Onwards we move to the last TV event of the year that I give half a damn about, The Fallout TV show- and to be utterly and brutally honest with everyone: I'm not feeling overly optimistic about it! And a lot of that scepticism has absolutely nothing to do with the show itself but rather my general impressions on the lot of the media proceeding it. The Last of Us show led all of us 'Adaptation wary' into a false sense of security that we've been knocked out of in the wake of movies like 'Madame Web'. And sure, 'Web' was not a direct adaptation of any work, but they still did a bunch of characters that we know incredibly dirty. And then there is the Avatar Live Action show which so far floundered the crucial beginning chapters, picked up substantially with it's middle chapters- and I haven't finished the first season yet- but I'm not blown away by the quality of it all. Which leads me to some degree of apprehension when thinking we've got our Fallout show headed our way in less than a month.
Now the significance of this Fallout show is not lost on me. With the exception of the Final Fallout game coming up in the 2030's- this is going to be the last Fallout project that the series reviver Todd Howard has a chance to produce, to prove that the direction of the franchise is on the right track for the next generation to take over. You know, provided that there is anyone left in the AAA space to take over executive positions in the next decade when everyone has been fired out of the industry. (It's a bit of a toss-up right now in that regard.) Todd didn't personally make this show of course, but it will be under his producing eye to ensure that Johnathon Nolan doesn't grab this source material and drag it into another vapidly existential diatribe into whatever pseudo-religious fringe-philosophy the mad man is currently studying- I just want this to retain it's original DNA a bit more than West World ever did- pretty please!
Of course, Mister Nolan has his own thoughts about exactly what he wants to achieve with this series and to the ear of the receptive it's actually somewhat positive. In an attempt to offer an olive branch out to us who stand afraid of exactly what the man has planned for our favourite post apocalypse- Nolan declared he wants this show to exist as something of a 'Fallout 5', on an non-interactive medium- which is a much more charitable way of saying he wants this to exist alongside that which has come before, rather than The Last of Us showrunner who callously tossed away games as the inferior artform in the face of his superior TV work. (Gotta love petty artistic squabbles!) But in that promise comes a certain shadow of expectation Nolan wasn't exactly cognizant of accepting.
Because at best I saw this as an oddity- an introduction to the world of Fallout to a non gaming audience without any real expectation behind in terms of intent or narrative purpose. Now I know to expect better. And more. By Nolan's curious interpretation, each Fallout is kind of an island of it's own beholden to it's own world and lore and canon whilst existing within a larger space- (an excuse Bethesda is desperate to adopt for how bad they've been at canon consistency over the years) which places this adaptation someplace similar to the Dark Knight Trilogy, for which he wrote. If we're going to compare this upcoming show to the quality bar of the Dark Knight, then my bar seriously shot up for what I'm asking for out of this show- to an extent I'm not sure the showrunners are ready for!
Fallout stories have purpose, they move a needle, they tell stories about pathos and growth and turmoil and concession- Fallout stories are multifaceted and reverberating and they don't have neat clean endings. Fallout stories contain no heroes or... well, okay they always have pretty clearly defined villains, but the 'heroes' are never squeaky and clean. Fallout contains so much fuel to feed into it's core thesis, that no matter how far the world changes and how much evidence persists to affirm the fallen state of the world and what we can do about it- conflict remains unchanging. War never changes. From conception to death Mankind will strife with itself until there is nothing left and that is a foundational aspect of the human condition.
Now if the Avatar show runners were the guys in charge of this show, I would be deeply worried about their ability to hit these nails into the coffin- but Johnathon Nolan is no stranger to reaching those kinds of beats in the entertainment that he makes. In fact, he often has a tendency to elevate the source materials he works on, pulling out it's best elements and highlighting them to their fullest. Maybe even getting lost in them, as I would argue was the case with Westworld. But by that same merit I'm not going to just lay back and assume that man knows exactly what he's on with a game franchise. I just don't believe the man even knows what the games are or cares enough to study them- one who did would be a little more cautious about copy-pasting the Prydwyn into their show without a single design change. (It was a custom construction for god's sake! There can't be two!)
But if there is one thing I need to highlight before it fries my brain like a shot of FOXDIE- OMG the NCR- what are they doing to my boys? Bethesda have apparently nuked Shady Sands and now the NCR look like scavenger remnants? Is this- this can't be the new face of the NCR, right? Tell me that Bethesda, through Johnathon Nolan, didn't just kill the only barely functioning government in the game about post apocalyptic societies! I mean sure, we know that the NCR are so big that the apparent eradication of their capital is a huge blow, but not a shattering event- but do Bethesda know that? They've always had a hardon for dragging the 'post' out of the apocalypse title and wanting to make their Fallout worlds as desolate as possible! Also- for the love of god don't make the Brotherhood the prevailing Western force as well as the prevailing Eastern force! Can we get a break from the tin can men, please!
Phew- there we go! Got the nerd out there and now I can talk about the show... It looks beautiful. Set design, character makeup, the cast- everything looks entirely on point to the extent that now we just need to hear that the writers have their A-game on- which was where the Avatar show lost it's way, so fingers crossed Fallout has them beat there! I seriously want to see a show like this go the distance, cover grounds familiar and new- bring a new face to the world of Fallout so we can talk about the intricacies of the Post Apocalypse in public without looking like irredeemable social outcasts! Please, Johnathon Nolan- save me from myself and make this show good!
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