🔗 Share this article

The post-apocalyptic TV show has made a triumphant return to streaming services, and it's safe to say that fans were pleasantly surprised by the caliber of its debut season. By depicting the retro-futuristic, nuclear-ravaged United States through the eyes of three distinct characters, it managed to capture different facets of the player's journey.

We followed vault-dweller Lucy, striving to do the right thing and discovering that the ruined world made that incredibly hard; Max, the militant faction initiate, who begins to question his faction's dogma and creates plenty of trouble in robotic power armour; and the Ghoul, a fan-favorite figure who has entirely abandoned any moral compass out in the radioactive badlands.

Setting the Stage for the Second Season

The show's first season ending disclosed a major secret about those responsible for the global annihilation that condemned a group of people in bomb-proof bunkers for hundreds of years. It also left plenty of questions unanswered for the next installment – and, this time, hopes are significantly higher.

“We'd gladly accept ‘not terrible’ – let’s get that on a poster,” says the show's co-creator.

“Starting the first season, people were like, ‘Just don't mess it up’,” states the game director. “We’re over the moon with the reception to the show, so this time people are bringing more enthusiasm and new expectations.”

The Mojave Beckons for Season Two

The new season is set in New Vegas, the setting of the 2010’s game Fallout: New Vegas, which is widely regarded for having the best writing and personalities in the series, even if it was a bit broken at launch.

“It has a desert vibe, a Mojave vibe, that’s so integral to that game,” explains the co-creator. “That parched, desolate iconic highway aesthetic of the game is so much rewarding to incorporate into the show.”

In the show's timeline, a significant amount of time has elapsed since the story of the New Vegas game by the time the protagonists make their way there. However, the creators indicate that it will honor the gamer's experience.

The Importance of Physical Sets

The Fallout TV series is notable for its physical authenticity – its creators ensured physical models and environments were fabricated, echoing the cobbled-together nature of the outposts in the games.

“As a sci-fi fan, so many productions I watch, I’m aware that they’re all standing in front of a green screen,” observes another of the showrunners. “The key objective of an adaptation, especially of a interactive medium, is to seem like it’s tangible.”

Actually, pretty much everything you see on-screen is physical, even the notoriously frightening irradiated monsters known as the apex predators. In the show, they are portrayed by puppets, and were by all accounts pretty frightening up close.

A Labor of Love

The Fallout series resonates because it is crafted by talented film-makers who are also passionate gamers, alongside the visionaries behind the video games. This mutual respect for the lore is apparent in the finished show.

The new batch of episodes is being released on a episode-by-episode basis rather than as a full-season drop, offering a different experience from the previous season. This approach will create a different weekly discussion, something the team themselves are looking forward to observe.

“It's richer, it’s bigger, it’s wittier, it has a lot of twists,” promises the game director. “I can't wait to seeing what people think.”