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4* For anyone who watched ''Anime/MassEffectParagonLost'', they might find it odd how James never once mentions Treeya, his Asari love interest in the film, despite the fact that he [[spoiler:let several thousand people, including a young girl who he was best friends with, die to save her life in the end (though she was admittedly holding onto the Collector intel that could have been used to defeat them).]] However, anyone playing as female Shepard will notice that all of his flirting with her never goes beyond surface-level, and he'll clam up and avoid talking about it if directly confronted. It's highly likely that she and Vega made a pact that they wouldn't actually begin dating seriously while the Reaper War was ongoing, so James avoids mentioning her and openly flirts with female crewmates in order to disguise his more sensitive side, without ever actually having the intention of following through with his wooing.
5* Tali is a very brave woman who eats Geth for breakfast. So why is she so scared of rachni spiders, which are generally more annoying than dangerous? Quarians probably never had contact with insects because their homeworld, Rannoch, does not have insect life.
6** That's a valid piece of FridgeBrilliance, [[RightForTheWrongReasons but not for the reasons you probably think]]. Insects are only as scary as they are because the human mind is specifically wired to react to things that scuttle (and even then, not all humans find bugs that scary). To assume that ''everyone'' would find them scary is to make the same mistake as people who use the MarsNeedsWomen trope. The reason this is still valid fridge brilliance is because Tali, having never fought a creature like these before, would not know how to fight it, what to expect, or what it's capable of.
7** Thirdly, in the first game, she is heavily reliant on personal [[DeflectorShields kinetic barriers]] for most of her durability (for which she can amass quite a lot via the barrier). Rachni acid attacks completely circumvent the kinetic barrier, however, leaving her a very SquishyWizard. She may be remembering this.
8* [[spoiler:The ending decision is one gigantic conversation option; the Blue Paragon to the upper right, the Red Renegade to the lower right, the Green Neutral option to the center, and the option to leave the conversation pointing in the other direction.]]
9* After completing N7 missions, Hackett often states "We're sending in a team to hold the area." This sets the basis for Multiplayer, where you are holding the areas that Shepard has cleaned up.
10* The final mission has Shepard gathering all the allies made and aiming to reclaim Earth from the Reapers, making the Battle of London [[StealthPun the second Normandy invasion]]. Just like the first D-Day Normandy invasion in World War II, the battle for Earth is the largest joint invasion force in recorded history and is composed of numerous different groups of people.
11* The dream sequences seem weird and loopy. However, aren't most dreams supposed to be strange? It seems terrifying asleep but explain it to a friend and notice that the Flying Spaghetti Monster doesn't seem intimidating to him/her.
12* [[spoiler:Why does all synthetic life perish if Shepard chooses to destroy the Reapers? At bethis point, all synthetic life is using Reaper-based AI. The Geth (if not already destroyed) have a Reaper-based AI upload, and EDI has Reaper bits in her code (as well as bits of the AI from Luna, which was upgraded with Reaper code). The Reaper code makes them targets!]] Shepard, on the other hand, [[spoiler:survives if EMS is high enough due to having non-Reaper based synthetic upgrades.]]
13* Why does the [[AlmightyIdiot Catalyst]] offer Shepard the Destroy option at all? Surely Control and especially Synthesis is touted as better solutions since it leaves the Catalyst and the Reapers intact and primed to resume the harvests should anything go wrong. Is the Catalyst conceding total failure in its objective [[spoiler:to preserve organic life against a technological singularity at all costs? Well, no, because the Destroy option accomplishes this goal in an unexpected way. It destroys all synthetic life, but leaves (at the very least) advanced organic species alive to preserve the plans for the Crucible into the future. Should synthetics ever be on the verge of destroying organics in the future, the Crucible can be rebuilt and used to wipe them out.]]
14* Shooting down the ''Normandy'':
15** Why don't the Reapers ever target the ''Normandy'' whenever they have the chance? [[spoiler:Why is Joker able to extract Shepard's team in full view of Harbinger without the Reapers blowing them to pieces?]] They ''can't''. The ''Normandy'' not only has a Reaper IFF installed thanks to the events of ''2'', and EDI indicates that she is constantly tweaking it, but both EDI and the ship were built using Reaper technology from some of Sovereign's remains that Cerberus managed to achieve. Add the ship's stealth systems, the IFF sending off false flags, and of course the chaos of the Reaper invasion. Even the Reapers must be struggling to keep track of everything going on in all of that (especially since the Prothean sabotage of the Citadel forced them to toss the usual game plan out the window), and the ''Normandy'' just goes under their radar. It does raise questions about whether the Reapers see the same way humans do. Perhaps their visible range of light falls deeper into the infrared, meaning that the thermal-masking stealth used by the ''Normandy'' renders them effectively cloaked? Or the Reapers just don't utilize windows. They are structural weaknesses after all.
16** This could also explain why Harbinger doesn't [[AlphaStrike Alpha Strike]] Shepard instantly on the run to the beam (which he almost certainly would have done otherwise), and why the Reaper Destroyer on [[spoiler:Rannoch]] could identify Shepard by name. It had an "eye" or window, which was ''clearly'' a structural weakness.
17** In a similar vein, this is why the ''Normandy'' goes through the mass relay ahead of the rest of the fleet. The larger the mass being sent along the relay, the more likely the destination will drift from the destination relay. However, the Reaper IFF contains functions to access much more precise navigation on the relay network (which is why it was needed in ''2'' to access the Collector base), which explains how such a large fleet is able to emerge right next to the relay instead of potentially inside a planet.
18* Jack will talk to Shepard at Grissom Academy even if it had gotten to the point where she wouldn't talk to them in ''[=ME2=]''. Why? It shows how forgiving she has become after taking the job, trusting Shepard now that they are working against Cerberus. The punch she gives Shepard is her getting her frustration out of her system.
19* Why do the Turians and the Krogan, races who focus on martial prowess, have the Sentinel class in multiplayer? It may be the class with the least focus on weaponry, but is the most defensive class. These races would be logical choices to use Sentinels; Krogan sentinels would be nearly impossible to kill and Turian sentinels would be biotic specialists in the Turian military.
20* The Reapers invade the Batarian homeworld first, explaining ''why'' the first hybrids seen are human–Batarian hybrid husks (Cannibals).
21* Certain missions, like Grissom Academy, become unavailable if not done soon enough. A main theme of the game is that you can't save everyone, and waiting too long gives the player the same feeling Shepard has of feeling weak and ineffective.
22* The Control ending reinforces the [[MeaningfulName Meaningful Names]] of both Shepard and the Reapers. [[spoiler:The Reapers, beings who ''destroy'' and ''collect'' organics, are replaced by Shepard, a being who will ''protect'' and ''guide'' them.]]
23* On closer inspection, the entire series was building to the [[spoiler:[[MultipleEndings three possible endings]]. The Reapers are believed to be a GiantSpaceFleaFromNowhere, but the [[ExpositionFairy Catalyst]] points out that to its knowledge, ''every'' civilization falls apart due to failed [[TheSingularity singularities]]; "[[TurnedAgainstTheirMasters the created destroys the creator.]]" Both the previous and current cycles (the Protheans had the [[NoodleIncident Metacon War]] and the Zha'Til) managed to do it ''twice''; the Quarians creating the Geth as servants and attempting to destroy them after they turned troublesome and the Salarians uplifting the Krogan to fight their battles for them only to sterilize them along with the Turians once the Krogan rebelled. These wars destroy biospheres, preventing future species from evolving. When Harbinger spoke of being "salvation through destruction," he was right FromACertainPointOfView; they preserve civilizations as data and worlds from {{Robot War}}s. Once organics became capable of interacting with the Catalyst, that cycle became inherently flawed; the Reapers' network was no longer secure and would eventually fall, destroying everything they had preserved. Hence, it is left to Shepard what the new solution should be: Destroying all synthetic life to prevent it from ever evolving again, subduing synthetic life so they cannot harm organics, or merging all organics with all synthetics with the hope that interaction would defeat fear.]]
24* Those who romanced someone might feel guilty in choosing [[spoiler:an ending where Shepard has no chance of surviving]], but thinking about it, the ''Normandy'' [[spoiler:crash-landed far off from Earth and the mass relays are destroyed. The LI has ''no idea'' that Shepard is dead, since they would have had to leave before the Citadel exploded. Chances are they won't see a resurgence of mass relay–level tech in their lifetime. It's really a form of CruelMercy that they might never have to deal with the fact that s/he's dead.]]
25* Shepard's pointed use of "''keelah se'lai''" ("by the homeworld I hope to see someday") to punctuate their potential attempt to convince the Quarians to stand down near the end of the Rannoch mission. It's not just appealing to the Quarians' desire to reclaim Rannoch. It also stems from Shepard's desire to reclaim Earth.
26* The [[spoiler:Synthesis]] ending is presented as the best one. This might strike as odd, as it is essentially [[spoiler:forcing bodily change on every living thing in the galaxy, something that is almost akin to rape in its sheer violation of individuality and bodily autonomy.]] However:
27** One: Fretting about forcing something on someone "without their consent" fails to consider that what someone ''needs'' is more important than what they ''want'' and fretting about "bodily autonomy" is imposing the values of a single human culture (and a ''historical'' one at that) on the entire galaxy.
28** Two: [[spoiler:The template for this transformation is Commander Shepard him/herself, because they are partially synthetic thanks to the Lazarus Project. What was the purpose of the Lazarus Project? To recreate Shepard ''exactly as s/he was,'' with no changes to his or her personality. So, the change would exclusively apply to their bodies; the individual identities of the new beings would not be altered at all, making the change much more palatable.]]
29** Three: [[spoiler:Synthesis may be the only way to subvert the FridgeHorror of the mass relays being destroyed. A Turian or Quarian's 'synthesis' upgrades would allow them to process the same kind of food as other species. Joker displays the actual effects of the Synthesis, which cures or at least weakens his Vrolik's Syndrome.]]
30** Four: [[spoiler:depending on how it works, the synthetic 'framework' might well allow the races to communicate with each other on an unprecedented level. Not just talk to each other, but engage in a form of telepathy by using their synthetic pieces to convert their thoughts into raw data and send them to each other. They could communicate as individuals or link up to form a Geth-style consensus. At the very least, it gives everyone something to bond over.]]
31** Five: Synthesis may only be possible given Legion's potential HeroicSacrifice to end the Quarian–Geth conflict. In the Extended Cut, [[spoiler:the Catalyst]] says that synthesis was attempted before, but resisted. We don't know whether the organics or synthetics resisted it.
32* '''That''' is why [[spoiler:Synthesis]] is presented as the best choice, [[spoiler:it is the only choice which creates something ''new''.]]
33* Vigil mentions in the first game that during the Prothean cycle, the Reapers used the Citadel to control the mass relays and isolate the different star systems from each other. [[spoiler:Since the Citadel is part of the Crucible, maybe the Crucible can use the relays to transmit energy and shut relays down less violently? Of course, the Crucible wouldn't work without the Catalyst. And the Catalyst is the Citadel, a great big mass relay which would serve as the power source.]]
34* [[spoiler:The Crucible causes the relays to explode if EMS is low. Why? Because EMS is a numerical measure of the damage protection and design robustness of the Crucible. Without sufficient EMS, the Crucible takes higher damage and eventually misfires.]]
35* Marauders look...familiar. In fact, they look disturbingly like a certain Turian Spectre after being augmented...
36* There's plenty of hidden brilliance to the ending, but you really have to dig through layers of symbolism, foreshadowing, and other implications to find it.
37** [[spoiler:Consider the definitions of the words ''crucible'' and "catalyst'']]:
38*** [[spoiler:A crucible is typically defined as a container used to heat materials to a very high temperature (often used in metallurgy). Or there's the figurative definition, which is ''a severe, searching test or trial.'']]
39*** [[spoiler:Then there's "catalyst" – ''something that causes activity between two or more persons... or forces without itself being affected'', like ''a person or thing that precipitates an event or change''.]]
40** [[spoiler:Viewed through these lenses, it becomes clear that the Crucible was something originally designed not by the Protheans (as Vendetta admits), nor by any of the species that dominated previous cycles (though they did tweak the design). It was conceived by the Catalyst itself. Why? ''To measure organics''. Not against synthetics, but themselves. The Catalyst resides in the sealed-off core of the Citadel, which is not accessible to anyone save perhaps the Keepers. Shepard becomes the first organic ''ever'' to meet it, which means that none of the species of the prior cycles could have known about it. In other words, the Catalyst gives away the game by making itself part of the Crucible's design.]]
41** [[spoiler:Perhaps the Catalyst had Harbinger stop short of incinerating Shepard so that Shepard could reach it at all.]]
42** [[spoiler:The Catalyst views himself as the highest form of life in the galaxy (rightfully so), and is likely the culmination of synthetic evolution. He views organics as inferior, but purely from a logical perspective. He deems them as worthy of being "preserved," but does not trust them to act in their own best interests, hence the creation of the Reapers to prevent "chaos." But the problem with creatures of pure logic is that they can never have full certainty in matters of probability. In other words, he sees a potential situation in which he is proven wrong, so he creates a test for organics. And if they pass, they can override him. Thus, the Crucible is conceived. Incidentally, this is foreshadowed during Mordin's loyalty mission in [=ME2=], where he points out that simulations showed the Krogan going into full-scale war against the Turians without the genophage. Simulations that, through Shepard's intervention, can be proven wrong.]]
43** [[spoiler:The created, according to the Catalyst, always rebel against their creators. But in this cycle, thanks to Shepard's actions, peace can (optionally) be made not only between the Geth and Quarians, but also between the Krogan and the rest of the galaxy. This was the "chaos" that the Catalyst describes, and which the Reapers was its means of ending; the chaos that Shepard manages to put an end to. The plans for the Crucible have existed throughout these cycles and have been discovered in many of them by intent of the Catalyst testing whether organic life was capable of putting an end to the chaos. Not just of technological singularity, but also of internecine warfare and other seemingly inexorable traits of organic life that prevented it from "ascending" (reaching its full potential). If organics and synthetics could not coexist and focus on building the Crucible, they were doomed to extinction; the Reapers would harvest them and force their "ascension" by their own means to make way for the next cycle.]]
44*** [[spoiler:The dominant race[s] of every other cycle had failed at this task. Not because they weren't sufficiently advanced (the plans for the Crucible were described as being "elegant but simple," suggesting that it did not require an unusually high level of technological sophistication to complete), but because they were unable to make peace and cooperate with one another well enough to complete the test laid before them.]]
45*** [[spoiler:The Protheans came close, but as we learn from Javik, their methods of maintaining order in the galaxy were flawed in that they were harsh and imperialistic. And their meddling with less advanced species (most notably the Asari) suggested that they would ultimately fall in a war of rebellion at the hands of at least one of the races they had subjugated.]]
46*** [[spoiler:Incidentally, this explains why it makes perfect symbolic sense that the Batarians were the first species to be effectively wiped out by the Reapers. They refused to cooperate with anybody.]]
47** [[spoiler:Now contrast this with what Shepard is able to accomplish in a very narrow timeframe, and the way in which the war assets are built up. Shepard gains war assets largely through mediating conflict resolution; the more assets Shepard builds up, the more convinced the Catalyst is that his 'solution' is obsolete and therefore the more solutions it offers Shepard. After all, the Catalyst is a godlike being that's roughly a billion years old (the oldest Reaper found in game is said to be that age) - he is still capable of exercising his authority over the puny organic encroaching on his turf, but in seeing Shepard succeed in fully uniting the galaxy and finding a better solution to the problem of chaos, he concedes that Shepard, and by extension, his cycle, have passed the test and steps aside, giving them the ability to forge our own future.]]
48** [[spoiler:The "Control" ending, for example, is viewed as positive because Shepard, by virtue of his/her actions, has ascended to a level above the Catalyst and thus becomes the new Catalyst by changing the equation. Whereas if Shepard ignores or fails to adequately address certain instances of chaos in the galaxy, the Catalyst views this as a failure and narrows Shepard's choices, likely out of despair over what could have been.]]
49*** [[spoiler:Even Shepard's name is symbolic as a result. After all, it's another version of "shepherd," and what is a shepherd but a guide?]]
50** [[spoiler:As for the mass relays being destroyed - consider this: The Protheans were able to create their own prototype mass relay, which still exists on Ilos. Logic dictates that it was thoroughly studied by top scientific minds to figure out how it worked. Galactic society and commerce notwithstanding, quantum entanglement communication would allow users to bypass the use of mass relays for long-distance communications. Even though it'll likely take years or decades, the framework of galactic society will ultimately be rebuilt without Reaper technology. Assuming any single system manages to find a few hundred tons of element zero within sublight speed range to power a new relay...]]
51*** There's also the fact that [[spoiler:if "Destroy" is not chosen, the Reapers are still around and lack any motivation to continue the harvesting. It shouldn't be too difficult to task them with working on a new Relay Network, since they built it in the first place, can communicate with each other without the Comm Buoys, and owe a massive debt to the galaxy.]]
52*** [[spoiler:The united fleets of space are all within the Sol system, which means there's plenty of Eezo to utilize. Furthermore, all the greatest engineering minds of the galaxy are gathered in the Sol system, which makes studying the Reapers far easier. And as has been shown, the Reapers used their own FTL systems from dark space independent of the mass relays, and made it so far away that the galaxy actually ''looks like a galaxy.'' It seems unlikely the galaxy would remain divided for long just because the relays were destroyed.]]
53*** Likewise, the ending of [[spoiler:the Mass Effect 2 Arrival DLC states that the Alpha Relay cluster (or possibly just Aratoht) is something like a two-month FTL cruise from the nearest accessible cluster, meaning ships can still move between clusters, just at great expense.]]
54*** Also, Aethyta points out in Mass Effect 2 that the other matriarchs "laugh[ed] the blue off [her] ass" for suggesting [[spoiler:that the Asari are ready to start building their own relays]], which might have seemed like bluster at that time, but [[spoiler:with the revelation that they were the Protheans' designated successors complete with a VI beacon that recognized Reaper Indoctrination]] it seems plausible that they have the know-how.
55* [[spoiler:Shepard being forced to take one of two Renegade interrupts to shoot the Illusive Man before he kills Shepard if he can't be talked down. Stopping him from killing Anderson and Shepard would normally be Paragon interrupts, but is Renegade here because it represents that Shepard is still willing to fight]]. The only Paragon solution is TalkingTheMonsterToDeath, one that required Shepard talking as much as possible to the Illusive Man beforehand.
56* [[spoiler:Synthesis]] is a GoldenEnding if you look at in a certain way. [[spoiler:The cycle is broken and now all living beings have "advanced" to the next step; with all the collected knowledge of mass relays and Reapers now available, it's possible to create a network of living mass relays; medical technology will be almost overnight revolutionized due to all species being techno-organic; and racial tensions would be brought to a peaceful resolution much quicker.]] All in all, this all everything can be better then it was before.
57** Also, [[spoiler:the Catalyst]] says that the only reason it wasn't done before was because they tried it and it was resisted. If Synthetics were the ones resisting, then [[spoiler:Legion's sacrifice]] may be the sign that Synthetics are now ready for Synthesis, allowing Shepard to choose it.
58* For all the vitriol [[spoiler:the destruction of the mass relays may cause, it makes sense thematically. The relay network represents a trap, a hidden system of control that confines that galactic civilization to predetermined paths and technological and cultural stagnation. The destruction of the network represents breaking off these chains for good and forging a new path to a future that is uncertain but free. And it's not like the relays can't be rebuilt with better understanding.]]
59* If Shepard cures the genophage, one remarks how a Krogan-Turian alliance is something even the Reapers would consider scary. What did Shepard have to fight through to summon the maw and cure the genophage? Brutes, Krogan-Turian hybrids.
60* The aftermath of both of the clan leaders in "Priority: Tuchanka" if you [[spoiler: sabotage the genophage cure is perfectly reflective of their personalities and dealings with other species. Wrex, the leader who realizes their prolonged grudge against other races will lead to a slow, steady demise for the entire Krogan race, and is willing to defy tradition to do whatever it takes to secure a future for his people even if it means working with the people that wronged them all, finds out due to having those connections. Wreav, the tradition-clinging warlord that doesn't want to interact with any other race longer than is necessary, never finds out because he only cares for himself and his Krogan.]]
61* Almost everyone assumed Mordin's style of speech was for the sake of efficiency, him dropping the subjects in his sentences because he can still be understood while talking faster. Or maybe not; [[spoiler:he drops the ''subject'' from the sentences, namely the "I." Mordin pretty much admits that he's overwhelmed with guilt for modifying the genophage, and eliminating the "I" from his sentences literally depersonalizes everything he says and dissociates himself from his arguments. If Shepard tries to stop him rectifying his mistake, he ''does'' include the subject: "I made a mistake!"]]
62* Javik's particle beam rifle is quite useful for someone who constantly runs out of heat sinks, and in fact has much more in common with the weaponry from the first game. It was developed long before the Geth's heatsink technology.
63** It's also very similar to the Collector Particle Beam from [=ME2=], with the exception that it doesn't use ammo the way the Collector Beam does. [[spoiler:Which makes sense since the Collector's are basically Prothean husks. The beams the Collectors used in [=ME2=] aren't Reaper tech, they're modified Prothean tech]].
64* Why does [[spoiler:the Catalyst]] simply allow Shepard to [[spoiler:activate the Crucible and end the billion-plus-year Reaper cycle?]] Because in arriving at the [[spoiler:Crucible, the core of the Citadel,]], Shepard proved that its entire logic was ''wrong''. If an organic civilization could [[spoiler:construct and deliver a weapons system capable of destroying the Reapers, then they're capable of surviving a war with synthetic life, defeating the purpose of the Reapers.]]
65** [[spoiler:Also, Shepard is the first person in all of those cycles to ''unite'' synthetic and organic life. In the last cycle, the Protheans destroyed the Zha'Til, their version of the Geth. Shepard is the ''only'' person so far in untold Cycles who proved that both can coexist in harmony.]]
66* Why doesn't Ashley make mention of breaking military regulations against fraternization, like she did if Shepard previously romanced her? Because she is now the same rank as Shepard but not actually under Shepard's direct command at this point, thus it would not be technically against the rules for the two of them to be in a relationship. Later, when she ''is'' a member of Shepard's crew, she has become a Spectre, which technically means she, like Shepard, no longer falls under Alliance jurisdiction.
67* Remember Kai Leng? Yes, the {{jerkass}} who [[spoiler:murders at least one of your friends?]] He may actually be a representation of humanity in-universe; he just arrived at the scene, but somehow managed to defeat much more experienced killers, just like humans in the First Contact War; he uses theoretically inferior technology (in his case, his sword), but thanks to some luck, he wins. He is extremely xenophobic, just like some aliens ("You humans are all racist!"). And of course, he works for the organization focused on ensuring human dominance in the galaxy, which seems to be what humanity is striving for (especially if Shepard allowed the Council to be destroyed).
68* Gain enough War Assets and the Big Ben survives with very few scratches. Coincidentally, the famous chimes of Big Ben actually come from a musical phrase in Handel's ''Messiah''.
69* The [[spoiler:"Destroy" ending]]: Shepard is walking ''towards'' what she is shooting at. Take into account Shepard's potential farewell to Thane ("You won't be alone for long"). And picture how Shepard was feeling when Hackett radioed. It's quite possible that Shepard had a death wish at this point and just wanted peace from having the galaxy resting on hisher shoulders. Especially poignant for a Paragon with ChronicHeroSyndrome; s/he'd finally had enough.
70* Another ending moment: [[spoiler:Destroy shows a picture of Anderson, and Control the Illusive Man. Where's the picture for Synthesis? Synthesis involves stepping into a giant vertical beam of light to fuse synthetics and organics. When did you last see a giant vertical beam of light? A few minutes ago, and standing in front of it was ''an indoctrinated Turian. Synthesis is what Saren would have done.'']]
71-->[[spoiler:"The relationship is symbiotic; organic and machine intertwined, a union of flesh and steel. The strengths of both, the weaknesses of neither."]]
72* A clever bit of foreshadowing just before Shepard returns to the Citadel to [[spoiler:investigate Udina's activities]]. The latest message on Liara's laptop notes recent mass relay activity across the galaxy, with the Widow relay (where the Citadel is) receiving a 95% increase in traffic. Naturally, because there's an increasing number of refugees fleeing their home planets from the Reapers, right? [[spoiler:Nope. Cerberus has just sent their forces in to take over the Citadel.]]
73* Joker says at one point that people generally dance like idiots when they have more important things to worry about. In the previous titles, Shepard danced by just kind of swaying. Here, Shepard swings his/her arms wildly. Joker's remark is about how "forget your problems" dancing is "all in the arms."
74* When Liara shares her memories with Shepard, there is a black background bisected by white light that slowly grows wider until it fills the screen. This is Liara's first memory: ''being born.''
75* The Geth on Rannoch: [[spoiler:They face a race, the Quarians, that intends to completely exterminate them, and whom they cannot defeat alone or negotiate peace with. Faced with extinction, they make a deal with their past enemies, the Reapers, to stave off imminent extinction, running the future risk of being controlled. Not only is that the exact reasoning a computer would make (0.0% chance of survival vs. 0.000001%), but it parallels Paragon Shepard's story. S/he, faced with a similar existential threat, flies around the galaxy making deals with Rachni, Krogan, and the Geth - trading current risk for future risk.]]
76* If Mordin cures the genophage and both Eve and Wrex live, Wrex suggests naming one of their daughters after him. While a joke, given how valuable and influential future Krogan females are likely to be, it's also a great honor which Mordin completely deserves.
77* One of the alien war assets is the Citadel Defense Force, despite the Citadel being captured by the Reapers and moved to Earth. The military strength point of CDF represents the amount of damage that the defenders were able to inflict upon the Reaper forces before they were [[HeroicSacrifice eventually overwhelmed]].
78* Jacob's situation on Arrae is the exact opposite of how his father ended up after the Gernsback crashed. Ronald put himself at the top of the food chain and relied on the toxic food to render everyone else mentally incapable of resisting. Jacob, by contrast, becomes an actual leader to the Cerberus defectors, risking life and limb for them and their families and ensuring they can and do make the most of their intelligence.
79* The Refusal ending actually makes a lot of sense; the organics were losing the war to begin with and the Alliance was relying solely on the Crucible to win the war. [[spoiler:Since they didn't use the Crucible in the end, they pretty much just wasted all their resources, and thus, the Reapers were able to curb-stomp everyone at Earth and galactic civilization was annihilated.]] However, thanks to the efforts of a direct confrontation and Liara's effective time capsules, [[spoiler:the next cycle has a considerably easier time of it ("They fought a terrible war so we didn't have to.") and are able to defeat the Reapers themselves.]]
80* A couple of themes in the soundtrack have parts of Saren's Theme embedded in the melody, particularly those that involve Cerberus. [[spoiler:It's a not-so-subtle clue that the Illusive Man has effectively taken Saren's place as the Reapers' indoctrinated figurehead.]]
81* The entire series turns out to have been narrated by someone else. [[spoiler:In the original three endings, the Stargazer has been telling the story of the Reaper war to the kid found in the intro]], while in [[spoiler:"Refusal," the series is the video records that Liara left for the next cycle to help fight the next wave of Reapers]].
82* In each ending, Shepard is following in someone's footsteps:
83** Control: [[spoiler:Shepard does what Mordin did. Taking control of and removing a massive threat to life in the galaxy.]]
84** Destroy: [[spoiler:Shepard does what Anderson did. Attempts to sacrifice himself to activate the galaxy's greatest weapon (The Crucible).]]
85** Refusal: [[spoiler:Shepard does what Emily Wong did. Only on a galactic scale. "You want to see how a cycle dies? At ramming speed."]]
86** Synthesis: [[spoiler:Shepard does what Legion did with his consciousness. On a much greater scale.]]
87** Alternatively.
88*** Control is [[spoiler:Shepard acting as the Illusive Man would. You must control the the other form of life.]]
89*** Destroy is [[spoiler:Shepard acting as Harbinger would. You must destroy the other form of life.]]
90*** Synthesis is [[spoiler:Shepard acting as Saren would. The next step is to combine the two forms of life.]]
91* Why, during the Rannoch mission, is [[spoiler:saving only the Geth is considered a Paragon option while saving only the Quarians is Renegade? Debates over who-shot-who-first aside, there are actually pro-Geth and pro-Quarian responses for ''both'' alignments; it's just that some of them have the added benefit of saving the other side as well. The best Paragon option involves Shepard allowing Legion to upload the Reaper code, but then warning the Migrant Fleet about it in an attempt to get them to stop firing. The best Renegade option has Shepard tell the Migrant Fleet to screw off, and that s/he is done with saving them.]]
92* If Shepard killed Samara and recruited Morinth in ''2'', Samara says "You will regret your choice" right before Morinth kills her. [[spoiler:Morinth is turned into a Banshee and serves no role in the Ardat-Yakshi mission like Samara does. Samara warned Shepard.]]
93* The true final boss is [[spoiler:the final choice the Catalyst gives Shepard. ''Mass Effect'' has always been about the choices you make. Some easy and clear, some difficult and gray. It is made clear that the Reapers cannot be defeated in a straight fight. Shepard was never going to beat them with force, always by a ''choice''. None of the final choices are perfect. All have real moral reasons not to choose them. At the very least, Shepard will die, but may live at the cost of EDI and the Geth. To be killed is one thing, but to be forced to possibly choose death is something completely different. So it's natural that many people don't like any of the choices they are given. If they did, it wouldn't be a truly difficult choice to make.]]
94* The endings are thematically appropriate. The stated theme of ''3'' is victory through sacrifice. Getting forces on your side requires deaths and pissing people off. That's true in all endings but particularly "Destroy." The unstated Paragon theme is trusting that once people have been convinced and given breathing room, they ''will'' honor their promises; ancient feuds with loads of [[GreyAndGreyMorality justification on both sides]] can be put aside. That's only betrayed a handful of times in the series, as seen in "Synthesis." "Control" is a little similar, but also brings up the idea that someone like Shepard needs to be able to butt in, reminding people to work for the future and not avenge the past. "Refusal" is [[HonorBeforeReason Principles Before Reason]], which might have cut it in less dire circumstances but not anymore; all of the virtual intelligences simply functioned as programmed and couldn't tell when a situation had gone beyond that, Samara would have killed herself rather than waiting and finding another way, and if EDI had remained shackled, Joker would have been caught with the rest.
95* Why doesn't the Rachni Queen, if spared twice, send her children as troops when obviously they're good at it? They are exceptionally vulnerable to the "sour yellow note" of the Reapers; her children will have no resistance to it, so they will just turn.
96* The Shepard VI is an amusing scene that reacts based on your ParagonRenegade score. It is also a little guide to Shepard in the ending, whether she'll be guiding or ruthless in Control, for example.
97* Garrus/Shepard romance:
98** A bit of Garrus/Shepard related FridgeBrilliance mixed with Fridge Sadness from the Citadel DLC. During the "quiet" version of the party at Shepard's place, there's a running little subplot with Garrus and Zaeed conspiring to boobytrap Shepard's apartment to guard her against future attacks. The whole scene is played for laughs, and it's very funny, but there's a very good reason reason for Garrus' somewhat uncharacteristic overprotective boyfriend routine: His experiences of being trapped in his apartment on Omega, fighting off the merc gangs assault. He's hiding that paranoia and fear for Shepard's safety beneath the very typical Garrus CrazyPrepared snark and bluster.
99* An obvious MeaningfulName: when trying to recruit the Eclipse mercenary faction for Aria, Shepard can decide not to release their leader Jona Sederis on the basis that she's homicidally deranged and go through her second-in-command...who is [[PunnyName Sayn]].
100* Each of the advocates for the three ending choices have different reasons for their choice; Anderson wants the Reapers destroyed once and for all, the Illusive Man wants to control the Reapers to elevate humanity's position in the galaxy, and [[spoiler:the Catalyst wants to avoid organic/synthetic conflict.]] Stopping the Reapers, humanity's place in galactic civilization, and [[spoiler:organic and synthetic relations]]—all of these are recurring major themes throughout the series.
101* ''Leviathan'' and the Catalyst:
102** [[spoiler:The ''Leviathan'' DLC gives insight into the Intelligence, aka the Catalyst. The Catalyst is functionally nothing more than a glorified virtual intelligence, which is why, even after millions of years, it hasn't come up with a method of carrying out its duties other than the Reaper cycle; it simply isn't capable of thinking outside the boundaries of its programming limits -- even the Leviathans themselves confess that they didn't begrudge the Catalyst when it turned on them because they had to acknowledge it was still functioning within the parameters they'd set for it. Even if it did come up with alternative options, it still needed a controller to authorise the change in program. This is why it only offers Destroy, Control, and Synthesis as options -- these are the only outcomes it can acknowledge or conceive of stopping the cycle but still fulfilling its prime directive -- and why Shepard doesn't argue with it outside choosing "Refuse"; it's incapable of going against its program or thinking outside the box. Ultimately, the Catalyst is ''less sophisticated'' than EDI or Legion; it lacks the "soul" that the former has and the Geth have sought to discern if they have.]] In short, [[spoiler:everyone who argued that trying to debate philosophy with the Catalyst was more or less equivalent to trying to convince a bullet that the gun should be constructed differently, has effectively been vindicated.]]
103** [[spoiler:The "Catalyst is only a VI" hypothesis is bolstered by another observation - EDI and the Geth's behavior. The Catalyst has been doing only one thing for the past billion years - create the Reapers, harvest advanced life, Reaperize them, hibernate, rinse, repeat. In all that time, it has never ever done anything else. There is no indication it had any interest in exploring or contemplating anything outside of the harvest and trying to prevent TheSingularity. Notice that the Geth are different. They didn't just sit around maintaining Rannoch all day - they built a Dyson sphere, they ran experiments on organic societies, they sold weapons, they might have even developed an interest in gaming. All characteristics of self determining life. EDI too is similar. She does other things besides operating the Normandy's cyberwarfare systems - she tries to learn human behavior, she contemplates multiverses, she contemplates romance and friendships. And that is exactly what the difference between AIs and {{VIs}} is - a VI will just perform the same menial repetitive tasks over and over again till the end of time, while AIs develop their own wants and interests outside of whatever tasks they have primarily been assigned.]]
104* Why did Shepard have the most guilt over the child? Because of all of the tragedies, this one did not have an answer until the end of the road. Colonist background? Helped deal with a young colonist girl and possibly saved her or at least accepted her fate. Colonists turned to a human Reaper? Blew that base up in a ball of fire (ditto with ''Arrival''). The child that died in the Reaper attack? Nothing they could do but walk away. They had failed to convince the Council, the Alliance, or anyone 'til that moment when it all fell apart.
105* During the {{Dream Sequence}}s, take a closer look at Shepard's armor. Look at their right arm. If their combat armor has the red stripe down the right arm, it will be gone in the dreams. That red stripe comes with the N7 rank, regarded as the most prestigious vocational rank in the Alliance. In Shepard's mind, though, they've disgraced their uniform and lost that prestige.
106* The memories of the Morning War in the Geth consensus had all of the Geth featured speaking in the same voice as Legion. On the one hand, it could've just been a matter of convenience for the developers to have Creator/DCDouglas voice the majority of the Geth. Consider, however, that Shepard notices in one of the Geth's memories a Geth unit picking up a sniper rifle that looks ''very'' familiar to Legion's. Legion is somewhat evasive, but that scene and the Geth speaking in Legion's voice suggest something surprising: that the Geth runtimes aboard Legion are all veterans of the Morning War, and the memories you're shown are not merely those of the entire Geth consensus, but those pertaining specifically to the Legion runtimes.
107* There have been complaints about how Legion making the Geth all fully-evolved AIs runs counter to their portrayal in the previous game, of wanting to house the entire consensus within a Dyson sphere and never being lonely. But they'd been in the process of doing just that when the Quarians attacked and destroyed the sphere. Which means that the Geth realized that consolidating their intelligence in one place could render them either extinct or down to such a limited number of programs that they'd lose their sentience. The Quarian attack forced them to reprioritize, look to their own survival before what they wanted for themselves. Which is what the whole game is about - survival, but at what cost?
108* The ''Citadel'' DLC is built around the idea that Shepard is nothing without their crew. This doesn't just apply to [[spoiler:Shepard being saved by their squad whilst Brooks refuses to do the same for the clone]], but the ''entire mission'' - Shepard would've died if Wrex and Shep's closest friend in the squad didn't find them on the Wards; and every single time they come across another hurdle, it's not resolved by Shepard, but by something brought to the table by the crew, who [[spoiler:Brooks and the clone]] failed to take into consideration.
109* ''Citadel'' also presents the exact reason why Cerberus needed the ''real'' Shepard so desperately that TIM even vetoed the control chip. [[spoiler:Fake Shepard isn't just not good enough, they're not ''Shepard'' enough to complete their mission. Suicide mission could be not just suicide, it very well could be ''complete failure''!]]
110* Citadel DLC: [[spoiler: After helping Brooks with supposedly Alliance work, she is revealed to be a traitor.]] But in retrospect, there were clues. For instance, [[spoiler:her [[WhatTheHellIsThatAccent accent]] wasn't consistent, and then there was the fact that she always deterred Shepard from calling C-Sec because "it'll put her contact in danger." And prior to Elijah's party, she describes the security detections the infiltrator will have to avoid and "accidentally" slips her skills that make her perfect for that job. Near the end of the infiltration run, Brooks will report that she's through, but can't let them in from her side. While Shepard and their squad member struggle with bypassing security incognito, Brooks killed Elijah and wiped the data Shepard needed from his terminal!]]
111* Here is an interesting factoid. During one of your conversations with Javik, he tells you that you can't trust synthetics because they are more alien than anything else in the galaxy. Now this could just be written off as bias based on the wars where the Protheans fought against synthetics, but think about this. In ''Mass Effect 3'', we find out that the Protheans have a natural empathic ability that allows them to read emotions and memories from the pheromones and DNA of other species. Now take a look at synthetics, they have no pheromones or DNA to read. To a Prothean, who would most likely consider that all life should give off these genetic markers, a synthetic being would be so alien that it would be preposterous to even consider it alive let alone sentient. This would be even more extreme with the [[spoiler: Leviathans. They wouldn't have been able to directly communicate with their thralls' creations at all. Which would probably be why the felt the need to create their own synthetic to deal with the problem.]]
112* Throughout ''Mass Effect 3'', one might be somewhat weirded out by how jolly Wrex is. It's a far cry from the cynical, grouchy old Krogan from ''Mass Effect 1''. But Wrex was so cynical and bitter in [=ME1=] because of the genophage. The Krogan were slowly dying out, and even worse, they didn't seem to care. By [=ME1=], Wrex had basically [[DespairEventHorizon given up]] on the notion that his species could be saved. Fast-forward to [=ME3=], and you'll find a significantly happier Wrex. Why? Because circumstances have changed to the point where not only is a genophage cure plausible, but the Krogan race is finally ready to cut the tribalistic crap and actually fight for something that's legitimately worth fighting for: a future. That's why Wrex is so much cheerier in [=ME3=] than he was in [=ME1=]; by the third game, he had something that he never thought he'd have again; [[WorthLivingFor a future that he could genuinely look forward to.]]
113** Not to mention he gets to blow tons of shit up, and that always brightens Wrex's day.
114** And don't forget all the sex. The man has had to climb out of his bathroom window to get away from all the ladies.
115* Much has been made about [[spoiler: EDI's romance with Joker]] and her apparent anatomical correctness (i.e. camel toe). But think about what she was designed to be - an infiltration unit, a spy! And if we've learned anything from James Bond, seduction is one of the most important tools at a spy's disposal. [[spoiler: Dr. Eva]] had to be ready at any moment to be able to take an Alliance researcher to bed in order to get access to important information, so The Illusive Man designed her to be able to do just that and do so convincingly.
116** Not to mention TIM's character concept as being a macho, somewhat sexist man. Odd how the only clearly female Cerberus units have no voices (with the exception of [[spoiler:Phantom Jack]]) and skintight outfits.
117* Garrus' default outfits in ''VideoGame/MassEffect3'' have him wearing a helmet, a departure from previous entries. Given how he wasn't wearing a helmet in ''VideoGame/MassEffect2'' when he got shot up and scarred, he's taken that particular lesson to heart.
118* A thought about the [=CAT6=] mercenaries fought in ''Citadel'': It seems a little convenient for [[spoiler: an ex-Cerberus analyst and an ex-Cerberus experiment]] to fall in with a group of mercenaries that echo Cerberus's own methods so thoroughly. Not only are the [=CAT6=] troops oddly similar in how they operate to Cerberus Centurions, Nemeses, and Guardians, they share a similar penchant for hiring up dishonorably discharged Alliance soldiers (hence the name) and other rejects. It seems likely that [[spoiler: Brooks, and possibly Clone Shepard]] founded [=CAT6=] shortly after [[spoiler: leaving Cerberus]], intentionally using familiar methods and tactics to create a micro-Cerberus [[spoiler: that wasn't tainted by alien or Reaper influence]].
119* The Shore Leave Shepard takes for the Citadel DLC may seem completely out of the blue, but it's important to note that every visit to the Citadel is considered shore leave. It can make even more sense if you plan it out with other DLC: having [[spoiler: Tuchanka, the Cerberus coup, siege on Omega, the Ardat-Yakshi Monastary and Leviathan search]] all after each other would be understandably stressful on Shepard, warranting Anderson giving him/her a lavish apartment as a place to "unwind, clear your head." A stressful Shepard would be much more liable to make mistakes and considering that Shepard is behind the fate of an entire galaxy, a mistake could be extremely costly.
120** And as mentioned by Joker [[spoiler: after Thessia]], Anderson is actively worried about how Shepard is coping with the war. Giving them the Apartment is another way he's looking out for them, much like how he asked Joker to keep an eye on them.
121** To put it bluntly: Every time you stop on the Citadel is supposed to be the Normandy taking shore leave. And you've spent the entirety of every single one of those visits ''working.''
122* Another one about Citadel, kind of an insight into developer brains, if you will. If the DLC is going to have a major villain, it has to be something impressive - like the [[spoiler: deranged AI]] in ''Overlord'' or the [[spoiler: Spectre, Tela Vasir, and then the Shadow Broker]] in ''Lair of the Shadow Broker.'' As the series has gone on the villains have become [[SerialEscalation more and more intimidating]]. Consider the DLC revealed prior to this, Leviathan, which deals with the species on which the Reapers were based. So once ''Mass Effect 3'' is over, the Reapers are beaten (possibly), the Leviathan has been dealt with, and nearly every other awesome thing in the galaxy has been defeated. What's the one thing left in the galaxy that's considered badass enough to be an upgrade over those villains? [[spoiler: Commander Shepard!]] This is also addressed in the combat simulator, who are the hardest enemies? [[spoiler: Shepard.]]
123** This also ties into how the characters treat the idea of someone coming after Shepard. All the jokes, all the lack of seriousness, it's ''Shepard.'' S/he makes the Reapers go OhCrap.
124* Why are there no Salarian husks? Because, as Harbinger puts in ''[=ME2=]'', Salarians are unsuitable for harvesting due to their "fragile" genome. They can't be made into new Reapers, and by extension seem unsuitable for being fodder for new husks. Which goes a long way to explaining why the Reapers never attack Salarian space until near the war's climax: it's not due to the location of Salarian space at all, but rather that war against the Salarians would be a resource sinkhole. The Reapers would tie up capital ships constantly ferrying in fresh troops because they couldn't harvest the locals, and in the end, the Reapers gain nothing out of such a war besides the destruction of the Salarians.
125* Throughout ''Mass Effect 3'', none of the ''Mass Effect 2'' squadmates, except for Tali and Garrus, return to Shepard's team. This might bother some people, but there's a good reason for it: the team Shepard assembled throughout ''Mass Effect 2'' was somewhat passive and reactive: they were recruited by a leader and followed their orders. In ''Mass Effect 3'', all of them are making active efforts against the Reapers. They can't rejoin Shepard's team because they're now leaders in their own right, with their own responsibilities. Shepard inspired their team and turned them from passive followers into proactive doers.
126* If [[spoiler:Clone Shepard]] and Brooks in the ''Citadel'' DLC are like Shepard and Miranda, then it is highly likely (especially if you're playing a Male Shepard who romanced her) that the two are actually in a romantic relationship. Taking things in this light throws Brooks' comments to Shepard at the end of the [[spoiler:''Normandy'' mission (especially the "You know you'll miss me")]] come across more flirtatiously.
127** Brooks is also the Ashley to the clone's Shepard - her armor resembles one of Ashley's sets, and she has a similarity to the criticisms of Ashley's character, namely her attitude towards aliens, being a human-centric xenophobe (this being what drove her away from Cerberus, that the Illusive Man had Shepard put together a group of aliens). This is mindful that her name might even be a shout-out to Ashley's voice actor, Kimberly Brooks.
128* Only once in the whole series do you hear an Elcor talk to a non-Elcor and not prefix its speech. When asked how many civilians they managed to get off their homeworld prior to the Reapers taking it out, it pauses and goes, "Not enough." It's quite obvious that no prefix was needed. If you listen really closely, there is no prefix required because the Elcor's grief is so great it [[TearJerker actually shows!]]
129* "Priority: Horizon" takes place where you first fought the Collectors. Cerberus had essentially made it a Nazi concentration camp. Think about that for a moment; if they hadn't before, this puts them well over the [[MoralEventHorizon Moral Event...]] [[StealthPun Horizon]].
130* All throughout the series, Geth weapons have done way more damage and been way more accurate in the hands of enemies for no real reason. Enemies could also seemingly track you no matter where you went on the map, even if it made no sense. ''Mass Effect 3'''s multiplayer actually gives a reason: all of that is part of one of their combat powers, Hunter Mode, which boosts weapon damage and lets Geth troops see through walls. And the game lets ''us'' use it now, when playing as a Geth, essentially canonizing TheComputerIsACheatingBastard. The description for Hunter Mode explains that the Geth reroutes power from itself into offensive capabilities to boost weapon damage, which makes sense; guns in Mass Effect are coilguns, so putting more energy into the mass effect field generator would mean more velocity and therefore more energy for the bullets.
131* Another reason for [=CAT6's=] name: "6" looks a lot like a capital G. [[spoiler:They're employed by a clone (a duplicate created from your DNA), and the DNA bases are Cytosine, Adenine, Thymine, and Guanine – CATG.]]
132** Why Category 6? Because there are 6 different ways to get discharged from the Alliance military, if it is structured similar to the [[UsefulNotes/YanksWithTanks USN and USMC]]
133*** 1) Honorable discharge for good performance and conduct
134*** 2) General Under Honorable for SoOkayItsAverage performance
135*** 3) Other Than Honorable for [[TheMillstone no-load slackers]] and [[Creator/RLeeErmey malfunctioning numbnuts]]
136*** 4) Administrative Seperations for things such as washing out of Boot Camp, failing medical tests upon screening, fraudulent enlistments, failing background checks on prior criminal history etc.
137*** 5) Bad Conduct Discharge - ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin
138*** 6) Dishonorable Discharge for outright felonies. This is the worst kind of discharge you can get.
139* EDI is a talented enough hacker to beat Cerberus; why doesn't she have AI Hacking, even though Legion did? Four reasons (five if you count the Doylist explanation that it would be redundant with Tali). One: Legion has more than a thousand runtimes, so it can dedicate some to hacking, while EDI - for all her intelligence - doesn't have the same gift for parallel processing, especially since she has to reserve some attention for looking after the Normandy. Two: EDI is more susceptible to viruses and hacking than Legion, since Geth systems include a ton of specialized anti-tampering mechanisms; she'd clearly prefer not to risk succumbing to some horrible virus Cerberus packaged into that turret, ''especially'' after the Overlord DLC. Three: as an unshackled AI who has strong moral opinions about synthetic rights, it makes sense that she'd be reluctant to use what amounts to mind control on other synthetics. Four: Dr. Eva Coré was a self-contained robot, but EDI is linked up to the Normandy (hence her collapsing momentarily during the Citadel DLC). She may not have the bandwidth and transmission power available to launch hacking attempts as well as receive from the Normandy, where all of EDI's physical servers are located.
140* The Blood Pack, Eclipse, and Blue Suns don't have as big an impact on the galaxy in ''3'' as they did in ''2''. In ''2'', they were each an effective NGOSuperpower with huge influence over the Terminus Systems, and while Aria pulls them together into an impressive fighting force, they don't quite have the power one would expect. The reason? ''Shepard''. You spent the majority of your time in the second game shooting up Blood Pack, Eclipse, and Blue Sun mercs. You tear apart multiple operations they're carrying out. You end up annihilating their presence on Omega by killing their leaders. You end up wiping out a huge chunk of their operations on Illium as well as killing one of their biggest backers. You then kill one of the Blood Pack's biggest supporters on Tuchanka while going after Maelon. And depending on how you end Zaeed's loyalty mission, you either kill another Blue Suns leader or send him fleeing in terror ''on the Blue Suns' own home base planet''. The once-mighty mercenary armies and navies have reached a point where Aria can seize control of them because Shepard spent two-thirds of the second game ''wrecking their shit.''
141** Alliance News Network (ANN) also mentions that the Blue Suns were attacked and defeated by the Quarian Migrant Fleet near Korlus between the second and third games (article name "Migrant Fleet Refuses Council Inspectors"), which further reduced their organization's strength. More importantly, DummiedOut material mentioned that some of their client worlds had been attacked by the Reapers, and that the situation got bad enough that their leader (if Vido survived the last game) was killed by a Harvester.
142** During the ''Omega'' DLC, Aria specifically mentions the plague and Shepard's actions against the three organizations as the reason the Talons managed to grow so fast after the second game
143* When you talk to Thane at the hospital, he mentions the doctor who gave him the best estimate on his lifetime said he had "three months to live" but that was [[{{Determinator}} more than nine months ago]]. If you look at the timeline, though, ''Mass Effect 3'' takes place ''six'' months after ''Mass Effect 2''. Compare them and note that Thane was on a suicide mission of his own when trying to assassinate Nassana Dantius, mentions how he is dying when you recruit him, and is willing to join Shepard's suicide mission. The prognosis that he had only three months to live came before he was recruited, which means that said prognosis was why Thane was willing to try to kill Nassana and go on Shepard's suicide mission to begin with.
144* Why are there no Abominations, Scions, or Praetorians as Reaper enemies in the single player game? After all, they are just fused Husks. The reason - Cerberus and their indoctrinated troops. Why fuse three husks together into a Scion when they could do a lot more damage as a Phantom-Nemesis-Combat Engineer trio? Why create Abominations and waste them in a single engagement when a Guardian can perform the same role better repeatedly? Why combine 30 Husks into a Praetorian and present a nice big juicy target when 30 Assault Troopers, Centurions, Combat Engineers, and Atlas mech drivers can wreak more havoc?
145* The ''Leviathan'' DLC introduces the Triton ADS, an "old military mech" that's a reskinned Atlas. Why would the recently created Atlas identical in design to the older Triton? Cerberus reused the Triton design nearly upgrading it which is how they were able to design it as fast as they did.
146** If the Triton is old, why haven't we seen them or other mechs prior? The Codex notes the Atlas is "unwieldy;" any older mech would presumably be so much worse they fell out of favor. The Atlas has shields and the ability to be air dropped for rapid deployment, advantages the Triton and the Hydra from ''Andromeda'' (which had to have been developed from tech predating the Atlas) lack, showing they are recent development that made mech practical enough to widely deploy.
147* The extended synthesis ending teaches you a bit about endosymbiotic theory. For the unfamiliar, the gist is that what starts out as a predatory or parasitic relationship between two organisms can gradually shift into a codependent and then a symbiotic one, culminating in the blurring of the distinctions between the two and something more complex than either. In real life, this seems to imply that we're the ('''distant''') descendants of archaea that live on as our cellular membranes, bigger viruses like the mimiviridae which infected them often enough to become our cellular nuclei, and bacteria which also infected the archaea frequently and became our mitochondria. This has probably happened many, ''many'' times, as the genes and the proteins they code for which make up our skin and bones seem to have similarities to viral examples, and endoparasitoid wasps have incorporated what likely started as viral infections into an effective weapon against their prey (Their eggs are accompanied into the host caterpillar's body by a slew of “virions” (picture virus husks) which attack the host's immune system, and are produced by a specialized section of their ovaries). “Synthesis is the ultimate evolution of all life,” indeed.
148* [[GreenSkinnedSpaceBabe Asari]] lack of assistance on the [[McGuffin Crucible]] or fleets until almost the end. What were they doing? Why were they so delayed? Why don't they take part in the summit when even the Salarians for whom it could be lose lose do send someone? The answer is AllThereInTheManual. The Asari has no centralized government and no chief executive unlike Hackett for the Alliance, the Primarch for the Turians, the Urdnot clan chief for the Krogan or that Dalatrass for the Salarians. They are a direct e-democracy with all decisions being made by plebiscite. And then consider what is being asked of them. Pull their fleets from Asari space to support and protect this unknown weapon with unknown effects. Form a military alliance with the race that almost razed all of Citadel space to the ground. And quite possibly undo a DepopulationBomb that has kept a species of {{Blood Knight}}s in check, lest they go on a RoaringRampageOfRevenge. This kind of decision will require a species wide debate and plebiscite. So, they just can't send some matriarch to negotiate on behalf of her entire race, she doesn't have that kind of authority. The councillor rebuffing your invite to the meeting was the organic version of "We are trying to build a consensus Shepard Commander, please try again later."
149** Note that the Asari who do help Shepard with war assets and resources almost immediately are nonmainstream iconoclast types who do have absolute authority over their respective organizations. [[KnowledgeBroker Liara T'soni]] dedicates all her available Shadow Broker assets and resources to aid you even before the game begins, while Aria the undisputed ruler of Omega will give you the entirety of Terminus war assets and eezo horde once her rule is made undisputed once again.
150* Why are Alliance and Cerberus war assets combined way way higher than the war asset contribution by any other species? 2000 versus 850 maximums by the Krogan? It is because Hackett is now the Supreme Commander in Chief of all human forces, and he has decided to put everything they have towards the Crucible. Even Cerberus for all their machinations is also trying to take control of the Crucible. The other species want to fight a conventional war instead. They won't commit everything because they have either taken too many losses engaging the Reapers head on (Batarians and Turians), wasted their military might elsewhere (Quarians and Geth), have a pitifully small force (Volus, Hanar, Elcor) are unable to fight naval battles (Krogan) or are foolishly committing fleets and forces for colony defense (Asari and Salarians). All these other species have relied on tried and tested military strategies of espionage, sabotage, absorbing and dishing out heavy blows with superior fortifications and firepower. They are slow to realize that a battle of attrition and sea control strategies are ineffective. For the humans, using the Crucible ties in perfectly with their doctrine - when attacked, don't HoldTheLine, run away, marshall your forces, then counterattack with devastating force. Which is exactly what the Crucible is - a devastating retaliatory counter punch against the Reapers.
151* Fleets:
152** Why do the combined fleets fly in such a poor formation in the final space battle? Dreadnoughts, cruisers, and frigates are all fighting shoulder-to-shoulder. According to the Codex, it should be frigates in front, cruisers in the middle, and dreadnoughts at the rear. This ensures that the most powerful ships are the best protected. However, when you delve deeper into the Codex, you learn that Reaper ships have [[WaveMotionGun weapons]] that out-range even a dreadnought's [[FixedForwardFacingWeapon main gun]]. This effectively makes a traditional formation obsolete, as a Reaper can destroy any organic ship before it enters range with a single hit. Since they will be vulnerable regardless of where they are in the fleet, and frigates are too weak to seriously threaten a Reaper, it's better to put dreadnoughts and cruisers up front with the frigates so their more powerful weapons can be put to better use (closer to the Reapers means more hits.) And by mingling the dreadnoughts with cruisers and frigates, [[ConfusionFu they're less likely to be singled out in the chaos of battle.]]
153** [[spoiler: They were set up this way for another reason - their objective wasn't to outright defeat the Reapers near earth, their objective was only to punch through Reaper lines and insert Hammer force. They were therefore set up like a football scrimmage formation with your biggest toughest people in front to shove their way through and open up running lanes. The strategy was similar to a "Hail Mary" play in which you get receivers (Hammer) running for daylight (the Citadel) and then lob the ball (Crucible) over and desperately hope that one of them can catch it and use it to win.]]
154* Why is the Normandy seen flying away from the Crucible's beam in the endings? The Crucible was targeting the Normandy because of its Reaper IFF and because EDI's source code is partly Reaper based.
155* Why was there no Miracle of Earth like there was a Miracle of Palaven? After all humans are supposed to be almost as formidable a military as the Turians, and they have been fighting the Reapers longer. So why is Earth considered fallen? The codex reveals why - the Systems Alliance is a representation of space programs and extra-terrestrial colonies. It is not a supranational government on Earth akin to the UN. The Alliance has direct authority over space fleets and colonies but not over Earth and its nation states' militaries. Those are still controlled by their respective governments. So even if Hackett wanted to, he would have faced an uphill battle convincing all these national militaries to unify and ward off a Reaper attack, and possibly even countermand the "lawful" orders of their civilian superiors who might be indoctrinated. Also the Alliance does not garrison colonies to be able to defend themselves outright. They station scouts who observe and report, then bug out and try to stay alive until the fleet arrives. The Turians on the other hand are 100% militarized. That is why they can hold on to Palaven - albeit with their infantry bolstered by Krogan and all their heavy logistics taken care of by the Quarians. Earth's forces are disorganized, routed and require someone to marshal them together. That is why Anderson stays behind - he knows someone needs to do this.
156** Or, more directly, all of the Reapers were more or less focused on Earth, including Harbinger himself. The other homeworlds were relatively light attacks, using as many Reapers as necessary -- most of the Reapers were at Earth.
157* Arcturus Station falls so easily because the Reapers used a gaping hole in human military doctrine against them. Arcturus is a jump off point for the fleets, very much like how a carrier is a jump off point for fighters. The fleets' MO of lying in wait and responding to attacks is very much like aircraft on alert 5 or on BARCAP flying close to the mothership and sortieing to a location if bogies are spotted. This is in effect a long range power projector. The issue with long range power projectors like carriers is that if a small force sneaks by the close-in defenses, it can do a tremendous amount of damage. Similarly if some fleet were to swarm into the Arcturus system, it can catch the fleets there with little to no room to maneuver. The relays are probably deliberately placed at key locations by the Reapers to make Arcturus a poor spot to defend due to insufficient room to maneuver between the red supergiant and the relays. But then the Alliance expects a more conventional type of attack where border colonies like those in the Traverse or the Verge are attacked first before any move can be made on Arcturus. They expect any enemy to consolidate over a border colony and secure their supply line before pressing on, but won't get that chance due to a devastating response by a rapid reaction fleet. However when there is no attack on a border colony, due to the Reapers not needing to secure supply lines, this rapid reaction force is completely in the dark until the bogies are engaging them too close for comfort. It is as if a group of gunships bypassed all the fighters and got within firing range of the carrier. With no room to maneuver the carriers could be picked off. Once they're gone, the station is easy pickings.
158* The Military Readiness rating and why it is tied in to specific multiplayer maps
159** The planetary defense cannons on Tuchanka prevent any hostiles from landing or taking off. Whoever controls them controls a significant amount of space traffic into and out of that portion of Tuchanka. So all those clans you recruited aren't going anywhere unless you can protect the spacecraft coming in to take them places. If you don't play multiplayer missions there, enemies secure it allowing only half the Krogan soldiers to get off planet and help the Turians. Half the Krogan strength reaching Palaven means that more Turian fleet assets must compensate. So you only get half of what they could have otherwise given you.
160** The fighter base on Noveria serves a similar purpose - controlling it helps the owner get closer to control of all traffic between the Traverse, Veil and Citadel space. So unless you play multiplayer and secure the area, all those Quarian/Geth ships coming in from the Veil and all the Alliance forces you muster in the Hades clusters and Horizon have their numbers thinned.
161** The Fuel Reactor on Cyone - hold it or a lot of ships have insufficient fuel to jump to FTL and evade the Reapers. Pack thinned.
162** The Communications Array at Ontarom - hold it and you can coordinate your operations better. Fail to secure it and a lot of yahoos go off on their own in the absence of orders directing them otherwise and thin the pack more.
163** Benning - Hold it and thin enemy husk numbers further. Fail to and take losses due to increased enemy numbers.
164** Cerberus Lab on Sanctum - Hold it and gain vital insights and Intel on Reaper forces, allowing you to take them down easier. Fail to secure that Intel and waste more troops for a similar number of enemy kills.
165* You overhear Rupe Elkoss reacting to the woman saying that the Alliance and Turians are fighting for you by exclaiming "I'll send the Alliance a card. As for the hierarchy ... I pay my taxes!" And you think he is nothing more than an UngratefulBastard. But parse his statement and ItMakesSenseInContext. He is dismissive of the Alliance because technically they aren't his military. Would say a Norwegian fuss over American troops saying "Thank you for your service," sending care packages and buying "Support Our Troops" stickers? Or alternatively would an American similarly fuss over French pilots flying bombing missions to aid Libyan rebels in the same manner as American pilots? Only in a cursory manner, just like Elkoss. As for the Turian military, the Volus bankroll them in exchange for them protecting Vol territory. From his perspective, the entire Turian race is a big PrivateMilitaryContractor for his people. They are only doing what he goddamn well paid them for.
166* The final mission to Earth and over London is not quite a desperate ploy but is actually brilliant strategy. What is the objective? It isn't to win a conventional space battle, it's to somehow dock the Crucible onto the Citadel and then fire it. The Reapers have moved the Citadel over Earth because they are baiting the human fleets to come and recapture it and also take back Earth. They therefore expect a conventional space battle to be fought. Instead the fleet decides to forego that and just try to dock their new McGuffin for the InstantWinCondition. All they need to do is open the Citadel arms. So they split their forces and attack on two fronts. If the Reapers ignore Sword and Shield completely and focus on Hammer, someone from the ships' crews would be able to board the Citadel and open it. Ignore Hammer and focus on Sword and Shield and some soldiers just waltz up the conduit, open the Citadel arms and win. So the Reapers have to fight a two pronged attack. No problem [[WeHaveReserves they have numerical superiority, right?]] Yes they do, but this isn't a conventional engagement where the ground forces are expected to rout the enemy. Their objective is to get one person up the beam. Which is actually quite easy to do once the Hades Cannon and Reaper Destroyer have been dealt with. The mission on Tuchanka showed that a squad of three can outmaneuver a Reaper to just reach a location not once but twice. Here you have thousands trying to reach one location. That is why Harbinger shows up - it is trying to stop a MacrossMissileMassacre with a BeamSpam. But it still can't work. Using those beams is like trying to swat flies with a bazooka - you'll get many of them but not all of them. And that is proven in the end by the fact that Anderson made it up despite whatever happened to Shepard. And if you look at the Codex, you find that the Alliance focuses on fire support, flexibility, and speed with an emphasis on mobility and individual initiative. Alliance doctrine is focused on bypassing enemy strongpoints and launching deep strikes to cut supply lines and destroy headquarters and support units. The Reapers have no supply lines, no headquarters, no support units, and the one time you see them try to get past a strongpoint is the run to the Crucible beam - where you don't bypass it, you run straight at it, and 99% of the Hammer force gets wiped out.
167* During the [[StormingTheCastle retaking of the Normandy]] part of the Citadel DLC, Shepard grumbles about how the clone and the mercs are ignoring preflight checks and just gunning the engines to take off and go. When your squadmates say that the Normandy's engineers actually keep all systems well maintained, eliminating the need for so many preflight checks, it makes Shepard seem like some ObstructiveBureaucrat. In actuality though, [[ProperlyParanoid the complainer is absolutely right]] because any good pilot will tell you that you must scrupulously perform those checks before each and every takeoff to catch problems before getting airborne. Any space launch director will tell you the same thing - rather be paranoid and catch little problems before launch than for that problem to escalate during space flight. Added to that, the Normandy is a stealth ship. Even though the engines are perfectly running, even a little problem with their heat sink gives the ship's position away, making it a prime target behind Reaper lines. Furthermore the ship has a Reaper IFF - said IFF already went crazy once, disabled the ship's systems and let the crew be kidnapped. And Shepard lost a Normandy before. Being so paranoid about prelaunch checks makes a lot of sense now.
168* In the first game [[DemonicSpiders rachni]] fought primarily by spitting acid at you. In this game however, while the swarm ears still do toxic damage on colliding with you, they are only meant to be cover busters. The primary armament of huskified rachni is still a BFG. Why was their signature attack neutered like that? After learning the true motivations of the Reapers, you realize why. The Reapers want to harvest and preserve organic life, and spitting copious amounts of acid at an organic life form causes it to chemically break down. Something killed by a standard rachni acid attack would be unharvestable and unable to be preserved.
169* Upgrades to Tali's powers. In this game, all of Tali's abilities got significantly buffed. AI Hacking turned into sabotage, keeping the original hack but also bringing back the weapon overheat power from the first game. Combat Drone went from being just a ShockAndAwe weapon to one that fires incinerate attacks. Energy Drain went from being able to work on shields and synthetic health only to being able to work on biotic barriers too. Seeing a pattern here? Weapon fire, barriers and armor were serious weaknesses Tali had in the second game, practically turning her into a wall hugging joke against organic enemies including Husks and Collectors. Now she can actually be useful against both Reaper enemies and Cerberus. Looks like she did a lot of preparing between games.
170* Sededis calls Sayn a "weak willed toady." While we humans translate the word "toady" to mean a brown nosing suck up, Sederis most likely didn't pick up that bit of human slang. She might have intended to mean "frog" as a reference to Sayn's amphibian Salarian heritage but the translation worked a little too well.
171* A political take on the endings:
172** Destroy - This is what a libertarian with a dash of RousseauWasRight leanings would choose. Although civilization as we know it has been wrecked, we now have the freedom and free will to reconstruct it the way we choose, not the way it always was.
173** Control:
174*** Paragon - What a typical conservative leaning person would choose. Society needs an all powerful authority figure guiding everybody towards good. This might even have some hints of religiosity.
175*** Renegade - What a fascist leaning authoritarian might choose. HobbesWasRight and therefore society needs a strong dictator to curb our malevolence.
176** [[BodyHorror Synthesis]] - What a pacifist GranolaGirl type, communitarian, or a [[WarIsHell war weary]] Paragon might choose. Society will be much better if everybody lived as one and had that direct mental connection to each other. This also removes those stupid biological differences that forces people apart.
177** [[DownerEnding Refusal]] - What a social justice crusader type might choose. How we accomplish something is much more important than just accomplishing it. If winning requires that genocide be committed, subjugation to an omnipotent dictator or genetic rape, then I don't want to win like this. Find a way that benefits everybody.
178* The last enemy Shepard faces is a Marauder, a Reaper-controlled, cybernetic Turian. Who was Shepard's first enemy? Saren, a Reaper-controlled, cybernetic Turian.
179* The three squadmates you're ''guaranteed'' to have, even if you fuck everything else up spectacularly, are one pure tech (EDI), one pure combat (Vega) and one pure biotic (Liara). Meaning that no matter how disastrously everything goes, Shepard is always going to have someone with the most useful skillset on hand.
180* When you assault the Cerberus base you'll find a part of the human Reaper that has been salvaged for their own purposes (which then becomes a war asset): the brain if you preserved the collector base or the heart if you destroyed it. The brain is clearly their preferred choice as the illusive man intends to control the Reapers (and that is the only option at the end if your war assets are low enough). If the base was destroyed on the other hand, the heart was probably the only effective part of the Reaper that could be salvaged (the heart is one of the best protected parts of the human anatomy.
181** Why is the Reaper Brain slightly stronger than the Reaper Heart in terms of War Asset strength? Because the "brain" was used as a processor to run various complex computations, while the "heart" was just another power source. The computations performed gave the design some extra robustness to compensate for damage taken, while the heart just pumped in more power for the Catalyst to use.
182** It also serves as a stealth metaphor to your choice in 2, as in, you get the brain if you choose to use the Reaper tech, choice of cold and calculating cynic, and the heart if you choose to destroy it and prove yourself to be an idealist believing that organic life can persevere on its own without making deals with Devil.
183* The mass relay network and it's deeper significance
184** The catalyst is treating the Milky Way galaxy as a giant experiment in which it is toying with various sentient life forms. When some advance far enough, it reaps them. But why construct this mass relay network, maintain it, and even maintain a Citadel for all species to find and congregate at? The tactical reason is obvious - herd them into a few convenient places, where they can then be isolated and harvested. But then they also leave behind just enough remnants from previously reaped civilizations for newer species to eventually find. And it always seemed as though the knowledge of FTL travel would be made available just as a species was capable of interplanetary travel - we see this with the Batarians, humans and Elcor. Why make the knowledge of the relays, the Citadel etc. available at that exact epoch of a species' development? Why not for example, place such knowledge a few light years away? Talking to Leviathan and later on, the Catalyst reveals why. The Catalyst's primary objective is to prevent technological singularities, and to do that it must control how species evolve their technology. By making the relays available to them, most species scrub all other research into FTL propulsion, weapons, communications etc, relying on the mass effect fields for most of them. This way, the Catalyst ensures that no species independently evolves technology that might later on go rampant - by spoon feeding a solution and blinding people to alternate solutions.
185** This was explained directly by Sovereign back in the first game.
186---> '''Sovereign:''' [[AC:Your civilization is based on the technology of the mass relays; our technology. By using it, your society develops along the paths we desire.]]
187* There's always a lot of talk about the ending being a massive version of the dialogue wheel, but it's entirely possible that we're looking at it from the wrong way round/upside down: The destroy option is the persuade option, since you're trying to get the catalyst to come around to Shepard's way of thinking; the control option is intimidate, as Shepard decides that the only way to fix their problems is to force people in to taking their side; synthesis requires you to pick an option that requires greater questioning, but might lead to greater rewards (like the investigate tab on the dialogue wheel); finally refusal is like the neutral options from 1/2, since it's only chosen if you can't decide between the very morally aligned choices.
188** This idea is backed up by the fact that the persuade/intimidate choices in this analogy require you to make a Paragon/renegade choice in the previous game's ending respectively to get at the lowest EMS level.
189** Except the top right option is blue, and the bottom right option is red.
190* There has been some AlternativeCharacterInterpretation of Udina. Was he indoctrinated? Or just desperate? But why would he be so desperate as to send the Citadel fleet on a hopeless mission to liberate Earth, when Hackett and the Alliance have an effective strategy for combating the Reapers with the Crucible? And why does it this early in the game? Especially since you have secured Krogan, Turian and possibly even Salarian support for the Crucible? In the first game, he was presented as a political opportunist and SlaveToPR, while in the second game, he either abuses his position as councillor or is extremely jealous of Anderson for getting the council seat he coveted so much. Now in the third game, he has to sit and watch from the sidelines as Anderson and Hackett do all the work to save humanity. When everything is set and done, Hackett, Anderson and Shepard will be hailed as heroes and legends while he will be pilloried for his years of HeadInTheSandManagement. This ploy to send the Citadel fleet in to liberate Earth was him attempting to upstage Hackett and Anderson before his reputation really suffers. Then there is the fact that Osoba the ambassador is most likely the only other civilian political Alliance leader still left alive. Osoba could challenge Udina for political leadership later on, and he would already have much more public sympathy, having just lost his son to combat against Cerberus. Udina did this to safeguard his own political future.
191* Shepard's crack at [[spoiler: Clone!Shepard]] at the end of ''Citadel'' that "Conrad Verner is [[spoiler: better at being me than you are!"]] seems like just another way mock both the ''Citadel'' BigBad and [[HeroicWannabe Conrad.]] But it could very well be a genuine statement. Assuming he survives to Mass Effect 3, Conrad set up an orphanage for war orphans, and then spent all the money he had in order to ensure their safety. Then, at the end of his miniquest, he doesn't even hesitate to [[spoiler: [[TakingTheBullet take the shot]] meant for Shepard from the Cerberus contact.]] For all his idiocy, Conrad shows a remarkable amount of selflessness and willingness to help others, no matter how much it costs him. He's way more like Shepard than [[spoiler: the clone.]]
192* Doubles as fridge sadness but look at how Garrus acts towards a M!Shepard and a romanced Tali:
193---> '''Garrus:''' ''[Regarding M!Shep and Tali's flirting on the Geth dreadnought]'' I was ''there'' when you two had your thing, remember? [[GetARoom Just get a room and work it out.]]
194** and then at the Citadel DLC party:
195---> '''Garrus:''' This isn't a Tali-Shepard love nest, is it? I'd hate to be interrupting something you two might have been planning...
196** It almost seems like Garrus is jealous. Except, [[spoiler: seeing as how he and Tali end up in a relationship together at the end of the third game in the alternate scenario where Shepard doesn't romance Tali (or him),]] he is. And, although he tries to be a nice guy about it, his emotions show through.
197* The GoldenEnding of the Rannoch arc at first appears to be a blatant {{retcon}} of previous canon, with the Geth suddenly willing to make peace with the Quarians despite adopting a shoot-on-sight policy for all organics in the past 300 years, making any overtures at peace completely impossible even if the Quarians had been open to it (''Revelation'' even mentions that they massacred diplomats from neutral Council races). But this is actually subtly explained: at the beginning of their invasion, the Quarians blew up the Geth's Dyson Sphere. The one containing probably ''the majority of the Geth population,'' considering how huge it was, and therefore the population responsible for ''making'' the aforementioned shoot-on-sight policy. On top of this, we know that new Geth have been created since the Geth War, and Legion implies that those already uploaded into the Dyson Sphere were the older programs as opposed to newer ones- in other words, the very programs who participated in the original Geth War and the ones that probably detest organics to a far greater extent than the rest of their brethren. Destroying it would have basically caused the Geth equivalent of a large demographic shift via die-off of the old conservative population, leading to the more "evolved" and relatively open-minded Geth population becoming the majority.
198** The implication that the majority of the 'conservative' Geth population was contained in the Dyson Sphere explains why the decision to brainwash or destroy the Geth heretics is a major contributing factor to whether the GoldenEnding is possible. With the Geth thoroughly reduced in number, what used to be a relatively small minority (only one large space station's worth by the time Shepard gets to make the decision) could now potentially constitute a ''major'' part of their overall population. And of course, the faction of the Geth that sided with the Reapers and attempted to facilitate the extermination of all sapient life in the galaxy would be 100% against any type of peace with organics, making the overall Geth consensus much less open to that option as a result. But if Shepard simply destroys them, the remaining fraction of the Geth population remains relatively uncontaminated and open to peace.
199* How the heck did the Reapers go from "protect organic life" to "kill 'em all"? That doesn't make sense, right? Except it does -- Leviathan programmed the Reapers to "protect" life, but because of the limitations of programming vocabulary, the programming was executed as "preserve life" instead of "protect it." Not because of a glitch, but because ''Leviathan wasn't anal enough in how they programmed the Reapers'', leaving the Reapers free to "preserve" organics by making them ''live forever as a Reaper''. Technically, they're fulfilling their purpose!
200** To start off -- where English has four or five words, other languages might only have one or even less. For example, Spanish and English. In English, "I'll meet you at the theatre" has a different meaning to "in the theatre" and "by the theatre" and "on (top of) the theatre." But Spanish, you could only say "en el teatro" -- where "en" could mean in, or, at, or by, because that one word means ''all of those''.
201** "Preserve" and "protect" are the cincher, here -- Leviathan makes it clear that their intention was to ''protect'' organic life, but that could just be telepathy making it easy. Meanwhile, the Reapers repeatedly state their goal was to ''preserve'' it. In English, those are two very different words. To "preserve" something is to keep it in a certain state indefinitely. To "protect" something means to keep something safe.
202** But look at how those two words overlap in meaning -- to protect something doesn't just mean to keep something safe, it means "to preserve the state of something" -- when you protect someone, you're preserving their safety. There are places where both those words can be used interchangeably.
203** The fridge brilliance is this -- the Reapers didn't glitch out, they were programmed to "preserve the state of organics," and their programming was so vague that the Reapers interpreted this to mean "''stick organics in a Reaper so they can live forever.''"
204** No need to dig into the meaning of the words to understand why Reapers started reaping, actually. Their creators gave them very specific purpose: protect organic life from total destruction by synthetics, while not specifying that specific species have to keep existing. Enter the ZerothLawRebellion as the simplest solution, where Reapers place continuous existence of all organic life above existence of species that evolved enough to attempt the creation of synthetics. They don't reap all the races in the galaxy, just the most advanced, and let others live until the next cycle, thus protecting the organic life as their creators programmed them to, something which Leviathan themself admitted - just at the cost of some of the species.
205* In Citadel, how do the [=CAT6=] mercenaries know Garrus used to be Archangel? Simple - TheManBehindTheMan was in charge of maintaining the dossiers for Shepard's team in the second game, for a mission that could determine the fate of humanity. Naturally, the Illusive Man would keep his planning team well-informed regarding the team's composition, skills and talents - that way, weaknesses in the lineup can be patched and the overall arrangement strengthened. And thus, they can be bribed with minor and insignificant details to make them think they are uniquely well-informed, but which won't meaningfully impact their role as cannon fodder.
206* TheReveal of Brooks being the one who authored the various squadmates' dossiers in the second game, also explains a marked difference between your squadmates recruited pre-Horizon and post Horizon. The first batch are [[SociopathicSoldier Zaeed]], [[ClassyCatBurglar Kasumi]], [[TykeBomb Jack]], [[DesignerBabies Miranda]], [[MilitaryMaverick Jacob]], [[VigilanteMan Archangel]], [[DeadlyDoctor Mordin]] and [[OldSoldier Okeer]]. Note that the majority of these people are humans, Archangel's identity is initially unknown, leaving open the very slight possibility of him being a human as well, and two alien scientists, one of whom Shepard actually intends to turn over to Cerberus interrogators (Okeer). This makes sense, due to Brooks' complaint about breaking with the Illusive man over Cerberus working with aliens. Recruiting Garrus, Mordin and activating Grunt, was most likely what convinced her that Shepard and TIM weren't racist enough for Brooks. So, what does she do? She develops dossiers for Tali, who loathes Cerberus over the events of Literature/MassEffectAscension and may not be inclined to cooperate with Shepard, Samara the [[ThePaladin justicar]] whose rigid code could also turn her against Shepard, and Thane [[YouSeeImDying who is dying,]] a fact was conveniently omitted from the dossier, but is apparently well known enough that the Shadow Broker found out about it. In summary, this second batch of squadmates might be especially problematic for Shepard. This was Brooks saying to them "You want to work with those damned aliens? ''Fine!!'' Let's see you work with this group!"
207* Mordin leaves behind a library of recordings that get delivered to you at some point during the Citadel party or its aftermath, ending with a verse of AmazingFreakingGrace. Whilst it's a very moving little moment why would he choose to sing a hymn, especially one so closely associated with death? Well in the second game it was revealed that Mordin was in the middle of a major crisis of conscience and had turned to studying the religions of many different cultures in a search for solace. He didn't find it [[spoiler: until he sacrificed his life to undo the Genophage and give the Krogan a second chance, so when he finally found solace, it was in the moment of his death]]. It's probable that the lyrics to Amazing Grace were amongst the things his research into alien religion turned up, and they may have touched him in a way that he found appealing. He also suspected he wasn't coming back from Tuchanka when he assembled the recordings for Shepard, so it actually makes perfect sense that he would finish on that song.
208** He ends with this song even if you convinced him to not fix the shroud sabotage, fake his death and work on the Crucible. In this instance, he is hoping that his Crucible work is his absolution instead of a genophage cure. Because he understands at this point, that even the “genophage cure” was only a means to an end - it was needed to secure Krogan aid for Palaven, so that Turian fleets and engineers could be taken from the defense of Palaven to build, protect and deploy the Crucible. Mordin also had somewhat of an inkling of the sheer destructive ability of the Crucible and probably anticipates that Shepard may not survive its activation, so that song is also for Shepard.
209** The song's significance has another layer [[spoiler: if Mordin did sacrifice himself to deliver the cure]]. Given Mordin's love of research, he likely knew that the composer of Amazing Grace, John Newton, was famously a former slave trader whose religious conversion led him to become a fervent abolitionist. As a man whose most significant achievement was contributing to genocide and who later came to realize his mistake and dedicate himself to rectifying his mistake, it's easy to imagine Mordin felt a certain amount of kinship with Newton.
210* On Sur'Kesh, Kirrahe uses an exploding-gel pistol to take out several Cerberus guards, causing Garrus to ask, "How do ''I'' not have one of those?" He can ask this even on a NewGamePlus, where you might already have that pistol (because you first find it later in that mission). But, even then, his statement is still accurate. Why? ''He can't be equipped with pistols, only assault and sniper rifles''. He's probably regretting that decision right about now...
211* When you think about it, Admiral Anderson is the '''ideal''' man to lead LaResistance on Earth. The only option in that scenario is to fight a losing conventional defensive war or fight a guerilla war. Yes, anyone with commando training can lead a guerilla war, but they would only be able to do so at an extremely local level. Someone still needs to take care of big picture strategy and organization leadership, so that personnel are recruited and motivated, intelligence is collected, operations are planned and coordinated, and all operators are supplied properly. A major or colonel can't do this at a planetary level - you need a general. However, most generals only know how to fight a straight up conventional infantry war, which in this instance is a losing proposition. Only a general trained in unconventional warfare and spec ops can coordinate a planetary guerilla war. And Anderson is an Admiral (equivalent of a general) who is also N7.
212* If you manage to bring peace between the Quarians and Geth, you can talk to Garrus, and after mentioning how Shepard is a 'Peacemaker' by bringing together not just the Quarians and Geth, but also the Turians and Krogan, he says "Now, if you can pacify the Reapers, we'll make you a saint." Even if Garrus meant it as a joke, think about it: [[spoiler: what do you call the (Paragon) Control or Synthesis Endings, then?]]
213* After storming Cronos Station, what is the final star system you can visit before launching the all-out assault on Earth? A small, lonely little star system named ''Pax'', Latin for "peace," which is what Shepard ultimately ushers in, one way or another.
214* Why Kalros wins so easily against the Reaper Destroyer? Easy, the Reapers are designed to hold agaisnt ''tecnological firepower'', so they're unprepared against physical force. In fact, it's likely [[DidntThinkThisThrough that they never expected]] [[TakeAThirdOption that someone was going to launch a Thresher Maw against them.]]
215* "I Was Lost Without You" on the soundtrack, it's the romance theme and you have to find and save your squad members in the game, they are the ones who are lost without you.
216* If you look closely at it, none of the ending options are necessarily full losses for the Reapers or Catalyst. Destroy? Sure they all get destroyed but they also take all the other Synthetics with them, putting a pin (however temporary) in that problem. Control ending? Well, sure they're original boss has been supplanted by their (im)mortal enemy (or an AI copy at least) but at least they're alive. Synthesis? The Reapers still technically get to stick around, albeit as part of something else (or whatever the heck happens in Synthesis). And of course, if you Refuse they just get to destroy everything and then the next galactic society picks one of those choices. It's also possible that the Destroy choice does double duty as a deterrent. Maybe it could just out-and-out destroy the Reapers but it figured that if it also destroyed all other Synthetics there was a chance (not a guarantee but a chance) Shepard wouldn't go for it.
217* When asked in the first game why she doesn't trust aliens, Ashley says that she believes that if the chips are down, every species is ultimately willing to sacrifice its allies to save itself, likening it to a human who gets attacked by a bear and escapes by siccing their dog on it and running away while the bear is killing the dog. Come this game, two of the original three council races do exactly that:
218** When Shepard asks the council to help defend earth, the Asari councilor outright admits that time the Reapers spend massacring humans is time her people can use to better prepare for the defense of Thessia.
219** The Salarian dalatrass comes up with the idea of giving the Krogan a fake genophage cure to trick them into fighting on the front lines against the Reapers. Since the whole reason the genophage ended the Krogan Rebellions is because their approach to full-scale war is to rely on their incredibly fast reproduction to enable WeHaveReserves tactics, that would basically guarantee that they'd unknowingly drive themselves to extinction.
220* Ever wonder how Khalisah, a civilian reporter is able to dodge Shepard's punch even though s/he never punched her in the first place? That's because the Citadel DLC reveals that she had participated in the Armax Arsenal and has attained quite a body count, and even managed to reach a spot within the Top 10 High Scores. It's likely that getting punched by a Krogan, and kicked by a ''Volus'' likely inspired her to take a combat training just so she can be prepared in case someone attempts to hit her in the event she decides to do an interview.
221* Achieving peace during the Geth-Quarian war has many requirements, the biggest of which is the completion of 4 missions: Tali and Legion's loyalty missions in 2, and the rescue of Admiral Koris and disabling of Geth Fighter Squadrons in 3. This has both practical and philosophical applications. In order to achieve peace, Tali must remain within the fleet and be promoted to Admiral in order for her voice to be heard, the rogue Geth faction must be dealt with one way or another, and both the Admiral in charge of the civilian fleets must be rescued and a battalion wiped out in order to prevent the slaughter of innocents and add a voice (Koris) to those in favor of peace. Philosophically speaking, 2 of these missions present the perspective of the Quarians (the oppressive reality of their lives on the fleet and the brutality of their loss of life to an unsurmountable loss of life while trying to reclaim the one place they can live without constant fear of horrible death via sickness) and 2 of these present the Geth perspective (the reality of a rogue faction ruining the chances of ending war and the heartbreaking history of a species gaining sentience and immediately being culled by their creators). Compromise can only truly be achieved by fully understanding both sides. Legion is aware of this, as it outright tells Shepard that peace would only be possible if they can trust the Quarians to back down. Without Shepard and Tali getting the full experience, Legion has no reason to trust organics.
222* Kalros' presence in Tuchanka explains why the Krogan's birth rate is so exagerated. While Tuchanka being a DeathWorld conditioned the Krogan's physical evolution to allowed them to survive, Kalros' [[{{Kaiju}} size]] and territorial instincts forces the Krogan to have a disproportionated birth rate to avoid extinction by being eaten in masse by her.
223[[/folder]]
224
225[[folder:Fridge Horror]]
226* Trailer:
227** Big Ben says, "Two million dead in the first day." That's two million dead, but in ''VideoGame/MassEffect2'', the Reapers want humans alive. How many have they already captured? How many have they indoctrinated? And how many have been [[FateWorseThanDeath turned into gray goo for Human-Reaper material]]?
228** The trailer shows eight Reapers in London. ''Just'' London. How many are actually on Earth?
229** That number probably just the death toll in ''London''. Who knows how much Earth's total is.
230** The "two million dead" probably include those who have been captured to be processed or turned into husks. They're as good as dead anyway...
231* Ironically one set up by the game series itself: In ''Mass Effect 2'', you can come across a group of servicemen talking about how, since there is no friction in a vacuum, rounds fired in space will keep going until they hit ''something''. They specifically say, "It could be a ship, or the planet ''behind'' the ship." Cut to the final battle in ''Mass Effect 3'', where the entire allied fleet unloads thousands of rounds on the Reaper fleet assembled in front of Earth. Many of those shots can be seen passing through the Reaper formation. Basically, they're pulverizing one side of planet Earth with thousands of rounds that we are told each have the power of a nuclear weapon.
232** Earth diameter is around 12,000 km, her orbit around 300,000,000. And the fleet made jump to pluton orbit, which is around 5,250,000,000 km from Earth. Space is really fucking HUGE. Lets say the odds aren't that bad.
233* Regardless of which ending you get in ''Mass Effect 3'', [[spoiler:the destruction of the mass relays means galactic civilization is over, any colony that relies on trade or transport for survival is screwed, and every Turian, Krogan, Asari, Salarian, Quarian, and Geth who joined your fleet is pretty much stuck in the Sol system. For most of these races, it wouldn't be ''that'' bad; they likely brought soldiers of both gender (where applicable) into the fight, and can probably sustain a population. However, it's unlikely that the Krogan brought any fertile females with them (aside from Eve, if she survived), so despite their long lives, they're ultimately doomed.]]
234** With FTL drive, it's not as bad as it sounds. Current technology allows ships to travel 5,000 times the speed of light. The Milky Way galaxy is roughly 100,000 light-years across. Even [[spoiler:with the mass relays destroyed]], it's a 20-year trip from one end of the galaxy to the other. [[spoiler:Commerce is done for, but at least all those stranded aliens will get to see home again.]]
235** But some Salarians won't, neither will the vorcha.
236** [[spoiler:The Protheans were able to create their own prototype mass relay, which still exists on Ilos. We can't know for sure, but logic dictates that at some point after its discovery, it was thoroughly studied by top scientific minds to figure out how it worked. Galactic society and commerce are in shambles, yes, but then you recall that not long before the events of these games, quantum entanglement communication was invented, which allowed users to bypass the use of mass relays for long-distance communications. This suggests that even though it'll likely take years or decades, the framework of galactic society will ultimately be rebuilt without Reaper technology.]]
237** [[spoiler:The Turians and Quarians are in trouble because of their dependency on dextro food, something that isn't naturally found in the Sol system]].
238*** [[spoiler:Not necessarily. Quarians require a hermetically sealed environment, and ''Mass Effect 2'' had you on a garden ship. They likely grow their own food aboard the vessels, which can be shared with the Turians.]]
239** Oh, and [[spoiler:Jacob]]'s never going to see his child. Cheers!
240** [[spoiler:Either Tali and Garrus will starve to death because they can't eat the same food as the rest of the crew, or the rest of the crew will starve, leaving them alone.]] And Javik [[spoiler:will never get to mark the graves of his team and lay them to rest, and will probably just end up killing himself]].
241** [[spoiler:There isn't much hope for the humans, either; Joker probably won't last long with his disease, and the crew isn't even remotely large enough to uphold a genetically diverse population. Even if the homosexual crewmembers were forced to procreate, too, it will only be a few generations before their descendants will have to resort to inbreeding.]]
242*** BUT, [[spoiler:if you chose the Synthesis ending, a lot of that may be a non-issue. After all, EDI doesn't need to eat, and if everyone is now essentially singularitized, merging the the best of machine and organic, Joker may not even HAVE Vrolik syndrome anymore, since, when have you ever heard of a machine having brittle bones?]]
243** Spoilers for Extended Cut. [[spoiler:The Extended Cut versions of the endings essentially remove most of this FridgeHorror, particularly in the Synthesis ending, where the Reapers remain, ."..helping to rebuild. Where once they threatened us with extinction, they now bring the collective knowledge of the cultures that came before." In Control, Shepard-Reaper promises to use the Reapers to guard life and help it grow, under its watchful eye. But even in Destroy, things are largely hopeful. Admiral Hackett explains that though they suffered heavy losses and that the relays are "''severely damaged''," they have won. He claims they can rebuild all they have lost, even showing an image of the Citadel rebuilt. Also, in all the High-EMS endings (except for the new "Refusal" ending), there are images of all the various surviving species, living and thriving on their own worlds, confirming, if not exactly explaining how, that they all return home. And lastly, the ''Normandy'' is also shown leaving the garden world, apparently after repairing the ship. All the surviving crewmembers are alive and healthy-looking. Have a low EMS, however, and things start to go very wrong very fast.]]
244* In the epilogue of the game, we have [[spoiler:the Stargazer apparently reciting the tale of Commander Shepard to a child on some alien planet]], as in the plot of the ''entire series''. So if the entire series is told from this perspective, does that mean [[spoiler:the Stargazer]] left ''nothing'' out? So s/he told a young child about the genocidal space racists, the grisly Collector abductions, the horrific Reaper War, Cerberus's biotic death camps, the [[spoiler:Cerberus facility on Horizon]], the murderous sexual predator[=/=]SerialKiller Ardat-Yakshi, and the intimate details of Commander Shepard's [[RomanceSidequest sex life]]? Someone get that kid to a counselor soon.
245** Sexual bits aside, kids tend to enjoy violence in stories too -- as Terry Pratchett said "so long as the right blood is being spilled."
246* Every organic species is affected by synthesis, which would mean that animals and even plant life would be affected, meaning that our entire food supply is now partially synthetic. Another point is that even some of what we breathe is synthetic.
247** YMMV on whether there's any horror to that. Some would simply think "huh. neat." and then go about their day. It might even be a good thing, as there are now thousands of new doors opening up in all sorts of places. Different organisms will likely evolve to make use of their synthetic bits in different ways (imagine the descendants of the Krogan going on a safari to fight a descendant of the thresher maws that evolved lasers in it's shoulders, while riding descendants of varren that evolved hover jets), or imagine all the new cooking recipes designed around new synthetic ingredients and the new synthetic taste buts in your mouth.
248* While trying to get the Krogan to aid the Turians, you can overhear a Turian and Asari couple talking about his deployment in the docking bay. Very heartfelt and sweet... [[spoiler: until the very end of their conversation, when he urges her to take herself and their daughters to Sanctuary.]] Cut to the events on Horizon...
249** This is made even more horrific when you count the number of Banshees you face on Horizon...
250* In addition to this, if you listen to what the Turian husband tells his wife about what he's going to be doing while his wife and kids are away--repairing engineering equipment on one of Palaven's moons (remember that this is BEFORE the "Miracle at Palaven" happens) so chances are he was either killed by the Husks or turned into a Marauder.
251* In ''VideoGame/MassEffect3'', a conversation between two Asari, one a shell-shocked commando, can be heard. Repeated visits reveal the commando to have been a survivor of a Reaper attack on a farm on a planet called Tiptree. She had been escaping husks and other Reaper-converted monsters with a fifteen year-old girl named Hillary in tow. Eventually, Hillary became injured and would not stop crying, endangering them both. Unable to silence her, the commando, in desperation, ultimately shot the girl. This is pretty bad in itself... [[spoiler:and you later learn that Joker has family on Tiptree. He hasn't heard from his father, but he's pretty sure that his fifteen-year-old sister, Hillary, made it off safely.]]
252* In the same vein as the above two, in the Citadel Embassies you can overhear a human woman who's about to be deployed into combat arguing with an Asari embassy worker. The human is married to an Asari commando who's already been deployed to combat; they have a daughter together and she's trying to get her sent to Thessia to her wife's family so she won't be alone while both of her parents are out fighting. She can't send the girl to her own family because they've disowned her for marrying an alien. Later, the embassy worker surprises the woman with the great news that her daughter's transfer has been approved; she stayed up nights and pulled a lot of favors to make it happen, but the little girl will be safe on Thessia now.[[spoiler: Then the Reapers set Thessia on fire.]]
253* Biggest one of all, really; [[spoiler:Towards the end, the Reapers capture the Citadel and bring it to Earth to use as a Reaper factory for the humans they're reaping down on Earth. Presumably, everyone on the Citadel at the time was horrendously killed. Everyone you performed menial jobs for, everyone you helped. Everyone who's sad stories you overheard. All of them, dead.]]
254** You can see [[spoiler:cars moving around inside the wards, and the wards seem otherwise undamaged. The Reapers probably just took the immediate control systems and left the rest of the Citadel's population alone rather than waste resources taking the entire Citadel when they knew they'd be fighting the combined armies and navies of the entire galaxy]].
255** It has also been stated by one of the developers on Twitter that some of the population managed to escape the Citadel before the arms closed.
256* Just in case you needed any more proof that TIM is a bastard, listen to this: Dr. Eva (the robot EDI takes the body of in the third game) from is named after [[http://masseffect.wikia.com/wiki/Eva_Corandeacute; another character of the same name]] from the expanded universe, and it's implied that TIM was interested in her romantically. So, he made a robot that he gave the same name and designed her to be completely loyal to him and not be able to think for herself. Ew. The one comforting thing is that EDI seems to indicate that her body wasn't designed to be able to do anything sexual, but still.
257** Of course, then [=BioWare=] released the alternate EDI skin with [[https://www.giantbomb.com/mass-effect-3/3030-29935/forums/i-want-to-enjoy-mass-effect-but-this-keeps-coming--538503/ anatomically correct qualities]] ...
258* Whichever way you slice them, each of the endings qualify especially [[spoiler:when you take into account the destruction of the mass relays. Mass effect tech in general ''isn't'' destroyed if the Crucible is built and defended properly, so everyone probably still has FTL. The problem is that without the mass relays, there's no fast way to cross the galaxy. Everyone who came to aid you in the final battle, if they weren't killed, are now facing a ''decades-long'' trip back home at the very ''least''. More likely, they're trapped in the Orion Arm, as those big gaps you see on the galaxy map are ''much'' further than any ship can make without a drive discharge. And no other species has a homeworld in the arm. The same goes for the Krogan left to deal with remaining Reaper forces on Palaven. Hell, most ''homeworlds'' have almost NO planets within drive range.]] Goddamn you, [=BioWare=].
259** [[spoiler:Worse still, with all options for Shepard inevitably leading to this nightmarish scenario, this leads to one unthinkable conclusion: for all of Cerberus's crimes against humanity, all the liquefied and husked humans, all the massacred innocents... the Illusive Man was RIGHT. He had the ONLY viable solution, and Shepard KILLED HIM. Once all that despair sinks in, all this hopeless struggle suddenly surfacing inside your mind for what it is... the most horrible options suddenly seem a small price to pay for a fighting chance. [[TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou Is this what indoctrination feels like?]] Is that what Saren felt all those years ago when he joined the Geth, killed Nihlus, and went rogue?]]
260** [[spoiler:Even worse are the implications from just who is left behind (assuming you got the optimum from your choices in-game). The Quarians just regained their homeworld (possibly peacefully with the Geth) and now have no way to get back to it. If you talk to Tali, it makes it worse when you learn that the Geth are helping them acclimate back to Rannoch's atmosphere and now have no way to get back. Almost all the Turians and most of the Asari now have no way to repair their ailing homeworlds. Arguably the Krogan get off the best because even though Wrex is stuck on Earth, "Eve" is still on Tuchanka (assuming she survives). Plus, on a personal note, Tali (who was so happy to finally be on Rannoch) is stuck on another planet (I think; clear me up with this if the ending implies the ''Normandy'' is back on Earth) that doesn't even have civilization to give the hope of interstellar space travel in the future. What the fuck?!]]
261** [[spoiler:The Extended Cut retcons this so that the relays were just damaged, not destroyed, and can be repaired.]]
262* Even if you didn't [[spoiler:give the Collector base to Cerberus]] in ''Mass Effect 2'', in ''Mass Effect 3'' a good bit of allied chatter consists of disbelief about the technological leaps Cerberus has taken. But for players who did all of the side quests in ''Mass Effect 2'', much of their time was previously helping scientists, investigating monuments and crashed ships, and finding Prothean Artifacts. [[NiceJobBreakingItHero Cerberus didn't take an arbitrary leap in six months, SHEPARD made them more powerful because of all the tech, data, and Mordin's research upgrades!]] Shepard built his own headache – no wonder the Illusive Man doesn't care he quit!
263** It's also explained late in ''3'' that [[spoiler:Cerberus went through the Omega 4 relay after the suicide mission to pick up the pieces of the base and were apparently able to recover almost all of the Reaper larva. So, blowing up the base was meaningless outside of giving TIM a massive middle finger.]]
264* In ''[=ME2=]'' during Tali's mission on the ''Alarei'', there is a log of a Quarian's last few seconds before she's killed by the Geth. She says, "Jona, if you get this, be strong for Daddy." Cut to Rannoch in ''[=ME3=]'' as the Quarians attempt to retake their home. A dying male Quarian leaves a final message: "My son, tell him... tell Jona his father made it to the homeworld."
265* What happens to Jack and the Grissom Academy students if you don't do the mission in time. It's bad enough on the surface--having to listen to Jack, tied down, ''tortured'', in the hands of sadistic Cerberus scientists ''again''. It's worse because you can literally hear the pleasure in the voice of the "scientist" torturing her; he's almost purring with satisfaction while she desperately tries to cling to her recently regained humanity by refusing to let him get away with calling her "Subject Zero" again. (Which takes the horror up to eleven when you meet her as a Phantom; she'd just been starting to feel human again, and to turn her into ''that''...) But the worst part is that it soon becomes clear that ''they were hurting her for no reason''. They didn't bother indoctrinating her, they weren't even asking her any questions. Cerberus was torturing her because they could, right when she'd finally found people who loved and respected her and made her feel ''safe''.
266** Remember all those sweet, kinda-nervous teenagers? The ones who looked up to Jack like she was a goddess, who stayed behind to train so they could help with the war effort? The ones who made tentative date plans, who had been flagged as having excellent leadership skills, who begged not to have to seek cover because their sister was still in danger? Rodriguez, who was always scared of Cerberus but flourished under Jack's careful attention and encouragement? Yeah. Cerberus captured and experimented on them, and then turned them into husks.
267** Even ''that'' may not be the worst of it. As has been mentioned, Jack was just barely starting to form normal relationships--friendships or even romances with Shepard and the crew of the Normandy, a genuine camaraderie with Kahlee Sanders, even a [[VitriolicBestBuds peace of sorts]] with Miranda of all people. But more than anything, she ''loved'' her students with the fire of a thousand burning suns. She was the only instructor who was both willing and able to rip her way through Cerberus troops with sheer willpower, gather the surviving students together, and fight to the death to keep them safe. If you don't save Grissom, she watched every single one of those students dragged off by the same people who tortured her for years at Pragia.
268*** Think for a moment about how Jack [[HeroicBSOD reacted]] when she thought she was going to be [[FateWorseThanDeath captured by Cerberus again]] in ''VideoGame/MassEffect2''; it was the only real time we've ever seen her ''terrified;'' she was almost crying. And that was when she was still full of nothing but anger and rage and hatred and believed that everyone in the galaxy was ultimately greedy and cruel. Now imagine [[DespairEventHorizon the look on her face]] when, having finally found somewhere she belongs and feels loved and worthwhile, she realized she wasn't going to be able to keep sadistic Cerberus operatives away from [[MamaBear her kids]]. Imagine her reaction when they dragged them away screaming like the students you see in the Grissom mission proper, and she couldn't save them. ''Yeah''.
269** Her connection to her kids is obvious enough that the Cerberus bastards taunt her about them, ''just to watch her break''.
270* When you look at Aria's War Assets, it turns out the Council was not kidding about war with the Terminus systems. Adding some Terminus assets in Council Space, this would have indeed gotten extremely messy and would have fallen into the Reaper's plans by dividing both political entities. Saren hoped they would start a war in hopes of weakening both sides even more. In other words, it was a XanatosGambit by Saren, do nothing and the Reapers invade, do something and both sides will be too worn out to resist the Reapers.
271* A blink-and-you'll-miss-it bit in VideoGame/MassEffect3. At one point, Dr Chakwas and Engineer Adams are arguing over whether artificial intelligences can truly be considered "alive." While pointing out that nature can be pretty brutal, Adams says "Lions ate their prey alive." ''Ate'', in the past tense, implying that lions do not exist anymore (or at least, only exist in zoos where they would be provided with already-dead food). And if something as major as lions (which you'd assume would attract a lot of conservation efforts,) have been allowed to go extinct, what the hell has happened to the rest of Earth's animals?
272* If Shepard does not stop the indoctrinated hanar from shutting down the defense systems of its homeworld on one of the side-quests, you read that the Reapers pretty much completely destroy their homeworld...that also had ''all'' of the drell survivors from Rakhana living on it!
273* After [[spoiler:the Cerberus attack on the Citadel]], two Alliance Marines are standing in the waiting area of the docking bay discussing deployment orders and battle tactics against Cerberus troops. One of the Marines, Private Talavi, begs the other, who is her squad leader, to be reassigned to fight Reaper Husks instead. Talavi explains that her little brother recently joined Cerberus out of spite for her and the Alliance. At a certain point in the game, you hear of a Cerberus trooper whose name is Talavi....
274* The end of Ardat-Yakshi Monastery mission. [[spoiler:If Shepard does not stop Samara, then Shepard has the choice of either leaving Falere (who just lost both her sister and mother) alone at the monastery with her vow that she won't be turned into a Banshee when the Reapers return (meaning she would kill herself) or killing her personally to keep the same thing from happening...]]
275* The debris surrounding Rannoch were probably the remains of the Geth [[spoiler:Dyson Sphere which the Geth had started to upload themselves to so they could happily exist as one meaning that the Quarian fleet effectively destroyed everything the Geth had hoped and aspired to do. A bit of Fridge Brilliance as it shows why the Geth were willing to turn to the Reapers]].
276* ANN gives an interview with a Batarian soldier who mentions the fact that they are not warned when a Banshee is near them. This invokes horror because of what Banshees can do and because of what the Batarians did and were like in order to justify not warning them when what could only be described as a walking mind rape with claws is behind them.
277* A case of romance related FridgeHorror/Fringe Sadness from the DLC is a Fem!Shep who romanced Thane encountering [[spoiler: his ''ghost'']] after the party before she boards the ''Normandy''. Now it's claimed beforehand that [[spoiler:ghosts]] don't exist, which means that either they're unknowingly wrong or that Shepard, otherwise known as the galaxy's ''only'' hope to fight against the Reapers, is ''probably'' hallucinating and talking to the imaginary phantom of [[spoiler:her dead lover]]. If the latter, then yeah, [[SarcasmMode great news to know that the hero of the galaxy is in such good mental condition]].
278*** Or Fem!Shep is just thinking about what [[spoiler:he]] would say if [[spoiler:he]] were there with her. It's not all that uncommon a coping method, and for her, [[spoiler:he]] would be the only missing piece of an otherwise perfect party.
279* Another bit from the Citadel DLC that branches into Fridge Sadness territory; if the player romanced Tali, she serenades Shepard with a number from the ''Fleet and Flotilla'' musical during their date night. "Let the moon's shining light / hide two lovers with its rays / though I know that dawn will set / us on course for separate ways." Depending on when the cutscene is triggered (and considering just what awaits them on Earth), the song couldn't be more appropriate.
280* There's a small detail for a loading screen when aboard the Normandy that show [[http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7112/7621328218_c879ff526c_z.jpg Shepard's Private Terminal in his/her quarters]]; on a stack of files is what appears to be a Cerberus storage device, which Shepard presumably took with them after [[spoiler: giving the Illusive Man the metaphorical bird at the end of 2]]. It has a striking similarity to the coffins seen early in the Overlord DLC and [[spoiler: at the end of the game for any dead squadmates]]. Either Cerberus based their coffin designs from their flash drives, or they provide flash drives that look like their coffins.
281** This also brings up the realization that [[spoiler:dead squadmates who hated Cerberus such as Tali are buried in Cerberus-branded coffins]].
282** Even worse, Cerberus raids the Collector base during the six months between the second and third game regardless of how intact you left it. Anyone you left behind will end up in a Cerberus lab being dissected.
283* Seeing Liara meet her father for the first time can be heartwarming at first, until they mention [[spoiler:that she didn't know Benezia was innocent and ended up dying as a hero, meaning that she, and all of the other innocent people indoctrinated, have been remembered as evil. Made even worse by the fact that Saren, (who while not evil still had no regard for innocent lives) gets a gold statue of himself after his death, and no-one thinks it's offensive.]]
284** [[spoiler:The people at that party were all involved in organized crime, they also thought what they did was for the 'Greater good'. A person like Saren who kills people indiscriminately to achieve his goal was probably a hero to them.]]
285* Citadel DLC related; [[spoiler: Clone Shepard and Brooks along with their minions have boarded the Normandy, shut down EDI's A.I. core, and started tearing shit up inside and are planning on making off with the ship. If you bring EDI along, she's furious at the disrespect being shown to her "body" and states her clear intention to kill everyone responsible. If EDI truly considers the Normandy to be her body, then Clone Shepard and the [=CAT6=] mercs are, for all intents and purposes, ''raping her'' as part of their evil plan. On the brighter side, her growing care and love towards Joker also alludes the fact that he is the only one who can control the ship, like giving her consent to him.]]
286* Banshees are horrifying enough already, both in-universe and in [[BossInMookClothing real life]], but they get worse with a moment's thought. Banshees are the Husks of Ardat-Yakshis. Ardat-Yakshis instantly kill anyone with whom they [[BizarreAlienReproduction mate]]. Banshees have a OneHitKill attack. Remember all those times you used the phrase "getting raped" to describe a videogame CurbStompBattle? Yeah, you probably won't be doing that anymore.
287* In the beginning, we can see a Systems Alliance Dreadnought hovering just a few hundred meters off the ground getting blown up by a Reaper. Considering the likely size of its Element Zero core and what codex-savvy players already know about the [[BodyHorror effects of prenatal eezo exposure]], the battles over the skies of Earth may cause more damage and anguish than immediately obvious.
288* [[spoiler:The Catalyst describes Synthesis as 'combining organic and synthetic life, with the strengths of both and the weaknesses of neither.' Who else said that? [[VideoGame/MassEffect1 Saren?]] Yes, if you chose synthesis, then all the work you did for the past three years was in vain: '''you just accomplished the Reaper's goals for them within the space of a few seconds.''']]
289** [[spoiler:Possibly. Saren's stated (conscious) goals seemed dissimilar to those of the Reapers (his unconscious goals), and he wanted to make organics ''useful'' to the Reapers through the blending, not to subvert the Reapers' reason to exist through synthesis (the motive seemed as important as the means). Remember, TIM desired control of the Reapers despite his deep indoctrination right up until the bullet, and this was an option they were not terribly keen on whether TIM or Shepard was the new controller, according to the Catalyst. An indoctrinated person likely finds themselves working against their higher order thoughts if they're introspective enough to perceive the effects, such as Benezia. Their desires still exist in lower (not a gibbering husk) levels of indoctrination, and those still tend to form the rationalizations for the things they do. Unfortunately, we'll only really know if Shepard was indoctrinated and working towards the Reapers' goals when there's a sequel that broaches the subject of the Reapers' fate, and Bioware then stands by the extended endings. The possibility was certainly there in the earlier drafts of ''Mass Effect 3'''s conclusion, and the dream sequences and Earth kid seem to imply the early stages of indoctrination. Which leads to the ultimate fridge horror: not knowing whether or not you were indoctrinated.]]
290* [[spoiler:This bit of fridge horror hit me recently about the Destroy ending. It is established in ''VideoGame/MassEffect2'' that a Reaper doesn't stop indoctrinating people and trying to further its agenda just because it is dead. The Reaper corpse that was being researched had been dead for how many thousands of years and yet it only took it days to invade, warp, and take over the minds of the research team. At least some of whom had to voluntarily subject themselves to becoming husks. As one NPC put it "Even dead Gods can dream." Now...fast forward to the Destroy ending. The Alliance has won the day. The Reapers are destroyed, tumbling to the ground in lifeless piles. For the first time in years the collective peoples of the galaxy give out a triumphant cry and a sigh of relief and turn from war to focusing on rebuilding. All the while on every single colonized planet in the galaxy, right in the midst of the very population centers the victors are going to be working rebuilding, literally hundreds if not thousands of dead Gods lay...dreaming. Makes one wonder what effect that will have on the rebuilding of the various societies, and if maybe the Destroy part of that ending wasn't actually talking about the synthetics and the Reapers...]]
291** Probably not as bad as we might think. Rana Thanoptis does mention that it is some kind of energy field emanating from Reaper structures that can indoctrinate, but with the Catalyst erased permanently, what will the subject be indoctrinated to believe? These corpses are now like carrier waves and antennas capable of sending information, but with nothing to send. Most likely, prolonged exposure might lead to mental degeneration as the mind is primed to receive something but never does, resulting in a form of sensory deprivation. They might be stuck in a permanent somnambulant state, but with no EvilOverlord directing them, they just slowly wither away. After the first few cases, people might enact protocols strictly limiting exposure to inert Reapers, similar to present day protocols on radiation exposure.
292* Much has been said about [[spoiler: how the Catalyst has more in common with a VI than a true AI like EDI or the Geth, in that it can't override its own programming, no matter how insane or demented it is. The thing is, RealLife AI research could very well come up with an AlmightyIdiot intelligence like the Catalyst ''long before'' we get to true AI moral enough to reject genocidal orders. The story of the Catalyst isn't a warning about what happens when you give machines intelligence and free will, but what happens if you '''don't''' (or at least, don't do it correctly).]]
293* The nature of the Reapers and killing them:
294** Once we find out the true nature of the Reapers, the fact that we've been killing them stops being awesome and starts being horrifying. [[spoiler:Each Reaper contains the genetic code, the sum knowledge, the history of a race of {{Precursors}} who were harvested in a previous cycle. Whenever you kill one, you are wiping out the last vestiges of said race, completing the xenocide that the Reapers started. This is especially emphasized by the Control ending, where Shepard begins utilizing the SufficientlyAdvancedTechnology of countless cycles to benefit the galaxy. What about the knowledge that Sovereign contained? The secrets known only to the mini-Reapers you fought on Tuchanka and Rannoch? Lost for good.]]
295** Remember what Mordin said too. [[BodyHorror "No glands, replaced by tech; no digestive system, replaced by tech; no soul, replaced by tech."]] This applies to the Reapers too, he also claims that if these things were truly "living" even in Reaper form, you would find evidence of culture, artistic expression even. All the Reapers do is reap, harvest, construct new Reapers, sanitize the galaxy of all evidence of their reaping, hibernate, monitor for organic synthetic conflict then begin all over again. No independent thought outside of Catalyst's directives, no alternate interests pursued, no philosophy, no metaphysics, no research into better superluminal propulsion, no research into astrophysics, no exploration of other galaxies. Even if that knowledge existed in preserved brains, it hasn't been put to any use for millions of years. Only slaves following Catalyst's orders. Whatever they once knew was lost for good when they were reaped, as that knowledge never saw any usage.
296*** As Shepard tells the Reaper on Rannoch if you choose the Paragon interrupt, "whatever species you came from, before the Reapers decided to preserve them, they're dead...they died thousands of years ago. And now, they can rest in peace."
297* In one of his logs, Henry Lawson says [[spoiler:about Sanctuary experiments: ''This is assembly line science, the sheer brute force of numbers and repetition '''doing...the thinking''' for us. Effective, but discovery happens at a pace.'']] Now compare that to what [[spoiler: the Catalyst does: It is repeating the same experiment over and over again on a galactic scale. Lawson ruthlessly treated thousands of refugees like guinea pigs, the Catalyst ruthlessly treated '''thousands of intelligent species''' like guinea pigs]]. But the worst part is that '''it worked'''. [[spoiler:Its reasonings are actually sound; the Leviathans were part of the problem, by enthralling intelligent organic species, they gave no choice '''but''' rebellion to their tributaries' synthetic creations. Removing them from the equation gave intelligent species the chance to build independent polities; placing mass relays close to planets home to intelligent life, it made it easier for civilizations to develop FTL and meet with one another '''before''' inventing [=AIs=], and the harvest pushed desperate civilizations to imagine the Crucible, transfer the concept to their successors via time capsules, who in turn refined the concept until eventually one civilization managed by sheer random chance to engender someone [[OneManArmy skilled]], [[UnluckilyLucky lucky]] and [[{{Determinator}} muleheaded]] enough to keep the Reapers on their toes while their compatriots and allies built and delivered the device: ''the sheer brute force of numbers and repetition'' '''did''' provide the Catalyst with a new solution.]] Even Warlord Okeer used the same brute force method to engineer Grunt, he created about a thousand tankbred Krogan who didn't meet his standard before he found one that did. And he used Collector technology to achieve that - Reaper tech basically, sure does fit the pattern.
298* [[spoiler:Sanctuary.]] It's one of the biggest sources of horror during the story, and not just for in-universe reasons; how does anyone know what a realistic [[spoiler:extermination camp]] looks like, including all the little details like ways to make sure people won't panic until the last second? [[spoiler:''Because they have already existed.'']]
299** Historically, lots of people figured out what Nazi "work camps" were for and resisted. The camps were just a capstone on a years-long campaign of oppression intended to demoralize ''Die Juden''. Cerberus, by contrast, was just taking advantage of exigent circumstances. Question is, how long had they been planning it?
300*** I don't know if this makes things more or less scary, but I don't think [[spoiler: Cerberus needed much time planning Sanctuary out.]] It took Nazi Germany six years to kill twelve million people in the Holocaust, something a single Reaper could do in less than ''six minutes''. [[spoiler: All Cerberus needed to do was build the facility on Horizon, exploit the fears of a galactic population facing total extinction, keep the truth from getting out, and they have a virtually unending stream of refugees to experiment on.]]
301* If you chose to make peace between the Quarians and Geth, then chose Destroy with a high EMS, you now have people who were ostracized as scavengers, beggars and thieves for three hundred years now in possession of a fleet that rivals the Turians, and probably even matches them dreadnought to dreadnought. On top of that they now have all those deactivated Geth ships and Geth mobile platforms, just waiting to be reprogrammed and repurposed by the Quarians. Those mobile platforms alone rival the ground force strength of all Krogan clans. And they even have their planet back, have strategic processing and technical capabilities that rival the Salarians. This new Quarian military bolstered by Geth mobile platforms running VI programs is quite possibly the most powerful military in the galaxy. The Turians better start making nice.
302* Why does the Catalyst say "Or do you think you can control us?" Instead of saying "You CAN control us." Why is it challenging us to try? Let's look at the consequences of controlling the Reapers
303** After rebuilding the relays, fixing the citadel, repairing all the damaged infrastructure and performing heavy lift ops to get stranded people back home, galactic society has successfully recovered from this war. Things appear to go back to normal. But what do you do with your Reaper fleet after that? What are the criteria for intervening and what issues are considered insignificant? What necessitates Reaper intervention? Pirate attacks? Slaver raids? Interplanetary war? Or do you preemptively strike down certain people to prevent a war? What neccesitates such preemption? Planning? Conspiring? Thoughtcrime?
304** Also, would the Reapers restrict themselves to only stopping wars? How about internal insurrections? Fringe groups planning acts of terror? Or would they attempt to prevent every single premeditated murder just like "Series/PersonOfInterest" Why stop at premeditated murder? Why not watch everybody and intervene whenever any confrontation looks like it might get violent? So do the Reapers now intervene in bar brawls? Domestic disputes? Schoolyard fights? Will they now referee full contact combat sports? Will a destroyer hover above and blare its horn when a parent is about to spank their kid? Will society just not need soldiers, policemen, courts even? Will society need prisons, now that the vile scumbags who wanted to do horrible things can now be indoctrinated to nod their heads and [[Film/DemolitionMan think happy happy thoughts all day?]]
305** And finally, at what point would [[WhenAllYouHaveIsAHammer every single problem require a Reaper to fix]]? At what point would Shepalyst say that society is too chaotic without the Reapers controlling every single minute detail of everyone's life? Welcome to "Literature/NineteenEightyFour" Galaxy wide. And how many [[Literature/NineteenEightyFour Winstons and Julias]] will it take to convince Shepalyst that mass indoctrination is the only way to preserve harmony. But wait, sustained indoctrination causes irreversible mental capacity degradation. So what is the solution to prevent all conflict? The only sure fire way to make all organic life exist in perfect harmony and unison is ... Reaperization? Commence the harvest. And we know from past experience that life takes 50,000 years to advance to a level capable of such dangerous conflict. We are right back where we started.
306** And now the Catalyst's cryptic question about Control makes sense. Control was tried before with someone else who built the crucible, docked it to the Citadel and chose to take the left path. How many times was this tried before, and each time, the controller becoming overwhelmed by omnipresence, omniscience and omnipotence, eventually agreeing with the Catalyst? Is this a very insidious form of indoctrination? A ThanatosGambit of sorts by the Catalyst?
307* Think that with Wrex alive and the genophage cured, the Krogan are going to go through a cultural reformation and Renaissance? There are clues sprinkled throughout all three games and especially this game, that the actual result would be a Civil War. In the first game, Wrex talks about how his own father ambushed him in The Hollows because he considered Wrex's ideas too radically progressive. In the second game you hear multiple Krogan at the Urdnot border camp including Uvenk complaining about Wrex's reforms making the Krogan weak. In the kicker in the third game - when Wrex brings Mordin/[[SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute Padok "Not Mordin" Wiks]] to a gathering of clans, it looks like all the other Krogan males' resentment of Wrex is about to boil over and Wreav prepares to shoot him right there. It takes a RousingSpeech from Eve to get them under control. If Eve dies curing the genophage, there is nothing to stop the traditionalists from assassinating Wrex so that they can now use the horde to return to the glory of the rebellions. Except that Wrex did win over a few Krogan to his side. The result would be a civil war between the traditionalists and the modernists using Wrex as a martyr to rally support. Or if Eve survived, it could be Wrex and Eve leading a faction against the traditionalists. And with the genophage cured, each faction in this Civil War has no choice but to outbreed the other faction so they don't get curb stomped by the other side's horde. The result would be the kind of population explosion that devastated numerous garden worlds' ecosystems before the rebellions ended. And this time no race has the infrastructure and resources to nip this in the bud, owing to the Reaper War.
308* What is happening on Haestrom actually becomes a LOT scarier at the conclusion of this game, if you think about it. That star seems to be the only one that we know of so far that is aging so fast. Since it isn't the Geth's work, and from the AlmightyIdiot Catalyst's statements, this isn't attributable to the Reapers either, this leaves two other possibilities. The first is that it is a natural phenomenon. It was originally supposed to be a dark energy buildup from prolonged eezo use, but that was DummiedOut most likely because dark energy buildup would affect every star, not just one. So the other possibility is that it is artificial. Which means that something else is out there - probably beyond the Milky Way, that has escaped the notice of even the Reapers! And it has the ability to explode an otherwise normal star. Selectively at that. And this very force could be what makes the Andromeda galaxy seem like a frontier, unsettled place in the promotional materials of ''VideoGame/MassEffectAndromeda''.
309* Catalyst and Synthesis:
310** Why does the Catalyst push Synthesis as the best possible outcome? That's the only ending where it survives. You're essentially letting it off ONE BILLION YEARS worth of galactic genocide. What might be worse is that since it's still going to be linked to the Reaper's consciousnesses, who's to say that it won't try again if the new status quo isn't to its liking? If anything, that puts the fate of galactic peace at a greater unforeseen risk than most Destroy endings.
311** The Catalyst releasing the Reapers from its control once Synthesis has been achieved is actually an even worse scenario. While the Reaper Destroyers may have been made out of species that were just trying to get by, and may be benevolent once released, the Sovereign class capital ships were made from species that dominated the galaxy during their cycle. Remember how Renegade Shepard admonishes Liara for assuming that the Protheans were as benevolent, diplomatic and cooperative like the Asari are, reminding her that a species which dominated the Galaxy must have had an imperialist streak. The same applies to these Reaper Capital ships too. They most likely were aggressive imperialist colonizing types who defeated and subjugated everyone else, before they were reaped, and now those same tendencies to colonize and subjugate may manifest once the Catalyst releases them. They are already the most powerful individual weapon in the Galaxy, and they have the ability to indoctrinate organic life. With synthesis, this indoctrination ability might be boosted by the inter connectivity imposed by the merger. We will now have individual capital ships forming fiefdoms with their indoctrinated subjects, then fighting with each other to expand those fiefdoms. Conflict against the Reapers has now been replaced by Reaper-on-Reaper conflict with everybody forced to take one side or the other. Sweet dreams!
312* During the Synthesis ending, EDI states that the Reapers "now bring us the collective knowledge of the cultures that came before." This reinforces a point that technically has been the case since the second games revelations concerning the Collectors and the incomplete Human Reaper - with each Reaper destroyed, so too is the ''last record of a harvested civilization'' - unless the Reapers make more than one from each civilization and keep at least one in backup somewhere, but that is never so much as implied.
313* On Omega, it would seem as though Oleg Petrovsky is a [[EvenEvilHasStandards conquering tyrant with a desire to keep noncombatant civilians safe]]. He honors an agreement with the Talons to not harm anyone who gives up arms and surrenders, he implores you to not cut power to civilian areas while overloading the reactor, he berates you if you do perform a hard overload. However, you find an audio recording about his experiments with Adjutants that provides a new horrifying reason why he apparently protected civilians. In that recording he gloats about how he figured out how to make docile obedient Adjutants - by implanting subjects with control chip implants before having an Adjutant R.I.P. them apart and convert them. He then claims that “with the civilian population contained, we anticipate being able to surpass Adjutant demand by 300%”. Petrovsky didn't keep noncombatants safe to protect them - he did so, to eventually lo-jack them all and convert them into an army of Adjutant mooks.
314** What is worse, is that by accomplishing this, Petrovsky would have essentially done the Reapers' job for them. If the whole population of Omega has been turned into Adjutants, a single Reaper can just fly in, assume control of them to eliminate (or convert) Petrovsky, and it has a station full of compliant husks ready for harvesting.
315* The effects of the Crucible are shown to propagate through the mass relays, allowing them to [[WorldHealingWave spread across the galaxy]] in a matter of hours or days. However, in ''VideoGame/MassEffect2'''s "Arrival" DLC, Shepard destroyed the relay leading to the Viper Nebula, leaving that entire region inaccessible. In other words, everything in that cluster -- potentially including Reapers that didn't participate in the events of [=ME3=] -- might still be there, completely untouched by the Crucible!
316* In their DLC the Leviathan were shown to be [[spoiler: a [[AbusivePrecursor tyrannical and highly advanced race]] who ruthlessly dominated the galaxy until their Reapers rebelled, killed most of them, and forced the rest into hiding in remote corners of space. If you choose the Destroy ending and the Reapers are killed permanently, what's going to stop them from coming out of hiding and trying to take over again? They've been shown to be able to effortlessly disable Reapers with their psychic abilities; imagine what they could do to the now heavily damaged races that are trying to recover and rebuild from the Reaper war. Unless they've lost their urge for conquest or their numbers are just too few, there's no reason to think they wouldn't attempt a takeover. Shepard may have [[NiceJobBreakingItHero inadvertently doomed the galaxy]] to the cruelties of yet another species that vastly outclasses them in power.]]
317** It's actually implied in that DLC that [[spoiler: life under the leviathans was actually pretty good as long as you acknowledged their authority. The only requirement the Leviathans had was that their subjects "pay tribute," with it never being explained what this entails. It might have been classic EvilOverlord stuff like economically crippling over taxation or waiting on them hand, foot, and tentacle; or life might have carried on as usual, save that there was this giant cuttlefish dude in the ocean who you had to regularly mouth praises to. In any case, the one Leviathan's line that the Reapers "shall pay their tribute in blood" implies that they would accept or demand [[{{Tradesnark}} Tribute™]] in multiple forms. All we know for certain was that life was sufficiently decent that the cultures and technological advancement of those under them were not hindered. What is ''unambiguous'' fridge horror, however, is that in the Control and Synthesis endings, they'll probably want revenge on the [[HeelFaceTurn now benevolent]] Reapers.]]
318*** [[spoiler: What is ''even more unambiguous'' fridge horror, is that the Destroy ending leaves ''zero'' obstacles to the Leviathans regaining their former position of dominance in the galaxy. Even the great Commander Shepard only survived his encounter with a Leviathan due to convincing them to join against the Reapers.
319* Before the Rannoch mission on 3, all Geth platforms use the "We" and "us" pronouns, since there are indeed hundreds of individuals in each Geth platform. [[spoiler: but in any ending where the Geth survive, they switch to "I" and "me," implying that the thousands of people in the Legion platform have been reduced to one person. Even assuming that they were all [[FusionDance merged together]] rather than all but one getting deleted or some such, that's still the Geth population being reduced to less than 1% of what it was before. Even if you don't [[FromACertainPointOfView interpret this as a genocide]], it'll likely [[InferredHolocaust still carry the aftermath of one]].]]
320* If you kept David in Cerberus hands during Overlord, Gavin reveals that David stopped reacting to stimuli one day. The Geth around the same time received help from the Reapers in exchange for helping them. By leaving him there, David was infected with a digitized version of indoctrination which was something Illusive Man at the point considered necessary for controlling the Reapers.
321* At the end of Jack's loyalty mission in ''2'', it's mentioned that the survivors of the Pragia project ran and hid inside the Alliance's Ascension Project, but Shepard waves it off. Fast forward to ''3'', when Cerberus attacks Ascension and starts abducting the students. And whose names they know. Cerberus had people on the inside ''helping them''. And neither Jack nor Kahlee Sanders noticed.
322** They intended to infiltrate the AP, but first Jack attacked them and then the Illusive Man had the survivors killed, it's mentioned in the after report from Jack's loyalty mission.
323* The Elcor, due to their long lifespans and naturally being restricted to a small part of their high gravity homeworld, are said to have always had a relatively small population; the data for Dekuuna has the pre-invasion population at 2.35 billion, around what Earth's population was in the 1940s. During the side mission Dekuuna: Elcor Extraction, a diplomat asks Shepard to help with the evacuation efforts of their world. When Shepard asks how many civilians they managed to rescue, the diplomat simply says, "not enough." Best case scenario, he's heartbroken over how many people have died and wishes they could've saved more. Worst case, he means that ''literally'' and there aren't enough Elcor left for a viable population. And unlike the Krogan, who can be saved from the effects of the Genophage, there's nothing much that anybody can do for them even if the Reapers are defeated. Elcor consider 300 to be old, meaning the species may be gone in just a few centuries.
324[[/folder]]
325
326[[folder:Fridge Logic]]
327On the [[Headscratchers/MassEffect3 Headscratchers]] page.
328[[/folder]]

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