Character Redesign #5: Samus Aran

Last redesign! Probably should've ended this project with Mario or Sonic, but I really wanted to do a female character, so... yeah, here's Samus from Metroid.

An intergalactic bounty hunter clad in an advanced armour-suit, Samus Aran is a force to be reckoned with. Armed with a myriad of weapons and abilities, she is often seen blazing through extraterrestrial worlds eradicating anything she comes across, which usually includes the bloodthirsty hordes of the Space Pirates and the alien bio-weapons known as Metroids. Based on the character of Ellen Ripley from the Alien franchise (a series the Metroid franchise pays many homages to), her gender was not revealed until the end of the first game, with the reveal itself being a shock for many gamers at the time.

Image Source: http://static.comicvine.com/uploads/original/10/102595/2424546-samus04.jpg

Image Source: http://lvls.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/rvl_smb_szerosuit_001.jpg

The thing about Samus is that she actually has two designs; one for her armour and another for the woman underneath. Now, the armour is pretty damn iconic. The massive shoulders, the classic helmet with the green visor, the massive arm cannon. It's all easily recognisable and personally, I think it looks pretty cool.
 ...Zero-suit Samus, on the other hand, looks like an anime stripper. Heck, just look at the image above and you'll see exactly what I mean; she's designed purely so she looks sexy. Worse, it doesn't at all reflect the character you play as in the games; she doesn't look like a solitary, battle-hardened warrior, she looks like a bloody super-model! Needless to say, I felt compelled to change this.

During the planning stage of the redesign, Josh suggested that I use traditional pen-and paper as opposed to sketching in Photoshop as I had before, resulting in the images above. It's been awhile since I've done this, but after this particular task, it's hard to argue with the results; I managed to produce nearly five times the amount of concept work in about a quarter of the time.
As far as the designs themselves go, the goals were simple; make the armour look more alien (the character's backstory specifically mentions that it isn't man-made) and possibly bulkier, and make Samus herself less sexualised

And here we have the design itself. The armour is based on several design motifs from the Chozo, an bird-like alien species with a recurring presence in the series, namely the layering of plates and the bulkier upper torso. I also tried to make it the material of the armour look more brassy, similar to an old diver suit.
As for Samus herself, well you can see for yourself; I've shortened the hair, given her a more realistic body and added some scars to her face. I've also given her eyes similar to a bird of prey, as she is supposed to be infused with the DNA of the bird-like Chozo who I mentioned before.

Overall, I'm fairly happy with how this design turned out.