Look above you: you see in the sky the shape of a cloud which blots out the sun with leathery wings, and then you realize that cloud is not a cloud but old death, a heaving dragon who hounds you through your life and demands a repetition of your ferocity, sated only by its own violent end. No one has to hunt this old death, but you see it, and you say, Ah. It is time to unsheathe my sword again.

That is who Samus is.

You see your goal, and it is far across a valley. Between you lies the entire world, and at the sight of you the world weeps, as many worlds have wept before - but too late, because you are already there, and standing between you and your goal is consignment to annihilation.

That is who Samus is.

The devils in the ocean, in their egocentrism and their arrogance, do not know you, but they learn. The devils in the ground are dragged up, screaming, into the air, made to burn alive in the unforgiving harshness of the sun. The men who consort with devils whisper of you by a name that isn't yours, seek to emulate your efficiency, your technique, and fail miserably. You are a hunter of devils, you act because it is impossible not to act, and no one can match you because no one else can say the same.

Samus is implacability without indestructibility, a whirlwind of annihilation whose success is made mroe amazing due to an inherent and human vulnerability. Death could come to her at any time - sometimes it does, always violently, always in screams and fire and the triumphant bugling of evil - but she walks through fields of the dead as if they aren't there. She is not unstoppable, but no one is up to the task of stopping her; entire worlds are compressed, burned, cast aside, and she marches on, always reaching her goal in a torrent of fire.

Sorry to quote such an old post, but this pretty much confirms what I have been thinking for a while...

The ultimate Samus (in the eyes of fans) is Batman.

She usually is what an ideal woman should be: silent and perfectly controlable.