User:VAVADevil32/sandbox1

"Heh, humans are always so weak to deaths of their own breed! Who knows, perhaps I consumed your "mama" so that my cells may live, hm? Is she here... or here?! AT LEAST PAY YOUR RESPECTS!"

- Ridley to Samus Aran.

Ridley is a high-ranking Space Pirates and military commander that became the leader of the entire organization, the archenemy of Samus Aran, and one of the most recurring enemies of the Galactic Federation.

Overview
He is a large, dragon-like alien and currently the leader of the Space Pirates, as well as Samus Aran's arch-nemesis, having murdered her parents when she was just a toddler. Samus' deep hatred of Ridley is as strong as his hatred against her endless attempts to thwart his nefarious plans against civilization in the galaxy.

Sadistic and bloodthirsty, Ridley delights in death and destruction, and was responsible for the massacre of the colony K-2L. Since then, he and Samus have clashed several times, with Samus usually emerging the victor. But Ridley's brutality is matched only by his resilience, and he regularly returns from apparent death to do battle with Samus once more. As such, the Space Pirate leader is fittingly referred to as the Cunning God of Death.

Resembling a skeletal pterodactyl-dragon with glowing eyes, the true name of Ridley's species is unknown. Despite his bestial appearance, Ridley is known to be highly intelligent and even shown to be capable of speech. He was also apparently capable of building a robot in his own likeness. Though Ridley often appears in different forms, it is clarified through scans found in scans, that every one of his incarnations chronologically seen prior his true death are indeed the same individual (the exception being the Ridley Robot), despite his numerous defeats. Strangely, some of his prior battles ended with his body seemingly exploding, but in-game lore states he survived these violent defeats until the explosion of Zebes.

It is also revealed that Ridley is extremely adept at survival. Ridley was apparently capable of healing his wounds by eating human flesh, as illustrated in a part where he claimed that he survived the destruction of his flagship by consuming the bodies and cells of the dead humans in K-2L.

Appearance
Overall, Ridley had the appearance of a dragon, with his head and neck resembling that of a pterodactyl. He also possessed a spiked segmented tail with a hooked end.

It is believed that his first appearance was similar to later ones, although the head crest was missing, and was depicted as only slightly taller than Samus Aran. In addition, the artwork for Ridley, depending on the source, either depicted him with a leech-like head and tridactyl feet or otherwise as a chibi dragon with expressive purple eyes. Interestingly, both sources depicted Ridley with blue skin, although the game itself depicted Ridley with purple skin.

He has bidactyl feet, had a largely emaciated appearance, and his eyes were generally depicted as glowing ominously (although there have been a few instances where he was depicted with irises), as well as his head given definite pterodactyl features, including a head-crest and a distinctive bent neck. Most importantly is that he also had his size increase, although not to the same extent as Kraid, where Samus' height just barely reaches the top of Ridley's chest while the latter is crouching.

After Zebes' destruction, Ridley, or rather, his clone has some notable differences in physical appearance. In particular, he is given a more muscular build, and his snout now has the top half being smaller than the bottom half, as well as pointed slightly upward, and he possessed four fingers and a thumb instead of two fingers and a thumb on his hands as well as tridactyl feet. His tail also has at its end an appendage that bears a close resemblance to a dagger blade.

Neo Ridley, however, is shown to be much larger with enlarged talons and claws, and also possessing thinner lips exposing his teeth constantly. Neo Ridley also seems to possess gill-like openings on his back, just behind his wings, and is depicted as being colored blue instead of his usual purple.

Personality
"Heh, humans are always so weak to deaths of their own breed! Who knows, perhaps I consumed your "mama" so that my cells may live, hm? Is she here... or here?! AT LEAST PAY YOUR RESPECTS!"

- Ridley mocks a young Samus about when she lost her parents.

Considering his screening and little-known backstory about him, Ridley is easily mistaken as a brain-dead and feral animal that can't control his actions, and has to eat in order to survive. However, this is proven wrong as Ridley is actually shown to be an intelligent yet bloodthirsty creature that kills a young girl's mother, which just so happens to be Samus, who tries to befriend him despite his ruthless actions; Ridley simply laughs at the request and attacks her, another goal of his is to destroy the peaceful planet K2-L.

His brutal disposition, foul temper and love of death and destruction are made apparent when he orders his entire legion of Space Pirates to annihilate the peaceful inhabitants of K2-L as he looked on, even going as far as to tell them to "have fun" while causing carnage. His ability for cruelty is further made concrete when he attempts to kill a small girl who tries to befriend him; killing her mother while trying to shield the child.

Despite these bloodthirsty tendencies, Ridley has shown to be an intelligent and competent battle tactician, orchestrating a great many successful battles, as well as proving a serious threat on his own. One instance of this intelligence was his ordering his Space Pirates to be careful when retrieving the Afloraltite due to its volatile properties, as well as his being implied to have held back in going all out on the carnage until after making absolute certain that they've secured the afloraltite beforehand.

His battle tactician skills were best showcased during the battle of Norion when fighting Samus: He tried to kill Samus while she was traversing through ducts in Morph Ball form and thus preventing her to transform, and later he also made sure to have Samus fall down the Generator C shaft with him to ensure that, in the event he could not defeat her, she would at least die with him. Similarly, it was implied that the reason he bombed the Cradle was specifically in an attempt to prevent Samus from accessing the Impact Crater during the events on Tallon IV, and when fighting Samus for the baby on SR388, he also proceeded to use his cybernetic arm to block Samus' Arm Cannon blasts while rushing at her. It is also implied that he set the Ceres Space Colony's self destruct protocol during the escape. Interestingly, his traits as a competent leader seem to also be embedded on a genetic level, as his clone, who was feral as a result of growing up without any education or civilized upbringing, was nevertheless seemingly capable of leading weaponized creatures into attacking Adam Malkovich's squad while he handled Samus alone in his adolescent form. However, his quick temper and his arrogant belief that nothing can defeat him often undermine these qualities, leading to a great many defeats for him as well, particularly at the hands of Samus.

Considering he is the warlord that he is, he follows his leader very unwillingly. This most likely is because his love for war is only because of the feeling for murder and death of people. Ridley does however grudgingly shows respect to those who are natural leaders, such as when Gray Voice ordered the Pirate Troops to their battle stations; Ridley, taken aback, smirked at being told by Gray Voice to attend to his job and sarcastically addressed him as "Sir Military Commander" when he flew off.

Even though this, he is shown to be very intelligent as well, as he makes sure that even if he dies, Samus will also die. This characterization was given a brief nod when he is seen with his back turned pounding the ground in a manner that evoked tearing his downed opponent apart before quickly turning his head with a grin.

His main trait of personality other than being a warlord though is his sarcastic and overly sadistic humor, he makes jokes about Samus' mother being dead at times very casually, and toys with Samus at times before trying to kill her, he even sarcastically calls his leader once Sir Military Commander, in which he obviously just flies away in arrogance after.

Ridley has frequently displayed a very sadistic sense of humor, evidenced by his various comments against Samus upon their first meeting since K2-L. Ridley even went so far as to taunt her by saying that he may have eaten and incorporated the cells of her mother's corpse into his body and sardonically wondered what part her cells reside in. He then proceeded to bring his foot down on Samus, growling "At least pay your respects!"; referring to her dead mother, showing just how much joy he takes in the suffering of others. This sadism can also be seen as a clone, when he appears to toy with Samus before being interrupted by Anthony Higgs. However, he was shown to be momentarily taken aback by young Samus' naivety and looked at her with apparent pity when she innocently tried to befriend him despite being scared of his terrifying appearance. In response to this gesture, Ridley called Samus cute, before refusing her offer in a sarcastically polite tone and revealing his intent to kill her.

He, like many of his Space Pirate brethren, also believes in the superiority of certain races over others, counting himself among the privileged elite species and seeing the "lower" races as something only to exterminate. His more sadistic and bloodthirsty tendencies were initially hinted at in a Pirate Data scan explaining his resurrection as Meta Ridley in Metroid Prime, where the crew guessed that Ridley becoming the mainstay of the Space Pirates' security force after the completion of his cybernetics was "a job he will certainly relish." He also has some degree of narcissism, due to his commissioning the Ridley Robot as a symbol of his power.

He seems to hold a grudge against Samus for her deceased father's role in the massive failure of Ridley's raid on K2-L. Rodney Aran intentionally ignited the Space Pirates' stolen supply of Afloraltite, causing Ridley's ship to not only explode and take numerous Pirate lives, but to also crash on top of Ridley. His injuries subsequently forced him to consume dead humans, despite his utter disgust and low opinion of the species. In the following years, Ridley would develop an intense hatred for Samus due to her constant interference and his various defeats at her hands. He also refers to Samus' existence when meeting her for the first time since the K-2L raid as a nightmare, implying that his hatred for Samus during that time stemmed also from the fact that she even survived the massacre at all. It's also implied that his hatred of Samus' parents, and by extension, Samus herself, may have also been retained as genetic memory due to the Mystery Creature (a genetic clone of Ridley) being especially eager to kill Samus and toying with her, with its trophy hinting that its antagonism of Samus was ultimately rooted in Ridley's earlier murder of Samus' parents. His undying hatred of Samus is given a reference with his Final Smash Plasma Scream, where he always attacks Samus Aran's Gunship irrespective of whether Samus herself is one of the fighters knocked into it.

Myths and Legends
Ridley's name is taken from Ridley Scott, the director of the first film of the Alien film series and its prequel trilogy, from which the Metroid series are stated to have taken a lot of inspiration. Ridley has a remarkable similarity to the Xenomorphs.

Quotes

 * "SAMUS! Such a miserable and helpless little girl! Your existence is like a bad dream! I WILL ERASE YOU FROM THIS AND EVERY WORLD!" - Ridley.


 * "Kill as much as you want! Have fun!" - Ridley, to the Space Pirates, immediately prior to their massacre of K-2L.


 * "Mhmm~You're so cute. I'm sorry miss, but... That's impossible!! Because... YOU'RE ABOUT TO DIE!" - Ridley, to a very young Samus when she tries to befriend him.

Trivia

 * The fact that Ridley is fully organic during his second battle in Zebes after his Phazon body previously is not explanined. A common theory claims that after the defeat of Omega Ridley in the core of the Leviathan, massive Phazon exposure from the explosion recreates his organic tissue since it is known that Phazon, despite its destructive potential, also has regenerative properties. To support this theory, Omega Ridley has some parts of his body fully regenerated while this isn't shown on Meta Ridley beforehand.
 * Ridley is the only other being besides SA-X and Dark Samus to best Samus in a fight. In the Ceres Space Colony, Ridley is able to incapacitate Samus long enough to steal the last Metroid and accomplish his mission, though Samus was skilled enough to somewhat defeat Ridley. The result is Ridley losing his grip on the Metroid Hatchling's canister and dropping it, but quickly grabs it again and flees.
 * Ridley is capable of being bipedal, as shown in the second phase of the battle between Samus and Omega Ridley, once she destroys the joints on his Phazite armor and his weak spot is exposed, he stands on two feet and clumsily walks around swiping at Samus as she blasts his chest with Phazon energy from Hypermode. Also, in his previous battle with Samus, he stumbles on two legs as the Chozo spirits blast at his exposed chest cavity. However, he also stands on his two feet during the battle when Samus fires a round into his mouth exposing his chest. While preparing his charge attack, he stands on his feet as well.
 * In the Pirate Command sector of the Pirate Homeworld, images of Ridley can be found on the glowing orange monitors.
 * A possible explanation for Ridley's color changes throughout his life may be due to an ability to control the pigments in his skin in a way similar to a chameleon or an octopus. When Samus first enters his arena in Zebes, Ridley is not visible at first. Ridley's eyes soon open in front of Samus, and he then becomes fully visible before soaring into the air to attack. This may indicate that Ridley can camouflage himself like a chameleon.

Image Sources

 * (Xander-brown-ridley-ishot-uplox.jpg) Ridley by Xander Brown
 * (SSBU Spirits Ridley.jpg) Official artwork of Ridley from Metroid: Zero Mission
 * (NES Metroid HQ Ridley artwork.jpg) Original artwork of Ridley from Metroid