History Characters / Cuphead

* ShoutOut: The guillotine lady the Rook daydreams of in his intro is just WesternAnimation/BettyBoop in the form of a guillotine.

* BreakingOldTrends: The theme for his boss fight is the only theme in the whole game to ''not'' be named after the level it plays on (it's named "Baking the Wondertart" in the soundtrack as opposed to "A Dish to Die For"), though presumably this is only so that the identity of the final boss wouldn't be immediately spoiled on the track listings for the OST.

* WhamShot: The hallway leading to his boss fight can count as this for players who thought of him as just a jolly old chef. After the trio gather all 5 Wondertart ingredients, they return to Saltbaker's Bakery only to find a trapdoor that leads to an ominous-looking dungeon. If that and the foreboding music didn't tip you off, you can later find Saltbaker's shadow visibly relishing in an EvilLaugh, giving away his true nature.

** The Rook takes the cake, though- he's almost entirely themed around this concept! He's not only an executioner with an axe who is introduced daydreaming about a Betty Boop-style guillotine, but the central mechanic of his fight is based on the fact he sometimes attacks with severed heads. Some of those heads are parryable; knocking them back into the Rook is the only way to hurt him.

* {{Leitmotif}}: She's associated heavily with xylophone. In the base game, [[https://studiomdhr.bandcamp.com/track/legendary-ghost her theme]] is played on xylophone, while ''The Delicious Last Course'' adds several xylophone tunes associated with her.

* {{Foreshadowing}}: When your bullets hit Katzenwagen in the third phase, [[spoiler:it makes a metal clinking sound]]. Additionally, after Katzenwagen bursts in and eats Werner, the brothers don't get the latter's contract, hinting that [[spoiler:he's still alive]].
** Speaking of Katzenwagen, you can occasionally see it peeking through the cracks and mouse hole in the wall into the battle before it shows up in person.

* CartoonBugSprayer: Amusingly the ant police's only ranged attacks are some of them attacking with these.

* ClippedWingAngel: [[spoiler:The snail's only real combat advantage is the element of surprise -- once he loses that, his projectiles are simple to dodge or parry, and he goes down in seconds.]]

* BringIt: The Knight will occasionally make this gesture towards the player character.

Acquiring the Broken Relic from Porkrind and solving a puzzle in the graveyard will cause a well of astral energy to appear in the graveyard. Once the cups takes a nap in this spot, they have a rather interesting nightmare...

Acquiring the Broken Relic from Porkrind and solving a puzzle in the graveyard will cause a well of astral energy to appear in the graveyard. Once the cups takes a nap in this spot, they has a rather interesting nightmare...

Acquiring the Broken Relic from Porkrind and solving a puzzle in the graveyard will cause a well of astral energy to appear in the graveyard. Once Cuphead takes a nap in this spot, he has a rather interesting nightmare...

* UnexplainedRecovery: In the final page of the credits, she's shown [[spoiler:celebrating with the boys, Saltbaker, and the rest of the island residents in her corporeal body with nobody in sight being benched in the astral plane on her behalf. Whether Saltbaker managed to bake the Wondertart (hopefully not at the expense of a soul, somehow) or some liberty was taken for an optimal GroupPhotoEnding is left up in the air.]]

** ''Crackshot'': Straight shot in pink, after traveling a set distance without hitting anything it turns into a weaker shot [[HomingProjectile aimed directly at the closest enemy]]. Ex Move is P. Turret, a pink planet-shaped turret that automatically shoots at enemies and can be parried to lob it at opponents. Introduced in ''The Delicious Last Course''.
** ''Converge'': SpreadShot in yellow, travels farther than Spread, has an adjustable spread angle, and pierces through enemies, but has a slower rate of fire and lower damage. Ex Move is Electro-Bolt, a laser that pierces through everything it hits. Introduced in ''The Delicious Last Course''.
** ''Twist-Up'': SpreadShot of [[BlowYouAway mini-tornadoes]] in turquoise. High rate of fire combined with average damage, but travels in strange arcs. Ex Move is Cyclone Spiral, a bigger tornado that moves in a spiral motion. Introduced in ''The Delicious Last Course''.

* BodyHorror: The only way to describe his final form, where his glass body shatters and he turns into a mass of living salt that then forms into a storm that consolidates into two huge salt pillars, covered in spiraling faces...

** Even the name of his stage, "The King's Leap," refers to an old chess rule that evolved into what we now know as "castling."

A canteen who's responsible for maintaining and upgrading Cuphead and Mugman's airplanes, as well as teach them how to fly a plane.

* UnexpectedCharacter: It's safe to say that nobody really expected an overworld NPC to not only show up in a boss battle, but to be such a central element of a unique fight.

** After all five of the Champions go down, the King congratulates you and concedes without a fight. After all, he’s got no one else left- you put him in checkmate, and it's well-known that the King is the weakest piece in chess.

* WolfpackBoss: The Pawns. There are eight of them- parrying all of them wins the fight.

A snow wizard whom you face in an ice palace in "Snow Cult Scuffle". Defeating gets you the Icy Sugar Cubes.

* EvilSorcerer: A wicked cryomancer.

* IcePalace: Is fought in one of these.

* {{Snowlem}}: The form he takes for his second phase is a giant, living snowman, and his third phase sees him become a giant snowflake.

* {{Determinator}}: [[ExaggeratedTrope Ester might be the biggest Determinator of all the bosses.]] While continuing to fight despite taking massive damage is fairly common in Cuphead, it still takes a special kind of stubborn to continue fighting after being turned into sausages by one's own malfunctioning equipment. Ester not only does that, but takes it one step further: once her sausage-body is packed away into a tin for convenient eating, she ''keeps fighting'', bursting out of the tin with her sausage-link body and spitting chili peppers from the advertising on the tin containing her remains- in effect, she dies ''twice'' during the fight, yet returns from the dead to keep up the battle! One might say she's quite [[{{Pun}} bull-headed.]]

** The anteater is possibly based off of the Anteater from the 1940 Fleischer cartoon "Ants in the Plants".

* {{Foil}}: To Baroness Von Bon Bon. Both are bosses themed on AnthropomorphicFood, but they contrast in a few ways:
** Bon Bon is a female, LeanAndMean candy princess with a mostly pink color scheme, while Saltbaker is a male FatBastard of a chef with a mostly blue color scheme.
** Both send out a variety of food minions before personally attacking the Cups, but while Bon Bon waits until all of her minions are defeated in the foreground, Saltbaker cuts up his minions in the background to use as projectiles.
** Bon Bon does not transform, instead pulling on her living castle to enrage it, while Saltbaker directly transforms as his battle continues.
** During the final phase of their battles, Bon Bon forces the Cups to run horizontally with her castle giving chase, while Saltbaker forces them to jump vertically with the remains of his glass body falling into a BottomlessPit.
** Bon Bon is initially hostile to the Cups, but the good ending implies that she is much more kindhearted when not having trouble with The Devil. Saltbaker is initially friendly to the Cups, only to reveal his true psychotic nature after they collect the Wondertart ingredients for him.

* ShoutOut: According to [[http://studiomdhr.com/surprise-cuphead-is-coming-to-playstation-4-and-its-out-today/ a post on the Studio MDHR blog]], Beppi's design is a based on a character from ''[[VideoGame/BubbleBobble Super Bust-A-Move 2]]'' (most likely Katze, who is also split into a red side and a blue side).

* {{Determinator}}: [[ExaggeratedTrope Ester might be the biggest Determinator of all the bosses.]] While continuing to fight despite taking massive damage is fairly common in Cuphead, it still takes a special kind of stubborn to continue fighting after being turned into sausages by one's own malfunctioning equipment. Ester not only does that, but takes it one step further: once her sausage-body is packed away into a tin for convenient eating, she *keeps fighting*, bursting out of the tin with her sausage-link body and spitting chili peppers from the advertising on the tin containing her remains- in effect, she dies ''twice'' during the fight, yet returns from the dead to keep up the battle! One might say she's quite [[{{Pun}} bull-headed.]]