I've decided to make my installments more detailed based on feedback.
Mass Effect 2 begins with the Illusive Man (who shall be referred to as TIM from now on) and Miranda Lawson discussion the accomplishments of Failure Shepard. While Fail Shep was able to stop Sovereign and save the Council, the Council forgot all about how they acknowledged that the Reaper threat is real and are sending Fail Shep to stop the remaining geth. TIM is the leader of Cerberus, a pro-human terrorist group that Shepard was supposed to encounter multiple times throughout ME1, but since Fail Shep skipped most of that game's sidequests, they've only been mentioned once before. Cerberus wants to help Fail Shep stop the Reapers, but there are two problems:
1. Fail Shep might not want to work for a terrorist group.
2. Fail Shep is about to die.
While scouting the Terminus Systems for geth, the Normandy is ambushed by a gigantic ship of unknown origin, which proceeds to rip it a new asshole. Navigator Pressly is killed by an exploding console and Fail Shep gets killed saving the Normandy's pilot, Joker.
After some wacky hijinks covered in a comic I haven't read, Cerberus recovers Shepard's body and manages to resurrect him two years later via the aptly named Project Lazarus. As soon as Fail Shep is revived, someone hacks all the mechs in the Cerberus Space station he's in to try to kill our hero. Fail Shep escapes and joins forces with a Cerberus operative named Jacob Taylor, who gives an Exposition Dump on how Fail Shep got here. Interestingly, Jacob claims that Fail Shep has destroyed several Cerberus bases, even though Shep's only interaction with Cerberus was hearing the late Corporal Toombs name drop it.
Fail Shep and Jacob meet up with another Cerberus member named Wilson, who joins them briefly until Miranda kills him because she found out that Wilson was the one who made the mechs go heywire in the first place. Fail Shep, Jacob and Miranda go off to see TIM.
Death List:
- Jenkins (Squadmate, Plot)
- Nihlus (Plot)
- Fist
- Stirling
- Anoleis
- Gianna
- Ventralis
- Benezia (Plot)
- Rachni Queen
- Peak 15 Scientists
- Talitha
- Conrad
- Jeong
- Zhu's Hope Colonists
- Fai Dan (Plot)
- The Thorian (Plot)
- Shiala
- Actus
- Wayne
- Toombs
- Kirrahe
- Avot (Plot)
- Droyas
- Imness
- Ashley (Squadmate, Love Interest)
- Saren (Plot)
- Sovereign (Plot)
- Charles Pressly (Plot)
- Failure Shepard (Plot, Resurrected)
- 20 other Normandy Crew members (Plot)
- Wilson (Plot)
