The Nuckelavee is a shit final boss and here’s why
Because I don’t have to make posts when they’re most relevant to their content matter
This fucker is tiny.
In RWBY and especially a lot of animanga, size does not correlate to power, which holds true for Huntsmen and people with their Auras unlocked. However, that explicitly does not apply to the Grimm. They do not have souls and thus have no auras, and thus their power is directly comparable to their size. As stated in-show, they grow larger and stronger and more intelligent with age. The Nuckelavee is clearly intelligent and powerful, but if that’s so, it should also be enormous. As it is, it’s the size of a regular rider and human and appears incredibly frail.
Compare that to the Petra Gigas fought in E1. That’s a beast of incredible mass and power and we can believe it poses a threat. Or, hell, compare it to the Giant Nevermore fought by another four-man team back in Volume 1. It is so big that we see why it can shrug off grenade explosions even if it backs off. Hit a Grimm only the size of a horse, though? The same response. Less of one, in fact.
Ruby’s rifle shorts and Nora’s grenades should be ripping that thing to shreds. If not, Ren’s basic knife shouldn’t have been able to scratch it. Instead they just sort of explode against it in that animated way that makes it clear that “this thing that should be happening is not happening”. They’re animated the same way as when the protagonists are fighting a human, when they’re not. Jaune’s slash goes right through the Nuckelavee’s model instead of bouncing off, yet no visible damage is done. If the Nuckelavee had been as massive as its age suggested, that would’ve been believable, but since it’s small, it’s not.
It’s a four-on-one fight.
Ordinarily that should be impressive. But what supposedly makes this Grimm interesting is that it is two creatures, two bodies fused into one and two independent minds. However, as made clear both by the show and the director commentary, it isn’t able to utilize that fact. Only one being is able to “become dominant” at a time and do any fighting. The most unique thing about this Grimm is not something it’s able to use to its advantage. So the group aren’t having to face a challenge of two minds and bodies working as one to up the ante and make cornering it more difficult.
It’s got fucking rubber arms.
Enough said. When Ren slices one off, it actually snaps back and contracts just like rubber snapping back on itself when it’s cut. There is just no way to make that threatening.
It’s not interesting
As I literally just mentioned, the most interesting thing about this Grimm is not something it’s able to actually take advantage of. You’re either dealing with a literal horse, which a handgun should be able to one-shot, or a man with stretchy rubber arms.
Wanna know how you could’ve made this boss interesting?
Give it a regen factor. Give it a scarily fast regen factor. Imagine Ruby shooting this thing’s arm off, only to have the entire thing grow back in seconds. Now that’s more threatening than just pretending high-power sniper rifle shots aren’t affecting this tiny Grimm.
Give it four arms instead of two. That’s eldritch-like, right? That way it can at least operate against four targets simultaneously, and isn’t made helpless by two of its arms getting pinned. Like, imagine Ruby and Jaune pinning two arms, and the other two yanking them free. Threat level raised.
Already explained it, but make it bigger.
Give it some kind of field or area-of-effect power. Maybe some sort of paralysis or dread field that makes it difficult to fight back, or slowly poisons or drains energy from surrounding victims.
Any of those could’ve made me believe that the Nuckelavee was truly a big enough threat to lead to the destruction of Kuroyuri and the traumatization and orphaning of Ren as a child.
You know what would’ve been a better Looming Final Boss Responsible For This Protagonist’s Crap Childhood? The Geist Grimm. The one seen at the beginning of the volume! It has an interesting power, which is to possess inanimate objects and create a body out of them.
That is something I could believe could be a looming sinister threat, and could effectively wipe out a town by itself. Imagine entire houses coming to life and tearing apart their owners in the streets. Imagine giant rock beasts like the one seen on rampages.
Better yet, imagine possessed people. Say this creature was able to possess living beings. Then what? For a while it’s dogs turning rabid and killing their owners. Then it’s loving husbands turning into vicious killers and murdering their wives. Imagine Ren’s father possessed by a Geist Grimm and his mother having to run away through the woods with little Ren in his arms while their father chased them under the Grimm’s control.
Imagine a possessed Huntsman! The town finally realizes it’s got a Grimm problem and calls one in, only for the Huntsman to get possessed too, and now they’ve got a terrifying superhuman capable of incredible feats of power destroying their village and causing chaos!
Doesn’t that all sound a lot more interesting than “spooky horse-and-rider Grimm shrugs off damage for some reason”?
Because that is the only thing lending the Nuckelavee Grimm any aura of fear: it looks spooky.