What a glorious day to head back into the Wasteland. After watching this first episode it looks like this season is going to be another doozy of Vault Tec experiments, mystery, and the insane environs of post apocalyptic alternate universe America. I’ll just mention a caveat as we go through this. As I’ve noted in our review of the first season, and as a fan of the franchise, I’m treating the world building as if I’m watching the consequences of someone else’s play through. I figure this will be important as we go into Fallout: New Vegas, since it’s supposedly will be a mish mash of all the endings. That aside, let’s carry on, shall we?
Amazon’s Fallout returns with flare as we are introduced to the enigmatic Mr. Robert House (Justin Theroux) in a flashback, America’s richest man and founder of Robco, where he seems to be experimenting with some new mind control technology in a scenario that ends up quite pulpy and setting the tone for this season’s serving of mystery and intrigue. I must say, this show makes excellent use of flashbacks and they are edited and timed quite well. Since Mr. House was a key figure in New Vegas, here’s hoping the show fleshes out some more things and surprise us in different ways with the character.
We catch up with most of the vault dwellers this episode like the dwellers of Vault 33 and Lucy’s brother Norm (Moisés Arias), as he remains captive by the Vault Tec exec turned brain bot Bud Askins (Michael Esper), but mainly we pick up where we ended in season 1 with Lucy McLean (Ella Purnell) and The Ghoul (Walton Goggins) hot in pursuit of Lucy’s father as he flees towards Las Vegas, Nevada. They nailed it with their introductory sequence in the town of Novac as our pair, uh, interact with The Great Khans, while utilizing the sniping position inside the tall dinosaur’s mouth was just perfect. I have to say the decision to pair Lucy and The Ghoul for more of this round was just a great idea. Lucy’s paragon/charisma play through is balanced so well with The Ghoul, who I imagine, embodies most of us who just want to solve the problems of the wasteland with all the cynicism and wit that a fully loaded rifle can afford you. Oh yeah, he’s definitely my favorite character in this roster.
Of course, like in the previous season, the easter eggs have been quite gratuitous, but are just so that they fit nicely into the world. I’ll try not to spoil them as I want you to enjoy them in your own viewing, but this show is so good at giving callbacks to the various titles of the franchise. A lot of the time, I feel that Cooper Howard is the one character that seems to be threading the events of all the games together with his intrigues.
The visual effects and the sound design have not diminished at all compared to season 1 and if any seem improved in some aspects. Of course, the Mojave desert does a lot of the heavy lifting, but the production team’s effects people do a great job of adding all the elements needed to make it feel like Fallout.
So far I have been sold for the most part in what they’ve done. I can’t wait to see what the other factions like Caesar’s Legion, and the Brotherhood of Steel are up to. Perhaps we’ll even get a hint of the infamous Courier Six.
I really look forward to the rest of these and I hope you join me in this viewing adventure!
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English (US) · 