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Gallery | REMics – Rewriting Metroid: Other M page 03 |
The creative exercise continues! This is part 3 of rethinking how Other M could have been. Last time, we talked about the supporting cast, but now we talk about the ones who deserve to stick around.
Part 3 – Old Friends
- Anthony Higgs
Anthony can remain largely unchanged as a character, because he serves a vital and interesting role that was not explored in the original game enough or at all. He’s Samus’s old buddy! Old pal! Big brother! He sees her, intimately, more as a little overly dour dork sister, going through an emo phase, instead of an accomplished bounty hunter. Unlike others who may know Samus only through her fame and achievements from a distance, he knows her personally. At least, as she once was. The one piece of concept art where he’s giving little Samus a noogie showed more character than in the entire game.
He’s the one who brings up her time in the Federation. The good times! We get to hear stories of her first pet, her first date, what she’s like when she’s drunk, her favorite movies… Anthony will be a fountain of the hidden knowledge on Samus’s casual past.
While the Rookie may ask for the grand story of Samus’s epic victory on Talon IV, Anthony would mention her grand win at a hot dog eating contest.
He also keeps wanting to protect her, maybe even so far as relaying false orders to keep her away from a dangerous area. There’ll be a point when Samus regains her confidence, where she has to tell him to let her handle things. And once she sees herself as she truly is, so does he.
- Adam Malkovich
Adam and Samus’s relationship is pivoted around one moment: When Samus leaves both the Federation and Adam’s command. The moment itself can remain largely as it was presented – Samus extremely confident that she could save someone, and Adam making the decision that she could not. Now reunited, this moment will rule their relationship – Samus will be wondering the entire time if the choice to leave was correct. While Adam… well-
The original game does something weird. Samus’s decision to leave the Federation is presented as if it were childish. Immature. Naive. ‘Such a childish thing to do’ the game seems to say. This flies in the face of the first game, and how she was the one chosen to go on the most dangerous, important mission in their history.
Some of this could work narratively if this is only what Samus is thinking and feeling since her supposed failure. This is a point that can be shared with Adam or Anthony once she’s finally ready to open up.
But until then, Samus has ‘realized’ that it was just one big mistake. She should never have left. Adam, however, has also come to a conclusion: He was wrong. After hearing of Samus’s feats, he realizes she was far more capable than he could have imagined. That she was right to leave, because he was only holding her back. With this understanding in hand, and seeing her in this distraught state, his role in this story is to play dad-mode to Samus and make her realize this too.
Not only is he setting up missions to fix the Bottleship, he’s also working to set Samus straight – he tells her to hang out with the right Federation troops to deal with her current emotional issues, never push her harder than she’s able to handle, and talk with her when she really needs it. A Machiavellian therapist, you could say, with the tact and care and insight of someone who has taken care of many soldiers and values them all, no matter how flawed or broken.
When Ridley attacks, Adam’s not all, ‘Use the plasma beam, Samus, you dummy.’ He sees the incident for what it is – an emotional breakdown – and his words are what brings her back to reality.
It’s thanks to him, and the Federation troops, that Samus is able to regain her confidence and return to her old self. She is helping the galaxy, and she can continue to do so. There are other ‘babies’ to save, and, succeed or fail, she can make a difference.
It’s in this moment when things look like they’re at their best that we put Samus’s newfound resolve to the test:
It’s time for Adam to die.
Well, at least when we continue! Eventually!
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