Fallout

A couple weeks ago, Fallout, a TV series based on the video game franchise of the same name, released onto Amazon Prime Video. Fallout is set in a post-nuclear war United States and follows a young woman as she traverses across the desert to rescue her father. I have never played any of the Fallout games, nor do I know much of anything about them but I am always up for a good post-apocalyptic TV show and was interested to see how this one would turn out. 

I had a lot of fun with this show. I really enjoyed the world-building of it as we get to explore all of these different aspects of this post-nuclear war world. The show covers all sorts of different societies such as the ruined world of the surface, the organization of the knights, and the underground world of the vaults. All three groups have very different views on how the world should run and it's interesting to see them all interact with each other. The main characters of the story also do a great job of linking with each of these lifestyles. We have the naive girl from the vault who thinks that everyone should be nice to everyone. There is the squire in the knighthood who thinks the knights should be the saviors of the world. Finally, there is the Ghoul who thinks the worst of everyone and views the world as everyone for themselves. The show does a great job with the interactions between these three and does a great job of allowing them to grow off each other. I also like how the show manages to have a lighter tone about something so dark. It is by no means a comedy but it definitely has some dark comedic moments too. I think part of this has to do with the 50s backdrop that the show is set in. There are all sorts of references and a soundtrack set to the 50s that give the show an overall lighter feel. I also liked the time-jumping aspect as we get to see characters both before and after the nuclear fallout. Finally, I liked how accessible the show was to non-game players. I knew nothing about Fallout before this show but still felt like I knew what was going on without having any pieces missing.

I do have a few issues with this show. One of the main issues was the whole Vault politics storyline really slowed the show down quite a bit. It doesn't really feel relevant until the last episode of the show and even then, I feel it could have been omitted. I also felt the show was a bit inconsistent with who the main characters were at times. The Ghoul specifically, would go multiple episodes without much any screen time even though he is set up to be a major player in the show. He is dominant in the first 2-3 episodes but then kind of fades into the background. 

Overall, this was a very fun and interesting show. It was very accessible to both veterans of the game and people who have never played it before. I am very interested to see where the show goes in season 2. 

Score: 8/10 Grade: B+ Recommendation: Check it out