The Fallout video game series has always been tailor made for adaptation. It balances gritty action with a sprawling sense of irradiated worldbuilding. The wastelands, while primed for a player’s specific adventure and personal taste for exploration, are also unceasingly cinematic. Uncovering towns, secrets, and armies of Rad Scorpions alike all have a dramatic flair and even the V.A.T.S. system (which allows you to see the gory success of your weapons in slow motion) seems like it’s priming us for the eventual televised rendition. And that’s exactly what we’ll be getting when the Fallout TV series debuts on Amazon Prime Video on April 12, 2024.
Todd Howard - a man who is equal parts Bethesda Studios director, open world gaming evangelist, and meme - has said that the show will be “dark” but also have a “bit of a wink to it”. This is good news! In order to stick out amidst a modern wave of grueling dystopian television like The Walking Dead, The Last of Us, The Handmaid’s Tale - amongst many others - Fallout needs to take advantage of its innate strengths. And leaning into its trademark sardonic humor is a great way to make that happen – in fact, the farther the better.
