Hiya!
So, the talk of the town is Amazon Prime’s Fallout television series. Based on Bethesda’s hit RPG series, the show has garnered a lot of praise from critics and fans of the games alike. While this was a highly anticipated show because of how good the trailer was, I was not exactly looking forward to it. I was intrigued by it and it did look good.
The problem is I’ve never touched a Fallout game in my life. The games just seem very intimidating because of how large they are. There just seems like there’s so much to do and I really don’t like the first person viewpoint all that much. That’s the same feeling I got with other Bethesda games like The Elder Scrolls and Starfield. So, while the trailer does make the new Amazon Prime series very enticing, I was nervous I wouldn’t “get it” and understand the reference, leading to disappointment on my end.
However, I did bite the bullet and decided to go see the Fallout series and give it a try. I was kind of curious if I would be able to understand the story without knowing anything about the backstory and all of the lore from the games. I wanted to see if I would fall in love with the world despite having no relationship to it. So, here are my thoughts on the show as a non-fan of the Fallout games.
Oh, I do have to mention a couple of things. For one thing, SPOILERS! I will definitely be talking about some specific stuff about the show. Things I liked and things I didn’t like. That kind of stuff. I may have to drill down a little bit to properly convey why I liked or didn’t like something from a non-fan’s perspective. Second, I may get the lore totally wrong. After all, I’m solely basing all of it from what I’ve learned from the show. So, if I get the context wrong or something along those lines, that’s because the show didn’t teach it right. With those out of the way, let’s dive into my thoughts on Amazon Prime’s Fallout live-action television series.
The first thing I do have to say about the show is I love how “real” it feels. What I mean by that is it feels really lived in. Well, the parts of the wasteland which still has people, anyway. There is a certain scale to the world were you may have a settlement here and there but there is always going to be this vast stretch of wasteland you would need to trek across in order to get there. The show does a great way of conveying a threat, be it from monsters like a mutated cockroach or some weird fish-like gulper thing or from the people you may encounter while traversing the harsh wasteland, could be lurking anywhere.
I also did like how the show conveys how different groups affect how they behave. The vault dwellers have a kind of naivety to them as they’ve never experienced how cruel the surface world has it. The people on the surface had to live under the wasteland’s brutality so they’ve become more battle hardened but still fair in their own way. It’s kind of sweet to see commerce and communities still popping up despite people having no real reason to trust one another.
I didn’t like the Brotherhood of Steel group, though. I didn’t really understand why they behave like a religious order when their primary mission is to collect pre-war technology. How does that mission change into having priests and knights and all of that? There may be some backstory on how the Brotherhood of Steel started out simply as a group of people trying to save old tech and how it evolved into this militaristic holy order but I don’t get how that happened based on the show.
Another thing I found confusing was why Vault-Tec was still working on the cold fusion thingamajig. Based on Moldaver speech, I thought they put the entire project on ice? However, there was still this one scientist who was working on it? Maybe he found plans for it as he was exploring Vault-Tec’s files and decided to revive the project. That doesn’t explain how he knew about Moldaver and that she was still alive even after 200 years! Why would he go to her and why did he know she was still alive? I may have missed this when they explained it but I’m pretty sure I didn’t. If someone can clear this up for me, I’m all ears!
I did enjoy the overall story of Fallout. I like how the main characters, Lucy, Maximus and The Ghoul, have their own character arcs and how they all go on their own version of the “hero’s journey” throughout the show’s 8 episodes. Lucy starts out with the single, solitary mission of saving his father and, after discovering that her father is actually a Vault-Tec agent who caused Shady Sands and her mother’s destruction, joins The Ghoul in hunting him down for answers. Maxiumus starts out idolizing the Brotherhood of Steel and how much he wants to become a knight. However, throughout his time in the wasteland, he discovers how the group he idolizes so much may not be all that’s cracked up to be.
The Ghoul’s story does feel less of a “hero’s journey” as he’s already a well-defined character when you first see him in his ghoulified form. However, his growth is shown in the past before the war as a dutiful father who slowly wakes up to what Vault-Tec is doing. It’s a shame they only show his motivation at the end of the first season. I would’ve loved to see some closure with him.
I was generally less enthused with the story happening back in Vault 33. I did like how the show starts out by showing how idyllic life seems in each of the vaults but how things may not seem all that’s cracked up to be when you’re told how Vault 4 was a testing ground for scientists to create new lifeforms which can better inhabit the wasteland. However, the mystery for Vaults 33, 32 and 31 seemed a little less well defined. I get Vault 31 is using the residents of Vaults 32 and 33 as a breeding ground for Vault-Tec’s higher ups and having 2 Vaults allow for genetic diversity. The problem is you’re told this and then that arc ends with Lucy’s brother having to stay there. It feels anticlimactic but maybe that’s how all of the other Vault stories in the games are?
I guess the biggest question is if watching Amazon Prime’s Fallout series convinced me to play the Bethesda games. Honestly, yes and no. Yes, because the story they did tell was intriguing. So, if the stories in the games are half as interesting as the one from the show, then I will be incredibly entertained. No, because the games are huge and I’m kind of afraid they’ll be stretches of time where all I’ll be doing is walking from one end of the map to another. God forbid they’ll be a fetch quest that will need my Vault person to just walk for hours on end! Still, if you have any recommendations on which game to start with, I’m open to suggestions.
So, yeah. I did like the first season of Fallout. The world is fun and the story and characters are charming in their own way. I do how Amazon Prime greenlights another season as I do want to find out what happens to Lucy, Maximus, The Ghoul and even Norm. That’s coming from someone who has no love for the games, so I guess that’s high praise?
Byee!
Have you played the Fallout games? How did that affect your experience with the live-action series? Let me know in the comments section below!
3rd World Geeks 