I watched a speedrun of Metroid Fusion yesterday. I've been doing that a lot lately after watching AGDQ 2014 and wanting to see more. Watching it I recalled that, despite whatever harm Other M did to Fusion's characters, it's setting and premise remained cool. It was a novel concept that this massive research lab was taken over by a nasty parasite that could replicate anything it came across and half Metroid Samus was the only one suited to stopping them. It also had a bit of shady business coming from the humans for once which was a pretty cool aspect. It's all very solid and well thought out but thinking on it yesterday I realized something didn't add up.

How did the X Parasites get a hold of Space Pirate DNA? There weren't Space Pirates on SR-388. That must mean they had Space Pirates somewhere on the Space Station. Were they experimenting on Space Pirates? That would make some sense given they were breeding Metroids and planned to breed X as well. To what end were they experimenting though? Were they just trying to figure out how they tick or... Were they breeding Space Pirates too?

I looked into this a little. Apparently Space Pirates are always genetically engineering themselves better. They've also got a knack for getting a hold of more Metroids and powerful creatures somehow. I thought about it a bit. And I've come to the conclusion Space Pirates are an inside job. The space station in Fusion is clearly designed for illicit breeding and bio engineering but not just for Metroids I think. I think the Galactic Federation actively has bred and engineered the Space Pirates both to keep outlying worlds from Browncoating and to keep the military budget, both in terms of weapon development/research and manpower, strong and steady. The pirates are in some ways ideal for that since while they have a number of strongholds which they're not especially good at holding that can be contracted out to independent parties (In Prime 3 and Hunters it's established there are dozens of hired guns each capable of taking out a Pirate leaders even within their strongholds) the main danger of Space Pirates is such that they could be anywhere and they could attack any undefended ship at any time. Easy to rationalize how they can return to strength after having their bases wiped out time and time again when they always can bounce back to guerrilla tactics.

Additionally doing some reading on other elements of the Metroid fiction some things fall into place with this theory. A lot of what the GF does in the games can be justified by wanting to keep pace with morally bankrupt Pirates. For instance the Pirates use Phazon Weapons which slowly poison the user. So does the GF. An upside of Pirates continually upgrading themselves biologically is that the GF can continue to get more powerful as well. Additionally one an raise an eyebrow at previous Metroid plots focusing on how Space Pirates have managed to clone Metroids and breed/engineer them to make them more dangerous which is exactly what the GF was doing on the space station. Had the X situation not turned as raw as it did odds are Space Pirates would've just found Metroids again and the GF would say "unbelievable! They did it again!" Additionally there's the bit where Mother Brain and the Metroids were made by the Chozos.

Here's my theory about Mother Brain and Metroids. One, Metroids aren't bad by default, they're made that way through breeding/engineering. The Metroids in Metroid 1 are little more than guard dogs and don't leave Tourian even though there would be little risk involved for the nigh unstoppable Metroids. Also obviously the ones in Metroid II were in nature and really shouldn't have been hunted to extinction for no reason. Two, Mother Brain went off the reservation. Saw the big picture for what it was. Took control of a band of pirates and wanted to do more with it than scare the natives. She failed and was killed by Samus.

Basically the theory is this. The pirates are too evil and loose too many strongholds too often to keep up the research necessary to dramatically change all their soldiers every few years, especially since they often lose their leadership when they lose their HQs. The GF have the resources and facilities to do this research and, additionally, do conduct some research in the same fields the pirates do ostensibly to keep pace. They see enemies as a tool for control and aren't concerned how dangerous they are or what the collateral damage is as evidenced by their intentions with the X. Basically the Pirates are created and supported by covert human research out of labs like the one in Fusion and serve to support and maintain military spending.

I would like it if this was the direction of a post-Fusion Metroid game since in any case you'd have to do a plot like that as Samus and the GF aren't on good terms after Fusion. Plus Samus is half Metroid now, maybe she could get a Castlevania Bat like move where she becomes a Metroid along with other crazy Metroid inspired moves. That'd be cool.

Phazon was totally a real and legit threat though.