With something that has so many moving parts as Fallout does, it’s somewhat understandable that sometimes it takes a little time to all, or even some, of the pieces into a particular configuration before you start letting some of those narrative dominoes fall. But with conspiracies, flashbacks, potential civil war and giant mutant monsters all jostling for position, it seems that the lion’s share of Fallout’s second season has been painstakingly building up the pressure to rather epic levels. In fact, there’s an argument to be made that it’s build up is so complex, there’s not even been room in the actual show to keep all those plates spinning as entire plot threads have been taking turns to sit out whole episodes in order to keep things moving.
But now we’re at the halfway point, the time has come to open a pressure valve and finally let some of that pressure out in forms of some glorious pay off that no doubt will lead to even greater stress doen the road. We’ve finally hit New Las Vegas, folks – it’s time to collect some well earned winnings.
After rescuing Lucy from crucifixion at the hands of the Legion, the Ghoul gets her back to the meager forces of the New California Republic to get medical aid, but while the plucky Vault Dweller is nursed back to health, it seems to have left her heavily addicted to a steroid known as Buffout. Finding that cold turkey is going for take up too much time, the Ghoul helpfully suggests that she simply continues taking the drug to combat the comedown, which in turn leaves her usually positive mood taking a more reckless turn.
Meanwhile, life in the Vaults are starting to get tense. With Vault 33 rapidly running out of water, Overseer Betty appeals to the new Overseer of Vault 32 only to find that Steph leading style is about as warm and fuzzy as a great white shark. But while Chet accidently discovers proof that Steph is far older than she looks due to Vault-Tech’s executive program. Speaking of which, Norm continues to lead the defrosted execs on the surface only to find that one of them knows far more about the overarching Vault conspiracy than he should.
However, while tensions are still rising everywhere else, they’ve just about reached their maximum with the Brotherhood Of Steel and Maximus struggles to contain the spreading chaos. After realising he’s just lit the fuse of potential civil war within the Commonwealth after killing Harkness to protect some Ghoul children, he stuffs the infected Thaddeus into a suit of Power Armour and gets him to pose as the murdered representative. From there, he sets out to assasinate Quintus in a panic, but as his poorly thrown together plans collapse almost instantly, matters become even more serious when a panicking Thaddeus causes the heads of the other orders of the Brotherhood to turn on each other with bloody results.
Still, look on the bright side… at least New Las Vegas isn’t infested with a massive, horned beast with a taste of human flesh. Oh, wait… shit… yes it is.
For a while there, I was beginning to wonder where the Hell the second season of Fallout was actually going. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I’ve been enjoying the steady rise of tension as it’s players have wandered from problem to problem, but I could help but notice that there was one character who seemed to be more lost than everyone else. Considering that Ella Purnell’s Lucy McClean is essentially the main character with a clearly defined vision (find her war criminal father), the first half of the second season has literally left her a little aimless, be it bickering with the Ghoul or getting caught up with the Legion. However, with The Demon In The Snow, we finally find she now has some stuff she can sink her teeth into when it comes to any progession in her storyline. While Lucy’s thread has mostly been defined about whether her up-beat, honest nature can remain in place in the face of the cruel horrors of the Wasteland, the cracks are now starting to show thanks to a rather weighty addition to steroids. As a result, she’s now grouchy, impatient and happy to indulge in the slaughter of Elvis impersonator Ghouls in order to speed her mission along which is something the Ghoul seems to be fully on board with. It’s a relief because with the Brotherhood on the verge of civil war, plenty of flashbacks concerning Cooper Howard’s backstory and the continuing issues concerning the various Vaults, it was beginning to feel like Lucy was becoming a bystander in her own show (shit, even Norm has had more to do), but now the show is now directly targeting her demeanor, it’s gratifying that she’s now got something to do other than just look horrified at yet more Wasteland shenanigans.
Also getting a boost are the various, choking conspiracies that are entwined around the various Vaults, although even though these plots where pretty much the lifeblood of season 1, they’re getting a little stagnant when compared to how big and expansive the rest of the show has gotten. In fact, while Steph tightens her grip on power and Betty struggles to get the rest of Vault 33 to understand the severity of the water crisis they face, there’s no one left in the Vaults that I’m actually, overly invested in, leaving the Vault based stuff as fun, but minor diversion to the big, surface stuff. However, upon saying that, I’m truly curious to find out where Norm’s thread is going to go now that his excursion to bring all the defrosted executives to the surface is already seeing lines drawn in the sand when one go-getter reveals he knows a lot of Vault-Tech’s dirty laundry.
However, despite the fact that Lucy’s storyline contains Elvis zombies, drug addiction and the debut of the hulking, mutant, murder machine known as a Deathclaw and Cooper’s usual flashback takes us back to his days in the Sino-American war, once again its Maximus’ hand in the rapid collapse of the Brotherhood which still holds has the best stuff this season. In fact, most of the macabre, ironic, farcical tone that the first season set has been mostly carried on by the formally serious Brotherhood as the chaos spiral that Maximus is trapped in just keeps getting worse. Watching an anxiety-ridden Thaddeus desperate try to pass as Harkness without realising that his terrified mutterings are being broadcast out of the Power Suit’s speakers. Finally, the dam breaks and the squabbling members of the other factions finally come to blows with a minimum of prodding and the sight of Maximus and Thaddeus fleeing as the Brotherhood erupts into war behind them is the cherry on the cake for a massively enjoyable plot thread.
By far the best episode of this season so far, it now feels that Fallout’s second coming is not set up to go great guns – I mean, we already know that we’re getting some frenzied, Deathclaw action the second episode five kicks off. In fact, with the spirited comeback of Lucy plotline, all we need now is a little bit of urgency in those Vaults and the fallout from Fallout will be raining down like hailstones.
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