The Fallout TV Series Needs To Avoid This Pitfall

If you need evidence that video games have successfully broken the barrier between nice hobby and mainstream entertainment, just look at the other sources of entertainment out there. Mainly, I’m talking about television and movies, two entertainment media that you could have discussed with pretty much anyone around the water cooler for decades without anyone batting an eyelash.

Just this year, we’ve seen the likes of Mario and Freddy Fazbear blowing up the big screen to amazing receptions, and television shows like The Last Of Us, Twisted Metal, and even the contentiously written and (as a result) Henry Cavill-less The Witcher have been lighting up our screens atr home without controllers in our hands.

Once More Into The Wasteland

Now the classic post-apocalyptic RPG series Fallout is looking to be the next big game to take the leap into a fully-realized television show. The first trailer just recently dropped, and while there are some dissenters, the fan base seems to be pretty pleased with how it’s looking so far. The art direction is staying pretty close to the games, and considering that those games are spread out from 1997 to the most recent release of Fallout 76 in 2018, and that ownership of the series switched hands about halfway through, that’s a pretty tall order.

From Vaul-Tec walkways to military Vertibirds, from pristine blue and yellow leather jumpsuits to dusty towns made of piled up junkyard scraps, the visuals presented in this two-and-a-half-minute peek into the TV adaptation of one of my favorite game series leaves no doubt as to just what I’m looking at (and the old-timey song played over it is relaxing my nerves a bit as well).

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But with all that said, there is still one nagging thought digging at the back of my skull — a nasty little molerat burrowing its way into my brain, planting seeds of doubt and whispering the concern that the show is somehow going to go in the wrong direction with one major piece of Fallot lore. I’m talking about The Brotherhood Of Steel.

Oh, Aren’t You Proud To Be In That Fraternity?

I’m going to be totally honest with you — we get three different shots of power armor-clad BoS members throughout the trailer, and combined, they only last a paltry seven seconds or so, but those seven seconds are the kind that leave me ambivalently breathless in two distinct ways.

First, they look amazing. The Brotherhood of Steel may not play the biggest part in Fallout’s lore, but the organization has been the poster child for the series since our first look at the original game’s cover back in the late ’90s, and these shots don’t disappoint. The first simply shows a soldier manspreading in an aerial Vertibird seat, looking much too big to fit comfortably. Then we get the heroic slow motion hero walk, with five armor-clad individuals slowly advancing at the camera with a veil of steam rising behind them. Lastly, there’s one the clearly hasn’t heard Three Dog’s public service announcement about feeding the Yao Guai.

But even amid all that excitement, there’s that little voice telling me to contain myself, because I still don’t know what kind of people The Brotherhood will turn out to be, and I can’t shake the feeling that they may turn out to be the friendly and helpful good guys we saw in Fallout 3, and that’s not good.

That’s Not The Brotherhood of Steel I Know

I’ve recently discovered that I’m the old dude here on DualShockers’ editorial staff (thanks for the babyface genetics, mom and dad!), and I’m going to use my elder statesmanship to my advantage. So I can tell you that while I wasn’t entirely disappointed when Bethesda took over the series starting with Fallout 3, I was not happy with the hey-ho, pip-and-dandy attitude that the BoS took in that game under the banner of Lyons’ Pride. Granted, the faction headed up by Sarah Lyons (seriously, what is it with Bethesda and blonde do-gooders named Sarah?) , while genuinely helpful, is treated as an offshoot of the main organization, as the black armor-clad Outcasts are presented as the game’s more traditional BoS and left her leadership behind because she didn’t stick to the code of saving the world by keeping all the best stuff for themselves.

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So what is this code exactly? Well, if you haven’t played the old cRPGs, the BoS in Fallout 4 is a pretty good representation of that. Still, if you want the authentic experience of being little more than an insignificant speck in the Brotherhood’s world, you’ve got to go back to the first two games.

What made the BoS so enigmatic in the first game is how little the group actually did. If you want to get your hands on a suit of power armor, you’re going to need to jump through a lot of hoops — namely, taking on a suicide mission into a highly irradiated hole in the ground because the big, tough metal people don’t wanna risk it. Even then, you’ll need to either steal a suit of armor (and probably get shredded by miniguns before you make it into the storage room) or beg for a busted suit that doesn’t even work anymore and fix it yourself.

The Fallout 2 BoS is a little more friendly and willing to work alongside the New California Republic, but still not buddy-buddy enough to share their secrets with them or you. Still, the group is at the height of its power and influence during this game, and it’s still up to you, a tribal looked down upon by proper society, to take on the even more powerful Enclave with whatever ragtag group your charisma score has allowed you to amass.

In either game, you’ll never be able to prove yourself enough to actually get accepted into the Brotherhood, though, no matter what you do (including single-handedly saving all of humanity, if that gives you an idea of these guys’ pompous hubris). And that’s that kind of bloated, condescending attitude I’m looking for from the Fallout TV series. Will I get my wish? Well, it sounds like I’ve got until April 12, 2024, to find out, but I really hope that nagging voice in my head isn’t right.

Jealous? His name’s Herbert. I talk to him when I get lonely.

Fallout 3

Released

October 28, 2008

Developer(s)

Bethesda