Amazon’s ‘Fallout’ adaptation is a wonderful, gory home run
Don’t say it too loud, but we might, finally, have reached the point when good TV adaptations of hit videogames become the norm rather than the exception. Hot on the heels of “The Last of Us” and “The Witcher” comes “Fallout,” an eight-part series based on the postapocalyptic world explored in the series of famed Bethesda games. In an alternate future, with the world devastated by a global nuclear war, a community of wealthy individuals retreats to a series of underground vaults to ride out the fallout. Some 200 years later, wide-eyed vault dweller Lucy (Ella
Purnell) is forced to leave the safety of her underground home when her father is kidnapped by raiders from the surface, kick-starting a journey that will not only make her confront the horrors of the unlawful society above, but also sees her meet a revolving door of eccentric (yet equally horrifying) characters along the way. Among these are Maximus (Aaron Moten), a squire in the militaristic Brotherhood of Steel, and The Ghoul (Walton Goggins), a terrifyingly mutated former actor now forging his way as a bounty hunter.
The key to the success of “Fallout” is that your enjoyment of the show isn’t dependent on whether the previous paragraph made any sense to you. Creators Graham Wagner and Geneva RobertsonDworet, and developers Christopher Nolan and Lisa Joy have taken the wise decision to create a world wherein knowledge of the wider “Fallout” universe is a bonus, but not a prerequisite. So even if this is your first time in the world of Pip-Boys, Gulpers and Vaulters, you won’t be penalized, and you certainly won’t feel you’re missing out. The world of “Fallout” is a gloriously gritty, bloody and savage one, but it’s also one of razorsharp humor and fiendish satire — not least thanks to Goggins’ phenomenal turn as The Ghoul. Acerbic and frighteningly violent, The Ghoul is the very embodiment of the savage, unforgiving wasteland, and Goggins has a blast with perhaps the role of his career to date. Lucy is the polar opposite, and Purnell is equally as great as the naïve-yet-capable young woman entirely unprepared for the muck and murder she emerges into. Throw the two together with a razor-sharp, witty script and top-drawer production values and you have a show that’s about as much fun as you can have without a controller of your own.
Even if this is your first time in the world of Pip-Boys, gulpers and Vaulters, you won’t feel like you’re missing out.