Fallout

[olivermoss]

*shrug*


Fallout's world building isn't meant to make logical sense. It's symbolism and aesthetics. That's why the currency is bottlecaps from legally-distinct-from-coca-cola. But, still, all the tech and physicals and computer and security and logistics just did whatever the plot needed them to. There was no grounding realism to anchor the floaty bits.

Basically, for a number of reasons the strength of the character writing has to carry the show. The writing was very meh to me. So, the battles making little sense stood out to me. For example, in an early battle the ghoul could easily have taken the shot, got the goods and got out while mech boy slowly floated in. Also, loyal attack dog just listens to his master scream without doing anything for a bit, and then bonds with the attacker?

I don't know how these battles read as scripts, but as shot the battles make no sense... unless it's supposed to be meta for like how you can't take actions during cut scenes?

The show's been very well reviewed. I don't know if I am an outlier, if the show seems awesome to fans of the IP or it's just good to have a TV show based on a existing IP just not suck for once.

Peeking at tumblr and reddit and a few other places, I am seeing a lot of 'the show is good actually, you guys are just mean' type stuff. Eh, doesn't really matter, just curious how the show plays for people into it's vibe and if it's me who is missing something about it.

Comments

[mistressofmuses]

I'm halfway through it. I'm also in the "it's... alright?" camp.

I've heard from a bunch of loose acquaintances how great it is and how much they love it, and all the critical reviews seem to be glowing!

Then my sibling has been making posts to the effect of "look, I know the show is basically the worst thing ever made, but just ignore it and don't let it ruin the parts of the franchise that you do love," so I guess there are people who think it's horrible.

It's... better than I expected it to be. I like the cast, the aesthetics are great, the acting has been good imo. I've found it fun enough to watch.
But while I like the characters fine, I strongly agree the writing surrounding a lot of the pieces has been weak.
The battle in Filly with the dog really bugged me too! The dog was discovered and they went on the run from the Enclave because the dog defended him. The dog is near-killed protecting him again... and then it just bonds with The Ghoul and does nothing to follow?
Other stuff just feels inconsistent, and like you said, like everything just happens in whatever way is most convenient to have the right outcome. Whether that's how many shots a character has or can take, whether that's how fast some mutated monster can move and grab prey to show us how scary it is vs. how quickly it DOESN'T eat a main character to give them an escape opportunity...
It also seems to sometimes play by video game rules: again, the ability for characters to sometimes take quite a few bullets, or to recover from really horrific wounds with some sort of sci-fi medical intervention, even the really gorey splattery deaths seem like a nod to a perk you can get in-game that does that.
But then other times, characters don't recover, and it seems like all the violence is still supposed to be a threat. Idk, do we have to worry about bodily injury or not?

ALSO. If the series is not supposed to follow any part of the games and be its own entry into the continuity, then why does it keep borrowing game plots and characters? I find Kyle MacLachlan a more compelling dad to try and find than Liam Neesan. But Dean Domino was the best (though he was the worst) old-world-celebrity-turned-ghoul.

[olivermoss]

The aesthetics are amazing. There may be more gameplay references that I am not getting. Every time there is a hail of bullets nothing hits, but every time it's a single bullet it's devastation. It's like the conservation of ninjitsu trope, but with bullets. Maybe this makes sense if I know the canon better?

Yeah, the world building is meant to be symbolic, but it's so floaty. There is no anchor or structure that I can see.

[mistressofmuses]

It's visually so good!

I feel like there's a handful of gameplay references, but not a whole ton. (Granted, if the references were unique to something other than New Vegas, I wouldn't likely recognize it either.) But yeah, the whole single shot being more effective than a whole hail of bullets flying just feels... off. (There ARE gameplay mechanics that let you aim single shots for better damage, but they don't seem to be really trying to reference that.)

The worldbuilding retrofuturistic corporate satire stuff is great, and it works well symbolically and as a point of contrast! In-game it feels internally consistent for me, but largely because it does mesh reasonably well with video game logic (healing items, weapon upgrades, putting points into specific skills, arbitrary currency). That is something that feels like it doesn't translate so well to the series, because it seems like they can't quite decide if they're going to commit to the video game logic or try to make it feel more real-world, and it just wobbles back and forth.

And I'm frustrated that the writing is a weak point, though I guess I'm not surprised. New Vegas has some really great writing, but it was an external studio, and the more recent games have supposedly been a lot weaker. (Even 3, which was at the time super well-liked as far as I recall has just straight up terrible writing in the ending climax that I have NEVER gotten over. [Me and countless others, lol.])

[olivermoss]

At a point near the start it felt like they were going to make game mechanic integration more of a thing, more visual, but didn't do that route.

Visually, it's great. Some of the acting is great. That one random recruit of the Brotherhood of Steel was too good, I kept wanting him to be a main character.

For 8 episodes it's one thing to have the world building be so floaty. If they continue it at all it's hard to see how they can maintain it.

I haven't played Fallout myself, outside of that one tablet game everyone was playing a thousand years ago. I am somewhat familiar with the lore and have played other Bethesda games

[mistressofmuses]

Yeah... the pip boys are a huge part of the games, and most of the things they did in the show are very much game things... but they never really committed fully to it.

Visually it was great! I enjoyed basically the whole cast! I even liked most of the broad character arcs well enough, but it was disappointing that it felt like the writing didn't serve those arcs very well.

I feel like they needed to do *something* with the worldbuilding. The visuals and most of the details work with the games, and it is intended to be within-continuity (sparking much wank because some of the dates don't line up with the established canon and so there is much rage), but... Agreed, it feels too disconnected and inconsistent to provide a good framework. Maybe I will be pleasantly surprised (I already was, honestly, because I expected it to be just bad-bad, instead of pretty-okay.)

If it does get a second season, people will either double down on the rage or the delight, since the final shot of this season is the New Vegas skyline. That game is a fan-favorite (my favorite!) for good reason imo, but it's the hard core fans of that game in particular that are maddest about how the show is treating canon.

If you have a chance at New Vegas, I do think that one is worthwhile, and I highly recommend the DLC, which was all really excellent. I have also played 3, but did not enjoy it nearly as much in terms of game design or writing. I have not played the older games or the newer ones; I heard a lot of disappointment about 4.

[olivermoss]

I don't know a ton about Fallout, but I really wonder how the show worked for people going in cold. I'd be very confused without my scraps of knowledge.

Yeah, hopefully they figure out what to do. So much of streaming has been about hype and then dropping shows. Them doing something so floaty and then basically name dropping New Vegas at the end feels like chasing hype. But, we'll see what happens.

I think F4 and the hype/crash was when I was most aware of Fallout because of the cons I was at.

[mistressofmuses]

I've seen a lot of things saying that the show did a good job of being accessible for existing fans and as an entry point into the series and lore, but I feel like I would have struggled a bit if I didn't already know certain things, too. I guess it did a fair job of introducing things, but it felt a lot easier to follow because I already had that base knowledge.

Streaming should be so good for making new series, instead of what it has been. So many cycles of hype-drop-hype new thing. That end scene felt very much like hype chasing, dropping a bunch of fan-favorite stuff (New Vegas; the deathclaw skull) right at the end... It seems obvious it's intended to continue, since nothing is resolved, but... yeah, we'll see. We'll see if they can hold it together for another season, or if they're even really planning to try.

Yeah, F4 was a big hype/crash, so if you were in spaces where the people who cared about it congregated I wouldn't be surprised you would have heard plenty about it!

[profiterole_reads]

I watched the trailer at the time and wasn't really into it. But I'm not big on post-apocalyptic stories in general. I read/watch a few here and there, but I'm picky about them.

[olivermoss]

Yeah, Fallout is a very specific flavor. I find it interesting, but it doesn't work for me