Samus Aran - Character

Character

Super Metroid's Player's Guide describes Samus as a young blonde woman, who is 6 ft 3 in (1.91 m) tall and weighs 198 pounds (90 kg) without her armor. She is mostly seen inside the Power Suit, a powered exoskeleton which protects her from most dangers she encounters, and is typically enhanced by power-ups players encounter during gameplay. Typically, one of her suit's arms carries a cannon, which can be charged to shoot an extra-powerful blast, a limited number of missiles, and various beams. Samus's suit can collapse into a sphere, a mode called the Morph Ball, allowing her to roll through tight areas such as tunnels. The suit can scan objects to learn more about them, and has a grapple beam used to cross large distances, such as chasms. Since Metroid II: Return of Samus, Samus has been accompanied by her Gunship, which is used in the games to save progress and restore health and ammunition. Appearances of Samus outside the Power Suit occur mostly in cutscenes, such as ending screens showing Samus in more revealing clothing. Metroid: Zero Mission also introduced the Zero Suit, a form-fitting jumpsuit that she dons below the Power Suit.

The Metroid e-manga covers Samus's origins. She was born and raised on the mining planet K-2L, and when she was a child, the planet was raided by Space Pirates, led by Ridley, in an attack that killed both her parents and destroyed the planet. The orphaned Samus was then found by a bird-like alien race known as the Chozo, who brought her to their home planet Zebes. Samus was infused with Chozo DNA to give her a strong resistance to foreign environments, then trained as a warrior and given one of the alien race's artifacts, the Power Suit. She enlisted in the Galactic Federation Police, but left for disagreements with her commanding officer Adam Malkovich. Samus then started working as a freelance bounty hunter, and is called on by the Galactic Federation to execute missions "because of her superior skills and sense of justice". Most of her missions revolved around getting rid of unsavory elements such as the mysterious lifeforms known as Metroids, who can drain life energy and are frequently used as biological weapons.