Fallout TV Show - Vault-Talk Ep 5

We're pairing Maximus up with everyone--are you Team Thadimus or Team Maxy? Join Jessica-Star, Andrew, Ray, and Wil as we recap and discuss episode 5 of the Fallout on Prime TV Show, 'The Past'

The Ghoul is spending this ep in LaLa Land so we follow Maximus and Lucy as they finally team up in the perilous wasteland, with Maximus revealing his origins in Shady Sands. Meanwhile, Betty Pearson becomes the new Overseer of Vault 33 as Norm starts investigating the intertwined history of Vaults 31-33. Themes of trust, survival, and uncovering hidden truths run through this weeks narrative.

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Transcript

In the past, Maximus confesses his true identity to Thaddeus. Disgusted, Thaddeus disables Maximus's power armor and leaves with Wilzig's head and CX 404.  Lucy finds Maximus and they agree to work together to retrieve the head. The pair stumble upon the ruins of Shady Sands, first capital of the New California Republic, the MCR, and Maximus's former home. In their pursuit, Maximus is injured by a cannibalistic fiend, and while searching for medical supplies in an abandoned Vault Tec building, they The two accidentally fall into Vault 4. Meanwhile, back in Vault 33, Council President Betty Pearson is elected as Overseer by a 98 percent majority.

RIP Thaddimus.

 Thaddeus does the thing where he ducks around and puts the key into the power armor, into the fusion core, unlocks it, and pulls out the fusion core, which immediately freezes the power armor, And Maximus is stuck in there. 

From there, he grabs the head. Just grabs what he can and starts to walk away. He's says,  I'm going to fix this. He drags the whole bag away with him. he grabs the whole giant bag and the head. And CX 404 follows along. Going with his master's head, which  I was trying to figure out why does CX 404 keep bouncing like that?

But then I realized,  it's with the head. That makes perfect sense.  And then of course, Thaddeus has a little bit of regret, I can't believe I let you fucking brand me.

And Maximus is of course, begging for his life immediately. Don't leave me here. You can't do this because if he's using his power armor and he's there for long, he's going to die.

 Still when he meets Lucy his first instinct is just to lie, lie, lie his way out of everything, it's just super frustrating. 

 He grows on me as the show goes on. But he was the one I didn't jive with right away either. And I mean, I still don't. Because like I said, he keeps, he does make these errors.  It's not that he's unintelligent, but he just, he doesn't trust people. And I think he's very socially awkward, a bit uneducated and yet sort of wise beyond his years at the same time with statements like everyone's trying to save the world.

I have to go after my squire took something. Belongs to the brotherhood. I have to get it back. And he's starting to walk away. But Lucy, of course says. we should stick together,  we can help each other. And then she's,  says, I'm after a head. And given that it seems everyone else on the way is planned, that I've been running into, is also after it, I have to imagine that you are too.

And Maximus doesn't really confirm or deny, but  he stops, looks, and he kind of,  nods imperceptibly, but it's Maximus, you know what I mean? We should work together. Yeah, because first she asks him if the Brotherhood has more T 60s, because that's what she's interested in, is getting more Knights for her cause.  And so  she says that she has to be able to track it.

If the Brotherhood could help her, if they get the head back, then the Brotherhood can help her.  Send some more knights to help rescue her father. As they shake the patriotic music swells.

Makes sense to be somewhat patriotic because they are, starting to engage in one of our sacred patriotic processes here in  America,  democracy and action and the ballot box.

They're all going in line. And I thought this was funny that Betty. Was over the intercom, like, we didn't even know that she was running up until now, but she's getting all this like intercom time while people are voting. Meanwhile, Reg and Woody, as far as we know, just put up a few posters.

Well, the best scene was in line, yes, Davy, Davy talking to Reg right? The Davy thing was really funny.  A very sitcom moment. Where,  he's like subtle at first, until he just comes out and says it. And finally, Reg is like, who am I kidding? Ends up voting for Betty anyway. 

 She's getting to be inspiring and literally in their ears while they're going to the ballot box. Betty's smart. She knows all you have to do is control the media.  Exactly. Oh my gosh. Oh yeah. He doesn't vote for himself. Everybody seems to be voting for Betty. And as we find out later, she got 98 percent of the vote.  Including Reg's. Right?  Probably  Woody's too.

Have they revealed how many people are in the vault?  No, we're thinking that's probably about 200 per vault here,  in vault 32, vault 33.  I don't know this vault specific, but I do know for a fact they talk about 200 people in the vault in an episode coming up, not to spoil that.

This is where he learns about the transfer 31 to 32 transfer 31 to 33 and that many of them have been elected overseer. Right? This is where he finds that.  Yes, that's what he's doing. He's on the terminal when we go to this scene. 

Funny little thing. I happen to just notice here, because we talked last time about how, Overseers sort of are elected differently that this 1 obviously does have election, but that some seem to be appointed maybe for life  I noticed by the overseers or the interval personnel transfers that they were that norm was looking at that all the 1s that came over to.

 People meeting in a location like this with nobody else around is very dangerous in the wasteland. And that's one of the things that differs from the show to the games a bit because we constantly we meet well, I was about to say cricket because, I feel like Will's going to mention this is very Cricket coming up, 

But like Trash Can Carla or any of the  people we meet people on the road all the time in game, we as the player character aren't necessarily immediately suspicious of them.  I didn't get the impression that he wanted to draw first blood. He just wanted to have the gun in case shit went wrong. 

So Lucy steps forward and she's going to try what she did back in Philly again roll a speech check. Try to negotiate. Try to pull out that, Vault Tec training.

And this time she does a bit better. You know. We're all a little tense here, right?  First she does her speech and I think they yell back like, what the F are you talking about?

 Maximus sees them going for their guns, and he grabs Lucy's gun and pulls out to shoot. Yeah, the guy did finish going for his gun first, but Maximus gets off the first shot, gets the girl, sometimes the guy shoots over at him, hits Maximus, then Maximus takes out the guy right in the forehead. He is a good shot on both of these takes out the girl first, then he gets hit, then he takes out the guy.  

 We know Vault 31. Better educated, a few more people.  They've got these things in their head, they're all equal, but Vault 31 is a little bit better,  a little bit smarter. They have a few more resources and stuff too. 

And that's why. But, you know, you gotta wonder, is that really why?  Norm says, then why are we whispering, if it's normal? Chet mentioned Steph was from 31, just as Norm's standing up to, keep talking. And Steph says, what? She comes out of the shower?

 And Lucy is taken aback,  and Maximus explains that, this was Shady Sands, it was our capital. And she said, but what about Reclamation Day? And he doesn't know what Reclamation Day is.

Now we know, of course, it's when people in the vaults are supposed to come out. It's the vaults that had a reclamation day. Not, not every vault had, but the vaults that were supposed to emerge, they had this concept of reclamation day, where we will emerge from the vault. We will, rebuild, reclaim, restore the America that was, and Maximus doesn't know about this, and she says, well,  we always thought we'd start, civilization, and it happened without us.

 Half of us stay here in Vault 33 and half of us will go to vault 32 to resettle  because, we need to keep the program going.

We are America's future hope, and this is what will be best for us. And they'll probably,  end up getting people from vault 31 too. She actually mentions so before we do this, I think it's important that together we go and we get a look at our new home. Okay. And so she's trying to reinforce. and kind of reset everybody's minds that the vaults are equal to 33 32 they're just the same perfectly homie 31   so, they're heading over, and Norm and Chet are looking at each other.

 It's obvious to me that Chet is really a mastermind. It's true. It's true. Ha  ha ha ha. Let's take a bet. 

So I just, at this point in the show, I just assumed there was some vast conspiracy that Betty knew about along with Vault 31, and there's a whole crew of people over there that came over and cleaned up. Knowing what we later know, that seems less likely, but still, must be robots or something. They were somehow prepared for this contingency. They must have stores and supplies  help survive this long and be able to restock and clean and do everything.

  And back to Lucy and Maximus, and they are laying on gurneys. And oh no, what have they gotten themselves into? Some kind of experiment? Super mutants? What? But you see Lucy starting to wake up and look over and sees Maximus down there.

And she slowly gets up, and looks over the window. and Maximus is following her and you know, as he wakes up and says,  where are we? And Lucy says, we're in the best place in the world. And that's when you get a view of the window and you see people in their vault suits, walking back and forth, like we're in the best place in the world.

 This is where I'm feeling like that Vault-Tec mystery at its best, which is also something the showrunners are kind of known for.

 You expect that, that where's the twist, where's the mystery? You get in Westworld, Point of Interest, there are other shows like that where there's always more going on and a central mystery, and you get it in spades with what is Vault Tec going up to, what's actually happening in the vault   I really like Maximus and Lucy together. Definitely.  Not as much as Thaddeus in Maximus, but you know, that's okay.

 And until next time, we'll see you in the California Wasteland.