Why Mirandas Infertility undermines her character arc and explains nothing regarding Henrys Legacy

Mirandas whole chracter arc was to show no matter how much one was to be engineered to be perfect, that true perfection for us humans will always be unobtainable. Her arc was to show that you do not have to be perfect, that it is ok to have flaws. It is alright to be imperfect, since imperfections make us human, they make us who we are and there is nothing wrong with that. You do not need to be perfect is the message of Mirandas character arc.

Miranda says she can never be measured by her achievements, since they are not hers, they are those of her genetics, her fathers achievement, although I am unsure if she only attributes succes to her genes or goes further with having to attribute it to her father, which she then would have to admit they are her fathers achievements, not hers, despite despising him. However the point is that her achievements are always because of external factors, not internal factors, in her eyes.

The only thing she can attribute to herself are her failures, since they stem from internal factors herself, her own shortcomings, her imperfections, she is falling short, not like her sucess which has in her own eyes nothing to do with her.

Her charcter arc culminates in ME3 with accepting to be imperfect, coming to terms, that she is as human as everyone else and realizes she does not longer need to aspire to a false unobtainoble ideal and can start living for herself for the first time. Her arc is about the mentality of accepting imperfection, accepting to be human, humanizing her on a psychological level, adressing the core what it means to be human. This potrayal is subtle since it adresses her mentality.

Now in the dlc its revealed she is infertile. Thereby detracting from showing her imperfections on a psychological level to show she is imperfect on a physological level. Thereby implying that Henry did not want to replace her with Orianna because her skills were not good enough, but that he merely disregarded her because he found out that Mirandas is infertile and therefore could not carry Henry Legacy forward by bearing a heir. Therefore Orianna is her replacemenmt with the assumption she is fertile. Thereby it implies Miranda is no longer imperfect because of being a human being with flaws with imperfections, but rather she is imperfect solely by being infertile. Which sends a ugly message which rubs me the wrong way that women who are infertile are imperfect, not good enough from the start, if we take this ugly implication full circle.

So there are two scenarios. Scenario one is what I just said imperfection are the result of infertility alone. Scenario two if it not changes Mirandas imperfections to be solely because of her infertility than her imperfections on a human level are still detracted and undermined that her shoertcomings are not solely because she is human but also because she is infertile.

Which ever scenario you pick if we go with these implications it undermines her character arc. Her arc should have remained on a pure psychological level and never have included her physiological level. If you ask me why the writers added her infertility I sincerely do not know. I think they probably thought it would explain more about Henry, but it does not. I think the writers only included it for the sole reason to make Miranda more sympathetic, therby diminishing her charcter arc imo severely.

What I am trying to say is that if one wished to truly learn about who Miranda is and where she is coming from it is required to look beneath surface level, to understand her mentality, her psychology, her upbringing, her struggles and her burden. So these information are not presented at mere face value, since they are more subtle. With adding the infertility aspect this subtilty is diminished, since her infertility is presented at face value, in the sense of more easy palpable to understand, then her mentality. Since understanding her mentality requires efforts from us the player to engage with her character, infertility (the physological level) does not require that kind of effort, since you can grasp these connsequences, the impact for Miranda instantly. That is why its a shame the writers had to add this piece of information since it diminishes her struggles by detracting to her infertility and undermines her character arc to coming to terms with being human, by potraying infertility as part of her imperfections, thereby recontextualizing her imperfections by not solely being personal character flaws any longer. The message of accepting only being human, being imperfect should resolve solely around personal flaws and shortcomings, not around imperfections by having a medical condition.

Now regarding Henrys Legacy:

The most common interpretation i saw was, we never knew why Miranda was not good enough for her father, until the reveal of her infertility, thereby providing the missing piece of information.

In that regard some people theorize that Mirandas biotics created (/are the cause of) her infertility, since biotics can can create tumours. Therefore Orianna has no biotic powers to avoid she becomes infertile like Miranda, since no biotics= diminishes possibility to create tumours. Which is a interesting theory however, since we do not know if Orianna is a biotic, it just remains speculation, nevertheless I wanted to mention this theory.

To say Henry was not content with Miranda for her infertility makes sense, since he wanted to create a legacy (children to carry on the best human genes possible in Henrys eyes), especially considering Miranda was a teen when she found out that Orianna was created. Which would make sense that Henry would check as soon as possible if Miranda was actually capable of bearing a child, then found out she could not and thus prepared her replacement.

The other side of the argument I have seen is the opposite that Henry made Miranda deliberately infertile to have a birth control mechanism (for a lack of better phrasing), to avoid that his "perfect genes" wouldnt get diluted by a "unworthy" nobody. When this is true it begs then the question why Miranda was discarded in the first place when her infertility was supposedly deliberate, since that seems the reason given for Miranda beinng unwanted by Henry. Additionaly if Miranda can not bear a heir then why does Henry want to have Miranda back, when she can not ruin his Legacy thanks to his implanted birth control mechanism. In other words Henry does not need to worry since she can not pass on her genes anyway (excluding the same method Henry used to create Miranda since she never would want a child to be created like this). The reason she went to Cerberus was not only to protect her sister but also herself from her father, to keep in mind, to stop him from pursuing her, which worked out succesfully until she left Cerberus.

What I do not get is where this notion is coming from that Mirandas infertility is the missing piece of information to explain why Henry discarded her. In my eyes it was obvious from the start: Henry disregarded Miranda since she did not meet his unrealistic ideal of perfection, she was merely just not skilled enough in his eyes. In other words she severely underpreformed for Henry. We need to remember that Miranda said she was not the first created, only the first one he kept. My interpretation was Henry was with Miranda for the first time happy to have created one (miranda) that sufficed in his eyes to not be disregarded immediately. So he kept her around and examined if she would meet his ideals. Only when she could not live up to his expectations he started creating another one, Orianna. If Miranda would not have rescued Orianna I am quite sure that Henry would have been dissatisfied with Orianna too over time, if he was not occupied chasing Orianna and instead could examine Orianna and therby getting rid of Orianna due to growing dissatisfication with her over time to. Since I believe that Henry will never be truly satisfied with one of his "creations".

Now of course the question if Henry just discards his "projects" anyway, then why chase Miranda and Orianna, when he at least wants to see Miranda dead. I think he has just a too big of an ego to allow that his "creations" are not being controlled by him/ around him. In other words I think he just cannot bear the thought that his "daughters with his genes" are somewhere outthere in the galaxy just wandering off and doing what they want, sth which can not be tolerated in his eyes, since he views them as his "property", where only he has the rights to do with them whatever he pleases.

To come back to topic. So therefore her infertility reveal lead to nothing since there was no missing information in the first place, to fill, since all this was already explained long ago in the base game itself, why Henry disregarded Miranda. Therefore this vague piece of information raises only new questions which did not exist in the first place, since this info is so vague that it only leads to unanswered speculation. Thereby not only undermining Mirandas character arc, but also explaining nothing regarding Henry Legacy. The infertility reveal is overall pointless imo. Since Miranda never brings it up, if romanced, or otherwise. She struggled so much with her insecurities of not being good enough and solely by being defined by her genes, so that she never brings up her infertility in any conversation is baffling and absurd, as part of her insecurities. These are the reasons why I think the writers did put little to no thought into Mirandas infertility, thereby making this information overall pointless, which leads imo to the conclusion that this information can easily be disregarded, since it adds nothing to Mirandas character or Henrys Legacy. Additionaly it raises the question shouldnt Jack be infertile too with all her experiments?

It was a bit difficult to write my thoughts down, which I had now for a while, however I hope I could convey them. I am merely trying to express that her infertility is on a pure narrative level a unnecessary detraction from her charcter arc, which was beatifully written, only to see it undermined by a afterthought of the writers in the dlc.

The good thing is thanks to, the writers I learned a lot about benign tumours with my research, since I was curius how her infertility works exactly. So I probably will make another post (a part 2) about her infertility by analyzing it on a pure biological level, instead of restricting myself, like this time to only the narrative level.

So what are all your thoughts does Mirandas infertility undermine her chracter arc for you and do you think her infertility actually explains anything regarding Henrys Legacy?