The main character of the game. Bayonetta is a witch who has lost her memories after being awoken 20 years ago from a 500-year slumber. Her goal in the game is to regain her memories of who she was.
Action Girl: Probably the most memorable female protagonist in an action game in quite some time, barring one or two examples. However...
Audio Erotica: As if her accented, breathy voice wasn't enough, many of her battle cries sound either bondage-queen-like or orgasm-like.
Biker Babe: While she doesn't really ride a bike for much of the game, when she does, it's hot, and awesome.
Erotic Eating: Her favorite snacks (as well as healing items) are lollipops.
Inverted. As Moviebob notes, with Erotic Eating, women are typically shown deriving enjoyment from the food in question, while Bayonetta looks like she's doing the candy a favor.
Reverse Grip: Bayonetta can achieve this with several weapons when linked with Odette, most notably the swords.
The Sacred Darkness: The Left Eye of the World that she bears (or more precisely that she is), overseeing the Darkness, is just as important as the Right Eye that oversees the Light.
She-Fu: Mixed with Gun Fu and taken to ridiculous levels.
Sociopathic Hero: She takes a lot of delight in killing those angels.
Spy Catsuit: Her regular outfit resembles one, with a few odd touches here and there.
Summon Magic: She uses her hair as a medium to summon demonic entities to aid her in taking down enemies.
Up to Eleven: Can be thought of as Dante Up To Eleven. For example, Dante has a pair of musically themed pistols: Ebony and Ivory. Bayonetta has four: Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme, collectively known as "Scarborough Fair"
Distaff Counterpart: She is kinda similar to Dante she has white hair and dressed in red she even rescues Bayonetta and freed her from Jubileus just like on how Dante rescues Nero and freed him from The Savior
Ensemble Darkhorse: Among the staff at Platinum Games; the concept artist stated in her blog that, other than she and Kamiya himself, most of the staff prefers Jeanne over Bayonetta.
Evil Twin: To Bayonetta, from fighting styles, to clothes, to glasses. No family relation, though.
Fluffy Fashion Feathers: Not on her outfit, but rather, she has massive feather tassels hanging off of the ends of her two guns. The concept artist, Mari Shimazaki, put them there to accentuate her movements, much like Bayonetta's long hair. They vanish inexplicably when she changes into her identical-to-Bayonetta's leather costume during their last battle.
The fan wiki speculates that the feathers are from Angels that Jeanne has slain.
Perfect Play AI: She follows this trope a shocking extent every time you fight her (and this starts as early as Chapter Two!), and she only gets better.
This alone categorizes her as the game's Wake Up Call Boss, as well.
Spanner in the Works: Jeanne is responsible for derailing Father Balder's plan, because he didn't count on her snapping out of her brainwashing and saving Bayonetta.
Woman in White: In flashback sequences and during her last battle with Bayonetta when she dons a white outfit identical to hers.
Cereza
An adorable little girl that tags along with Bayonetta and Luka and sees the former as her mother. She's actually Bayonetta as a child.
Cheerful Child: Barring one or two incidents where she is about to cry, Cereza is really not that fazed by the horrible monsters constantly trying to attack her.
Goggles Do Something Unusual: Her glasses allow her to see the supernatural things around her, like the angels. Luka borrows them from time to time. But only if she enchants them.
Although she can see them just fine without the glasses, she merely enchants them for Luka's sake.
MacGuffin Girl: The angels need her as part of their plan. What she is actually needed for is to reawaken Bayonetta's memories.
Meaningful Name: Her name means "Cherry" or "Cerise" in Spanish.
Morality Pet: She is the first person we see Bayonetta be nice to. Which means that the first person Bayonetta is nice to... is herself.*
Rosa was an Umbra Witch and Bayonetta's mother. She concieved Bayonetta when she fell in love with a Lumen Sage called Father Balder. When Bayonetta was born, Rosa and Balder were punished greatly by their respective clans. This was because a child born of darkness and light would ultimately undo the age-old pact between the overseers. Rosa was imprisoned for the rest of her life
Umbran Elder
At the beginning of the game, the Umbran Elder lectures Rosa and Balder about their law-breaking.
A demon taking the form of a woman who left this world under unfortunate circumstances, only to be reincarnated in hell. Unlike her beautiful, swallowtail butterfly-like appearance, this demon is particularly brutal, and her reputation is well known even amongst the denizens of Inferno.
Queen of the River Styx, the boundary between humanity and Hades, Madama Styx is said to be a moth living within the human world. These insects, born from the magical power that flows from a woman's body, are charged with luring the souls of sinners into Inferno.
A monstrous creature hailing from the demonic wood, Johnson Forest. Taking the form of a dragon, it is incredibly fierce, identifying all that moves as game and devouring it's prey. Territorial, it is most likely to be found alone.
An enigmatic raven-black bird shrouded in the mysteries of the sky. Ever curious, Malphas has filled itself with all the world's knowledge and mysteries.However, this same curiosity has led to a rather brutal demeanor, causing the bird to tear those it encounters to shreds with its sharp beak and razor-like talons.
A giant endowed with six fearsome arms capable of pulverizing mountains, those unfortunate enough to fall underfoot of the demon are subject to days-long violent earthquakes.
A vile centipede hailing from Frejentonta, a river of boiling blood in the depths of Inferno, rumors speak of it's body exceeding ten kilometers in length.Moving unlike anything its size, its deftness allows it to wrap around and constrict its prey in the blink of an eye.
Phantasmaraneae nests upon a sea of magma, deep within the furthest reaches of Inferno. Rarely seen upon the face of the Earth, even sightings of the demon in hell are a seldom event, leading to its name, which means phantom spider.
Expy: of the boss Phantom from the first Devil May Cry
Little King Zero
King to the Little Devils, he is an unlockable playable character, unlocked when the Lost Chapter is completed.
Little Devils
The Infernal Bad Boys, loyal to Little King Zero. Summoned by using the Infernal Communicator Bayonetta is able to temporarily contract the "Little Devils," calling upon their power to attack her foes.
Queen Sheba
When the cosmos was split into light, darkness and chaos in between, the incredibly powerful Sheba was born alongside the darkness controlling the world of Inferno. As she lives in the hellish land, and is often classified as a demon; however, the full details of her existence are unknown.
Evil Twin: She is basically this to Jubileus, although she is much, much, much bigger. Much more powerful too − she effortlessly punches God's soul from Pluto to the sun. And if her file is to be believed, this is only a tiny portion of her real power. Good thing the enemy in the game is not Inferno, really.
The Chessmaster: Naturally, being a Big Bad who only actually appears in a small segment of the game, Balder has been pulling the strings from behind the scenes since the very first chapter of the game, faking his own death in the process.
Altought he only appears in a small segment, his voice is present throught the whole game, you just don't know who it is until you meet him.
Climax Boss: In more ways than one. He meets all the criteria of the trope in the sense that he is fought after a hefty heaping of plot-twisting exposition, and the fight itself is overwhelmingly dramatic in every sense of the word - you're falling off the top of an impossibly high tower, headbutting skyscrapers at him and playing catch with a satellite. You have to hammer him with no less than three Climax attacks before he finally suffers a Critical Existence Failure. He can also be fought on Non-Stop Infinite Climax difficulty, while wearing the Climax bracelet. Needless to say, like everything else, this game takes the trope Up to Eleven.
Complete Monster: He's the one who started the Witch Hunts in the first place, and ordered Angels to murder Luka's father.
To put a bit more emphasis, he had them rip off his arms and legs, and then order them to kill Luka the same way just for the sake of killing him the way he killed his father, though Bayonetta's intervention leads to Luka falling out the window instead, which he somehow survives.
Biblical / Mythical Motifs: Lucifer (specially as the Yezidi edition, Melek Taus; particularly more ironic in the latter since Satan Is Good in that religion), Balder (both in name, powers and role as the Last of His Kind), Enochian Angels (Babogel, Bornogo)
One-Scene Wonder: He only appears at the very end of the game, though we do hear lines from him in Bayonetta's head, but he steals the stage as soon as he makes his debut.
Except he show up at the intro of the game without his name being revealed until the very end of the game
The Blacksmith: Though not in the traditional sense of the word. Whenever you bring him LP's, he teleports into the bowels of Inferno and plays the angelic music recorded on the disc, summoning demons to him like moths to a flame. He then defeats the demons and uses their spiritual essence to forge new weapons for Bayonetta. The Laguna text claims that Rodin's skills as a smith were legendary even amongst the echelons of Heaven, and that he often crafted weapons which struck terror into the hearts of The Legions of Hell.
Bonus Boss: You can buy an item that'll cost enough Halos to turn him back into Father Rodin.
Boss Subtitles: "The Infinite One: Father Rodin." Cue the player's Oh Crap Reaction.
Holy Halo: Seeing as how he is a fallen angel, it's only natural that he'd sport one of these when you return him to his true form. In a rather intimidating twist, the halo around his head is the same halo that Jubileus (i.e. God) herself wears.
Lightning Bruiser: Especially when you have the Gaze of Despair equipped. Rodin has ridiculous amounts of health, insane damage output, unbelievable attack speed - all the criteria you'd tend to associate with the Bonus Boss gets cranked Up to Eleven here.
Nintendo Hard: He practically takes this trope to incredible levels, especially when you have the Gaze of Despair equipped when fighting him.
Pop Cultured Badass: He makes several references to other video games and makes a home run that would make even the most skilled of baseball players jealous.
Power Glows: Like all the other angels, Rodin is pimped out with a shiny, glowy halo in his true form.
Rapid Fire Fisticuffs: Rodin's most frequently used technique involves pummeling you about half a dozen times in the space of a second. One of his grab techniques involves hitting you so many times in a single instant that the game doesn't even bother rendering them - all you get is a white screen and the sound of a savage beating.
Satan: Oddly, all of the character art for Rodin in the unlockable extras never uses that name, giving his name as "Mephisto", the name of a German folklore demon most prominently mentioned in the Faust legend and occasionally has been used as another name for the Devil himself. Appropriately, Rodin's role is broadly similar to the traditional devil: a fallen angel who is thwarted and punished from trying to conquer Heaven (and is feared by it) who rules his own "sub-basement" location after his punishment, and jokes about the "deals" he provides Bayonetta.
The Four Cardinal Virtues
Fortitudo, Sapientia, Justitia, and Temperantia, are the embodiments of The Four Cardinal Virtues and serve as Paradiso's generals and effectual leaders in Jubileus's absence. Their main objective is to bring their beloved creator back at any cost, and aren't above making use of their nature bending powers to do so.
Affably Evil: Mostly evident with Fortitudo and Temperantia - the Cardinals were very kind and polite as they addressed the heroine, and even as they were dragged down to Inferno, they chose to spend their last breath giving Bayonetta one final blessing.
Somewhat averted when you realize that when they say that, they are actually asking Jubileus to go easy on you!
What, asking the Big Bad not to be too vicious isn't affable?
Bilingual Bonus: They speak in Enochian, the language of angels.
Climax Boss: Not as much as Balder, but the fights against each of them is a chapter in and of itself.
Co Dragons: As mentioned above, the four acted as the generals of Jubileus' army in Paradiso.
Colossus Climb: Although not played totally straight, Bayonetta must get onto Temperantia's body to attack the joints of his arms, and run along Justitia's tentacles to strike their roots.
Early-Bird Cameo: Fortitudo appears on the short introductory fight and in subsequent flashbacks before confronting Bayonetta in the actual game's present.
Light is Not Good: Being angels, they have holy halos and some light attacks.
Motor Mouth: Fortitudo. The cutscene prior to the actual Boss Battle against him opens with him talking to himself about cryptic things and Bayonetta needing to draw his attention to her by shooting at him. Then she has to shoot him in the face to interrupt him again twice when he tries to go off on long involved rants about her before the boss battle can actually begin. While this would apply to all the Virtues as far as Bayonetta is concerned, he's definitely the worst of the lot in this regard.
Although prior to the battle with Iustitia, it does not utter a single word, and only starts talking after its defeat.
Perhaps most notable is that he manages to reach the top of Balder's skyscraper, despite Bayonetta needing her ability to walk on walls to get there, and is just fine after Balder throws him out the window.
Butt Monkey: Comes with the territory of being a Muggle amongst the cast. He doesn't have it nearly as bad as Enzo though.
Distracted by the Sexy: He will often start conversations swearing he will destroy Bayonetta, then start ogling some particularly attractive body part of hers, lose his train of thought, segue into sexual innuendo, then remember he's supposed to not like her by the end of the conversation.
Freudian Excuse: There is something odd about seeing a really hot woman kill your father, then spending the rest of your life chasing after her, but also flirting with her a ton and being a general Handsome Lech.
Grappling-Hook Pistol: His only notable skill in the game is making flashy getaways.
Handsome Lech: He's even known some Capcom characters along the way. Dovetails into Butt Monkey when you realize one is "Ammy".
Informed Ability: Luka is supposed to be a renowned journalist who is tracking Bayonetta to expose her to the world, but all he seems to do is general Butt Monkey stuff.
One the other hand, he does have a considerable amount of knowledge on the supernatural, though it's not made clear how much of that he picked up on and what he got from his father.
Morality Pet: Not the extent of Cereza, but Bayonetta does not like to see him seriously hurt.
Motive Rant: Most of his dialogue. Subverted in that he can't seem to decide what his motive is himself, leading to the comical sight of him constantly switching motives, sometimes from one sentence to another.
Overshadowed by Awesome: That's what happens when you don't have guns attached to your feet.
