S01.E02: The Target

[paulvdb]

Quote

I know life can't have been easy up here...

Premiere date: April 10, 2024

[MrWhyt]

2 Episodes in and no Ron Perlman narration! 😪

Other than that, really enjoying it. Always love Goggins and Emerson and Ella Purnell is giving just the right amount of naive do-gooder.

[thuganomics85]

Whelp, it was fun seeing Michael Emerson while we could!  Definitely seems like its going to be a show where characters don't last for very long, outside of maybe Lucy, Maximus, and The Ghoul.  He made the most of his screen time at least.  And judging from that final bit, we will likely be seeing his severed head again, at least!

Knowing the unspoken rule that killing animals on television makes you irredeemable, I was definitely shocked when it looked like The Ghoul killed the dog.  Instead, he only wounded her and brought her back to life with a handy, dandy stimpack!  Of course, I doubt it was out of the kindness out of his heart.  I'm guessing he's going to use her to track Wilzig (or what's left of him) down.  Walton Goggins continues to be perfection in this role.

The shootout in "Filly" was extremely violent and highly entertaining.

I figured the Knight Maximus was stuck with would end up not being the macho ass-kicker he built up in his head, but I wasn't expecting him to be Michael Rapaport!  I know he's an acquired taste, but he does have a knack for these type of roles.  Also think it's funny that this makes another former Justified villain to pop up here.  Just need to get either Neal McDonough or Margo Martindale next!

Dale Dickey!!!

Have to imagine Lucy will eventually grow out of her naivety at some point, but Ella Purnell is continuing to actually make me like the character and root for her to maintain some form of morality by the end of this. 

[Spaceman Spiff]

My thought process during this episode.

Oh look Nolan got Emerson for this new show. Awesome

And they gave him a dog like in Person of Interest. Double Awesome

Crap they took his leg away.

Fuck they killed his dog.

Oh wait they gave him a new leg. Crap he has to walk with a limp like he did all of PoI.

Ooooh the dog wasn't killed. Awesome.

Crap the Ghoul gonna use the dog to track Emerson.

Fuck Emerson just killed himself.

 

Best line of the episode. "I'd offer you a cherry tomato, but you have hole in your neck"

I was also getting Fin/Ren Force Awakens vibes for Lucy/Max when they met in the town.

 

[Tachi Rocinante]

A nice mix of dark humor and gory action.

However, I am already over the moldy oldie music. It set the scenes in episode 1 and was decent background for episode 2. If it continues, it will become fucking annoying. It is no longer necessary.

Also, I love Walton Goggins, but he's channeling Boyd a little too much.

[Anela]

2 hours ago, Tachi Rocinante said:

A nice mix of dark humor and gory action.

However, I am already over the moldy oldie music. It set the scenes in episode 1 and was decent background for episode 2. If it continues, it will become fucking annoying. It is no longer necessary.

Also, I love Walton Goggins, but he's channeling Boyd a little too much.

I was just going to say, it's like Justified, in a different universe. We're just missing Timothy Olyphant. 

I didn't know what to think about the ghoul not killing the dog, because he left the chicken alone, too. I don't think he wanted to kill the dog. 

[Ottis]

22 hours ago, Tachi Rocinante said:

A nice mix of dark humor and gory action.

However, I am already over the moldy oldie music. It set the scenes in episode 1 and was decent background for episode 2. If it continues, it will become fucking annoying. It is no longer necessary.

Also, I love Walton Goggins, but he's channeling Boyd a little too much.

I thought the music was intrusive in ep 1, and it continues to be.

Goggins is great in anything, and continues to be awesome here. So fun to see a little SOA and East Bound and Down and then Lost with the other guy.

Does Lucy have a lip piercing or an injury? It’s distracting.

I played Fallout years ago and all I remember is that it was so depressing I quit playing after a while. And swamps. Lots of swamps.

Edited April 13 by Ottis

[Anela]

2 hours ago, Ottis said:

I thought the music was intrusive in ep 1, and it continues to be.

Goggins is great in anything, and continues to be awesome here. So fun to see a little DOA and East Bound and Down and then Lost with the other guy.

Does Lucy have a lip piercing or an injury? It’s distracting.

I played Fallout years ago and all I remember is that it was so depressing I quit playing after a while. And swamps. Lots of swamps.

Someone warned me that it’s depressing, and that she plays a more cheerful show in the background as she plays. I’m already depressed, so I might pass for now.  
 

this weekend is busy, I’ve only watched the two episodes, and I’m really in a mood to binge.  

Edited April 13 by Anela

[shrewd.buddha]

Sigh.. the first episode made me optimistic but this one seemed to set the tone for the show: which appears to be apocalyptic wacky shenanigans with sprinkles of gory violence. 
  I can deal with the gore and violence but not sure how long I can tolerate the grizzled hillbilly chicken f**kers and the main characters being dumb and dumber. 

  Quirky can be amusing, but in a savage wasteland, a naive idiot like Lucy wouldn't keep her belongings or survive for more than a day. Maximus also seems to be bumbling from one situation to another, just lucky to survive.

  I will stick around for a few more episodes, but this may be one of those shows that isn't engaging to me.  The shootout in Filly scene and the gory foot attachment device just struck me as silly. 
  Maybe fans of the Fallout game are getting more out of this than me. 

On the positive side, it appears that a lot of people manage to survive past middle-age in the wasteland. 

[Sakura12]

I think it would've been better to have a death claw over a yao guai (the radiated bear). Those are pretty easy to kill. Being surprised by deathclaw is a fuck, fuck moment. 

I also just became a Knight of the Brotherhood in the Commonweath in my current playthrough in Fallout 4. Which they did mention that's where their orders to hunt down Michael Emerson came from. So that's cool. 

The music is from the game. It's what's on the radio if you turn it on. I normally turn off all the radios so I get it. Playing modern music with the 1950's post apocalyptic setting doesn't fit as well. So I also get why they are sticking with the older music. 

Edited April 14 by Sakura12

[Jack Shaftoe]

5 hours ago, shrewd.buddha said:

Quirky can be amusing, but in a savage wasteland, a naive idiot like Lucy wouldn't keep her belongings or survive for more than a day.

Yeah, her naivete is a little too much. Even after the raiders attack on the vault and the shootout on the street, she just had to give a whole speech on whether violence would be justified.

And Maximus should have had very little difficulty defeating the ghoul. Maybe he is such an old trainee because he is really incompetent, just like the knight whose armor he took.

I am a huge fan of Person of Interest but somehow didn't know Michael Emerson would be in this show. I suspected he might not be long for this world and sadly I was right.

I wish it had been a deathclaw instead of a bear too.

Anyone else keep thinking of Shannen Doherty every time they take a look at Ella Purnell?

[PurpleTentacle]

I at first thought it was going to be a deathclaw. A slightly mutated bear was the much, much better scenario for our young friend there.

I don't know writing people this dumb that they threaten and insult the people who have currently their lives in their hand was kinda played out a long time ago. I can maybe stomach it once or twice, but not this many times. He probably should have just died from the bear attack right away.

Also Maximus, you don't think you should bring your support bag, with all the medicine inside? It's not like it's going to be hard to carry in the power armour...

[AnimeMania]

38 minutes ago, PurpleTentacle said:

Also Maximus, you don't think you should bring your support bag, with all the medicine inside? It's not like it's going to be hard to carry in the power armour...

He didn't even bring the big gun.

[Spaceman Spiff]

2 hours ago, Jack Shaftoe said:

Anyone else keep thinking of Shannen Doherty every time they take a look at Ella Purnell?

No but I do get Georgina Haig.

[Sakura12]

Lucy and Maxumus maxed out their luck skill. That's my explanation as to why they manage to survive. 

 

[paigow]

4 hours ago, Jack Shaftoe said:

Anyone else keep thinking of Shannen Doherty every time they take a look at Ella Purnell?

a tall Christina Ricci

47 minutes ago, Sakura12 said:

Lucy and Maxumus maxed out their luck skill. That's my explanation as to why they manage to survive. 

 

 

[Sakura12]

Ella Purnell was in Yellowjackets with Christina Ricci. They do have similar eyes. Ella seems to be making a name of herself in video game adaptations. She's the voice of Jinx in Arcane. 

 

[peridot]

I was surprised to see Maximus turn on his knight so quickly.  So he's not only a coward, but self-righteous too.  I hated seeing his smirks throughout the episode.

After seeing Lucy's behavior this episode, I totally get the pawn shop lady's attitude towards her.  Lucy is surprisingly adaptable though, ready to cut off a man's head with her catchphrase.

I want to know the story with the vault dwellers and why they stayed down for so long.  When the raiders came into 33, they had some radiation but didn't seem to be sick.

[tennisgurl]

I am taking my time to really savor this one, as much as I want to automatically click next to watch the next episode. I was pleasantly surprised to see Michael Emerson here but I guessed that we sadly wouldn't get him for very long. He did at least come with the plot ticket that will get things moving at least, a cute dog, and apparently his head! Still really enjoying the show. 

Turns out that the Brotherhood's recruitment standards aren't great, Maximus's Knight turned out to not just be an asshole, but an incredibly stupid one. Yes, stop your mission and jump out of your ride into the radiated wasteland just for shits and giggles and then insult the guy who's your only hope of survival while he holds your medical pack, very smart. 

I love the amount of visual storytelling we're getting, every set is so detailed, so much of the world building is being shown instead of told. 

Lucy might still be adorably naïve, but she does at least have a pretty good ability to think fast and roll with the punches, taking advantage of the shoot out to find the information she needs and being willing to hack the head off of a body, so she might just make it, hopefully with at least a bit of her plucky can do attitude in tact. 

 Walton Goggins continues to have a grand old time here in wasteland Deadwood, he's clearly having an absolute blast. I was surprised to see all of the main characters in one place so quickly, even if it was just for a minute. Looks like they will all be back together again soon, as Lucy has whatever Michael Emmerson had in his head and The Ghoul and Maximum are both after him, plus Maximus and Lucy clearly had a moment back there. 

The dog is alive! After seeing puppies getting put into a furnace I couldn't handle more dog killing, so thank God.

I love getting some classic dark Fallout humor, like the "Please Remain Calm" machine gun. I am also glad that they are keeping the 50s music throughout, its not Fallout without that retro futuristic 50s aesthetic. 

[Anela]

Puppies being put into a furnace? I missed that. Gross. 

[Sakura12]

When watching this a second time I just realized Lucy walking up to that guy holding her gun is a big nod to the game, since you are always pointing your gun at people when talking to them. 

Edited April 19 by Sakura12

[dovegrey]

I’m enjoying the show - probably because I'm getting a lot of enjoyment out of the “game play” aspect. It’s very cool to see Fallout portrayed on screen with near-fidelity. I'm interested to see Lucy's progression as the series goes; it's like I'm watching my first ever Fallout playthrough through her. (And, uh, the Knight sprinting away while yelling "fuck fuck fuck fuck" was pretty relatable. 😆)

So, that being said - I really enjoyed the first episode, but this episode felt sloppy, rushed, and disjointed. Everyone ends up at the same place all the time for no apparent reason, but there’s no twist or catch to it. Okay? (Just like in Episode 1, when a bunch of self-contained Vault people have been having huge weddings every three years with the self-contained Vault people next door … but no one realizes that they don’t know anyone this time?) It doesn't feel like tight storytelling.

Like a few others here, I’m also wondering where all the typical people are in Los Angeles. The show is leaning hard into the batshit part of the Fallout vibe, but Fallout has a lot of typical people and families just working to get by. Lucy would be just fine in a lot of places.

Spoiler tagging some of this out of respect for posters/viewers who don’t follow the games. Also trying to work with mods to get clarity on the spoiler policy here, given the amount of lore and what similar PrimeTimer forums have done when a show canonically builds on different source material. So this posted was editing just now for that - no content changed. 

Spoiler

Also - where’s the NCR?

This version of the Brotherhood sounds like the Legion. Thought it last episode, and then the cowardly knight spouted off about stringing people up by their lungs. 🤔

I’m really curious to know why Vault 32 and Vault 33 existed, how they survived their Vault-Tec experiment(s), and how that (hopefully) fits into the overarching plot. People know Lucy who shouldn't know Lucy.

Thank goodness the dog was saved. Seriously. I damn near stopped watching after the opening scene with the lab puppies.

Edited April 24 by dovegrey
Noted

[mrspidey]

13 hours ago, dovegrey said:

Everyone ends up at the same place all the time for no apparent reason, but there’s no twist or catch to it. 

Probably because Filly is the only bigger settlement in the area.

Lucy gets directed towards it by a random wastelander, Wilzig goes there because that's where he was told his contact would be waiting. Maximus gets there because him and Titus were literally ordered to go there.

[dovegrey]

41 minutes ago, mrspidey said:

Probably because Filly is the only bigger settlement in the area.

Lucy gets directed towards it by a random wastelander, Wilzig goes there because that's where he was told his contact would be waiting. Maximus gets there because him and Titus were literally ordered to go there.

Which would have been fine, if not for the series of disjointed, forced random encounters that happened before the big meet up in Filly. All of it together in one episode was silliness and bad pacing to me. 

[Hanahope]

the only problem with calling it Filly is that i keep thinking Philly, which is on the other side of the country.

[mrspidey]

22 hours ago, dovegrey said:

Which would have been fine, if not for the series of disjointed, forced random encounters that happened before the big meet up in Filly

Well, that's just being extremely true to the games. Trust me.

You wanna know how my Fallout 4 experience went last night?

I just wanted to do a quest where i had to kill a specific raider.

I did that, but when i went to loot the corpses of her crew, a message popped up: one of my settlements was being attacked. I fast traveled there. 3 weak ass raiders.  As i engaged them, another message popped up: another settlement under attack. Rince, repeat. Gunners, this time. They also attacked one of my military checkpoints right next to the settlement.

I cleared them out and got another message: settlement Nr. 3 under attack.

Just two super mutants with planks. Easy peasy. But wait, there's more. Fourth settlement being attacked.

Tough fight. About 10 Gunners armed to the teeth shooting up the place. Managed to kill two of the named npcs too. I looted their corpses and gave their gear to the remaining settlers so they'd be able to defend themselves better next time.

With no more settlements under attack i went back to where i had started. In my way to finally loot those raiders, i ran into a threeway fight between Gunners, a BoS patrol and some super mutants. Helped the BoS and looted corpses. 

Then i finally got to those dead raiders. Looting them made me overencumbered so i had to slow walk back to a settlement close-by to dump all that stuff. But as it turned out, a deathclaw had decided to make the ruin that housed the workshop station where you dump stuff its new home.

Now, you do not want fight a deathclaw overencumbered. Hell, you do not want to fight a deathclaw at all unless you are extremely prepared for it. So i snuck away from the place and just dumped my stuff on the ground when heard gunfire. A checkpoint close to this settlement was being attacked. My Minutemen were trying to fight off two Yao Guai (the irradiated bear from this episode). I helped them and as i was looting the bears, i heard a little kid calling for help nearby. There was the ruin of a house with a fridge inside and the voice came from the fridge. I opened it and out came a ghoulified kid. Apperrantly, he had been stuck in there ever since the bombs dropped. Now i have to help him find his parents, or rather, their remains.

I never got to turn in the quest i actually had wanted to do.

It was an eventful evening in Fallout, sure, but 95% of it was just me happening upon random bullshit.

Edited April 24 by mrspidey

[dovegrey]

2 hours ago, mrspidey said:

Well, that's just being extremely true to the games. Trust me.

You wanna know how my Fallout 4 experience went last night?

I just wanted to do a quest where i had to kill a specific raider.

I did that, but when i went to loot the corpses of her crew, a message popped up: one of my settlements was being attacked. I fast traveled there. 3 weak ass raiders.  As i engaged them, another message popped up: another settlement under attack. Rince, repeat. Gunners, this time. They also attacked one of my military checkpoints right next to the settlement.

I cleared them out and got another message: settlement Nr. 3 under attack.

Just two super mutants with planks. Easy peasy. But wait, there's more. Fourth settlement being attacked.

Tough fight. About 10 Gunners armed to the teeth shooting up the place. Managed to kill two of the named npcs too. I looted their corpses and gave their gear to the remaining settlers so they'd be able to defend themselves better next time.

With no more settlements under attack i went back to where i had started. In my way to finally loot those raiders, i ran into a threeway fight between Gunners, a BoS patrol and some super mutants. Helped the BoS and looted corpses. 

Then i finally got to those dead raiders. Looting them made me overencumbered so i had to slow walk back to a settlement close-by to dump all that stuff. But as it turned out, a deathclaw had decided to make the ruin that housed the workshop station where you dump stuff its new home.

Now, you do not want fight a deathclaw overencumbered. Hell, you do not want to fight a deathclaw at all unless you are extremely prepared for it. So i snuck away from the place and just dumped my stuff on the ground when heard gunfire. A checkpoint close to this settlement was being attacked. My Minutemen were trying to fight off two Yao Guai (the irradiated bear from this episode). I helped them and as i was looting the bears, i heard a little kid calling for help nearby. There was the ruin of a house with a fridge inside and the voice came from the fridge. I opened it and out came a ghoulified kid. Apperrantly, he had been stuck in there ever since the bombs dropped. Now i have to help him find his parents, or rather, their remains.

I never got to turn in the quest i actually had wanted to do.

It was an eventful evening in Fallout, sure, but 95% of it was just me happening upon random bullshit.

I’ve been playing since 1998! It’s a good time for sure. Random encounters out in the wilderness is a perk of the game. I also never get where I’m going! Even in New Vegas haha. That doesn’t describe what happened in this episode, to me. What happened in this episode was Sole Survivor ran into Nick, Piper, and MacCready within 8 hours of leaving the Vault (using random FO4 stuff here in context of your gameplay) and got exactly where she was going, at the exact same time everyone else got there, immediately. Santa Monica appears to be the size of Freeside. 

Edited April 24 by dovegrey

[Sakura12]

Does it make sense, no. But I like that the show didn't waste 3+ episodes to have the 3 mains meet. With the new format of only having 8-10 episodes I don't want to just watch people walking places. I'm going to assume the Landfill that became Filly was near the pier. Maximus had a vertabird that dropped him near Filly and Michael Emerson's character was told to go there. If the Brotherhood had his Intel that he might be there then that's why Cooper made his way there too. 

I already think that Maximus and Lucy put a lot of points into luck. And Maximus has the idiot savant perk. Coopers got to be maxed out on everything being over 200 years old. 

Edited April 25 by Sakura12

[Danny Franks]

Two episodes in and I'm already sick of the Ghoul being the coolest, baddassest badass that ever existed. Feels like he was written by a thirteen year old RPG kid.

I get the jokes about him having all the perks because he's been around so long, but having one character that overpowered would break a game (and anyone who maxed out a character in Fallout 3 or 4 can testify to how boringly easy it makes the game). It could easily break a show.

Other than that, I'm enjoying everything else that's going on. The inherent goofiness of the world is intact from the game, and the incredibly brutal violence that you sometimes committed completely by accident. The visuals are perfect, and we've already seen signs of the interesting, sad, human stories that are scattered throughout the Fallout world, with the family that committed suicide.

The twist with Knight Titus actually being a whiny, petulant coward was fun, but Maximus sitting there and watching him die is another indicator that this guy might not be the hero he thinks he's going to be. Power hungry and thirsty for adoration. I already envisage him becoming a villain and the Ghoul being Lucy's ally.

Ella Purnell is really good so far as the innocent, naive vault dweller who is confused by things like violence, dirt and animals. Everything she encounters is a wonder and a horror. But she's already shown a toughness and resolve that will see her through this bizarre world.

The CGI is acceptable, although the mutant bear looked a bit ropey in some shots. I'm pretty sure I read that the show isn't doing super mutants, which is a shame, but understandable as they'd be expensive to do well. I hope we get at least one Deathclaw this season.