Fallout - Season 1 Review

Fallout - Season 1 Review

Up until recently, video game adaptations haven’t been the best received both in terms of box office numbers, and critically. With many flops including ‘Assassins Creed’, ‘Hitman’, ‘Hitman: Agent 47’, ‘Doom’ and ‘Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time’ just to name a few. However, in recent years, we have seen a shift in this, with many hits hitting both the big and small screen. Some of these hits included: ‘Uncharted’, ‘Tomb Raider’, ‘The Last of Us’, ‘Sonic The Hedgehog 1, 2 & 3’, ‘The Super Mario Bros.Movie’, ‘Detective Pikachu’, ‘Fallout’, ‘Warcraft’, ‘Gran Turismo’ and ‘Borderlands’, all impressing audiences across the globe. ‘Fallout’ is one of those games, that has continued to impress gamers across multiple sequels. I myself, have played multiple iterations of the game across multiple consoles. It was only a matter of time before we were going to get an adaptation and in 2024, we finally did!

Set in a retro-futuristic, post-apocalyptic California, ‘Fallout’ follows the aftermath of the Great War of 2077, a devastating nuclear exchange between the U.S. and China. Survivors live in underground Vaults, unaware that many of these shelters were designed for sinister experiments by the corporation Vault-Tec. The story centres on Lucy MacLean (played by Ella Purnell), a bright and idealistic young woman from Vault 33 who ventures into the irradiated wasteland in search of her kidnapped father. Her journey brings her face-to-face with the brutal realities of the surface world, including mutated creatures, scavengers, and warring factions. The crosses paths with Maximus (played by Aaron Moten), a soldier of the Brotherhood of Steel, a militaristic group seeking to restore order through advanced technology and The Ghoul, a mysterious and morally ambiguous bounty hunter portrayed by Walton Goggins, who harbors secrets from the pre-war era. As a fan of the games and the world of Fallout, I was really looking forward to this series, and thankfully it didn’t disappoint.

Fallout hits all the notes of the video game, creating an interesting, fun look at the post-apocalypse. The production design of this retro-futuristic, post-apocalypse is very well realised here, feeling like it was taken directly from the amazing lived-in world from the video games. Production designer Howard Cummings, who worked with writer/director Jonathan Nolan on Westworld, has done an amazing job here. Showrunners Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Graham Wagner also do a great job adapting the game here as a show. Whilst there are many different characters in the game, the show had a monumental task here, of realising these characters are creating them nearly from scratch. The dialogue is fun, funny and well-written. The story itself is also intriguing. We have two timelines playing out, pre-apocalypse and of course post-apocalypse. Both are well-developed and help with the overall tone of the show as a whole. Its all really well done.

The show essentially follows 3 characters. We have Ella Purnell as Lucy Maclean who is essentially our protagonist, living in Vault 33. We then have Aaron Moten as a member of the brotherhood of steel and Walton Goggins as both the Ghoul, a bounty hunter traversing the lands, for his next bounty and Cooper Howard, his pre-apocalypse character, who has uncovered a plot, that may lead to an apocalypse (which, given the current state of the world in the show, we know it did). The cast are all fantastic. Ella Purnell follows-up her work on shows like Sweatpea, Yellow Jackets and Arcane, with another strong performance. Showcasing her incredible range as an actress and proving why she is one of the stars of the future and someone to watch. Aaron Morten is also fantastic. The relationship his solder forms with Lauren. Both have an innocent nature and are trying to traverse this new world. Noth feeling innocent in their own way, but both coming from very different walks of life. Walton Goggins though steals the show for me here. He has proven himself as one of the best actors working today, with roles in the past few years in TV shows, ‘The White Lotus’, The Righteous Gemstones, Vice Principals and The Unicorn. He is reliable and always brilliant. Playing the dual role here, he brings a gravitas that a lot of actors wouldn’t have. These three performances, coupled with the writing, makes it one of the best new shows on television!

‘Fallout - Season 1’ is worth the time for fans of the game and those just looking for a solid TV show. Its fun in ways I didn’t think it could be, given the subject matter, and the moments of levity really do make the show more memorable. The characters are fun and bought to life by fantastic performances from its incredibly talented cast. It’s a great first season and I can’t wait to see where it goes, with its second season slated for release later this year! Be sure to secure your copy on DVD, Blu-Ray or 4K Ultra HD from Sanity today, you won’t want to miss it!

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Christopher Pattison from Oz-Movie Geek wrote this blog post for Sanity. See more from Chris here