Witness Testimony
For almost a hundred years now, people all across the world have sat in front of their TV screens to laugh along with the antics of their favorite cartoons! Filled with lovable characters, zany adventures, and somewhat violent sense of humor, cartoons have warmed the childhood hearts of several generations.
In fact, cartoons have become such a staple in pop culture that there are characters and properties dedicated entirely to paying homage to the comical medium. But in a battle of video game ‘toons on the take-up of their missions to eliminate the big baddie at the end of the journey, one of them’s being taken off the air.
Cuphead, the Devil’s unfortunate servant for soul contract fulfillment…
…And Peacock, Lab 8’s spunky anti-Skullgirl unit! I’m Starlow and he’s Bolo, and we’re taking slapstick to a deadly extreme on this episode of Courtroom Conflict!
When you think about the classic cartoons that inspired many of today’s standout hits, what are the first things that come to mind? Steamboats? Beer-bellied dads? Cat-and-mouse chases? Or maybe satanic imagery that definitely flew over some peoples’ heads in front of and behind the television?
Well, believe it or not, that kind of stuff in the rubberhose animations of the 1900s still lingered in some peoples’ heads. Enter Inkwell Isle, a normal land by appearances chock full of cartoon residents. This included a pair of cup-headed brothers whose lives would never be the same after a chance trip over the railroad tracks: the aptly-named Cuphead, and his pal Mugman. And his pal Mugman. And his pal Mugman, and his pal Mugman, and…
Uhhh… While he’s doing that… Cuphead and Mugman were living peaceful, innocent lives under the wise Elder Kettle, happily wiling their days away on Inkwell Isle’s first chunk of land. But as fate would have it, it only took one visit to the Isle’s seedy underbelly to land them in some hot water with a very stringent debtor: the Devil himself!
After Cuphead literally bet their souls away at the craps table in the Devil’s Casino, the brothers had no choice but to become the Devil’s underlings, and he gave the two one mission: collect the Soul Contracts of Inkwell Isle’s every debtor. To do this, they wound up receiving a magic potion from the Elder Kettle that must have been bullet hell extract or something, because it gave them the power to shoot a bunch of projectile types from their gloved fingertips.
The most basic of these shots is the straightforward and modestly-damaging Peashooter, which is Cuphead’s basic shot type for most situations. But for those enemies whose fighting styles are trickier to counter, he can change things up and switch to a different shot type that better suits his needs depending on what the situation demands.
For evasive enemies or targets he has to run away from, Cuphead has the Roundabout shot; for close-range enemies, he has Spread and Lobber for continued or brief bursts of big damage. Chaser is good for when it’s hard to aim since it tracks its targets, and when continued pressure won’t work as well as single blasts to expose a weak point, Charge will blow down the defenses of any opponent, big or small.
And he’s got more than just shot types up his nonexistent sleeves that he can use to change up his approach! Through the use of a number of Charms, Cuphead’s basic abilities can be enhanced and even functionally altered for specific scenarios. The most useful of these is definitely the Smoke Bomb, which turns Cuphead’s regular dash into an invisible and intangible forward rush: perfect for a safe approach!
If he needs an extra boost to get through a fight, he can equip the Heart or the Twin Hearts to give himself additional stamina at the cost of decreased attack power. The Sugar and Whetstone alter Cuphead’s parry technique, which allows him to bounce and rebound off of specific projectiles, by making automatically parry the first viable projectile and adding a damaging axe blade to the move respectively. And finally, Coffee offers Cuphead a boosted stream of energy for those early-morning cram sessions, or a last-minute effort to get your report in on time.
Well, maybe in real life, but in Cuphead’s world it actually constantly supplies him with power for his most devastating techniques: EX Abilities and Super Arts. The EX Abilities are enhanced versions of Cuphead’s normal shots that take their usual effects and amp them up into a bigger, better version, and the Super Arts are powerful techniques that can get Cuphead out of a bad situation or turn a fight around at the last second!
In terms of their order, there’s the Energy Beam, which spills a giant blast of… whatever Cuphead’s cup head is full of, in the enemy’s direction. The Invincibility super pretty much does just that: make Cuphead invulnerable to damage for a short time. And the Giant Ghost channels Cuphead’s soul into a large manifestation that whirls around while following Cuphead’s movements, beating enemies down like any good Stand.
…Hey, wait a second, was that a JoJo reference?
Maybe. And while we’re talking about all of these items, you might be thinking to yourself, ‘But can’t Cuphead only use one of these at a time in the game? That makes them pointless to list off, right?’ Well, no, that’s not really the case. That kind of limitation on his arsenal is more in line with the results of game mechanics being in play, so for something like a Courtroom Conflict we’d neglect those in-universe rules and give him unrestricted access to all of his tools.
The last of which is his trusty biplane, which he hops into any time there’s a particularly big or airborne enemy that needs taking care of. He can fire dart bullets from it at a consistent pace, shrink down to avoid projectiles, fly in every direction, drop bombs from the lower carriage, and even turn the plane itself into a warhead to drop a big boom in the foe’s face!
All of that stuff came in handy when Cuphead and Mugman pretty much ran up on every single debtor of Inkwell Isle, cleaning their clocks no matter who they were. They took down enemies like the giant Djimmi, the crafty Werner Werman, the flame-spewing Grim Matchstick, and even the Devil himself once they got back to his casino.
They can bust up cars and large ships with their shots, outrun everything from explosions to cannonballs to missiles to lasers, and shrug off a great deal of punishment from the debtors thanks to their toughness and cartoony durability! But even all of that couldn’t make their trials a cakewalk… and for some reviewers, that apparently includes the tutorial level.
Cuphead himself can be brash at times, and their heavy emphasis on long-range combat can leave them lacking when an enemy gets in their face. But those aren’t any reason to underestimate this tough piece of ‘toon tableware.
Cuphead Announcer: A brawl is surely brewing!
Before any talking birds, imaginary friends, or parasitic upgrades, Patricia Watson was just a girl from Rommelgrad living a rather ordinary life. Despite her home being an orphanage, she tried to make do with what she had in life alongside one of her best friends, Marie Korbel. But like most situations with the vulnerable, it only managed to get worse from there.
That’s an understatement. Patricia and her friends were abducted by slave traders, but because she was too much to ever be sold into slavery, the traders instead made an example of her. And their methods were… less than kind, to say the least.
Now without her eyes and limbs, things looked pretty bleak for her until she and the remaining captives were rescued from a Medici warehouse through the combined efforts of Lab 8, Lab 0, and the Last Hope. Despite her condition, there was a seasoned ASG band ‘bot on the scene that refused to give up on her. And that’s where Patricia’s journey to becoming Peacock first began.
ASG stands for Anti-Skullgirl Unit, and Big Band was far from the only one at Lab 8, where Patricia eventually ended up. After some tests and experiments to bring her back into a livable state, along with throwing some Parasites into the mix, Patricia demanded that she be able to join the ASG units under her new codename: Peacock.
And thanks to all of those lab test things, she turned out to be way stronger than they’d anticipated. See, Peacock has two Synthetic Parasites attached to her body, the first of which is the Argus System. Created by Lab 8 specifically for Peacock, it makes up her replacement arms and eyes. It’s also where she gets her codename from, ’cause the eyes fan out in a pattern similar to peacocks’ tails.
But the far more powerful Parasite given to her was the Avery Unit. Capable of being space itself, this creation allowed Peacock to have instant access to Lab 8’s weapons cache, making her a walking armory. But what makes it even stronger and what made it defy the scientists’ expectations was that it developed the ability to directly warp reality according to Patricia’s thoughts, spawning objects and entities out of thin air!
It’s with this machine that Avery can summon her ‘gang’ of fellow cartoon characters, including Andy Anvil, Tommy Ten-Tons, George Bomb, Lonesome Lenny, and the Avery, apparently the personified figure of the unit itself. If you can’t tell by looking at him, Avery sees Peacock as his boss, and so do the rest of the ‘gang’, so Peacock’s not just armed to the teeth with the Avery unit: she’s got a veritable squad on hand ready to back her up in a fight.
Or to just encourage her worst habits. See, Patricia’s a little mentally damaged after all of the horrific trauma she had to endure as a kid, so she’s a sucker for escapist media like cartoons. She doesn’t like to view the world around her the way that it really is and would just prefer to go wild all the time, whether that means stuffing her face with junk food in front of a TV or clobbering bad guys in the streets of New Meridian.
Thankfully, her new modifications made her ready for both extremes. Peacock’s whole body is lined with ways to be weaponized, whether she’s pulling off her eyes to make portals, boosting through the air with rocket shoes, shooting out her bear trap of a mouth, or just fighting in the most slapstick ways possible. The eyes on her new arms can stretch out if needed, and they can each fire blasts of Theonite energy. Because even the cartoon cyborg needs to have a cool laser.
And thanks to her new Parasite buddies, she’s packing more hear than her appearance might suggest! Peacock will draw on her huge arsenal of tools and gag props to embarrass her enemies into the dirt, with stuff like guns, cannons, cream pies, spiked bats, hammers, sandbags, pianos, and a freaking elephant making up just part of her made-for-TV array of weaponry – not including Avery’s road roller, which he makes wryyyy-lly good use of when crushing opponents flat.
I guess everyone gets one when it comes to JoJokes. And like we said before, Peacock can also bring her gang out to go to town on any poor souls that cross her. Andy and Tommy obviously like to fall on peoples’ heads, and George can charge her enemies in a number of ways with explosive results, but Lenny is by far the strongest of the gang. His explosions are shaped like those of nuclear warheads, and their force is so unstoppable that not even Peacock herself is safe from being caught up in the blast radius.
Getting up from a blast like that should show that Peacock’s a tough nut to crack, but that’s hardly all she’s accomplished after becoming an ASG unit! She’s slaughtered the Medici mafia’s forces, defeated the combined forces of Valentine and Double, stood up to Big Band on a few occasions, and even destroyed the Skull Heart in her story ending. In fact, she was so insane upon reaching the Skull Heart that her complete unpredictability and cartoonish immaturity made the Skull Heart reject her entirely!
Pretty impressive against a relic that’s all about twisting your wishes in bad ways. And seeing as how she has to beat up her former friend, Marie, to get at the Heart, it goes without saying that Peacock is pretty strong in battle. She throws around Lonesome Lenny without much effort, and based on her killing spree among the Medici’s forces, it’s likely she can take hits from Cerebella, who can punch chunks of rock hard enough to turn them into a diamond.
Good thing, too, because Peacock’s more about the flashy, domineering style of fighting than she is about anything strategy-related. She’d rather rush in guns blazing every single time, so if she happens to run across someone stronger than her then she’s in for a heck of a roadblock.
And despite how compatible she is with her Synthetic Parasites, she has yet to unlock the Avery Unit’s full potential, so she’s not quite as strong as she thinks she is – which is the strongest of anyone if you were curious. It just goes to show that there’s always room to get stronger, whether or not you think you need to attain that.
That was actually kind of poetic, Bolo! Well said!
Wait, did I do something good? There’s a fly in the studio so I wasn’t really paying attention.
Never mind… I guess some things never change. Just like how no matter what comes her way, Peacock will never stop being an unstoppable one-girl powerhouse, straight out of your TV set!
Peacock: You leave me no choice but to beat you down, blow you up, and rip the Skull Heart right out of you! Let’s hope that there’s enough of you left that we can sit down with some pie together when this is all over, ‘K?
Cross-Examination
We’ve looked at all their info, so you know what that means. Time to switch on the TV.
Saturday morning cartoons have never been more violent than right now! Here we go!
COURTROOM CONFLICT presents…
A GALACTICATTORNEY production…
Cuphead & Peacock
in
“Cartooney Contract Clash”!
A Written Battle © GA Entertainment LLC., 2017
Setting: Inkwell Isle, World 1 – Die House
King Dice: Hrmmmmm… Let me see here…
With one hand placed on his angular chin, the Devil’s right-hand man inspected the Soul Contracts laid on the ground in front of him. He read off the names on each contract in his head – Goopy le Grande, Cagney Carnation, The Root Pack, Ribby and Croaks, and Hinda Berg. All five of the Devil’s debtors in the first area of Inkwell Isle. With a toothy grin, the dice king looked up from the contracts at the young man who had brought them to him: Cuphead, the unlucky fellow being forced into collecting these contracts after an unlucky stroke of the dice at the Devil’s Casino.
King Dice: Well, ain’t this a pip… Ya got all the contracts from this here locale! Not too shabby, kiddo!
Cuphead, staring up at King Dice, said nothing in reply. It seemed as though he was just eager to move on to the next area. King Dice, sensing this urgency from the cup-boy, smirked.
King Dice: Well, I suppose I’ll have to let you pass then…
King Dice stepped to the side, unblocking the door leading to the next part of the Isle. Cuphead’s smile sprung onto his face and he began to hurry towards the exit, but King Dice slid right back into place, causing Cuphead to run right into his tall legs, scattering the contracts all around the small cubical room.
King Dice: NOT! Haw haw!
Cuphead rubbed his stinging forehead and looked up at King Dice with an upset look.
Cuphead: B-but, mister King Dice, I got all the contracts-!
King Dice laughed a smug, conniving laugh and stuffed a large die into Cuphead’s open mouth, folding his arms afterward and continuing to speak.
King Dice: The Devil’s got a real special mission for you, little fella. Read up on the note in that there die and get to it, or you ain’t passin’ through this house ANYTIME soon!
With that stated, the Dice King hoisted Cuphead up by the seat of his pants and comically booted him out the door of the Die House, slamming the door shut behind him with an evil laugh.
Once King Dice had retreated back inside the Die House, Cuphead spat out the die in his mouth, coughed a bit, and sighed. What could he possibly have yet to do that he hadn’t already done? There was only one way of figuring that out, he supposed, and he pulled on the die that was rudely gifted to him moments ago. It opened up with a satisfying pop and out tumbled another contract-looking rolled-up sheet of paper. Cuphead tossed the die aside and unfurled the paper, holding in front of him and reading it aloud.
Cuphead: “To Cuphead. While you’re still moseyin’ about out there collectin’ my debtors’ souls, I got a real special contract for you to fill. Go to Lab 8 and get me the soul contract of Doctor Avian. On the back of this letter is directions to get there. Now get movin’! From, The Devil.” Lab 8? I’ve never heard of such a place…
Cuphead turned the letter over to discover a map of the first area of Inkwell Isle printed on it, with a strange path leading off to the northwest, up to a strange-looking hole. The cup-boy stood up and straightened out the map so he could properly read it as he walked along the grassy paths.
Cuphead: Well, gosh, I suppose I’d better get this done if I wanna keep my soul… To the hole I go, then!
What Cuphead didn’t know was that the hole marked on the map was in actuality a spiraling portal to another world, and on the path it resided on, from that portal a leg suddenly stuck its way through, followed shortly after by the entire body of a denizen of the world on the other side of the hole. She was an odd specimen, with thin metal arms with eyes sticking out of them, a large top hat of sorts, and a dress to match. Looking around the foreign cartoony world, she raised a gloved hand to her forehead to look around, taking in the environment, and when she had fully soaked in the cartoonish air of the world she found herself in, a wide grin of her metallic teeth spread across her features. This was the Anti-Skullgirl unit codenamed Peacock, and she lowered her hand, satisfied with the view.
Peacock: Man, I gotta thank the doc for leavin’ those portal guns just layin’ around! I zapped myself into a CARTOON! It’s PERFECT! I think I’ll just mosey on down this path and have myself a look around!
And so, swinging her arms lazily from side to side, Peacock strutted down the grassy path and away from the portal, her dress ends swishing in the pleasant breeze while she whistled the tune of a cartoon theme song as she went. However, Cuphead was just beginning to cross onto the path as well, and with Peacock’s eyes closed while she went and Cuphead’s attention buried in thinking about this special mission he’d been assigned, neither of them noticed the other until they collided rather rudely in the middle of the cliff path.
Cuphead: Oof!
Peacock: Awk!
Both of them stumbled back and shook their heads, looking up to meet the eyes of who they’d accidentally bonked into. Peacock, confused by Cuphead’s peculiar biology, stared for a bit, prompting Cuphead to apologize for the collision first.
Cuphead: O-oh, very sorry, ma’am! Shoulda watched where I was going…
Peacock, recovering from the initial curiosity of a talking cup with a body, waved her hand as she stood up hastily.
Peacock: Ah, don’t sweat it, kiddo.
Cuphead nodded and smiled, remembering after a few seconds why he had been going this way to begin with. Retightening his grip on the letter in his hand, Cuphead slowly made his way to pass Peacock on the somewhat narrow cliff edge.
Cuphead: Thanks, ma’am… I, uh, gotta be goin’ this way now. See ya!
Peacock frowned in thought as Cuphead made his way past her. Why would anyone be going this way? The only thing what was out on this cliff outpost was…
Peacock’s eyes widened and she dropped down one of her portable wormholes, popping up between Cuphead and the portal, giving the cup-boy quite the spook as he stepped back in surprise.
Peacock: Hey, cup-for-brains… Whatcha goin’ this way for anyway, huh?
Cuphead had to collect himself momentarily before responding to Peacock’s inquiry. Seeing no reason he needed to conceal his quest, he elaborated to a listening Peacock.
Cuphead: Oh, I’m on a sort of mission, see… I’m supposed to go into this here spinnin’ hole and collect someone’s soul!
Peacock arched an eyebrow at this. Collect someone’s soul from her world? That sounded like it could be trouble.
Peacock: Uh-huh… And whose soul is on your to-nab list, huh?
Cuphead responded by unfurling the letter and rereading the name of his target.
Cuphead: Ahh… Some fellow named “Doctor Avian.”
Peacock’s eyes widened. Take the doc’s soul? No way was she about to let that happen. So, while Cuphead was still looking down at the Devil’s letter, she released her Burst attack, flailing in midair with a terribly angry expression to send Cuphead flying back down the path, the letter falling from his grasp and sailing down the cliff face.
Peacock: WHAT!?
As Peacock recovered from her violent outburst, Cuphead gasped as he saw the paper slowly flutter away from him, gently drifting down the seemingly infinite drop down the cliff’s face.
Cuphead: Oh no! The letter!!
Shortly after he called out for his lost letter, Cuphead grew angry at the stranger’s attack and looked towards Peacock as she walked towards him once again, putting more distance between Cuphead and the portal to her own world.
Peacock: Listen, cup-kid, that doc’s got one crazy cartoon to put up with already – ME! And ain’t no sippy cup changin’ that anytime soon!
Cuphead got to his feet and pointed his finger at Peacock’s abdomen, shooting a blast of the Peashooter shot type at her. Peacock, seeing the blue bolt flying at her, squawked and stepped to the side to avoid it, watching it hit the ground and singe the grass at the foot of the vortex. Slowly, Peacock turned back to Cuphead with a mischevious grin.
Peacock: Oooohohoho… I see how it is, bucko! Of course, you know… THIS means WAR!
Peacock spread her arms apart in her usual combat stance, and Cuphead’s finger glowed blue as he prepared to fire once again.
It was time to increase the age rating of the programming.
GOOD DAY FOR A SWELL BATTLE!
A crisp snapping sounded from Cuphead’s finger as he fired more Peashooter blasts at Peacock, who pulled out a stop sign from what looked like nowhere and blocked each shot as they came at her. When she got a rhythm for the shots as they struck her stop sign, Peacock leaped skyward with her rocket-propelled shoes, pointing at Cuphead while cupping her free hand around her mouth.
Peacock: AND THEY’RE OFF!
A sudden loud revving from the portal caught Cuphead’s attention, and suddenly a squad of six tiny cars driven by George Bombs came zooming from the spiral. Cuphead, knowing a bomb when he saw one, quickly turned tail and began running the other direction as the cars darted towards him. As he ran, he racked his brain for how to get the bombs away before they blew him away, and he found his solution: the Chaser shot.
Shooting a torrent of puffy shots in front of him, Cuphead continued his sprint as the green shots turned tail and went flying at the George Bombs. The homing shots caused the bombs to explode on impact, leaving smoking craters the size of tables in the ground. Cuphead stopped and turned to make sure none of the go-karting bombs were left, and upon looking towards the ground he noticed a shadow increasing in size right in front of him.
Peacock: Look out below!
Shooting down from the air, Peacock slammed a cream pie directly into Cuphead’s face, shoving him back and blinding him. His shouting muffled by the pie, Cuphead clawed at it to clear his vision, but couldn’t manage it before Peacock plowed into him with her gloved hands extended, her legs a blurred wheel beneath her midsection as she slammed Cuphead into the trunk of a nearby tree.
Peacock: I’m gonna clean your clock, kid!
The Anti-Skullgirl unit wound up her arm and delivered a fierce poking to Cuphead’s midsection that was somehow forceful enough to hurt. At her feet, Avery popped up through a hole in the ground holding a football over his head, and Peacock swung her foot to “kick” the ball, whiffing once Avery pulled it away and instead kicking Cuphead squarely in his chest, knocking him back into the tree trunk and shaking the great oak violently. The tremors in its body caused acorns to begin raining down from its branches, cascading down onto the two fighters.
Peacock: Ow! Hey, who put all these acorns up there!? Ow!
The acorns fell onto Peacock’s face, each stinging just a bit. She produced a cinderblock and blocked some of them as they fell from above. Cuphead, meanwhile, didn’t feel anything from the acorns as they splashed harmlessly into his cup, and he decided to take the offensive while his opponent was caught up elsewhere. Dashing up to Peacock, Cuphead jumped up into the air with a flip, a hand sprouting from his red and white straw as he flipped. The makeshift arm chopped Peacock’s cinderblock in two with a parry, landing behind her and firing some Roundabout shots away from her.
Peacock: Agh!! Why, I oughta-
Peacock was interrupted by a fierce slap to the face from Cuphead’s straw-hand, which grabbed her by the neck and flung her around so that she and Cuphead switched places. The Roundabout shots just finished curving and flew back the way they came, hammering Patricia with curved shots while Cuphead unloaded some Lobber shots into her back, unleashing a powerful Kablooey attack when the Roundabout shots had all hit their mark. Purple goop exploded everywhere and Peacock was sent flying from the force of the attack, sliding to a stop with violet sludge and grass stains on her dress.
Cuphead watched as she lay sprawled out on the grass, rings of imaginary Averys floating above her head. Suddenly, though, a noise came from the tree above him, and Cuphead looked up to see an anvil falling from the branches.
Cuphead: Ah!!
With a timely backdash, Cuphead managed to avoid being fragmented by the falling anvil, but he was still taken by surprise when it suddenly grew arms and legs, standing up and facing him with a frightening face on his steely features.
Andy Anvil: Nobody roughs up the boss like that, punk!
Andy rushed in with his fists held in a boxing stance, landing a solid uppercut to Cuphead’s jaw followed by some body blows while the cup-boy was in the air. Not leaving any room for Cuphead to breathe, Andy grabbed his leg in the grip of his glove and slammed him into the trunk of the tree he had fallen from.
While Andy was roughing up his boss’s opponent, Avery leaped from Peacock’s hat while she was still recovering from the Kablooey, scampering over the grass and towards Andy and Cuphead.
Avery: Andy, I’m open!
Hearing his partner’s cry, Andy turned and flung the dizzied Cuphead at the small avian parasite.
Andy Anvil: You’re up!
Avery launched himself into the air and flailed his arms crazily, smacking Cuphead repeatedly before reaching into hammerspace and pulling out a miniature shotgun, which he unloaded a blast of into Cuphead’s face, sending him flying back into Andy’s waiting punch. Cuphead, brutalized and winded, fell motionlessly to the ground. Andy smirked and took a few steps back to give himself room for a running start, whereas Avery turned back around to go help rouse Peacock from her dazed state.
Andy Anvil: Here comes the pain, Chip!
The anthropomorphic anvil sprinted forward before leaping into the air, retracting his limbs into his body as he prepared to fall on top of Cuphead, aiming to crush him under his weight. Just as he was inches from flattening the cup-boy, however, two giant translucent hands emerged from Cuphead’s chest, grabbing Andy and stopping him in midair.
Andy Anvil: Eh? What the-!?
Rising from Cuphead’s body was a huge ghost Cuphead with an extremely buff frame, which glared angrily at Andy in its hands. Andy stared back meekly.
Andy Anvil: Um… Help?
The ghost Cuphead delivered a few infuriated punches to Andy’s face before he brought the anvil back and flung him high into the air, letting Andy’s weight carry him crashing down somewhere deep in the forest beyond the current scene of the fight. Andy’s cries as he soared through the air slowly died away, and the ghost retreated back into Cuphead’s body as his eyes fluttered open and he sat up, rubbing his aching head.
Cuphead: Oww… Golly, that hurt…
As he soothed the throbbing in his head from Andy’s powerful strikes, a shadow fell over Cuphead, and he looked up to see Peacock standing over him with a spiked bat in hand, a malicious grin on her face as her expression was masked in the shadow of her top hat, making her look strangely intimidating.
Peacock: My boys roughed you up good, huh? Lemme give you some new pain to focus on!
Peacock wound up with the spiked bat and swing it into Cuphead with brutal force, sending him high into the air. The rockets in Peacock’s shoes flared to life, and she flew up after him, flying just over the peak of his ascent and dropping a stick of dynamite over him.
Peacock: Sweet dreams, kid!
Peacock flew away just as the stick of explosives detonated, sending Cuphead rocketing back to Earth with a painful thud upon landing. A Cuphead-shaped indentation in the ground was made, and he slowly peeled himself from out of it, shaking the dirt out of his cup to regain his senses. From overhead, Peacock drew her pistol and began firing volleys of objects at her opponent from the sky, laughing smugly.
Seeing Peacock fly overhead while firing balls at him from her pistol, Cuphead saw only one option: take to the air as well. He began to run across the overworld until he reached the cape by where Hilda Berg resided. Sitting in the grass was Cuphead’s red fighter plane, and he quickly hopped in and gunned the engines, the propeller sputtering and spinning to life as the plane rumbled awake. Peacock, having lost sight of Cuphead as he darted away, looked down on the overworld in search of her opponent.
Peacock: Come out, come out, wherever you are…!
Avery popped out of the top of her hat to look around with her, looking in the exact opposite directions as his host. Suddenly, Avery flapped his arms wildly as he spotted a red blur closing in fast from a distance away.
Avery: AWK!! Nine o’clock, boss!
Peacock: Huh?
Peacock turned to her left to be greeted with a large black missile that plowed into her at full speed, detonating and sending her reeling in the air. The propulsion in her shoes kicked up to keep her flight pattern steady, and she shook the explosion’s recoil off her, glaring down her reappeared foe. Cuphead stared Peacock down in kind, tightly gripping the controls of his plane for some aerial madness.
Cuphead: Let’s see how you like this!
Laying his thumb down on the firing button, Cuphead’s plane launched a volley of darts at Peacock, who nimbly used her rocket shoes to maneuver out of harm’s way. The rhythmic ratta-tat-tat of the guns firing sounded over the air as Cuphead flew his plane around, unrelenting in the slew of gunfire he unleashed at Peacock. At ground level, some denizens of Inkwell Isle had overheard all the commotion and were gathering beneath the two cartoony combatants, spectating in confusion and intrigue.
The air was an absolute maelstrom of projectile trading. Cuphead’s darts shot past Peacock’s sports balls that she fired from her pistol, both of them flying around through the air offensively. The pressure was high, and it seemed as though Cuphead was having the better time of the two. His smaller, faster-moving, more numerous darts were overwhelming Peacock, and a few darts flew through her top hat, rousing skwawks of panic from Avery as they narrowly missed his body. At the screeching of her parasite partner, Peacock was distracted enough to not notice a dart heading straight for her. Its sharp, pointed tip embedded itself in one of the Argus eyes on her left arm, and she cried out in pain as she wasted no time in ripping it free from her arm, the stinging pain lingering.
Swapping out her pistols for signal flags, Peacock began waving them around wildly, and from the trees below came a squadron of George Bombs piloting planes of their own, flying straight towards Cuphead in a kamikaze-style attack pattern. Turning to address the imminent danger, Cuphead sprayed darts at the pilot bombs, causing them to explode one by one. However, this left him open for a strike to the back of the head from a chainsaw-wielding Peacock, inflicting cuts on his back and sending his plane tottering into the rest of the George Bombs, which promptly exploded. Cuphead’s plane suffered a few dents and holes in its hull, but it was still flying, and thus he shot away from his opponent once more to resume firing on Peacock from afar.
Getting frustrated at Cuphead’s unwillingness to just sit still and take the beating, Peacock put away her flags and took out a cannon, holding it in the cusp of her right arm and firing it with her left. Cannonballs soared right through Cuphead’s dart storms, and he reacted in kind, swerving and maneuvering his plane around the cannonballs. Cuphead’s straw whipped around as he pulled off loop-de-loops, aileron rolls, and other impressive plane moves, the cannonballs flying past him and sailing into the forest below.
Peacock: Rrrrrrgh… Hold still, you stupid mug!!
Peacock’s cannon fire continued unrelentingly. Seeing her insane anger, Cuphead pulled a downward spin into a descent until he was level with Peacock, upon which he flipped back up and flew straight toward her.
Peacock: Stupid move, milk-brains!
A loud BOOM resounded as Peacock fired an especially large cannonball at the approaching Cuphead. Springing into action, Cuphead put the plane into a descent, unfastened his seatbelt, and leaped as high as he could manage, managing to get on top of the cannonball as it rocketed below him. As his plane slowly sank lower without a pilot in the seat, Cuphead pushed off the cannonball and pointed his finger at Peacock, unleashing a Radical Barrage right in front of her.
Peacock: Gahhh!!
Peacock was sent reeling from the big burst, and her vision was blinded. Cuphead dropped back down into the waiting seat of his plane, pulling it out if its downward descent and back into the air. Pulling a roll back down, he smirked as he planted his palm on a big red button on the plane’s dashboard, the aircraft twisting and turning until it transformed into a huge red missile. With a grin, he flew the missile straight towards Peacock.
As Peacock’s vision slowly started to return to her and the ringing in her ears subsided, she could head the light ticking of some kind of timer. She looked up and was immediately greeted with the warhead of Cuphead’s missile mere feet from her face. She blinked twice, then held up a wooden sign that read “Crap.” with a silent, displeased look.
Scorched and heavily stunned by the massive explosion, Peacock started falling towards the ground, her rocket shoes ceasing to keep her aloft. As she fell, however, she managed to utter a single, quiet word.
Peacock: T… Tommy…
As Cuphead pulled away from the cloud of smoke that resulted from the giant explosion, he could plainly see his opponent falling towards the ground. He breathed a sigh of relief, thinking the conflict to be over, but a loud, gruff voice from above and behind him quashed that thought.
Tommy Ten-Tons: ‘Scuse me.
Cuphead turned in his pilot seat just in time to see the limbed weight known as Tommy Ten-Tons come crashing down onto the tail of his plane from above, the incredible weight rendering the back end of the plane and sending it plummeting down to the ground under his body.
Cuphead: …Oh, that’s no good.
In a comical puff of smoke, the front half of Cuphead’s plane stopped working and plummeted like a stone towards the ground below. The gathered crowd of Inkwell Isle residents all cried out in fear and ran to get away from the area before the plane crashed, and all that was left to take the fall for Cuphead and his smoking airplane husk was the unforgiving dirt. Sensing the surely fatal crash, Cuphead leaped out of his seat and bailed just moments before impact with the ground, landing roughly and tumbling across the grass a short distance as his plane violently crashed into the soil, digging a trench as its momentum dragged it further through the ground before it finally came to a stop. Seconds after its crash seemed to end, its engines exploded in a plume of flamed and smoke, and Cuphead shielded his eyes from the sudden bright flash.
As he watched the flames rage, he heard slow footsteps approaching him from behind. Quickly, Cuphead got to his feet and turned around to be greeted with a beat-up looking Peacock glaring at him. Her bear trap jaws were hanging out of the side of her mouth, and she pulled them back into place with a consistently irritated look on her face.
Peacock: So, you’re a wise guy, are ya?
Without warning, Peacock swung a large hammer into Cuphead’s chest, knocking the wind straight out of him and sending him flying across the ditch his plane had made in the dirt. From the surrounding tree-covered areas, Andy Anvil, Tommy Ten-Tons, and a George Bomb all walked up slowly. Peacock, appearing right next to the downed cup-boy through a portable hole, took out a burlap sack, scooped up Cuphead inside, and tied it shut tightly, dropping the strings and looking at her boys.
Peacock: Sic ‘im.
In an instant, the gang was stomping on Cuphead tied up inside the bag, Peacock bearing a massive smile every time her foot came down on her enemy’s trapped body. Stomp after stomp after stomp rained down on the trapped cup-boy, and Peacock relished in the satisfaction of laying a solid beating on the tricky Cuphead.
Suddenly, however, a loud ringing came from the bag, and everyone was knocked back by a shockwave of magic power as Cuphead crossed the astral plane to become invincible, his giant floating head grinning in place.
Cuphead: Ha ha ha…
A golden, shiny Cuphead leaped from the apparition’s jaws as it twisted out of view, promptly aiming his finger at Peacock and unleashing a barrage of Spread shots. The red tack-shaped projectiles pelted Peacock repeatedly, pushing her back with the constant surge of the shots making her whole body groan in pain. With the constant surge of Spread shots all hitting Peacock at once, Cuphead managed to push her all the way to the edge of the cliff where their fight had first begun. Once she was at the very edge of the outpost, Cuphead prepared his final Super Art.
Cuphead: Sorry it had to come to this… But I gotta beat you!
Peacock, looking pained from the barrage of Spread shots, took out a whistle and managed to blow on it lightly. Cuphead began stirring up the drink in his head with his straw, preparing to unleash the powerful laser attack. Once it was stirred up enough, Cuphead tilted his head back, wound up, prepared to fire…
…And blinked as something fell out of the sky and hit him in the forehead.
Cuphead: Huh?
Cuphead lowered his stance and put his hands out to catch the strange object. It looked to be a small teacup, but when Cuphead turned it over in his hands, he could clearly see what was drawn on the other side.
A face on the cup was drawn over with a red marker, the eyes crossed into red Xs.
Cuphead gasped as Peacock blew her whistle much harder than before, and at the base of the cliff a piano, fridge, and Moai statue blocked the way back to the mainland. The cup-boy was trapped.
With a grin, Peacock reached into her hammerspace and lifted the massive Lonesome Lenny over her head, throwing the large bomb down on top of her enemy. Cuphead’s knees went to buckle from Lenny’s weight, and in a fight to keep his balance, he staggered back and forth in a panic to keep the bomb from dropping off his head. In his frightened frenzy, however, he ended up accidentally releasing the Charge shot he was storing up. The bright green bolt whizzed past Peacock, and Cuphead staggered off balance from the recoil, Lonesome Lenny slipping out of the curved rest of his, well, cup head.
Peacock grinned as Lonesome Lenny slowly rolled down the narrow cliff path, making a low lumbering noise as his bulk carried him down the slight incline. Finally, he came back to a stop at the part of the cliff where the jutting-out rock met the mainland, coming to rest against the fridge, statue, and piano. Cuphead started to get back to his feet and looked up to see Peacock reaching into her dress to get something. Thinking her distracted, he shot up to solid footing and drew his fists back, channeling his power into a huge Mega Blast.
Cuphead: TAKE THIS!!
The young cup thrust his fists forward with all his might, a huge blue energy blast rocketing from his knuckles. Its energy torched the grass as it passed over it, heading straight for Peacock, who was still fumbling in her dress.
Peacock: Hmm… Now, where’d I put those dang things…?
Not even a second after she finished her sentence, the Mega Blast arrived at its target. A giant explosion of blue energy forced Cuphead to cover his eyes once it occurred, kicking up plenty of small rock fragments and dust that either fell off the sides of the cliff of settled into the liquid in Cuphead’s cup. Behind the shield of his glove, he tried to stare through the energy and dust that floated in the air, intermingling.
Suddenly, catching Cuphead by surprise, something flew through the dust cloud and over him. He had just enough time to look up to make out the glowing, lit end of a cigar sail overhead, leaving a barely noticeable trail of cigar fumes in its path. Following its arc of movement with his eyes, Cuphead watched it fly behind him and –
Fwoosh.
In a perfectly executed throw, the lit end of the cigar made the rope in Lonesome Lenny’s head catch alight, slowly burning down the length of it as Lenny obliviously scratched his head, looking at some birds nesting in a nearby tree.
Cuphead: …Oh dear…
From behind Cuphead, the voice of his enemy rang out as the dust cloud faded away, revealing Peacock, who was spinning one of her portable holes on her index digit. She had used it to duck under the Mega Blast, using its raw power to light her cigar from the safety of the makeshift pit. A confident smirk was displayed on her face at her own cleverness.
Peacock: Thanks for the light, cup-cake. Catch ya on the flip side!
As the hissing of Lenny’s fuse growing shorter and shorter graced their ears, Peacock turned tail and hopped through the air and into the portal back to her world. Cuphead turned to see Lenny’s burning fuse disappear into his body, and his arms flew out to his sides as it did so, the 8 on his chest suddenly crossing into an X as sparks flew from his head.
Filling the sounds of the otherwise peaceful grassland overworld with a cataclysmic BOOM, Lenny exploded in a gigantic mushroom cloud, severing the cliff face from the rest of the ground. Cuphead, fearing for his life as the cliff began to slide down the edge of the earth, scrambled up the descending ground towards the portal, his only chance at surviving this. With a mighty leap, he brought himself level with the vortex in the midair and extended his arms as he dashed towards it, an elated smile spreading across his face.
Cuphead: Oh, thank goodness! I’m gonna live! I’M GONNA-
Cuphead was cut off by a voice resonating from the other end of the portal. He recognized that voice in an instant, and his heart immediately sank.
“EYES…“
Cuphead dashed through the portal and into the universe of Skullgirls, the dark surroundings of Lab 8 a drab contrast to what his world was like. It was brightly lit up, however, by Peacock’s Theonite Cannon charging up a large beam directly in front of the portal, the dozens of red beady eyes that were a part of her parasite all staring at him as they charged up with theonite energy as well. Cuphead, accepting that he was powerless to avoid the attack, only closed his eyes and braced himself.
“…OF ARGUS!!“
The mechanical peacock head opened its beak wide and loosed its energy beam, its power boring a hole through Cuphead’s face that burned all the way through his body, the beam reemerging through his lower back and disappearing through the portal. Its beak snapped shut and the head ducked lower, making way for the Eyes of Argus to unleash a barrage of energy blasts onto the already dead cup boy. The onslaught of shots pushed Cuphead’s corpse back through the portal, inflicting singe marks that smoldered and smoked as his unmoving body fell into the abyss of the drop below where the cliff edge had once been.
Meanwhile, back in Peacock’s world, she wasted no time in grabbing up the portal gun that Doctor Avian has left lying around – the very same one she had spawned that portal from and wound up in that battle. Throwing it to the ground and stomping on it a few times turned it into mere sparking scraps, and the portal flickered and vanished as the gun was totaled. Taking in and letting out a deep breath, Peacock turned and headed back towards her bedroom, tired from everything that had just happened. From inside her hat, Avery poked out the top and looked down at her.
Avery: Good fightin’, boss! Wait’ll we tell everyone else ’bout how we-
Peacock: Nah.
Patricia entered the open doorway of her room, turning around in preparation to close it.
Avery: Wha!? Aww, c’mon, why not!?
Peacock just smiled a little, seeing some sparks still fly from the wreckage of the portal gun. Avian would be furious in the morning when he found one of his projects turned to spare parts, but it was probably easier to explain that than detailing the battle she had ended. Not feeling a need to explain this to Avery, she just shrugged and closed her door, turning off the lights.
Peacock: The doc doesn’t haf’ta know about that one.
WOW! And we managed to keep a PG rating with that!?
I’m not so sure we’ll keep that much longer. Cuphead’s many shot types gave him an obvious leg up when he was at a distance. Not only was he totally out of his league in close quarters, though, but Peacock’s got a million and one ways to deal with and get around his shots: flying, portable holes, ranged attacks of her own; the bottom line is that Cuphead had no real shot of keeping Peacock in a favorable position for him. And that spelled trouble considering Peacock boasts higher attack power through her zany arsenal and greater physical strength, shown where she lifts Lonesome Lenny and throws him around with relative ease.
Plus, Peacock’s connection to the Avery unit gave her access to a vastly more impressive and varied arsenal than Cuphead’s. She could pretty much attack from anywhere she wanted to, while Cuphead was stuck just trying to gun her down. Even then, shooting her wouldn’t have done much seeing as how Peacock’s got the durability to tank the shots!
Yes, Cuphead has fought against seemingly impossible odds in his adventures before, and you could make the argument that he fights against cartoony enemies all the time whereas Peacock does not. However, this doesn’t really change anything. Cartoony or not, Peacock is nothing like anything Cuphead has had to fight before, and this is where the fight becomes really clear-cut.
Cuphead’s battles normally rely on him learning the attack patterns of his enemies and dodging their attacks once he’s got them on lock, or exploiting a specific weak point on his enemies when they drop their guard. Peacock doesn’t really have that kind of easy-to-exploit part of her, and her literally insane unpredictability would make it pretty much impossible for Cuphead to learn her vast bag of tricks!
When it came down to it, Peacock’s feats from her story mode and her abilities in gameplay just kinda outshone Cuphead’s. She has the greater destructive capability, attack potency, physical strength, and durability, and being as unpredictable as she is puts a big hole in Cuphead’s chances of winning, which were slim to begin with due to the rest of the disadvantages he was at. Not even being at a relatively similar speed to Peacock could to much to save his, uh… skin? China? Marble? Whatever cups are made out of.
That all sounds about right… But Bolo, aren’t the story endings in Skullgirls non-canon since they all contradict each other?
They might not be canon to the actual lore of Skullgirls, sure, but in terms of an analysis it’s fine to include feats from their individual story mode arcs and endings. That way we can at least get a sense of what they’re capable of, even if we’re regarding the canonicity of events with a grain of salt.
Huh, okay. Well, it looks like Cuphead’s win was stolen from him. You could even say he was… mugged!
The winner of this Courtroom Conflict is Peacock.
Peacock (Winner):
+Higher attack potency
+Physically stronger
+Better combat training
+Up-close advantage
+Insane unpredictability
+Better durability
=Comparable speed
Cuphead (Loser):
+Ranged advantage
+Better strategist
+Parrying can help avoid attacks
=Comparable speed
-Relies heavily on learning opponents’ patterns
