Super Smash Bros. Fighters – Metroid series – 03 Ridley
In the Metroid series
As Ridley: Metroid (1986)
As Meta Ridley: Metroid Prime (2002)
In the Super Smash Bros. series
As a Boss Fight: Super Smash Bros. Brawl (2008)
As a playable character: Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (2018)
Boxing Ring Title: Cunning God of Death
Theme Song: Vs. Ridley (Ultimate version)
The primary antagonist of the Metroid series. Ridley - also referred to as Geoform 187 -
is the cruel and ruthless leader of the Space Pirates. Ridley is
Samus’s arch-nemesis, and the hatred between the two is mutual.
Not
much of Ridley’s past is known, but it can be assumed he began his life in the Space Pirates as a soldier before clawing his way up the ranks until he was
designated the Space Pirates new leader, either through promotions or by
taking it forcefully.
After that, Ridley would proceed to rampage throughout K-2L's colony, only to stop when he noticed that his spaceship has bursted into flames - thanks to Samus's father blowing up the collected afloralite in it - and is heading straight for him. While the rest of his troops get killed from the crash, Ridley ends up getting massively injured and buried underneath the wreckage of his ship. When he finally regains consciousness - during which he misses the Chozo returning to look for survivors, where they find and take the young Samus with them - Ridley takes to eating all the nearby human corpses to regenerate and recover his health before leaving the planet.
Some time later, Ridley and the Space Pirates would launch a plan to conquer Planet Zebes. To do so, Ridley sends some of the Space Pirates to conquer the Planet Jigrad to distract the Galactic Federation while he and his men head off to Zebes. The plan proves to be a success, thanks to one of the Chozo's creations, Mother Brain, betraying her creators, as well as Chozo named Gray Voice joining their cause. When the Galactic Federation learns of this, Samus and two of her friends head off to Zebes. Her two friends rush off to find and rescue the Chozo while she heads off to reclaim the planet by visiting Mother Brain, completely unaware of Mother Brain's betrayal.
As Mother Brain tries to coax Samus into joining her, Ridley would enter the scene, scoffing at the idea of Samus joining them. However, his sudden appearance frightens Samus,
and her Power Suit disappears, causing Ridley to recognize her as the little girl from Planet K-2L from so many years ago. While initially enraged by
this, blaming Samus for the loss of his ship and his troops, Ridley then begins to taunt her with the possibility that he may have eaten her mother’s corpse to survive,
only for Gray Voice to tell him to stop. Ridley then tries to coax Gray Voice into killing Samus, only for Gray Voice to reveal that he has a mental guard against performing violent acts. Annoyed at that answer,
Ridley decides to kill the other Chozo for fun, only for some explosions to
happen somewhere on the planet. With the possibility that the Galactic
Federation may have arrived earlier than intended and are launching an assault, Ridley heads
off to investigate.
A bit later, as Samus regains her composure and begins leading the Chozo to safety, Gray Voice would reveal his true colors, equipping himself with an Ancient Chozo Power Suit before heading into Tourian to destroy Mother Brain. Gray Voice has the upper hand until Ridley arrives. Enraged by Gray Voice's deception, Ridley would quickly turn the tide of the fight, severely injuring Gray Voice by using his tail to stab Gray Voice in the abdomen. Gray Voice manages to at least make it to the surface of Planet Zebes, where he – in a final act of defiance – fires a powerful blast from his weapon at one of the Space Pirate ships giving chase to Samus and the Chozo, allowing them to escape more easily. With their plans now completely ruined, Ridley, in complete anger, would fire his Plasma Breath on Gray Voice, killing him. After that, Ridley would quickly head off to fight against Adam Malkovich’s fleet, only to lose and be forced to retreat.
Some time later, the Galactic Federation would discover the Metroid species on Planet SR388. This info would attract the attention of the Space Pirates, who would steal the Metroid that the Planet Reclamation Division obtained. The Space Pirates Science Team would then learn about the Metroid’s ability to suck life energy from its host, as well as its near invulnerability to most weapons. With all of this, the Space Pirates begin to clone an army of them so that they can use them as bioweapons to take over the galaxy unopposed!
The game would also receive a remake called Metroid: Zero Mission. In this game, Ridley makes a few appearances in the game's cutscenes leading up to his boss fight. Here, it's shown that he's off-planet in the Space Pirate Mother Ship, but returns to Zebes upon receiving a distress signal the Space Pirates sent after Samus managed to defeat his comrade, Kraid. Ridley makes it back to the planet at around the time Samus arrives at Lower Norfair. Once she reaches his lair, he has his first real battle against Samus Aran. Despite his best efforts, Samus manages to defeat him.
Sometime after the game, the Space Pirate would find and retrieve Ridley, transporting him to Frigate Orpheon. Due to taking heavy damage from his fight with Samus, the Space Pirates High Command allowed Science Team to "resuscitate" Ridley by transforming him into the cyborg Meta Ridley. The process Ridley underwent was described as "excruciatingly painful" but it allowed Ridley to continue to live.
In Metroid Prime, Meta Ridley was still in the process of being rebuilt. However, once the space station he's on is set to blow up, Meta Ridley was awakened a bit earlier than intended. He would proceed to flee to the nearby planet Tallon IV, unaware that Samus was following him, though she eventually lost track of him. Once Samus arrives at Phendrana Drifts, she spots Meta Ridley flying high above, possibly flying off to either Glacier One or the Phazon Mines to warn the others that Samus had arrived.
Once Samus manages to shut down those operations and recover the twelve Chozo artifacts, she heads to the Impact Crater to open it up. It's here Meta Ridley ambushes her. He mostly stays in the air and tries to pelt her with missiles and his Kinetic Breath Weapon. Once his health has been reduced to about a quarter, he switches to fighting on the ground, due to his cyber wings burning up. While still utilizing his Kinetic Breath Weapon, Meta Ridley also mixes things up by creating shockwaves and trying to tackle Samus.
Despite his efforts, Samus manages to wear him out. The nearby Chozo statues suddenly come to life and start focusing a laser attack on Meta Ridley's chest as punishment for destroying the Chozo Artifacts, which leads to him falling off the arena and into the abyss.
Meta Ridley would then show up in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption. Notably, Meta Ridley has less cybernetics on him, suggesting he's slowly recovering his flesh. Some time before the events of the game, Dark Samus would invade the Space Pirate Ship Colossus and use her Phazon to corrupt and mind control the crew on it to work for her. Once she arrived at one of the Space Pirate's Homeworld, she used her Phazon again to force more of the Space Pirates into serving her. One of those members was - as you can guess - Meta Ridley, who loyally served under her. He and some of the Space Pirates are then sent to the planet Norion to conquer it.
Meta Ridley's first seen easily dispatching some of the Federation Soldiers. Later, he tries to attack Samus as she's rolling around in a Moprh Ball Tunnel, though Samus manages to get away from him using her bombs. At Generator C, Meta Ridley ambushes Samus with the intention of crushing her on the floor, but he ends up breaking it instead, causing them both to fall down the Generator Shaft where they do their battle. At the fight's end, Samus blasts three Charged Shots into Meta Ridley's mouth before getting saved by Rundas, while Meta Ridley continues to plummet to the bottom of the shaft.
Meta Ridley manages to survive the fall, but is seriously wounded. Managing to make his way to the Pirate Homeworld, he would be exposed to the Phazon Core, which not only rapidly healed his injuries, but also transformed him into Omega Ridley! With his new powers, he engages with Samus once more. After a fierce fight, he ends up being defeated. Before he could get completely disintegrated, Omega Ridley manages to escape.
Learning that the Galactic Federation has sent Samus to the Planet SR388 to exterminate the Metroids, Ridley quickly rushes over to planet to snag at least one of them before Samus wipes them out. Unfortunately for him, Samus had just wiped all of them out... well, except for one, who she decides to spare. Just as Samus arrives on the surface of SR388 with the Baby Metroid and about to leave on her spaceship, Ridley arrives and snatches the infant. Noticing Samus, he decides to battle her, but after taking some damage, he decides it would be better to flee with his prize while he could. Samus gave chase, and after a small scuffle, blasts his chest until he releases the Baby Metroid. Before Ridley could react, Samus snags it and blasts Ridley towards a nearby mountain, where he then lands on the ground as rocks fall on top of him.
However, Ridley wasn't going to let that stop him and got back up, redoubling his efforts to defeat Samus. After another tough bout, Ridley manages to create an opening for himself and begins a violent beatdown on Samus before pinning her to the ground. Just as he's about to blast her point-blank with his Plasma Breath, the Baby Metroid quickly rushes in and attacks Ridley to save her "mama." Fully enraged at this point, he began to attack Samus with everything he had. During the third phase of the fight, the Baby Metroid would occasionally do an unexpected attack on him, which would blind Ridley with rage and make him throw out a hasty attack, which Samus could capitalize on by performing a counter on him to deal massive damage.
At the end of the battle, Proteus Ridley finally goes down. Samus and the Baby Metroid leave the planet. But after the credits roll, one of Ridley's mechanic hands are seen, revealing that he's dropped the last of his remaining mechanical parts and fully recovered! He heads off in hot pursuit of Samus's last destination: the Ceres Space Station.
Ridley would make his "final" appearance in Super Metroid. As the third game released, this game established Ridley's iconic dragon look, as well as introduced his iconic theme song, though said song also played during the Torizo and Draygon fights.
At the beginning of the game, Ridley invades the Ceres Space Station to snag the Baby Metroid. Here, he has a brief battle with Samus. After exchanging blows, Ridley decides to activate the space colony's self-destruct switch and flee the scene back to the Space Pirates' newly rebuilt hideout located on Planet Zebes. With the Baby Metroid, the Space Pirates begin to clone their Metroid army. The initial batch they cloned turn out to be failures - and are sent to patrol Maridia - but eventually they get the process working.
Ridley then stays put in his lair, which is located in the depths of Lower Norfair. Once Samus arrives, he has his final no-holds barred showdown with her. During the fight, he pelts her with his Plasma Breath, his tail, ramming into her, and also grabbing her with his talons. Despite his best efforts, Samus manages to best him yet again. However, in a desperate act of defiance, Ridley grabs Samus with his talons and let's out a mighty roar... before his body ends up - literally - falling to pieces, finally meeting his demise.
And yet, despite all that, Ridley would manage to return in Metroid: Other M. As Ridley fell apart during his battle in Super, some strands of his DNA fell on Samus's Power Suit. The corrupt side of the Galactic Federation ended up scraping some of it off of Samus's Power Suit, and unknowingly brought him back to life! However, his young infant clone ended up resembling a little bird-like creature - that Samus ends up calling "Little Birdie" - thus no one was the wise to his true identity.
Little Birdie notably took a very keen interest in Samus upon spotting her. Whether it was because he recognized her from his previous life, or simply detected her as a threat is unknown. He would soon grow into a big, furry lizard that Samus refers to as the "Mystery Creature." He would then attempt a successful ambush on Samus and the Galactic Federation Squad, only to flee after Anthony shot him with his Plasma Cannon. Finally, Mystery Creature soon transforms into Ridley. where he waits at the Geothermal Power Plant for Samus.
Once Samus and her friend Anthony arrive at there, Ridley ambushes the two of them. Taking pleasure in terrifying Samus at his unexpected return, he would end up tossing Anthony off the arena into his supposed death towards the lava. He would then turn his attention back to Samus, who was now enraged at what he had done. During their fierce battle, Ridley would slowly get worn out by Samus's Plasma Beam blasts and her other weapons, thus he decides to make a hasty retreat to recover his wounds.
...Only to come face-to-face with a cloned Queen Metroid! Ridley didn't stand a chance, and gets his life energy sucked dry, reducing him to a husk. At the end of the game, the corrupt side of the Galactic Federation arrive to transport Ridley's corpse away.
Personality-wise, Ridley is mostly defined by his cruelty and bloodlust. He craves death and destruction, and enjoys tormenting anyone who gets in his way. He's also shown to be quite intelligent, as well as a competent battle tactician, able to come up with various plans that have helped get the Space Pirates to where they are today. Ridley is also very narcissistic, viewing himself - and the Space Pirate in general - to be superior to every other race in the galaxy, and has a very dark sense of humor. While these traits were mostly only mentioned in the game's manuals, the Metroid Manga would be the first installment to showcase these traits. The Metroid Manga also implies Ridley can talk, though in the games he mostly just roars and screeches.
Ridley has an intense hatred of Samus. Initially, this hatred was due to him placing all the blame for his failure to claim the afloralite on K2-L on her, despite the fact that she was too young to really do anything at that time. However, this quickly changed when she managed to become the first person who not only survived a battle against him, but also managed to best him, causing him to view her as "a nightmare that won't go away."
Despite Ridley's depravity, he seems to be on good terms with fellow Space Pirate commander Kraid, who was even referred to as Ridley's comrade in the Metroid Manga. Ridley's relationship with the other Space Pirate commanders is unknown.
Ridley's Clone is also shown to be pretty intelligent, even as Little Birdie, though he is notably a bit more feral in comparison to the original. Whether he retained the memories of the original Ridley or not is unknown; while he does notably hold an intense hatred for Samus like the original, it's unknown if it's because of those previous memories, or if it's just because he views her as a threat.
In Super Smash Bros., Ridley is the tallest of the fighters, though it might not be too noticeable since he’s constantly slouching. Ridley is able to dish out tons of damage to his foes, though his size means that he’s an easy target to hit, so don’t get too cocky.
Special Moves
Pressing the Special button will have Ridley spit out a plasma ball that bounces along forward. Holding the Special button will have Ridley charge up his Plasma Breath. Depending how long you charge it, Ridley can fire up to five plasma balls.
Inspired by his main method of attack in the first“Metroid,” where he would fire Plasma Balls that would bounce forward in the direction he’s facing.
In "Metroid Prime," attacking Meta Ridley's open mouth when he's charging up his Kinetic Breath Weapon would stun him for a bit. "Metroid Prime 3: Corruption" would make his open mouth one of Omega Ridley's weak spots.
Ridley lunges forward with his arm outstretched. If he manages to grab someone, Ridley then slams them into the ground begins scraping them while he
rushes forward. This attack can quickly rack up damage, but opponents
can escape from it depending on how damaged they are. The more damage they have compared to Ridley, the harder it is to escape.
Pressing
the Special Button at any point while he’s holding his opponent will
have Ridley jump into the air and fling the opponent away from him.
He’ll also automatically fling them away if he approaches the edge of a
stage.
While Ridley began using grab attacks as early as “Super Metroid”, the attack is more inspired by his intro cutscene in The Subspace Emissary from "Super Smash Bros. Brawl." During the game's story, he manages to grab Samus by surprise and slams her into the wall, where he begins to scrape her against it. Ridley would do something similar in his own series in "Metroid: Other M."
Ridley hovers for a second before flinging himself upwards, unless you’re holding down, left or right on the control stick, in which case he’ll fire off in that direction, albeit at an angle. Downwards sends him in a slightly forward angle. Forwards sends him at a slightly downward angle. Backwards sends him in a slightly upward angle.
The sharp spikes on his wings will damage foes, and can even allow Ridley to destroy certain projectiles.
Inspired by one of his attacks in “Metroid Prime 3: Corruption”, where he uses it to fling himself at Samus.
An all-or-nothing move, Ridley uses the sharp end of his tail to Skewer an opponent. If the sharp edge of his tail connects with the opponent, the screen will zoom in towards Ridley and his victim as the latter takes massive damage! However, it takes a second for Ridley to use the move, and if he doesn’t land the move on the opponent near the very tip of his tail, it’ll only do a pitiful amount of damage and leave Ridley open for a counterattack.
While Ridley has used his tail to help him in combat starting in "Super Metroid," he has never used anything similar to this in the games. However, in the "Metroid Manga," Ridley performs a similar-looking move on Gray Voice to severly injure him after learning that Gray only joined the Space Pirates in order to destroy Mother Brain.
Ridley lets out a roar and charges forward. The first two opponents that get hit end up getting flung into space, where they land on the right side of Samus’s Gunship.
While Ridley has always been capable of firing Plasma Breath, it wasn’t until “Metroid Prime” where he was shown being able to fire it akin to a laser beam in the form of the Kinetic Breath Weapon.
Samus's Gunship made its debut in "Metroid II: Return of Samus," and is what Samus uses to get around in space. Samus's gunship has occasionally been shown getting shot down in some of the games, the first instance of this occurring was in "Metroid: Zero Mission."Additional Notes
Masahiro Sakurai – creator of Kirby and Super Smash Bros. – initially didn’t want to add Ridley as a playable character to the Super Smash Bros. series, as he felt Ridley was more suitable being a boss character, not to mention the fact that Ridley was “too big” to be a playable fighter. Of course, by Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Sakurai and his team managed to find a compromise to make him work, and now he is playable!
Before becoming playable, Ridley has managed to appear in almost every installment except “Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS. He can occasionally be seen flying in the background of the stage Planet Zebes in Super Smash Bros. 64. He briefly appears in the opening movie for Super Smash Bros. Melee. In Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Ridley is a boss fight in The Subspace Emissary story mode. Finally, Ridley's clone shows up as a Stage Boss in the Pyroshere stage in Super Smash Bros. for Wii U.
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