Prime Video just dropped a new trailer for Fallout, a zany post-apocalyptic series based on the video games by Bethesda Softworks and Interplay Entertainment. The Fallout games have been going strong since 1997, with each installment telling a totally new tale set in a different part of the Wasteland. The television show will continue in that vein, featuring a new cast of characters yet nonetheless treating the long-running game franchise as part of its canon.
This new trailer gives us our best look yet at the series. Combined with some juicy new tidbits shared by the cast and crew at a virtual trailer launch event attended by Winter Is Coming, we now have a bunch of new details about the series that we didn't know before. Watch the trailer below, and then read on for five of our biggest takeaways.
1. Bethesda reached out to Jonathan Nolan to adapt Fallout for television
It was first announced that Westworld showrunners Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy were adapting Fallout in 2020, and we'll only now be watching it in 2024...but this Fallout adaptation has actually been in the works for much longer.
It all begins with Fallout 3 in 2008, the first title in the series produced by Bethesda Softworks after they bought the rights to the series from Interplay Entertainment. That game was an enormous hit that reinvigorated interest in the franchise, which had mostly lain dormant since 1998's Fallout 2. As Bethesda Softworks executive director Todd Howard explained during the trailer launch, it wasn't long after that that Hollywood came calling.
"People would approach us over, you know, I would say a 10-year period after Fallout 3 came out, you know, from 2009 on, to adapt Fallout to film or television. And we took a very cautious approach," Howard said. "Jonah was somebody I was such a fan of the movies he did and the TV he was doing, and I actually, you know, had someone reach out."
After Bethesda got in touch, Nolan and Howard went out to lunch, where they discussed how to adapt Fallout for the screen. According to Nolan, this was "about five years ago," so circa 2019. "It was a bit of a fanning-out moment for me," Nolan recalled, saying that he and Howard "just [started] talking about the possibilities of how you could take this incredible universe."
"When I first talked to Jonah, I mean, honestly, it was like someone I had known for a long time, you know, [he] obviously played the games a ton, and his approach, right from the get-go, was in sync with what I was thinking," Howard said.
That lunch resulted in a "handshake deal" that Nolan and Bethesda would adapt Fallout, though it would be some time yet before everything was put down in writing. I doubt I'm the only longtime Fallout fan heaving a sigh of relief after hearing how Nolan and Howard hit it off so immediately because of their shared vision for the series. Like so many other gamers, Nolan got hooked on the series with Fallout 3, which he said "devoured about a year of my life."
"You know, I was an aspiring writer at that point. It almost derailed my entire career. It's so ludicrously playable and fun. No, I mean, seriously, the games were just incredible."
According to Howard, Nolan and his team have built an adaptation that is "authentic" to the world of Fallout. "For someone like me and the team here at Bethesda, it's just a real blessing to see what they've done with it."
If I wasn't already excited to see Fallout, I'm certainly even more so now.
2. Fallout will drop its entire first season at once
While there are plenty of story-related details to pour over in the trailer, one of the things that shocked me the most was the reveal that the show will debut its entire season on April 11. Up until now, we've been assuming that Fallout would follow the usual release schedule for Amazon originals, perhaps with several episodes debuting on premiere day and then one per week after.
It's an interesting decision for Amazon to release Fallout all at once. I'm a little confused about why they wouldn't want to stretch out interest in the series, especially considering the massive fanbase out there that will undoubtedly be interested in seeing such a beloved game series brought to life on the small screen. But on the plus side, it means we can binge all eight episodes of the season right from the start!
3. Fallout takes place after the video games and considers them canon
This is technically something we already knew, but it's important so we're going to repeat it: This TV series is technically a sequel to the video games, which takes place about a decade after Fallout 4. The show considers the games canon.
"It's set in the world of Fallout, but it's a new story that comes, sort of after the events we've seen," explained co-showrunner Graham Wagner. "So it really is, the show is built on like 25 years of creativity and thinking and building [from the games]. And we sort of thought the best thing to do is to continue that, versus retread it. Because that's sort of what has worked with Fallout over the years. It's traded hands, it's changed, it's been altered, and it's a living thing. And yeah, we kind of felt like we ought to take a swing at trying to build a new piece on top of that."
Jonathan Nolan expanded on why this idea of building a whole new story works so well, and how it's always been a part of the Fallout storytelling tradition: "I think one of the things that's so powerful about the Fallout series is that every game is a little different. Different characters, a different setting, and a different look into this extraordinary universe," he said.
And what sort of characters will we be meeting in this new Fallout story? There are three at the forefront: a Vault Dweller named Lucy (Ella Purnell), a Brotherhood of Steel squire named Maximus (Aaron Moten), and a ghoul who can't help but keep things interesting:
4. Fallout will explore the Ghoul's backstory, pre-apocalypse
Actor Walton Goggins (Justified, The Shield) is known for playing somewhat chaotic characters, and he'll be bringing that energy to Fallout as the Ghoul, an irradiated bounty hunter who roams the Wasteland. Ghouls are a pretty important part of the Fallout mythos; in essence, they're people who have been exposed to so much radiation that their skin has mutated, some of their bones have sloughed away, and they no longer resemble the people they once were. At worst, they can become feral and go around mindlessly attacking people. But at best, ghouls are still just as sentient as humans and an integral part of Wasteland society.
Goggins' ghoul appears to be the latter sort, as evidenced by his quick wit throughout the trailer. Goggins appeared at the trailer launch in a pre-recorded video where he revealed more details about how the show would explore his character's backstory before the nuclear apocalypse.
"The Ghoul is, in some ways, the poet Virgil in Dante's Inferno. He's the guide, if you will, through this irradiated hellscape that we find ourselves in in this post-apocalyptic world," Goggins said. "He is a bounty hunter, an iconic bounty hunter. He is pragmatic, he is ruthless, he has his own set of moral codes, and he has a wicked sense of humor. Much like me. [laughs] No, he's a very, very, very complicated guy, and to understand him you have to understand the person that he was before the war. He had a name. His name was Cooper Howard, and he was a vastly different person than the ghoul that you've seen so far."
"Over the course of the show, through his experience back in the world before the nuclear fallout, you will understand how the world was. And he is the bridge between both these worlds."
We get to see quite a bit of the Ghoul as well as his former persona Cooper Howard in this trailer. At first, we see him talking up the virtues of the Vault-Tec vaults on television. Later on, we see the Ghoul watching an old episode of some TV show starring Cooper where he was dressed as a cowboy.
As of this writing, my best guess is that Cooper Howard was an actor. Perhaps he was known for being in westerns and was hired by Vault-Tec for an ad? Perhaps in exchange for a spot in the vault if the war started, which Vault-Tec then failed to deliver on? We also see him running with a young girl in his arms as the war kicks off. Given his ghoulish look later on, it seems safe to say he never made it into a vault. Cooper Howard was changed by the Wasteland, and we're going to see how.
5. Getting the power armor right was one of the show's biggest challenges
Adapting video games for TV or movies can be a tricky affair; for every success like The Last of Us, there are dozens of duds which failed to live up to expectations set by their source material. Which kind of adaptation will Fallout be?
It's too early to tell, but it's pretty obvious that Fallout producer and director Jonathan Nolan tried hard to do right by some of the game's most important aspects. That includes depicting power armor well. In Fallout, power armor suits are worn by various people to dramatically increase their odds of survival while fighting off the many creatures and bandits lurking in the Wasteland; they're especially utilized by the Brotherhood of Steel, a militant group who uses power armor and other weapons technology in order to keep the Wasteland safe. Or as safe as it can be according to their views, at least.
Power armor is one of the most iconic images in Fallout, which has been featured in artwork for the games ever since the original Fallout game launched for PC back in 1997. When Nolan was asked if there was one particular aspect of Fallout that was especially important for the show to pull off, he singled out the power armor and the tone of the world, which often sways from humorous to bleak and back again.
"We talked a lot about the power armor," Nolan said. "I think the tone was maybe the most challenging and the most intimidating thing for me. But working with, you know, with [co-creators Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Graham Wagner], you knew that we were going to be in a really good place with that incredibly ambitious story. On a technical level, the scope of the world and the power armor in particular was one of those things you go, 'oh, how on Earth are we going to do that?' But we got there."
In order to capture the look and feel of the power armor, Fallout primarily utilized practical effects rather than CGI. This made it much easier for the actors and crew to get in the proper headspace.
"Every day on set was a new, fun challenge," explained Aaron Moten, who plays Brotherhood of Steel squire Maximus. "And, you know, it's super exciting as an actor, I think to get the opportunity to show up to work to do outrageous things. You know, I think we spend a lot of time doing things that are normal, or there's a mundanaity to them. You know what I mean? And we spend a lot of time doing that at work. So to get to, you know, trudge around the Wasteland with the power armor by my side is an experience in itself. And getting to see our stunt performer, Adam, you know, in the full garb, and seeing the seas of people and crew on sets part for him. You know, that practical realness to it is really exciting."
"No two days were the same. Every prop, every costume, every location, every set was just bonkers," added Ella Purnell, who plays starry-eyed vault dweller Lucy. "And, you know, one of the joys of working with Jonah is that he loves to do everything as much as he can for real. So you're not working with that much green screen or, you know, dudes in green leotards. You get to really work with practicals. And that, you know, you don't have to imagine so much. It's real, and you can really do it. And just like, just a kid in a candy store, honestly. So much fun."
So remember, when you see power armor charge across your screen in Fallout, that power armor is real!
6. The makers of the Fallout show clearly love the video games
Over the years, we've seen plenty of video game adaptations of various calibers. But something that seems to remain true is that, in order for them to really take off, it helps if there are people attached who are genuinely fans of the franchise. Craig Mazin, the co-showrunner of The Last of Us, comes to mind; he was a fan of the games for years before he and The Last of Us game creator Neil Druckmann teamed up to make their show.
We've already talked a little bit about how Jonathan Nolan began his Fallout journey with Fallout 3. But sometimes a picture (or trailer) says a thousand words. That's the case with this latest trailer, which absolutely bleeds love for the video games. From the radiation click sound effect during the opening pan of the Wasteland to the inclusion of the Vault-Tec bobblehead to the music choice of "I Don't Want to Set the World on Fire" by The Ink Spots (an iconic Fallout song), there are so many Easter eggs to pour over that we'd be here for quite a while if we listed them all.
It even sounds like John Cleese may reprise his role from Fallout 4 as a Mister Handy robot! Amazon has yet to confirm his involvement in the series, but that sure sounds like him at the 1:30 mark.
But more important than any of those specific details, the tone of the series matches the video games, at least so far as we can tell from the trailer. Fallout is unique because of how its tone can shift from quirky and humorous to dark and deranged at the drop of a hat. A prime example is that scene featuring the aforementioned Mister Handy robot, which cheerfully informs Ella Purnell's Lucy that it's about to harvest her organs before sedating her and trying to cut into her stomach with a buzz saw. It's going to get weird and gory and poignant up in here. But that's all part of the appeal of Fallout.
"It's such a rare thing and such an unbelievable thing, and I've gotten to do it twice in my career, to take something that you love and get a chance to play in that universe, to create, you know, your own version, I guess, of that universe," Nolan said. "The first go-round for me was Batman, and this time with Fallout, a game that I absolutely love, a series of games that I absolutely loved."
That barometer of loving the games served as a north star for the series. As Nolan tells it, it's pretty much impossible to please all the fans of a franchise like Fallout. But having a creative team behind the show that were already fans themselves allowed them to keep a healthy perspective.
"I don't think you really can set out to please fans of anything, or please anyone other than yourself. I think you have to come into this trying to make the show that you want to make and trusting that as fans of the game, you know, we would find the pieces that were essential to us about the games and try to do the best version of those we can," Nolan said. "I think, you know, it's kind of a fool's errand to try to figure out how to make people happy in that way. You gotta make yourself happy. And I've made myself very happy with this show."
Perhaps Fallout will make you happy, too. Find out when it premieres all eight episodes on Prime Video on April 11.
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