Amazon Prime’s ‘near-perfect’ sci-fi thriller makes the apocalypse look fun

Crack out the RadAway, put on your least bloodstained Vault jumpsuit, and make sure your rifle is loaded because we’re heading back to the Wasteland. 

That’s right, after just over a year of waiting, the Prime Video sci-fi series Fallout has returned for season two.

Based on the video game series of the same name, this weird and wacky show is set in an atompunk future where humanity has been brought to the brink of extinction following nuclear Armageddon. 

Fallout, then, follows three different characters as they try to survive the many irradiated horrors of the Wasteland.  

You’ve got Lucy MacLean (Ella Purnell), a naive newcomer to the ruins of what was once America, who’d previously spent her entire life locked in an underground bunker.  

Then there’s Maximus (Aaron Moten), a paladin in a group of techno feudal knights known as the Brotherhood of Steel (they’re like the Night’s Watch if the Black Brothers wore Iron Man armour).  

Finally, we have Cooper Howard, aka The Ghoul (Walton Goggins), a bounty hunter and literal walking corpse kept alive by radiation, drugs, and misanthropy.  

After spending the first season bumbling around California, this new chapter sees our heroes make their way across the Mojave Desert to the bright lights of New Vegas, where they find themselves embroiled in the machinations of the megalomaniacal Mr House as they hunt Hank (Kyle MacLachlan).

To say any more would be a spoiler, but you’re not here for plot details; you’re here because you want to know if Fallout season 2 is worth your time.  

Well, here’s the good news: the second season is great – it may even be brilliant at times – combining exciting action with likeable characters, excellent world-building, and a gripping story. 

I’d actually go so far as to say that the Fallout TV show is a near-perfect adaptation, being both slavishly devoted to maintaining the style and tone of the games while also having the confidence to do its own thing when it needs to. 

Like the games, the series has a sense of humour darker than an emo’s favourite pair of black skinny jeans, skewering late-stage capitalism and nationalism like a knight with an exceptionally sharp lance.  

With that in mind, though, the show’s not all po-faced satire about the dangers of commercialising human survival; there’s a lurid streak to it that’s expressed through demented over-the-top violence and borderline slapstick silliness.  

In fact, that’s one thing I really appreciate about Fallout: for a series set in the ruins of civilisation, it’s remarkably bright and colourful both visually and tonally.  

Too often, these apocalyptic shows seem to think the end of the world means everything has to be brown and miserable (I’m looking at you, The Last of Us), but this is a series that dares to make doomsday fun.  

A lot of this comes down to the hard work of the production team, who, I must say, have put an incredible amount of effort into making the show look exactly like the games. 

From the props to the costumes, the weapons and creatures, everything looks like a video game come to life.  

I know that sounds like faint praise, but the attention to detail shines through, and you can see the effort on screen.  

Still, as much as I love the series for its devotion to the Fallout games, what makes it truly special is how it engages new audiences. 

It’s clear that while the writers have a lot of love for the source material, they didn’t want to turn the show into an Easter egg hunt for those of us who know a deathclaw from a radroach.  

As a result, the main focus is always character first, and they do a sensational job at making Cooper, Maximus and Lucy flawed but likeable.  

Now I must admit I did find Lucy’s blind innocence a little grating at times, as was the Ghoul’s continued belligerence (Maximus innocent), still, I’m willing to look past it because it makes sense for these characters.  

The writers also made the smart decision not to burden the story with the full weight of the game’s canon. 

There’s some lip service paid to the actions players took in the game, but they skirt around the specifics to tell a story that doesn’t require you to have a PHD in the history of this alternate apocalypse.  

Instead, they tell an intriguing story with a decent mystery behind it that’ll keep viewers hooked. Sadly, however, I think this is where Fallout stumbles slightly. 

You see, there’s a mushroom cloud hanging over Fallout in the form of The Ghoul’s story.  

Cooper is easily the most dynamic and compelling character, and his quest to find out what happened to his family is the most interesting. 

So you do find yourself wondering at times, ‘I wonder what the Ghoul is doing now?’ when the spotlight moves on to Lucy and Maximus.  

I also think the show is trying to balance so many different storylines at once that it can feel a little jumbled at times.  

This is most noticeable when we return to Vault 33, which is the part of the story I care least about.  

Yet while Fallout may stumble, it never goes into full meltdown. In fact, I had a blast (pun intended) with it.  

Fallout season 2 is streaming now on Amazon Prime Video now.

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