Right, let’s get back to it. After all, we should be used to seeing America for the tainted, withered, comically grotesque husk that it is by now.
Though belated as ever, I’m happy to get back to Fallout. The first season was stellar, as a show and as a video game adaptation. And the second season is set up to delve into what many consider to be one of the most unique chapters in the games. Or, at least, explore its aftermath.
That would be the stuff related to Fallout: New Vegas. This episode alone delivers a lot of those vibes right out of the gate. It starts out with Mr. House (who it turns out uses a double and is played by Justin Theroux now) in the past, testing a mind control device on some blue collar guy. That’s immediately followed up with Lucy and Cooper/The Ghoul battling the Great Khans in Novac to the tune of Marty Robbins’s “Big Iron” in a scene that could have been lifted straight out of the game.
I’m excited for all of this, but I’m also still curious as to how exactly all of these references will play into the story of the show. Time will tell if it’s able to successfully weave this all into one narrative that feels new, or if the show’s content to simply ride the coattails of the games. I’m thinking it will be the former, but you never know.
I do, at least, like that this episode alone is a good progression of pretty much everything set up by the end of the previous season’s finale.
I like that the flashback scene is a direct continuation of the last one we saw, with Cooper heading straight home after finding out Vault-Tec (and his wife’s) plot to end the world and attempting to flee with his daughter. He’s given another option by the woman who would one day be known as Moldaver. While cryptic about it, she suggests that Cooper use his fame and status as Barb’s husband to get a meeting with Mr. House, and to kill him. Past-Cooper is clearly uncertain and reluctant, but in the present, Ghoul-Cooper appears to be heading down that same path.
While they aren’t exactly friendly with each other, Lucy and Cooper do make pretty good companions. They have a sort of good cop/bad cop dynamic that fits the setting in a lovely way. And they’ve already made it to the Mojave Wasteland, hot on her father’s trail.
Norm, Lucy’s brother, ended last season in a very precarious position: trapped in the uninhabitable Vault 31 by a jarred brain on wheels. I thought it was cool that he didn’t just meekly accept his hopeless situation and actively undermined Bud-on-a-Roomba. Was not expecting him to just release the other Vault-Tec executives in the cryo-pods. That should be interesting.
Betty and Steph, the two time-displaced execs now serving as Overseers of Vaults 33 and 32, are trying to keep smiling but are clearly over-stressed by the deteriorating conditions in the Vault. There seem to be a lot of increasingly discontented vault-dwellers — like Chet, Reg and Davey — which makes me think that there’s going to be some control issues down the line. I'm sure either Norm or Lucy will add some fuel to that fire.
Speaking of control, Hank MacLean makes it to a massive undisclosed vault somewhere in or around New Vegas. It’s through this sequence that I think we’ve gotten the clearest sense of what kind of person Hank really is. He’s an absolutely ruthless sociopath who carries out his dark agenda with a light-hearted can-do attitude. We also discover that, in addition to being a pre-war Vault-Tec employee, he was working as a double agent for Mr. House the whole time. He’s well aware of the mind control technology, and apparently wants to earn his way back into House’s good graces. And he’s expecting some kind of “promotion” for his efforts.
It’s all pretty ambiguous right now, but that’s okay. The level of intrigue is on point. And I’m ready for more.
Caps and rads:
Music: In addition to “Big Iron,” there’s also “Cheek to Cheek” by Peggy Lee and “Working for the Man” by Roy Orbison. The lyrics to that last one match up nicely with Hank. ‘Cause the company and the daughter you see, Their both gonna be all mine.
* Between the Roy Orbison song and Kyle MacLachlan merrily grinning as he drinks a cup of coffee, I couldn't help but think of Twin Peaks during Hank's sequence in the vault.
* No Maximus or Brotherhood of Steel in this episode.
* We get right back to the spirit of the show with a reference to The Good, The Bad and The Ugly early on. Lucy and the Ghoul’s scheme with shooting the noose is quite similar to what Clint Eastwood and Eli Wallach’s characters get up to in the first act of that movie.
* Though very different in tone, Fallout is still reminiscent of Westworld. That show’s last season also opened with the head of a robotics company testing a mind-control device on some guy and forcing him to kill his friends.
* I’m mostly enjoying the show’s portrayal of Mr. House, so far. The opening scene establishes his character — think Howard Hughes (but more impressive) meets Elon Musk (but more evil) — and his mind control device, but his actions in the scene are telling too. We see that he’s a rather deranged man with a risk-taking personality. We also see that he’s not all powerful, physically or in terms of the technologies he relies on. He weirdly asks the burly construction worker to punch him in the mouth as some sort of macho flex, but he reacts as one might expect. And he’s clearly worried when he appears to lose control of Bill and there’s a delay in the head-exploding feature of his device.
* The music cue that dings when our attention is drawn to the mind-control device is straight from the games. I think it usually occurs when a mission is completed or an achievement has been reached.
* The Star-Lite Drive-In is another nod to New Vegas. In the show, we discover it's the secret location of Vault 24, which acted as an R and D lab for House's mind control tech and its inhabitants were mercilessly used as test subjects.
* I’ve played three Fallout games, and somehow didn’t realize until this episode that Sugar Bombs was supposed to be a breakfast cereal.
Quotes:
Lucy MacLean: “And just to ask the question, would it help if I said ‘please?’”
Nick the Prick: “Whoever kills the girl gets to eat the dog!”
Lucy: “Okey dokey.”
Davey: “That’s a heck of a wife you got, Chet.”
Chet: “We’re not actually married.”
Davey: “And a beautiful baby.”
Chet: “Not mine.”
Davey: “I never had a family. What happened? Wife, I guess. Things move quickly down here.”
Chet: “I don’t have a family either, Davey.”
Davey: “Well, enjoy it.”
Norm MacLean: “I’m not gonna be your prisoner.”
Bud-on-a-Roomba: “You’re already my prisoner. All you have to do is wait until the surface is safe to recolonize. Then, we’ll all head up for Reclamation Day.”
Norm: “And when is that, exactly?”
Bud-on-a-Roomba: “When there’s no one left on the surface to disagree with us.”
Bud-on-a-Roomba: “You’re living in my world. These three vaults are the product of decades of strategizing. The combined efforts of hundreds of the brightest pre-war minds with all the resources of a functioning civilization. You’re just some malcontent who wandered down the wrong corridor. What hope do you have against the greatest achievement in the history of vertical integration?”
News anchor: “Meanwhile, RobCo owner Robert House created a stir today with remarks on the escalating war. In an interview with Galaxy News, he stated that ‘The question might not be whether the world will end, but merely who will push the button.’ More on that story after a word from our sponsors.”
Lucy: “Never seen a vault like this before.”
The Ghoul: “Par for the course, in my experience.”
Four out of five bowls of flea soup.
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