Beavis and Butt-head is a cultural icon, giving us a unique take on the world through the eyes of two incredibly stupid protagonists who were disturbingly close to home. The nature of the characters and excellent writing meant that anywhere Beavis and Butt-head went, they brought riotous comedy with them.
The show originally ran for seven seasons from 1993-1997 with a feature-length movie in ’96. The show was then brought back for an eighth season in 2011, and there’s often talk of bringing it back again. Here are the 10 most popular episodes:
“Candy Sale” (8.3/10)
In this episode, we see the return of Mr. Manners, who joins Buzzcut’s class one day with a class project, wherein each student is given 100 candy bars to sell door to door for $2 each.
After Beavis and Butt-head each sell Mr. Manners a candy bar at half-price, they return home and ‘sell’ the other 98 to each other, passing their $2 back and forth. The fallout when they return to class memorably leads to Mr. Manners and Buzzcut having a callback scrap.
“Bungholio: Lord of the Harvest” (8.3/10)
In this extended Halloween special, Beavis and Butt-head attempt to do some trick or treating, but with little success due to their age and lack of costumes. After they manage to sneak into Tom Anderson’s house, Tom locks Butt-head in the trunk of his car and abandons him in a field in the middle of nowhere.
Meanwhile, Beavis finds Tom’s bowl of candy and devours it, turning him into his charismatic but unfocussed alter-ego, Cornholio. They both adventure through the night until they meet in a fun conclusion, where the traditional horror-movie cackle is replaced by Butt-head’s iconic snicker.
“Manners Suck” (8.4/10)
This episode introduced Mr. Manners, in his first attempt to subdue Van Driessen’s class. Beavis and Butt-head don’t make it easy for him though, and he eventually snaps and grabs the duo, forcing Van Driessen to step in and a fight to break out between the 2 men.
Something seemed to get through to our protagonists though, who later practiced being polite in the bathroom after abandoning the carnage they caused.
“Mr. Anderson’s Balls” (8.4/10)
This classic episode begins with Beavis and Butt-head on a quest to find a missing child and receive the reward money. Their adventure takes them wading into a river, where Beavis gets hit by a golf ball. When they realize they’ve stumbled onto a golf course and that Tom Anderson is the one who hit Beavis, they come up with a plan.
They start stealing all of Mr. Anderson’s balls as he plays them and then sell them back to him, which succeeds at first, making it one of their better plans. The episode is a lot of fun and very satisfying to watch.
“The Great Cornholio” (8.4/10)
This episode was an important milestone for B&B since it introduced us to The Great Cornholio. The episode begins innocently enough, with Beavis and Butt-head visiting Stewart’s house. Stewart’s mom makes burritos for dinner, but they don’t go down very well.
Beavis and Butt-head then raid the kitchen and an over-excited Beavis starts demolishing all the sweets he can find, transforming him into the hilarious inexplicable persona that became one of the most memorable aspects of the show. Butt-head also has no authority over Cornholio, so it’s always interesting to see the tables turn.
“Werewolves of Highland/Crying” (8.5/10)
After 14 long years, this episode brought Beavis and Butt-head back onto the screen, plunging them into a world that had changed so much since the 90s, it was like seeing them on another planet.
The episode addresses the Twilight obsession of the time, and after Van Driessen suggests women are sexually attracted to vampires and werewolves, Beavis and Butt-head invite a homeless man they mistake for a werewolf to bite them and end up in intensive care. Season 8 did not disappoint and went on to craft an ending for the show all over again.
“Prank Call” (8.5/10)
The mere act of giving Beavis and Butt-head a phone book (those were the days) is more than enough ammo for an episode of TV gold. After finding a man named Harry Sachs, they choose to interpret his name as “Hairy Sacks” and proceed to torture the man to boiling point with a series of uncreative and poorly executed prank phone calls.
They eventually lead the man to Stewart’s house, where he trashes it, confronts Stewart’s dad and then puts the house-phone (those were the days) in an unspeakable place, before returning home to get pranked by our heroes all over again.
“No Laughing” (8.5/10)
The next leg of our journey stretches back to the humble days of season 2. In this memorable two-parter, Principal McVicker tries an unusual strategy to deal with Beavis and Butt-heads’ constant disruptions once and for all, by banning them from laughing for a week.
For some reason, probably just plain stupidity, our protagonists insist on enforcing this rule on themselves all week, and it genuinely seems to be doing them some good. Unfortunately, Buzzcut gets wind of this and milks his next sex-ed class for all the crudity it’s worth to get back at them, forcing Beavis and Butt-head to face their greatest challenge yet.
“Bus Trip” (8.6/10)
This episode is one of the best and keeps things simple. Van Driessen takes the class on a field trip in the school bus and is forced to deal with the typical behavior of bored teenagers on a bus trip, ramped up to 11 by Beavis and Butt-head.
After catching them mooning out the window, Van Driessen makes them sit up front, but because he’s on his feet in the aisle, he ends up crashing through the windshield and falling down a cliff when the bus makes a sudden stop on a windy road.
“Beavis and Butt-head Are Dead” (8.7/10)
The official 200th episode of the pop-culture legend brought the show’s original run to a worthy end. After Beavis falsely claims he and Butt-head are dead and that’s why they’ve been skipping school, all the main characters from the school revel in the peace and quiet. The faculty then decides (despite Van Driessen’s objections) to exploit their deaths by collecting money for a memorial to get on TV.
Whilst on camera holding the jar, Principal McVicker declares he would trade every dime in the jar if Beavis and Butt-head came back, which is when Beavis and Butt-head came back. They then left with the jar, assuming they were rich enough they’d never need to go to school again as they walked off into the sunset. But it wasn’t the last we saw of them, and they’d be more relevant than ever if they returned once more …
