It's weird that the Fallout TV show glosses over one of the series' biggest antagonists

Movies & TVFalloutIt’s weird that the Fallout TV show glosses over one of the series' biggest antagonistsWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.

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(Image credit: Prime TV)

Siggi Zilwig

🚩🚩NOTE: Big spoilers inbound!🚩🚩

But something’s missing, and I don’t just mean the supermutants—seriously, though, where are they at? I can’t walk a yard in Fallout without bumping into them. Anyway! For all the dangers the trio face as they wander across the Wasteland—from stoned organ harvesters to hungry gulpers—their journey is absent a larger-than-life, scenery-chewing villain like Fallout’s Master or Caesar from New Vegas.

(Image credit: Obsidian)

Caesar

In the first episode, Moldaver is set up as Fallout’s Big Bad. Her attack on Vault 33 and subsequent kidnapping of Hank is the impetus for Lucy’s journey, but after that her presence is barely felt. She’s mentioned a couple of times, and we learn a tiny bit about her background through the Ghoul’s flashbacks, but she doesn’t show up again until the final episode, where she gets to reveal the true nature of Vault-Tec before being killed off unceremoniously.

Granted, Moldaver’s role is important when it comes to Lucy’s transformation from sheltered Vault-dweller to determined Wastelander. Technically she’s also now responsible for empowering everyone living on the surface, at least in what used to be LA, thanks to cold fusion—though I’d argue Lucy and Wilzig (RIP) deserve as much credit.

Regardless of importance, though, Moldaver isn’t really the first season’s antagonist. In RPG parlance, reaching her is simply Lucy’s quest objective. For Maximus, meanwhile, she’s the Brotherhood’s competition. And for the Ghoul, she’s a ghost from the past. She doesn’t throw any obstacles in their way, or interfere at all, and then we discover that she’s actually one of the good guys—as much as anyone in Fallout can be, anyway.

(Image credit: Prime TV)

Fallout characters

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Vault-Tec, then, is more a mystery that the first season unravels rather than an adversary.

Just like Moldaver, however, the true nature of Vault-Tec isn’t revealed until the finale, split into three parts: Norm’s discovery in Vault 31, Moldaver’s conversation with Lucy in the Griffith Observatory and the Ghoul’s backstory. While Fallout vets will have already known the many almost comically terrible things Vault-Tec did in the Vaults, until the TV show players were given the impression that it had ceased to exist, and that impression was maintained right up until we realised what was happening in Vault 31.

With the cat out of the bag, it’s all a great setup for the second season. Vault-Tec is responsible for everything, and is still ultimately running the show. But it took a whole season for this to become clear. We only ever get to see hints of the company’s machinations, like the gulpers or the crater in what used to be Shady Sands, rather than what it’s doing now. Vault-Tec, then, is more a mystery that the first season unravels rather than an adversary.

(Image credit: Amazon Prime)

Two people in a vault at a desk smiling as they look at something

Vault-Tec, though, is not the only holdover from the old world. In the second episode, we’re reintroduced to one of Fallout’s most notorious antagonists: the villains of Fallout 2 and 3, the Enclave. After Wilzig escaped the fascistic former US shadow government’s clutches, I assumed it would serve as the show’s main threat. But that’s the last we see of it. Nobody even explains what the Enclave’s deal is. It’s just tossed in there casually, and forgotten about immediately afterwards.

Anyone watching without the benefit of the games must have been a bit baffled. It’s the only time we’re shown anything outside of the Vaults that doesn’t look post-apocalyptic. Even the Brotherhood base looks pretty war-torn. The Enclave base, meanwhile, is full of tech and scientists and automated turrets. Also, many well-behaved dogs—the surest indicator of civilisation.

I suspect creators Graham Wagner and Geneva Robertson-Dworet wanted to avoid overloading the audience, given that they’ve already got to get to grips with Vault-Tec, the Brotherhood and the remnant of the NCR. But it still feels like there’s a hole where the Enclave should have been. There are a couple of scenes where Vault-Tec’s strategy for the future is broken down simply: its greatest weapon is time. It waits out the nuclear apocalypse and rebuilds America from the ashes, conducting social experiments in its Vaults to gather data. But the games establish that this was all done on behalf of the Enclave and its plan to continue the war against communism even after the fall of the US. Given this, it’s even more peculiar that the Enclave doesn’t get more than a name drop.

(Image credit: Black Isle)

Enclave power armour

I can’t think of a more perfect villain for the show, and nearly everything seems designed to set this up.

Since it’s been active for centuries and is responsible for the discovery of cold fusion, it’s so bizarre that it didn’t make any visible effort to recapture Wilzig. If the Brotherhood was able to find him, why not his former masters? It would have made so much more sense for it to send out goons in power armour to retrieve him and, following his decapitation, hunt down Lucy. I can’t think of a more perfect villain for the show, and nearly everything seems designed to set this up.

(Image credit: Prime TV)

A monster attacking a man in armor

Despite this, Fallout manages pretty well without a clear antagonist for most of the show, but it does make this jaunt across the Wasteland feel easy-going compared to my own misadventures, and it diminishes the stakes.

After Lucy shakes the Ghoul and teams up with Maximus, their biggest obstacle is the accident-prone Thaddeus—a character who exists mostly for laughs, who spends an episode with only one functioning foot, and in the end he gladly gives them back Wilzig’s stinky head. From there, they simply walk to their destination, with the Ghoul not far behind. It feels like there are some missing episodes and near-death experiences. Of course we know Lucy’s going to find dear old Dad, but a few more moments that force us to consider ‘what if she doesn’t?’ wouldn’t have gone amiss.

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