Fallout review: Video game adaptation is a wild nuclear western

as early as one of fall outThe film flashes back several times to the late 21st century, where actor Cooper Howard (played by Walton Goggins) is worried about the ending of a western he is filming. Why would his character, a law-abiding sheriff, choose to shoot a gangster rather than arrest him outright?

“It’s a new kind of Western,” his director explains.

fall outTake these words to heart in this adaptation of Bethesda’s best-selling video game series. In the show’s first scene, a cowboy-clad Cooper desperately rides a horse away from the billowing mushroom cloud engulfing Los Angeles—call it a nuclear Western.

But this is just the beginning of Western influence fall out Wear blue and yellow sleeves with pride.Over the course of the series – appropriately presented by westworldStarring Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan – We’ll meet tenacious bounty hunters, witness tense confrontations, and venture into a vast wasteland teeming with dangerous factions.This is a world where giant cockroaches eat giant cockroaches, and fall out It’s at its best when it digs into how weird, wild, and chaotic the world is.

what is fall out about?

Laying the foundation for the “new type of Western” fall out A “new” America is needed. It offers both. First up is America in 2077, and we’re going to spend some time in a flashback. It’s a retro-futuristic vision filled with 1950s aesthetics, advanced robotics, and Cold War paranoia. But don’t get too used to it! Soon, this America—and the world—will face global nuclear war.

Human civilization exists 219 years later in the form of isolated underground survival shelters called “Vaults,” whose inhabitants hope to one day repopulate the surface of the world. Among these Vault residents are Vault 33 Overseer Hank McClane (Kyle MacLachlan) and his daughter Lucy (Yellow shirt armyElla Purnell)The young woman’s character is sunnier and more quintessentially American than the idyllic Nebraska cornfields projected on the walls of Vault 33.

However, after the attack on Vault 33, Lucy’s ruthless fighting spirit plummeted. Despite warnings from her fellow vault dwellers, she heads to the surface and sets things right. But the world she finds above ground is unlike anything she could have prepared for. It’s a place filled with cannibals, mutated creatures, and people who simply don’t understand Lucy’s beloved golden rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

Here she will encounter the dangerous Brotherhood of Steel member Maximus (Aaron Morton) and Ghoul (Goggins), a centuries-old bounty hunter scarred by radiation. .

fall out Great…finally.

need some time fall out The series truly resonates when its pieces fall into place. Our main entry points into the show’s world are Vault 33 and the Brotherhood of Steel, and the tonal clashes between these factions can be intense.As we move from Vault’s cousins ​​incest jokes and jelly cakes to the Brotherhood of Steel’s clunky power armor and religious techno-fascism, it feels like fall out Struggling to find its footing (especially the sense of humour).

Until Lucy and Maximus actually left home, fall out Unleash everything and throw everything at us – from giant mutant salamanders to plot-relevant decapitated heads to beloved canine companions fall out game.The more Lucy and Maximus get from their starting companions, the funnier and freer the show becomes, a development that definitely fits fall outWestern tendencies.

Westerns are largely about the evolution of individuals when faced with a new, rugged landscape: how we change when faced with a new territory where we can go wild and surrender to our base instincts in order to survive ? In Lucy’s case, it’s hard to stick to your principles, even when you find yourself heading to a dark place. (Purnell plays Jackie’s fan Yellow shirt army It should be nice to see another upbeat Purnell character face a horrific reckoning at the hands of The Wild. ) If you’re Maximus, you might find yourself adopting a whole new identity, using your time in the wasteland as an opportunity to completely rewrite yourself.

Walton Goggins as Ghoul fall outof prominence.

The ghoul is the perfect foil for Lucy and Maximus, and Goggins brings a million tons of weary charisma to his performance. fall outThe resident lone wolf, the Black Hat archetype. While Lucy and Maximus are new to the wasteland, the Ghouls have been there since the moment the bombs dropped. He’s a ghost from the past, dragged into the dusty, wild present – and we learn from flashbacks from the ghoul’s past life as Cooper Howard that he may have had a bigger role in creating this present than previously thought More.

In true Nolan and Joey fashion, fall out no only Nuclear Western. It’s also a somewhat mysterious box. There are questions about the Ghoul’s own past here, but there’s also some delightful intrigue in Vault 33, with Lucy’s cantankerous brother Norm (Moises Arias) investigating what led to his father’s kidnapping security vulnerabilities. The touted reveal will shock, awe and maybe even catch the game’s devoted fans off guard, fall out This proves satisfying, but the mysteries don’t overstay their welcome.

These mysteries and fall outThat total embrace of the Western genre speaks to its proven approach to adapting video game franchises into such a huge and beloved one. fall out.Rather than translating a specific game storyline, the show uses the game’s setting, character archetypes, and various genres—yes, including Westerns—to make something both original and complete fall out. Yes, there may be some stumbling blocks on the televised journey into the Badlands, but it’s still a fun ride.

All episodes fall out Premiering on Prime Video on April 10 at 9pm ET.

theme
Amazon Prime Video Streaming