What a fantastic finale. Not only did it give a bevy of satisfying answers, it also posed intriguing new questions and set up potentially excellent plots for season 3. Vault 31’s pointless endeavor turned out to be, well, pointless, but the rest? The rest was fantastic.
The Legion
We start back with the Legion. As fighting between the warring camps rages, Macauley Culkin’s character pulls Caesar’s corpse off the battlefield and into a tent. After a long wait, we finally know what Caesar’s final declaration was: “I am Ceaser. I am the Legion. It ends with me.”
A poor soldier happens to see that Culkin’s character has read the note, and he is quickly killed to hide the truth. One eaten note later and our boy, nay man, Culkin is crowned the new Caesar.
We’ve seen that the Legion would march on New Vegas in trailers, and now we know for sure who leads them there.
The House Mostly Wins
Back in New Vegas, we get a short scene between the Ghoul and Robo House. Some back and forth ensues with House and The Ghoul coming to an agreement.
In exchange for not destroying the Cold Fusion that brought House back online, they’ll journey to the underground management Vault together. House accompanying the Ghoul who puts on a fancy new Pip Boy.
Outside, Maximus is fighting nearly a dozen Deathclaws. As he struggles, the NCR’s Power Armor missile defense system activates, helping him quickly dispatch a few behemoths.
It’s like Chekov’s Rocket Launcher, as the Ghoul called out, having one as one of the few ways to ‘easily’ take out one of the big nasties. The fight here looks great, with the Deathclaw CGI holding up well in the daylight.
Lucy the Killer
Poor Congresswoman Diane Welch, whose head is in a jar with Robert House’s brain-scanning equipment on, is still alive. As Lucy walks over to her, she begins to moan. It’s not long before “kill me” is all she says, repeatedly.
Lucy, after asking just why everyone wants her to become a killer, finally gives in and bashes Mrs. Welch in the head, ending her suffering. I’m curious if she was in the management Vault or if Hank/The Enclave/Vault-Tec had maintained her cut off dome for the last 2cut-offs.
Vaulties
The Vault 31 storyline gets a few scenes. In the first we see them dragging Norm out of the room he was double concussed in last episode. Claudia, aka the only other not crazy one, tries to save him and gets pushed into an elevator door button.
Now we have Chekov’s Roach Farm come into play. Quickly enough, the Vault 31 management members are quickly and horribly killed one by one by the Rad Roaches. All, of course, except for our two thickest wearers of plot armor.
Norm, after dickhead Ronny refuses to let him into an office with the rest, hides under a table. Ronny, after pushing Norm away, is unable to close the door fully, and everyone in the room is chopped to bits, except Claudia.
She’s just a bit injured but a screwdriver to a roa,ches’ dome saved her. Of all the plotlines this season, the Vault 31/Norm stuff was the least consequential. I’m not sure what might change moving forward that is tied to it, but it ended up just being a vehicle to get Norm out of the vault and give him a friend/potential love interest.
The Enclave
A big part of the episode is House laying out that he finally learned who the hidden party was. The Enclave is repeatedly named as the organization behind it all. We did briefly see the Institute in season one, as Dog Meat and the good Doctor escaped from it.
Hank’s secret bosses he radioed, the “investors, whom” that Vault 31 sent messages to, and who the President really served is all finally confirmed. The Enclave being the main threat felt inevitable, though as we’ll see, they will not be the only one.
We get a scene betweenonesnk and Lucy where he explains why they used Congresswoman Welch as the blueprint for their memory wiping template. She was the ‘ideal personality’, because she was a good person who wasn’t aggressive or dangerous.
Lucy is horrified, especially as her Dad uses the mind-controlled Legion member to overpower her. Ella Purnell and Kyle Mclaughlin give incredible performances as a father and daughter who both truly believe in what they are doing.
Hank has no faith in humanity, using his knowledge and access to miniaturize House’s tech for mass scale use. Lucy just wmass-scalead back, and for him to face justice, but the surface has changed her.
The Past and The Present
We do a lot of jumping back and forth in this one, as per usual. One of the bigger reveals is that, after only a night together, Steph and Hank are engaged. We find out what is in the case that Hank kept hidden in the Overseer’s office as Steph opens it in desperation.
The normally peaceful Vault 32 dwellers have given in, chanting “Death to management”. She turns on the Enclave Pip Boy and sends them a chilling message, “Initiate Phase 2.” Is it F.E.V. time for all of those left in Vaults 32 and 33? We’ll have to wait a year to find out, but it isn’ tlooking good.
Back in the present, just as Lucy is about to be brain-chipped, The Ghoul saves her. One knife to the mind-controlled Legion member’s dome and a shot straight into Hank’s ass, and he gives Lucy the choice. He leaves her with a pistol, as she is free to decide her father’s fate.
We get a lot more fighting with Maximus outside, as the citizens of New Vegas start taking bets on whether he’ll win. At one point, when things are looking grim, they realize that if he loses it means they’re all dead, but continue betting anyways.
Thaddeus uses his anywayd arm and a few good toes to help Maximus with some sniper rifle shots from the roof. Reloading is a bit of a bear, though, and Max has to abandon his armor after a voracious Deathclaw destroys most of it.
Grabbing a roulette wheel and one hell of a pointy pipe Maximus, “just a damned ki,d” as one citizen calls him, is ready to die fighting, then a shot rings out and the music hits.
The New California Republic
I was watching the finale with my wife, and when a sniper-rifle shot rang out sniper riflet Thaddeus, I knew who it was and I was ready to geek th,e f*ck out. The New California Republic is back, led by the female soldier we saw earlier this season.
A few expert .50 cal shots and the two closest Deathclaws are down, as the Fallout theme swells, and hot damn do their uniforms look perfect. I had chills seeing their contingent marching forward, and laugh my butt off when the line “we have it from here” was met with Maximus’ typical dorky “uh… yeah that makes sense”, in a perfect line delivery by Aaron Moten.
Introducing the NCR this late is a bit of a tease. We get one minor scene with them, but knowing they’re on the board and back for Season 3 next year has me damned excited.
Colorado
As Cooper and Robo House head toward’s Jany and Barb’s crtowarders we cut back to the past a few times. Coop bet on the wrong horse, and the US Government is ready to arrest him for handing over the Cold Fusion to the President.
In the game lore, there was a President who was part of the enclave, and this scene confirmed it is the same here. We finally get the answer as to why the party goers in season one thought Coop was a commie, and why he and Barb were divorced.
As Robert House calls and warns him at the airport just before his arrest, he lets Coop know that it wasn’t him behind it. Coop, who had joked to Barb earlier that they should move to Colorado to get away from California and Vault-tec, tells her that hVault-Tec the fall.
Their divorce isn’t because they hated each other; they were more in love than ever by the end. They did it to save their daughter, lest both her parents be seen as unpatriotic commie bastards under arrest.
As House opens their cryo chambers, Coop is met with… nothing. They’re both empty and look like they were never used. At the bottom of Barb’s though is a postcard with Colorado on the front, and “Colorado was a good idea” written on the back.
Immediately, Walton Goggins’ eyes shift under all that Ghoul makeup as he states that for the first time in 200 years, he knows his family is alive. He’s off, with Dog Meat in tow, to the Rockies in Season 3.
Battle for New Vegas
The final scene between Hank and Lucy outside the casino entrance is a bittersweet one. She chose a third option, no killing, no forgiving, instead she implanted his m mind control device into her dad’s neck. They have a back and forth, each doing their best to convince the other to come to their way of thinking. Once Hank realizes there’s nothing he can do to sway her, and that any knowledge of The Enclave would only put her in danger, he uses his own remote device to activate the chip in his brain, wiping his memories clean.
It’s sad, as while his body is alive, if the process is truly irreversible, then Hank is essentially gone forever. While Lucy loses her dad, though, a minor miracle happens. Maximus is there, post-Deathclaw fight victory. They walk to each other, smile like the goofy love-struck nerds that they are and hug. It was a genuinely moving moment that got an “awwwww” out of my Mrs.
The season ends as The Legion marches on New Vegas. Lucy and Max look over the city, bracing for the oncoming war as reality settles in. Lucy may be ‘at fault’ that there isn’t an army of mind-controlled drones to fight the Legion, but Max assures her that it’s just how things are in the wasteland. Robo House quickly blips back into life on the screen behind them, while Lucy and Max holds hands. A post-credits scene gives us one hell of a tease for next year. Dane brings Cleric Quintus a blueprint back at the Brotherhood of Steelto Area 51 base. Liberty Prime Alpha is one hell of a tease to end things on. For any Fallout 3 fans Liberty Prime was a highlight, one gigantic communist hating robot that threw Super Mutants around like they were playthings.
Every storyline got a solid setup or conclusion, outside of the Vault 31 crew. Norm and Claudia are all that is left, and they’re just wandering around LA. Every other plot, though, was moved forward in exciting ways. Having the Legion and NCR ready to go to war in live-action is a dream. Finding out at “phase 2” is for the vaults, whatever this plan that the Enclave had for them, is exciting. Lucy, Max, Thaddeus, and the NCR vs. The Legion, The Ghoul in Colorado? That was a damned near perfect finale. The show continually blends comedy and drama in a way that only the Fallout IP can. There really is nothing else like it in gaming. So much of the story and lore from those titles fits perfectly in live-action without ever feeling out of place.
Wrapping this season up
Fallout’s second season was a rousing affair, full of missiles, nods to the game, memories being wiped, and the board being reset. It’s a rare thing in TV nowadays to have a show that knows it’s coming back. Fallout is all the stronger for it as this finale gives satisfying endings, surprising reveals, and an excellent setup for season 3.
Fallout S02E08 - Finale
PROS
- Everything except
CONS
- Vault 31's storyline never went anywhere
