and a forlorn expression floating in a strange, blue void appears as suspenseful music plays in the background. It then looks up at Courage (and quite creepily, the viewer), and whispers to him that he's not perfect, before bowing its head sorrowfully. Courage then wakes up screaming, disturbing his owners. After Courage wakes up from another nightmare, Eustace stops him from barking by blaring the bugle into his ear.
Appearance
Normal
Eustace playing his bugle.
Before Courage has a nightmare of it, the bugle appears as a normal bronze one with a big crack on its side and has a mangled horn. Towards the end of the episode, Eustace ties a bandage around the crack.
Nightmare
In Courage's nightmare, the bugle appears as a strange, blue-skinned being rendered in CGI. It has a distorted human-like face with a small mouth, a long-crooked nose, and baggy eyes set far apart from each other. The creature's body appears to be nothing but a stump or a neck, which resembles the real bugle's main body. If one looks closely at the bottom of the creature as soon as it appears, it isn't connected to anything, appearing to have a snail-like foot representing the bugle's bell. On the right side of its body, it has a short, thin limb with a rectangular "hand" attached to it, mimicking the bugle's key. On the left side of its body, it has a long-twisted tube that connects to the creature's head, which is surrounded by bumps. It also has a horn on the right side of its head at the top.
Personality
Although little traits of this creature's personality is shown, due to it being just a nightmare, it appears to be sad and/or disappointed in Courage's imperfection. The creature also seems to be a hypocrite, due to calling Courage out due to his imperfection, despite being badly deformed and imperfect itself.
Trivia
- The Bugle Monster's voice was provided by the series creator John R. Dilworth who also provided the voice of King Ramses, another infamous disturbing CGI animated character in the show.
- The Bugle Monster was animated by Keith Chamberlain.
- Like King Ramses and the Violin Girl, the Bugle Monster's scene is considered by fans to be one of the most horrifying moments of the show. It is also considered that people who have watched "Perfect" mostly remember it because of this specific moment.
- The bugle monster seems to represent Courage's sadness of not being perfect, as it is blue, the color of sadness, and has a depressed look to it.
- He could possibly be a homage to Aylmer from the 1988 film Brain Damage, as both are soft-speaking blue deformations that cause someone to witness weirdness, and in Courage's case, to dream about the deformed Bugle Monster itself.
- The bugle monster was designed by John R. Dilworth's late brother, Jim, who also designed King Ramses who, as mentioned above, was also voiced by Dilworth.