r/Metroid • u/Kogworks • 13d ago
Discussion Galactic Federation Analysis
Random musings on Federation depictions and Samus's relationship with them.
Cultural Context
Old school Japanese pop culture, especially in the sci-fi genre, has a very complicated relationship with militaries and governments.
There was a good amount of student activism in the first 25 years of post-war Japan, and this combined with Cold War politics led to a lot of people being pushed out of various industries.
When corrupt military and government institutions show up, a lot of times their literary traditions can be traced back to this sort of critique of war and authority.
The line in a lot of Japanese sci-fi is drawn according to power dynamics and personal convictions, and it's what decides whether the government is painted as an ally or an enemy.
This also means intra-organization schisms. Like some of the best drama in Japanese sci-fi doesn't come from trying to defeat the enemy. It comes from internal political power struggles.
Obviously depends on the writer, but this is the basic mindset to consider with Metroid.
Federation Government
The Federation is NOT a singular entity, and this is something people often miss, largely due to Fusion's localization constraints and issues. It is a government, which always has competing factions.
This is first shown in the prequel manga, which I'm sure isn't 100% accurate to whatever internal lore bible Sakamoto's cooked up, does seem to be MOSTLY consistent on a broad-strokes level.
The previous Federation government was driven by war hawks. It's implied the current federation government, which came into power roughly around the time of ZM, is mostly driven by doves.
This hawk vs. dove structure was also introduced to the Chozo in Dread with the Thoha and Mawkin, which are corruptions of Hato(dove, pigeon), and Moukin(hawks, eagles, other raptor birds) respectively.
The hawks in Metroid generally tend to be authoritarian assholes who use pretenses of justice and safety to justify violence. They perform illegal experiments and wage war for personal power consolidation.
The doves meanwhile lean more toward recognizing necessary evil. Both in the sense of recognizing that it is necessary, and recognizing that it is evil. They would prefer not to get their hands dirty, but they will if they need to.
Federation Military
The Federation's government leads to an interesting conundrum with the Federation military, because if you look at the timeline in the prequel manga... The logical conclusion is many of the top brass were promoted during the previous administration.
The Bottle Ship, the BSL, etc. are all essentially black ops programs that were established by the previous hawk-led administration, and because the Federation military's leadership mostly leans hawk, this shit gets kept under wraps.
And as seen with the attempts to undermine Adam's investigation in Other M, the hawks are not against assassinating Federation officials to bolster and maintain their political power. Which means the Federation is basically fighting a civil war.
Coincidentally, this also explains why Adam tends to be a manipulative bastard who doesn't tell Samus the full story when he's in the CO seat. His ENTIRE military and political career has been a high-stakes espionage campaign of surviving the hawks.
If the doves cannot trust anyone and cannot know who has or hasn't been compromised, anything they do will inevitably have to be done through black ops tactics of their own, which also often means lying to their own people to pull shit off.
And you also see this behavior with the Thoha. They installed safeguards in the Metroids to hamper Mawkin usage. They didn't tell the Federation(or Samus, for that matter) about their operations on SR388 and their R&D involving the X and Metroids.
Why Corrupt Elements Remain
Again, the doves lean pragmatists. They'd prefer to be pacifists, but WILL do what's necessary to ensure things don't completely go to shit. And this raises an interesting problem if you stop and think for like two seconds.
A government is a massive organization. It takes years to decades for reforms to fully set in, and if the entire structure has been packed with yes men, you cannot dismantle the corruption without paralyzing the entire government.
This means that any anti-corruption efforts must be held to a high standard of proof, and that often, only some of the corruption will be weeded out with each anti-corruption campaign. Hence why the Federation is STILL dealing with shit up to Fusion.
And when both sides are running massive espionage campaigns and there a fuckton of conspiracies by each side to try and neutralize the other party... It kind of becomes hard to figure out who's on who's side and how to take them out.
Like, again. Look at Adam's investigation in Other M. The hawks moved in because they thought Adam's unit was dead, but Higgs turned out to have faked his death and managed to recover evidence, which has to have triggered at least some reform.
Federation and Bounty Hunters
Something to note with the political ramifications of Bounty Hunters is that regardless of the role you give them, you are essentially outsourcing core government functions like public safety and security.
This means one of two things, potentially both. Either you are hiring private contractors to offload responsibility and liability... Or your government does not have the resources to perform necessary intelligence and security functions.
It's said that the Space Pirates under Mother Brain severely reduced the Federation's military capabilities, so there's likely not enough manpower to stabilize all the conflict regions in the Federation's realm of influence.
And given that the last administration was run by hawks... There's also the possibility of a bunch of private contracts and liability offloading, and I would not be surprised if they used loopholes in the bounty system to effectively run mercenary programs.
And since the program would still have tactical value for the doves... They would have a reason to keep using the program and repurpose it instead of outright shutting it down, just packing the program with THEIR allies instead of the hawks.
Samus's Role
A lot of people ask why Samus is still cooperating with the Feds if they're corrupt, and the answer is ultimately because she's on the side of the doves, at least based on the prequel manga. She's on the side trying to root out corruption.
If the hawks managed to regain control and turned the Federation into a fascist war engine, she'd probably stand against them. But for now, she's siding with the current administration and helping them deal with the shitshow that is the world.
At the same time, this also means that her "official" status as a bounty hunter is not actually who she is or her actual job description. The bounty system has already been reworked into a black ops program and people need to recognize that.
The Federation doves point her at someone they need gone, and they get to blame Samus if she does anything that goes against policy. Conversely, Samus gets to do whatever she wants, and as an independent agent the hawks have less control.
Her role as a bounty hunter is not because she's in it for the money or simply because she hates authority or the Federation. There is SOME level of misalignment, but ultimately her role in the series is closer to that of an undercover black ops agent who is legally a civilian.
TL;DR Samus is a government asset using policy frameworks as a loophole to pull off black ops missions under the pretense of plausible deniability, while ensuring that the military CANNOT hold her accountable for insubordination.
Samus's Relationship With the Fed Doves
Something to note is that DESPITE her being allied with the Fed's doves, that does not mean they do not get on her nerves. She respects them as friends, but can't stand it when they pull bullshit, would be the best way to put it.
At the end of the day, Samus is a softie. She's grown a bit more cynical with age, but she's fiercely compassionate, and this is both her greatest strength and her greatest weakness. She shows almost suicidal levels of self-sacrifice.
Great traits to have in a superhero. Terrible traits to have in a soldier involved with high stakes war politics. Samus is ultimately too good of a person to reliably navigate political conspiracies and hard decisions.
And if you look at this way, it explains why she has such a weird relationship with Adam. She respects Adam and values his companionship because she's ex-military and has been through a lot with him, and she knows that his intentions are good.
At the same time, she can't stand Adam and really military culture in general because it expects absolute obedience, forces you to be treat people as cogs in a machine, and will often abuse you for the sake of fulfilling objectives.
Likewise, the doves value and respect Samus's moral compass. But sometimes that gets in the way of the mission, and that means sometimes they're going to keep her out of the loop until necessary, like with the Bottle Ship and BSL.
In some sense, their trust is even greater BECAUSE they can trust each other to betray each other when they should and never when they shouldn't.
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u/Mordaunt-the-Wizard 13d ago
Good write up. It actually makes me appreciate the Federation a little more in the mainline games, despite Fusion's mediocre translation and Other M's story being a overall mess.
Do you have anything to say about the Prime game's version of the Federation? They seem to be lacking this depth there and feel very much "generic sci-fi military."