Written by Jonathan Wojcik
Reviewing Devil May Cry V Demons: Part Two, THE BOSSES!
GOLIATH
There obviously aren't half as many bosses in this game as there are regular enemies, but they still felt like they warranted a page all their own. Instead of chronological order, we're going to review them from my least to my most favorites and that unfortunately sticks poor Goliath at the beginning here. If you've seen one big giant monster man with a mouth in his chest, you've seen them all. He's also an arrogant, loud mouthed dimwit, which is funny, but also nothing new for a giant. What he does do that's kind of interesting is that whatever he puts in his mouth catches on fire - specifically hellfire - for when he spits it back out like a fireball.
KING CERBERUS
Another we've all seen before, adding no noteworthy twist on the basic three-headed dog. His heads are fire, ice and lightning powered, respectively, which is corny as heck. The three heads also have the most cliche personalities you could imagine; fire is always angry, ice is more calculating and lightning is a dopey braggart. Each also thinks it's the best of the three, but that's one cliche of multi-headed monsters I never stop finding fun.
ELDER GERYON KNIGHT
This is just one of those "Angelos" we talked about in the enemy review, but it's riding a demonic horse called an Elder Geryon, which has "localized control of time." The look of a scaly, demonic horse is interesting, but a little to cool to be frightening. In fact, putting a tyrannosaurus head on a horse body is a lot less haunting than an actual horse head.
URIZEN
This guy is kind of the second biggest deal in the game, the demon who tastes the fruit of the Qlipoth in an attempt to become ruler of hell, but like I said...I'm reviewing these by how much I like them, and while Urizen looks pretty awesome covered in fleshy roots, that's nothing but a sort of "suit." The real Urizen is a big blue devilman looking dude, which is alright, but inherently a let-down. It would have been so much more interesting if the root-coated look was just what the Qlipoth permanently did to his body!
NIGHTMARE
We're getting into the good stuff now! Nightmare is actually a boss from the very first Devil May Cry, but in that game, it was a demonic biological weapon manifesting as an embryonic, slug-like heap of sludge and metal. This one is the manifestation of the memory of Nightmare, taking on what seems to be a more developed and stable form, which looks a lot less cool but still fairly interesting. It definitely looks like something "unnatural" even by demon standards, and I really like those hands that are just goopy globs of fat, squirming digits.
GILGAMESH
And just like that we're into the outright fantastic stuff. In-universe, gilgamesh is actually just the name of a demonic alloy that can fuse with demon flesh, and this boss is a construct of Gilgamesh fused around an inner body of Qlipoth roots! It's both a badass and extremely weird idea in the context of this game, and its design is appropriately as terrifying as it is alien, an almost insect-like colossus that towers on extremely long limbs and really does look like a whole lot of tangled plant parts coated in metal plating. Love the spiny flower tentacles, especially, which it uses to generate shockwaves from the air, and that strange triple-lobed head it has atop a neck-like root clump!
MALPHAS
GORGEOUS. The freakiness of naked, baby birds is something my mind has always come back to as monster fuel, but I seldom see utilized in mainstream media. Here we've got one grown to titanic proportions with all the uncanny grodiness you might expect, but with the added bonus of rancid, human-like teeth and gnarled, black fingers for feather quills! Fused to the bird's back is a pale-skinned, black-eyed witch with three heads or quite possibly multiple, fused bodies, and I love how the stones protruding from the bird's back make her look like she's casting spells in a little graveyard.
Apparently, that multi-witch is a sorceress who fused herself to a bird, but she chose one that was underdeveloped and it just sort of stayed that way. No further explanation is given as to why she needed or wanted to do this, so we'll just have to assume it was her aesthetic. An aesthetic we can ALL admire.
ARTEMIS
My favorite is actually kind of a toss up between our next one and Artemis here. What she is would be a spoiler, so let's stick with the design: basically a six-winged demonic mermaid, but so much more!
NIDHOGG
The last one here, and rad as heck! You know Nidhogg as the serpent or dragon who gnaws on the roots of the Norse Yggdrasil, but this Nidhogg is a parasitic worm of the Qlipoth! You had me at "parasitic!" In fact, only one thing in this image is the true Nidhogg, and you can probably guess that it's the faceless, prickly man-worm at the center, which is a great design all on its own. The rest of this enormous, beautiful carnivorous plant hydra is a part of the Qlipoth that only seems to exist under the influence of the parasite, so basically the equivalent of a demonic plant gall! I freakin' LOVE that!!
This is also another boss with an actual personality attached, which is great. You'd think it'd just be some mindless, otherworldly worm, but Nidhogg is in fact a violent, insecure meathead who flies into a rage when he thinks he's being made fun of. LEAVE HIM ALONE!!! Even if that weird rippling effect when he speaks is awesome to watch!
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