When Commander Shepard bought the farm during a Collector attack on the Normandy, it was Miranda Lawson who came dashing to the rescue! As the head of Cerberus’ Project Lazarus, Miranda not only brought Shepard back from the dead (literally) - she also played a vital role in stopping the Reaper invasion from destroying all galactic life.
Here’s ten things Mass Effect fans need to know about this cold, calculating cucumber with a warm and toasty inside. Rest assured, there’s a lot more to Miranda than meets the eye!
10 Her Birth
Not much is known about Miranda’s life, possibly due to her father’s iron-fisted control over her young life. As such, there’s little to go by, except her birth year and location.
Miranda was born in 2150 in Brisbane, Australia, which might be a conscious change on the part of the developers to better suit Yvonne Strahovski’s Australian accent. In contrast to her character, Strahovski was born in New South Wales, rather than Brisbane.
9 Her Last Name
Miranda’s last name is Lawson, but the developers decided to incorporate more of Yvonne Strahovski’s personal traits into the character, which meant altering her lineage a bit.
This includes her last name, which was originally “Solheim,” the Norwegian word for “Sunhome.” The purpose was to play up Miranda’s Earth origins, as opposed to many humans who were born off-planet.
8 Her Hair Color
Miranda was originally intended to be of Scandinavian ethnicity, with an appropriate last name to match. This might explain the character’s original concept art showing her with blond hair.
When actress Yvonne Strahovski was hired to voice Miranda, the crew incorporated many of her physical characteristics into the character, minus her blond locks. Those were changed to black in order to give Miranda a more sensual edge.
7 Her Character Is Heterosexual
While early plans for the game featured the ability for both sexes to romance Miranda, that was changed in later drafts to make her susceptible to male Shepard’s charms, only.
This seems to follow suit with the character’s apparent heterosexuality, as she also hints at a previous relationship with Jacob, with no mention of a same-sex relationship anywhere in her history.
6 She Saved The Citadel Council
In her early days working with Cerberus, Miranda was tipped off about a possible terrorist plot to assassinate a key political delegate. Miranda and Jacob investigated, and unraveled a conspiracy with far greater applications.
The scheme involved wiping out the entire Citadel Council with a bio-weapon. She managed to prevent the catastrophe from taking place, which is ironic given Cerberus’ use of terrorist attacks to further its own cause.
5 The Lazarus Project
Mass Effect fans know of Miranda’s involvement with the Lazarus Project, a Cerberus initiative to bring Commander Shepard back from the dead after being killed in a Collector attack.
What many don’t realize is the extent of her involvement. Miranda dealt with agents Rasa and Kai Leng, who were hired to retrieve classified files about the Commander from the Alliance database, and she even had direct dealings with Liara T’Soni. The extent of her involvement is too lengthy to mention here. Suffice it to say, Shepard’s resurrection danced on the edge of a knife.
4 Her Involvement With Rasa
The operative Maya Brooks, otherwise known as Rasa had a troubled and volatile relationship with Miranda throughout the early days of the Lazarus Project. After being poisoned and placed on indefinite medical examination, Rasa was tasked with determining suitable candidates for Commander Shepard to team up with, once resurrected.
Rasa’s rocky relationship with Miranda hit a peak when the latter revealed that she was aware of her intentions to access classified files regarding the Lazarus Project. She would later pop up in Mass Effect 3, where she experiences a similarly volatile relationship with Shepard.
3 Her Connection With Liara
Following Shepard’s death at the hands of the Collectors, Liara T’Soni mourned, while refocusing her efforts on the Collectors and Reaper tech. She still found time to deal with Miranda regarding the possibility of the Commander’s resurrection.
While the two possessed a mutual understanding of the situation, Liara’s warm nature was rebuffed by Miranda’s cold, calculating logic, which was only bolstered by her involvement with Cerberus.
2 Her Contact List
Miranda is one of the few Cerberus operatives (if not the only one) to have privileged access to Alliance contacts, which is a shock given their mutual loathing of one another. Perhaps due to her cold, business-like mind, Miranda has been gifted with a contact list that spans the galaxy.
Her list of informants is embedded in high levels of government and business spanning Citadel space, the Terminus Systems, and the criminalized Nemean Abyss. As such, her ability to gather valuable intel from a wide array of sources is a definite plus for the Illusive Man.
1 She Respects Other Races
Though Miranda was considered by the Illusive Man to be one of his trusted operatives, she never fully held with Cerberus’ humanity-first agenda. In fact, she loathed the fact that so many humans enlisted with Cerberus, purely out of xenophobia.
Miranda was different in her views. While she was pro-human, she was also respectful of other galactic races, openly expressing admiration for the Asari, the Salarians (most notably Mordin Solus), and others.
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