the Fallout Feed
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the Fallout Feed
the Fallout Feed #562: Vault-Talk Fallout S2E3 The Profligate
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We talk gameplay in Starfield, Fallout 76, & Mario then discuss the current One BGS union action. Plus Vault-Talk, our recap of Season 2 Episode 3 of the Fallout TV Show.
0:00 Intro
2:30 Current 76 events and gameplay
37:14 Iguana Bits News
50:00 Vault-Talk S2 E3
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I believe so. Jess, are you ready?
SPEAKER_01Let's do it. You saw the I he can see the side of the side. I can see your eyes.
SPEAKER_14Every time I look away, it happens. I haven't seen it.
SPEAKER_12He's currently behind my spider web on the wall, so I'm gonna see if I can smack him.
SPEAKER_14You should hire the spider to kill him. It's a fake web. It's a decorative.
SPEAKER_12It was a bad angle. It was a bad angle. I might not have gotten him, but I might have. I don't know. I did multiple snacks.
SPEAKER_13Yeah. If you don't have a body, he's still alive.
SPEAKER_12But if body might have fell.
SPEAKER_13No.
SPEAKER_12No, I'm worried about it too, Ray. I think you're right.
SPEAKER_13It should have been effective, but it was if he if he fell behind, then he's just gonna lay there and recover. All right.
SPEAKER_01Well, we're good.
SPEAKER_13Fly or no fly, we're going live in three, two, one.
SPEAKER_16You can support this show at patreon.com slash ASA Podcasting.
SPEAKER_14I've got Ray. What's up, Ray? Hello, hello. And also Jess. What is going on, Jess?
SPEAKER_12Hey, Andrew. Greets everybody. Hot dog.
SPEAKER_14Hot dog tonight on the show. We, the really big sure, will be going over some gameplay, of course, at the top, as always. Then we'll be getting into a little bit of iguana bits. If there was more fallout from any more of the Bethesda stuff, but the main draw tonight will be we are continuing our round table air quotes of the Fallout TV show. So we will be uh checking in with episode three of season two. The Profligate, I think it's called.
SPEAKER_12Yes, the Profligate.
SPEAKER_14So let's roll right into stuff, see what everybody's been getting into this week, and then talk some TV. Alright, Jess, do you have a chance to play the video games this week?
SPEAKER_12Played a little video games this week. I should mention a Fallout 76, the SOCHO miniseason started, the summer sock hop. Just like most mini seasons, you gotta log in, you do a thing, and you get rewards. Well, this one is based on the dance. So a couple things I want to mention here. First off, new dance. You'd think it would be in the atomic shop and you claim it for free. But no, no, no, no, it's not. So if you're logging in and you're wondering, where is this dance people are doing? Where is this shimmy? Which by the way, the shimmy, it's a fun little dance. It's actually pretty great. I'm enjoying it. So it is on the mini season calendar itself. So you need to go to the scoreboard, you need to hop and click into the mini season, and then you can claim it for free as your first item. And then once you do that, it's still not activated. So then you gotta go to the atomic shop, go to your emotes and make sure to put it on your bar. And maybe on PC, that's good, but you know how it likes to unequip your emotes sometimes in the emote wheel? So you gotta let it know which ones you want. Yeah, when I was in there checking, I actually had a bunch of emotes unequipped again. So I'm glad I went in.
SPEAKER_14What full dances are there now besides Mothman and for the longest time, it was all Mothman and Robot.
SPEAKER_12And like that's all we could do to everything. So we try to mix it up. But they're they've been doing more and more. The last two years has been like a non-stop cavalcade of dancing with the stars.
SPEAKER_14Sometimes I duck out the dances, flood in.
SPEAKER_12So maybe they can help me keep up in the chat if I miss any. But so we've got obviously we've got funky Mothman, we've got the robot, then we've got, I believe, is it just called the ghoul? That's kind of like the thriller dance. So we've got that one. Yep. Then we've got the Madison, and the Madison is the little whistly one with a little spin and a turn. And I really, really like that one. It's great. And the newest one is the shimmy. We've got that. I know I'm missing another dance-esque one there. There are so many emotes now. Like a little astronaut moon jump. That's a great one.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_12The juggling grenades, that's a great one. I really enjoy that one. Flipping a coin is one of my favorite items. They're wonderful. They actually reorganized the entire emote bar, too. Gosh. End of last year. So everything moved to a different location.
SPEAKER_02Oh.
SPEAKER_12It takes a little while to get used to. Once you're used to it, it's not bad. It like the build menu, it makes more sense now.
SPEAKER_14Did they do that with the cards too? And the build menu. They're just rearranging goddamn everything. Yep.
SPEAKER_12Changing perks. But that's the problem. You think you know a game. You think you know a game. You live with him day in, day out for six, seven years. Six, seven.
SPEAKER_14Think you know a game.
SPEAKER_12And then he goes and checking out. Yeah. You're like, oh man, you've changed. Follow 76, you've changed.
SPEAKER_11Changed the game.
SPEAKER_12But a lot of it is for the better. It just takes a while to get used to. So, you know, I mentioned a few weeks back that I was getting used to the new build menu, and I am. I actually finally kind of like it. I'm kind of in the flow. And so the mini season. It's just challenges. Some of the rewards are good. So the whole sock hop theme. For anyone listening who doesn't know what a sock hop is, I'm sure everybody does if you're into culture, but you know, what basically it was just like an old dance in the 50s, 60s, right? With poodle skirts and jackets. This is really just a school dance.
SPEAKER_14Yeah, the the greasers and socias and chicks and the jukeboxes. Right. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_12But it's all about the dancing for the challenges. So a lot of them, there are a serious remote challenges. You've got to use it over at Berkeley Springs, gotta use it over at Camden Park. You've got to you've got to do the shimmy at Make Out Point, classic, of course, there. Sunny Top, Watoga High School, all that. And then there's regular challenges too. One funny thing that people who haven't played the game much in the last year, or who haven't played Burning Springs at all, might not be worried, but there's actually a Sock Hop location in Burning Springs now, too. Which, yeah, Make Out Point, exactly. I don't know that it's labeled, but it's a uh Nuka Shine bottle location, I think. It's a Lior and everybody in chat knows because they've been playing more 76.
SPEAKER_14But they've been up there making out.
SPEAKER_12Drinking Nuka Shine and making out. No, but it's called Sandy Sock Hop and it's in the Burning Springs area. It's a dance hall. It's really cute. And yeah, so it all goes with the theme. Enjoying it. So that is the mini season. A rewards, let's see. So they've got some odd little okay. So you know how they're doing titles as rewards and as part of the things? They can be cool, but these two make no sense to me. So we've got varnished as a prefix. Varnished. So what you can be like a varnished dweller?
SPEAKER_14What is what does that imply? Like your your furniture or something? I don't know.
SPEAKER_12I mean, maybe 50s slang I'm not familiar with. Like you're so smooth, you're varnished. My guy. Shellack. Yeah. Give someone a good shellacking. Oh, that's a little different. Give that fly a good shellacking earlier, I think.
SPEAKER_14But and then pan is hide, you varnish his furniture.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, exactly. But then get the suffix, gym. Not like he's dead, gym, but like I'm hanging out in the gym, which is yeah, that's where you have a sock hop. But why would you have that as part of your name?
SPEAKER_14As the name. And the you said it was not the prefix.
SPEAKER_12It's the suffix. It'd be the second word. So you'd be like experimental gym, like like wasted gym. Like I just I don't even get it. It's an odd choice.
SPEAKER_06That is odd. Interesting.
SPEAKER_12But then there are some cool cutouts. So you know how they have the vault boy cutouts? They've got sock hop cutouts with vault boy dancing and vault girl dancing, and those are really cool. They got a cool ass new black piano that I really like.
SPEAKER_11Oh, nice.
SPEAKER_12And you can get a sandy sock hop sign in your camp. A couple things like that. Oh, and you can also get the suffix and prefix enjoyer. So you can have enjoyer front or back. So I expect to see some creative names using that.
SPEAKER_14Gym enjoyer or enjoyer gym. There you go.
SPEAKER_12I look forward to finding out what many of my fellow Wastelanders enjoy, and I look forward to hopefully not finding out for some of them.
SPEAKER_13So here are the the definitions for varnished. To gloss over the truth. Oh, okay. Okay. To to get drunk.
SPEAKER_14Oh no, I didn't know that one. Is that a 40s, 50s slang thing? Or to engage in a sexual activity. To to varnish is to get it on.
SPEAKER_12That one that feels like a bit of a stretch. I feel like that one wasn't like a popular slang.
SPEAKER_14Where are you sourcing this from? Is this like dictionary.com or Webster's or what? What are you looking at? Yeah, just Google. Yeah.
SPEAKER_12Makes sense. I mean, and varnish the truth. I've definitely heard that. So that's that's a good one.
SPEAKER_14Oh, right. Yeah. In that context, yes, I have heard that.
SPEAKER_12And the floor is totally varnished. But that is good. So that's what's happening in 76 right now. Meet week, of course, wrapping up. We've now got the sock hop mini season coming up. And then we'll have Foshnok starting next week, I believe on the 28th. Yeah, so we're not in the bits yet, but I figured I'd just mention all that. So a lot going on. Fun mini season. And Foshnock should overlap with the sock hop for the second week.
SPEAKER_14And hop into some Foshnacht.
SPEAKER_12Exactly. Shimmy your way with the Rovits down the line. So many dances now. I'm loving it. I I gotta make a new dance video or something. But I've seen some fun ones. People have been sharing a lot of them, shimmy, because it's part of the challenges doing the shimmy at different locations. People have been sharing a lot of that, and it's been fun to see for sure.
SPEAKER_02That's cute.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, I always enjoy that sort of thing. I mean, we love doing the flash mobs with the gato and doing dance flash mobs and stuff. A lot of our friends have joined in and participated in them. And so those are awesome, full length, but just like hanging out when you load in a location, you gotta swap me Fallout 76, Fallout 76. It's it's serious and fun and goofy at times.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_12But I do think the Madison is probably my favorite of the new dances still. I just I really like it. There's a bit of a twist there, nice little spin. Oh, that's 76. Beyond that, I haven't been playing much, no real cyberpunk to report. Still, I got in, I thought I was serious, but I haven't been serious yet. But I will be serious.
SPEAKER_13Yeah, yeah, whatever.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, you'll believe it when I actually do it, you know.
SPEAKER_14Right now, you're a cyber poser.
SPEAKER_12No.
SPEAKER_14Oh, that hurts.
SPEAKER_12And yet it's true. So I can't I can handle the truth. I am a cyber poser right now.
SPEAKER_132026.
SPEAKER_12Oh, we'll get there. But yeah, that's pretty much it for me. I mean, I've played some indie stuff like I do, but oh my god. Also, just a quick shout-out. I think it was Cosmo in chat who said this. But listening back to a previous episode jumped into live chat after the show and said 314,000 gamer score of a whole lot of hidden cats.
SPEAKER_14Whole lot of cats. Is that you? Is he finding cats too? I assume he's talking to you.
SPEAKER_12He's talking about me. He actually looked at my actual gamer score and put it in there, like 314 something thousand.
SPEAKER_14Oh teasing me. I thought he was making a joke.
SPEAKER_12You actually have the no, no, I mean that is my gamer score. It was not all hidden cats. Now there might be 10,000.
SPEAKER_14Did you say million? Six. Okay.
SPEAKER_12I passed the 300,000 landmark. I mentioned on the show, so he heard.
SPEAKER_14Thresholds of ten.
SPEAKER_13Making six figures.
SPEAKER_12I want to get to half a million. That is my goal. There's a new look. Okay, they gave me a badge, okay? And everyone knows that on the like level of cool things, first of all, there's a pizza party on Friday at work. That's pretty cool. And then maybe a certificate. But getting a badge, oh, that's that's higher up.
SPEAKER_14Need a a parking spot for your e-bike.
SPEAKER_12Levels of worthless acknowledgement to get excited about. But yeah.
SPEAKER_14E-bike charger.
SPEAKER_12How do you think we all need to have goals? Oh, I I plug into the wall.
SPEAKER_14Oh, I guess that would make sense.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, my my e-bike is still.
SPEAKER_14You don't have to install a special thing.
SPEAKER_12I'm not taking trips every week, but I've used it for errands, just fun rides along the trails. Get a nice 12-15 mile trip in. It's fun.
SPEAKER_23God damn.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. While we're catching people up, the ice cream stuff. I did the coolest ice cream today. I guess I do have to share this. Okay, everybody, fall out food. So still trying new things. But today I made bacon ice cream.
SPEAKER_13What nice?
SPEAKER_12Yes, it was so good. So it was a nice batch of vanilla frozen yogurt. But then I respun it with a bunch of cooked bacon and a little bit of uh peanut butter powder. Oh my god, the bacon was all spread throughout. It was so good.
SPEAKER_14Peanut butter bacon is a pretty dangerous combination.
SPEAKER_12They are with a vanilla base and those little crispy bits. So now I want this to be regulating.
SPEAKER_13I was expecting perfectly preserved pie ice cream.
SPEAKER_14Ooh.
SPEAKER_12Well, you know, I've done pumpkin ice cream twice now.
SPEAKER_14That's like custard pie, right? Or sugar cream pie or something, the perfectly preserved.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_14Like a slice of fruit pie or anything.
SPEAKER_12No, it has like cherries and cream on top, so it must be a custard pie. I always thought of it as pumpkin pie until in 76 they gave us pumpkin pie as a separate thing. So that's why I've done it.
SPEAKER_14Right. Oh, that is proof that it's not pumpkin. You're right. Or at least not standard pumpkin.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. Yeah. So that's why to me it's more of a, I don't know, cherryish custard pie.
SPEAKER_13I thought it was a cheesecake.
SPEAKER_12Oh, there we go. It is more of a cheesecake. Thank you, Ray. That's what we needed. And for those wondering, a cobbler is not a pie, but guess what? A cheesecake is a frickin' perfectly preserved cheesecake pie. Still mad about that. Cobblers are pies. I mean, I know they're not, but they should be. For the purposes of challenging.
SPEAKER_14Why is it not? Because it doesn't have the bottom crust? Does a pie have to have the bottom crust?
SPEAKER_00Ray, you and everybody. You and everybody.
SPEAKER_13It doesn't have to have a top crust to be a pie. So why should it have to have a bottom crust?
SPEAKER_12Thank you. I mean, my mom used to make pies that was just pie filling in a pie plate. And like, you know, no crust at all. Say, hey, it's pie. Like, awesome.
SPEAKER_14That's great.
SPEAKER_01Scoop me an extra large scoop.
SPEAKER_14Some cherry glaze, please.
SPEAKER_01Bacon ice cream on top. Let's go.
SPEAKER_13And I don't really care what's right. I just want to argue whatever is the opposite opinion.
SPEAKER_12I appreciate that you being devil's advocate sometimes. It's fun. Keeps it interesting. Even if Bethesda then has challenges to end up saying cobbler, which is not a pie, which still burns my button.
SPEAKER_13That's why I stopped playing 76 altogether.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, exactly. A crustless pie is an abomination, says Lee in chat. Oh my goodness, Lee. I you know what? As long as I get delicious pie filling, I'm okay. But there should be a crust of some kind. Nice graham cracker crust or something. All good.
SPEAKER_01That's it for my gameplay, and apparently a few other fun little things too.
SPEAKER_14Beautiful. How about you, Ray? You're playing the game this week? I did, but none of them were uh Fallout 76. Any pie? Any pie related games?
SPEAKER_13No, no pie. Pie gaming. I did I wrapped up uh the long 15. Oh, no big.
SPEAKER_14Right.
SPEAKER_13How's that? It was it was a lot of fun. There's a lot, a lot of little side quests and fun things to do. I did end up screwing up the main quest. Ah boy. I had gone into a cave, and there was a guy at the uh front of the cave that stopped me, and he wanted me, I can't even remember exactly what it was, but he wanted me to agree to something. Oh, he wanted me to agree to not turn him in without any explanation as to who he was and why he was there. And so I said, no, I can't do that. I can't promise you that. And so then he started shooting at me, so I killed him. And all of his friends started shooting at me, so I killed them too. That escalated quickly.
SPEAKER_12Seemed like a thing to do with the time.
SPEAKER_13So I I cleared out the cave. Okay, well, these you know jerks obviously had something to hide. Yeah, they got a treasure back there, something. And later on found out that they were integral into uh taking down one of the major bad guy characters.
SPEAKER_14They should have taken a knee instead of died, right?
SPEAKER_13Yeah, or just said, hey, look, we're having this issue. Please let us live. Hey, if you would like to continue this DLC.
SPEAKER_12Right.
SPEAKER_14Like I can respect the mod, it's mod.
SPEAKER_12I can respect when the game lets you take out essential NPCs. You know, that's kind of cool. But you know, so rough with good writing and keeping it fluid, they should have at least warned you in some fashion. Yeah, give me a little hint.
SPEAKER_13Yeah, yeah. Some kind of signal that these weren't bad guys. So, but anyway, so long 15's wrapped up. Sometimes I can be my own worst enemy. So I watched a video about uh some of the more advanced settings on my AMD video cards. Right. So I was like, oh, okay, I can try that. So I I changed a bunch of the settings and uh went into Cyberpunk to check it out, and my Cyberpunk had been running at about 180 frames per second.
SPEAKER_14That seems excessive. It's like live action in front of your face at that point.
SPEAKER_12It's it's yeah, that is higher depth than high def.
SPEAKER_13But uh as soon as I loaded in after I made the settings, it was at 22.
SPEAKER_12Wow, it tanked it to 22?
SPEAKER_13Yeah.
SPEAKER_12Oh, you need at least 30. Oh, that is bad.
SPEAKER_13So I'm like, ah crap. Okay, so then I went back and I changed all the settings back. Went back in, still at 22.
SPEAKER_12Oh, weird. Did it have some kind of cap or something? Okay.
SPEAKER_13I don't know what I did. So I'll have to figure it out. I'll I'll keep working it. Uh, you know, fortunately, I'm not currently playing Cyberpunk. Uh, like Jess is not playing Cyberpunk. Either G. We have that in common.
SPEAKER_12Look at that. Look at oh my god. Oh my god, wait, just like just stab it again, Ray.
SPEAKER_14What's uh what's the observable uh naked eye? Can you tell 20? 22 with your yeah, you can definitely probably tell.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, people can see 60, you know, all that.
SPEAKER_14Anything below 30 is 30 is is base.
SPEAKER_12Well, 24 is like what most film is, you know. That's what I thought. It's smooth enough.
SPEAKER_14Why wouldn't that be over 30 then?
SPEAKER_12It's because of that doesn't look choppy to it's because of the variable nature of it, right? Right. I feel like because it's a smooth lock 24, it doesn't feel choppy. But if it was jumping between like 20 and 26, you'd probably notice.
SPEAKER_13Yeah, and the video games are different in the way that they are, you know, because they're they're putting things together as you go. They're they're moving polygons and covering them with color and texture and everything else. So it's a different animal than a than a film, which is a a fixed image on a uh flat surface, yeah. But anyway, so Jerry and then Lee started talking about the Gate to Stars, which is a uh mod collection. And since I have kind of uh slowed down on Genesis because I'm waiting for an update, I jumped in and and uh threw that one up. Fortunately, there were no conflicts, so I didn't have any problem.
SPEAKER_12Uh oh, okay, okay, let's go.
SPEAKER_13So I very quickly realized there's some really glaring stuff in Gate to Stars.
SPEAKER_12They made some weird choices that you wouldn't.
SPEAKER_13They made some very weird choices. So the alternate start mod is really cool. It's it's hard to figure out at first and easy to screw up, but I like that okay. But once I got into the game, I found that so when I went to buy a ship, because of the start I chose, I had to purchase a ship, I wasn't given one. I went through the uh vendor at New Atlantis and the the ships are all 30, 40, 50k. I'm well out of my price range. And then I came across this uh this giant C-class ship that was 123 credits.
SPEAKER_12123 credits, that's all.
SPEAKER_13Yeah, and so I'm like, well, okay, let's check this out. Maybe there's some reason why it's so cheap. And uh I checked it out and the thing was covered with Vanguard uh weapons. I'm like, oh that's kind of weird.
SPEAKER_12Right. I mean our favorite, but okay. Well, were they the Vanguard disruptors or something else?
SPEAKER_13Yeah, no, they were the it was the the the obliterators and the uh the cannons. And so then I started poking around in the shipbuilder and it turns out that they changed the the autoprojectors from a a low power you know weapon. I think in in regular game it's only it only takes two power to charge them because you can have six of them on your ship. Well they took that down to one. Only takes one power now? This one only takes one power.
SPEAKER_12Wow. So Lee mentioned that it's way OP. So that's what you're finding too. Is it is it way overpowered?
SPEAKER_13Yeah, so they also changed it because particle weapons typically have the same uh damage hulls and shields. And I think the uh seems to me they're like 19 and 19 typically. But in this mod, uh they're 240 uh hull damage and 19 uh shield damage. But wait, there's more. It cost uh a dollar each.
SPEAKER_12I I'm okay. So balance wasn't part of the concept for behind this mod, huh?
SPEAKER_13Clearly not. So I guess I guess to balance it out there uh you know, I don't know if it must have been my install or something, but almost all of the clothing was invisible.
SPEAKER_01Wait, all the clothing was invisible?
SPEAKER_12Like did you invisible or were you just naked everywhere?
SPEAKER_13No, they you were just invisible. So you just see heads and hands walking around new Atlantis. But it also makes it really hard to shoot at enemies when all you can see is their head.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, they're running around like Andrew with his green screen on and a green shirt the other day.
SPEAKER_13So you know, there there's definitely some stuff, and then there was an update that didn't go well. So I just uh I decided to move on from gate to stars, which was a really weird so you're not currently rec recommending that mod pack, but it was something that seems qualified. They have some work, they need to polish, they need to work on their patches. So I loaded up uh another one which is called Nova Field. Nova Field, okay, which has the same alternate start mod, a lot of the same mods as far as you know, the needs mod, the real fuel, the cost of space, and all those, you know, immersion mods. Um, but it doesn't have any of the weird pricing or you know, weapons that should be locked behind quests. So we'll see how it goes. I haven't gotten too far on it, but I did I failed the alternate start. I took the shipwreck start, which you are shipwrecked on a planet uh and you have to find supplies to make a uh rescue beacon so that you can call somebody to come pick you up. And then they drop you off wherever you want them to, but then you don't have a ship, and so you have to earn enough money to buy a ship. Well, I was shipwrecked on a planet, and when I was out looking for resources, I found a pirate ship. So I commandeered the pirate ship and then took off and continued looking for supplies, and then I found a spacer ship and so I commandeered the spacer ship, but they took off and so I had to commandeer it in space. And so at that point I failed the uh the shipwreck mission, but I had two ships and could fly wherever I wanted to go, so it was okay. So cool. Um cool yeah. I noticed a lot of of chatter about a new mod that lets you seamlessly fly from the planet's surface into space, and that's not really the mod I want.
SPEAKER_12No, it's uh a couple people have been talking about it that they're allowing seamless spaceflight, they're working on it right now, from the planet to the stars, not necessarily seamless landing yet as a thing. It looks neat. A lot of people testing it on PC, but it's not something you want.
SPEAKER_13No. Because I don't really care about that. You know, big deal. You're you're you're blasting off into space and flying through the atmosphere. Okay, great. What I want to do is I want to fly in my ship within the planet's atmosphere.
SPEAKER_12Right. I mean, that would be pretty awesome. To now, there are m plenty of mods that let you do that with your you know, your RAV eight, different things that mod the RAV 8 to be more of a ship, but it's not quite the same.
SPEAKER_13But the thing is with Starfield, you're locked into the landing cell.
SPEAKER_00Yep.
SPEAKER_13And so until there's a remedy for that, you know, where you can cross over those cell lines, we're really not gonna get the uh the travel that I want.
SPEAKER_01No, not not.
SPEAKER_12Because ultimately that's my favorite way to start a game is to fly and find a location for your starting base or something.
SPEAKER_13No, you've got no ship.
SPEAKER_12No ship.
SPEAKER_13You're on your own two feet.
SPEAKER_12Yep. Well, that's how you do in No Man's Sky, you've said.
SPEAKER_13Yeah. And so you if you have to walk around the entire planet to get what you need to be able to get a ship, then that's what you do. But with Starfield, you're locked in a cell.
SPEAKER_12That said, any given cell, you can probably find at least one ship. You know, one will land while you're wandering eventually, or you'll find a random encounter where it shows up. The name of that mod, I just double checked it. It's called Seamless Planet Takeoffs, SFSE beta, currently. And yeah, you stay in the cockpit as you ascend through the atmosphere, no man's sky style. And it how smooth it is depends on the weather and atmosphere. So uh some weather on planets and some atmosphere colors and stuff like that cause more trouble than others as he's working through it. But I mean it looks neat for people who like it. But yeah, and I don't think I really need either. You know, I'm perfectly happy with the little takeoff scene and then boom, I'm in space.
SPEAKER_13Yeah, Nova Field has been is been pretty solid for me so far. But we'll see. It's um it definitely changes the way you play because of the real fuel.
SPEAKER_12Oh, that would as of part of a survival mode concept, that definitely changes things.
SPEAKER_13Yeah, you know, because you can get yourself stuck if you if you go into a system that that does not have uh any planets with helium on them.
SPEAKER_12And you don't have enough reserves. I mean, I there's gotta be ways that you can land on planets and discover a way to refuel. If they're gonna give you that mod, they gotta give you ways to unstick yourself, you would think.
SPEAKER_13Yeah. Well, so if you can find a vendor, so just there's always gonna be a a civilian outpost POI on a planet somewhere.
SPEAKER_12Absolutely, yeah. And some of them will shell will sell stuff like that.
SPEAKER_13But it could take you a couple of days to find it.
SPEAKER_12It definitely could. That's funny. I there have been obviously new mods coming out all the time for Starfield. The creations are still really popular. As you mentioned, talking about stuff, a significant number of downloads. Um, my one friend Sweep P talked about her mod being played six million times, one of her mods, you know. I mean, that's just that's crazy. That's such a crazy total. But uh, I should want to mention people too on thinking of it. ESO Danny. Some of you guys might know, uh not the game ESO, but the YouTuber streamer ESO. He used to do a lot of scrum videos back in the day. He just did a video on some of his favorite creations and mods for Starfield. So it's not super in-depth, like a full collection. But I think he's got a good 12 to 15 in there at least and kind of talks through why why he likes them. That was a fun thing to see.
SPEAKER_13Yeah. Yeah, I saw that video pop up. I haven't watched it yet.
SPEAKER_12It was promoted by the Starfield account, so that's why I saw it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_13Yeah. But yeah, I think that's about all I did.
SPEAKER_12Love that. Well, I am curious what Andrew's been up to then in his gameplay.
SPEAKER_14Oh, not too terribly much. Um, I'm running into the issue where I've been playing Switch so much the last few weeks that going back and forth to the Xbox is now getting it's usually probably the other way where I'm always doing the wrong thing on the Switch controller. But Tori and I were playing um Lego Star Wars this week.
SPEAKER_12She was playing the Xbox or on Switch?
SPEAKER_14On the X on the Xbox, but I kept doing everything backward on the buttons because I'm so used to the Switch right now. Ah, but it's usually you know the reverse problem. But Lego Star Wars has like the Skywalker saga, which is sort of like the newer version of Lego Star Wars. Tori was trying to play that and it she just it just didn't vibe with her. She likes the old school one. So I went and found the uh older one was on sale for just a few bucks or whatever. So we've been playing that this past week. It's been really fun to sort of go through that. Anyone who has been listening to the show a long time knows that that's really how Tori and I bonded when we first started hanging out a lot was playing that Lego Star Wars game. So it's been fun playing that again.
SPEAKER_12So awesome. And are you doing the new one that came out? The one with all the new scenes or the original trilogy?
SPEAKER_14Uh the original one, just because Tori doesn't vibe with that new one. It's a little too flashy for her. Yeah, you know what I mean.
SPEAKER_12Okay, no, that's fair. It it is kind of, you know, it's shinier. It's like more like an Apple store.
SPEAKER_14There's better puzzles in the old game, too. This new one's just sort of like it's a lot of running around, run and blast and stuff. But the older one's like, you have to, you know, pick up this block and move it over here and put it back to unrelease that thing and get it.
SPEAKER_12The newer ones they use more movie quotes too, like actual lines from the movies and stuff like that. And no, there is there's a charm to the original Lego Games for they started doing that for sure.
SPEAKER_14Yeah, before they started using lines. I actually I don't know. There's something to be said for the simplicity. So we were playing that together a little bit. What I played a lot this week was Mike Tyson's Punch Out, or what's it called Mike Tyson's Punch Out? Just Punch Out on the 8-bit. So yeah, the Nintendo emulator on the Switch. I also played some of the one on the Super Nintendo, but I didn't I didn't like it as much. But I I got to the point where I was playing enough where I actually sort of like started looking up stuff about the game, and it's like, ooh, I wonder what the stars and the hearts actually mean and how to deploy them, and like there's super punches and stuff that I never really realized how to use. I've only ever really like dabbled ever in the game. But it's uh it's been pretty fun. I I've been digging digging punch out this week a lot. And I wanted to start I went to start a shelter on Xbox in uh Fallout Shelter, but because I'm so Switch oriented right now, I kept like destroying rooms, no ejecting people out of the vaults, just like doing the wrong thing at every turn. So I was like, ah, I think it exists on Switch too. So I went and I got I got uh Fallout Shelter on my Switch, and I started a vault and a certain a new survival vault and on my Switch.
SPEAKER_12For the year I had a Switch, I had shelter on it too. It's one of only two games I played on the Switch.
SPEAKER_14Yeah, that's funny. So yeah, been playing lots of Switch recently. Um a little bit of Mario 4. The world. Super Mario Land. World. World.
SPEAKER_123D world, land, stars, galaxy.
SPEAKER_14Yeah, exactly. Odyssey. Oh, Odyssey. God, I want to see that movie. We've got uh getting some great movies. Our theater downtown has one of those like super duper IMAX, not not just a regular IMAX, but you're like your super enhanced IMAX or whatever at our state museum. And they just announced that they it's been sold out for the last like couple whenever it released, was it last week or two weeks ago?
SPEAKER_12I think it's great in IMAX.
SPEAKER_14Yeah. So I want to want to get tickets, and I was looking at it, it's like sold out for the next two or three weeks, like, ah damn. But they just need to add more showings. If it's selling out all the time, just like add an 8 a.m. screen. Los Angeles will like go to movies at 8 a.m.
SPEAKER_12It's like, God, that's that's ridiculous. Although, to be fair, it's that would make it like 11 at a civilized time like we have on the East Coast, right? But um, but a lot of theaters, you know, they'll just open another screen or two, but if it's IMAX, there's a limited number of screens that they can use. It's not like every screen is an IMAX screen. Most theaters right.
SPEAKER_14Yep. Yeah, there's if you have that screen, that special screen, you've only got one of them. Generally, there's not a cineplex of IMAX screens.
SPEAKER_12Wow, how crazy would that be? Like, I could totally force it.
SPEAKER_14It'll we'll be here someday. Don't worry.
SPEAKER_00The theater of the future brought to you.
SPEAKER_14Or or we're just gonna open one of those um those globes that are in LA. Not LA, Vegas. Was that that dome thing?
SPEAKER_12The ball, the big I would want to watch a movie on that. That's like the opposite of IMA.
SPEAKER_14The Wizard of Oz? Come on, it was like the tornado was all around you, and but it's curving the wrong direction.
SPEAKER_12It's not like you can get inside of it. You watch from the outside.
SPEAKER_13No, you watch it from the inside. You looked up into the tornado.
SPEAKER_12Can you get into the dome?
SPEAKER_13The yeah, the theater's inside. Yeah.
SPEAKER_12I I thought I had no idea there was anything inside. I thought it was just a hollow dome to put things on.
SPEAKER_14They redo these movies so that it's sort of like 3D all interactive all around you and stuff.
SPEAKER_12I've only ever seen the outside, so it's like a planetarium kind of then on the inside.
SPEAKER_13Yeah, yeah, they do concerts in there too.
SPEAKER_12Oh, Killer Diller. That's actually really cool. Yeah, I always thought it was just like a big old waste of space. I never really took time to think about what might be inside.
SPEAKER_14But the it is funny, the dumb graphics they do on the outside sometimes. Yeah. The eyeball looking around looking at you.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, I just picture Mr. House on it. You know, I'm a simple girl.
SPEAKER_14He's inside, plugged in, some mummified old man. Yeah, other than that, no. I think that's that's pretty much it. Switch shelter, uh, some Mario, some punch out, Lego, Star Wars. Just a bunch of hopping around playing a bunch of different games.
SPEAKER_12And Mo still hogging the Switch 2, so you're on the basic Switch.
SPEAKER_14Yeah, I'm I've been having plenty of fun with my basic Switch, though we do have that that that new Pokemon non-fighting game.
SPEAKER_23You know, the Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_14And I I kind of do want to snag that, but I can't play it on normal Switch. That's only Switch 2. So and you got the new Donkey Kong. Is that we're talking about yeah, Pocopia, Pocopia, I don't yeah. That that that long, yeah. Yeah, so having lots of fun on the Switch, nothing, nothing too terribly serious. All right, let's check in on the show notes, see what we've got going on. I think maybe we'll check and see is there any bits this week?
SPEAKER_00Jessica to the office, please. Jessica to the office. Your iguana bits are ready. Please come pick them up.
SPEAKER_12Nice and early bits this week. So yeah, I hadn't written any bits myself ahead of time. And Andrew just added a little note. Any more Bethesda fallouts? So I thought I could cover a few things. So has there been any more fallout fallout this week? Kind of, but Fallout, fallout.
SPEAKER_14I see what you did there.
SPEAKER_12We covered so much with the roadmap that I don't want to go back over all that, but there has been some clarifications and some of the stuff to talk about. So one thing I want to mention. We talked two weeks ago uh about the layoffs and everything happening there. And in some ways, people talk about how the announcement and everything kind of put after is a bit of a distraction from all the bad news around the layoffs. Like, don't worry, we're still making stuff, we're still doing these things, we're still as capable as ever. And like we discussed about those games. Yes, I believe this is what they're working towards and all that, but still the layoffs were drastic. So, what I do want to mention is last Wednesday and over the last little bit, uh, the One BGS union. So they're part of the video game CWA, which is a larger, larger union for a number of studios that they're part of. So they did a big march last Wednesday at all four studio locations, but also outside Obsidian, um, you know, because Obsidian, as we talked about, lost 25% of people. So they did a demonstration there. And I think it and a few other places did stuff in solidarity too, about what was happening with them. And some people showed up to march. So I wanted to kind of go over what they're actually looking for because would they like to reduce the number of people laid off and save some of their jobs? Yes, absolutely. But they're not marching for that because that's not necessarily an expectation right now. Like these have already, you know, they have already been served notice, people are being made redundant. So what they're going over is what they'd like to have happen from here because there's this process called effect bargaining, which people are part of a union might understand. Or, you know, you talk with the union about about okay, what are we doing for the severance? How are we going to do this? And some of that's written into the contract. Now, what's interesting for OneBGS, okay, while the QA people and the CWA, like a couple of these uh unions, uh social Microsoft have had full contract ratifications. One BGS, while the union was authorized and approved, they never had a full contract ratification, which makes it a little bit more of a fuzzy area. People wonder if that's one of the reasons it was being put off. Uh but they were it was called the Save Our Devs march. And so what they are doing is getting three points in the effects bargaining. And it does seem like Microsoft has finally come to the table because last week they had not yet come to the table to actually discuss this. So what they want to do essentially are three major points. They want to get preferential rehiring. So should positions reopen and should rehires be there, they want their people who are being laid off to have the option of preferential rehiring first come for positions when they open up. They're also trying to get replacement within, like offering possible replacement, relocation, etc., within the Xbox studio system and other stuff, such stuff for them. And then, of course, they're looking to get a decent amount of severance pay. Like, how much severance pay can we give these people? How much of a bit of an off-ramp can can we get them? So working on that.
SPEAKER_14Now, one thing to mention not just them, but also yourself for in a few months when it happens to you as well.
SPEAKER_12There's always that worry. You know, I do think that they moved on from BGS and most Xenomax studies at this point, but there are still that little guillotine overhead of they're still gonna lay off more people in the next year, they've already said. But uh yeah, we'll see where from. Um but one thing I want to mention is that people in Montreal who are laid off are officially part of OneBGS, but they're also Canadian, not US. And there are minimums as far as Canadian law for what has to be provided.
SPEAKER_14For certain percentage of their employees have to be Canadian.
SPEAKER_12Exactly. Well, despite everyone laid off being told the same thing that they were working into, I believe, September and they would have their pay assured through that and a few other things. The people in Montreal were then followed up with afterward and they were essentially dismissed and they're being given what the Canadian minimum. So I don't have uh information up on what that was exactly right now, but instead of negotiating with them as part of everything in effects bargaining, they're simply getting the minimum legal required by Quebec. Which I was telling some people what that says to me, it's probably around the maximum what they were aiming for. And they're like, well, we're not gonna be able them down to what we want. So we'll just get the minimum we have to and move on. So not great. Not great.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Agreed.
SPEAKER_12Hmm. But that is that. So that's effects bargaining, that's what's happening. And yeah, so the July 15th March happened. If there are future marches, I will mention them, but I don't know that there will be another one about this specifically now that they're coming to the table.
SPEAKER_14Something they publicize for like people like us to show up to town.
SPEAKER_12They were actually asked if people wanted to show up in solidarity. Yep, bring signs, march. A lot of people who are nearby to some of the studios did go. They had support from other studios and from general populace. It'd be nice if other unions came out for such things. They do occasionally, but I think this one was probably not enough time to make that happen in some cases. Along those lines, too, talking about fallout. So some people have been asking about Todd. Okay, well, with all this going on, with all this changeover and stuff changing. Yeah, he's gone. Todd retiring now, right? He's just gonna get Elder Scrolls 6 out and he's gone. Is that what's happening?
SPEAKER_14No, he's gone now.
SPEAKER_12In previous interviews this spring, so we got Todd talked about how he was in a good place with where he was and he was happy. But of course, big changes since then, his layoff. Well, he brought it up again in the interview he did with Jason Schreyer, which he did a one on one interview with Jason Schreier. He did a one on one interview with uh Jez Corden from Windows Central. And he actually popped in on a few things. Like he actually popped in to a kind of funny live episode. So Greg Miller from Kind Funny does this thing where he likes to call devs and speedy people that he know sometimes just get them on the line. Well, he did that with Todd. Okay. And then Todd's like, Well, let me talk this. You know what? You want to talk about the Obsidian Fallout game? Let me call Fiergus. So he then went double telephone and brought in Firgis Erkhart, the head of Obsidian Studios. So you've got Todd and Fiergus both on the line talking about their excitement working on the game. They can't really say anything about it yet, but Firgus was talking up. He he did mention, oh, there's gonna be a vault boy in it. And you'll probably fight mole rats at some point. Like you couldn't say much. It was the minimum. It was funny.
SPEAKER_14I hear there's a laser pistol involved.
SPEAKER_12Oh my! Oh my big news. Big news. Kind of like learning that there are gonna be more trees in Elder Scrolls 6 than there were in Skyrim. That was big news on the day it happened. Oh really? But to the question at hand. In an interview with Jason Schreier, Todd Howard said there was a period of time in the recent past where he thought about retirement, but but he's pretty happy with what he's doing and where they're on track with the studio, how the studio is set up and things are working. He says, quote, the truth is there was a period of time where I pondered, what does it look like? Not is it imminent, but what does it look like when I retire? And I'm no longer thinking about it. Quote, I see the work we're doing. I just love it. I love working with these people. It's not really something I think about. Some folks in our industry, a little older than me, they're still making good great stuff too. So it's just not something I've been thinking about. End quote. So yeah, you guys, it's not imminent. Todd's pondered it like we all have. Sometimes we all just want to sit around and play games all day.
SPEAKER_14He would honestly retire and play games. He's that was his job. He's not giving up on the uh movie studio.
SPEAKER_12Exactly. There's that too. Yeah, there are a lot of things to consider. He works on so much.
SPEAKER_14He's gonna retire into film production.
SPEAKER_12They've got some great projects happening. Yeah, so I was just I was gratified to hear that. I'm sure some of the people would be too.
SPEAKER_14How old is he? Is he mid-60s, early 60s?
SPEAKER_12Oh gosh, no, no.
SPEAKER_1470, 50, 58.
SPEAKER_12I think he's 53, 54. He's not that old.
SPEAKER_14He can't be 54.
SPEAKER_12Todd Howard Age. He was born in 1970. He's 55 now. 55? Yeah, he's born in 1970, so right around there.
SPEAKER_14And a boy. Yeah. He's just can't retire yet. He's got a good 10 years.
SPEAKER_12He has been moving on from the leather jackets a bit though. I don't know if you noticed, but he has not been putting on the leather jacket for the last conference or two he's done. So, you know.
SPEAKER_14The blazer with the elbow patches.
SPEAKER_12He's moving in the his professorial phase, right? God, I love those elbow patches. Excuse me, Professor Howard.
SPEAKER_14Looks down his nose through. Yeah.
SPEAKER_12Oh my goodness. I mean, he was in the chess club, so you know. In a quick little little fun story. Well, actually the opposite of a fun story, but in a story of interest to our listeners and fallout friends. So, not too far from me, there has been an incident of people being evacuated from their homes because of radiation detected up around Niagara Falls.
SPEAKER_14What's around there?
SPEAKER_12So there were some regular inspections being done, and they found that there was some radioactivity around the land, some places, and then they went into the homes, and there were even higher amounts of radiation in the homes coming up through the floors where some people have been living for generations.
SPEAKER_14Oh no.
SPEAKER_12So they don't know the cause of it yet, although it seems to be that there was likely gravel and fill that came from.
SPEAKER_13Illegal dumping.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. And yeah. Like, and in this case, it was uh recycled rocks and and waste material too that were used that was used as fill in a few places. And so at least four families are being relocated by the EPA, and they're testing more houses because it might be a little more widespread. So people know about Love Canal in that area here around Niagara Falls, Buffalo, anyway. This is a little bit further inland, uh, a little bit closer to the falls area.
SPEAKER_14That's right there too. Holy shit.
SPEAKER_12Yep.
unknownYep.
SPEAKER_12So it's it's uh part of the Niagara-Eerie County Radiological Survey, and they had found some radiation, they tested the houses even more. And so the governor even had to step up, and they've outlined a 21-day testing timeline for the entire area, and we'll see what happens. But you know.
SPEAKER_14Oh my god, when mole rats start emerging.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, Lee asking if it's radon, it's not just radon. Um, I don't know exactly what kind of radiation it is.
SPEAKER_14Oh, radon, that's in fucking every basement.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, no, it's a little bit, a little bit stronger, but I'm not positive on what it is exactly. But they were, I mean, they were using the guard counters. It sounded just like a Fitboy in there. They're walking in and it's doing the click. It's doing the Fitboy click.
SPEAKER_14They can also do that for to just God. They can set that to be so sensitive that it like clicks. Your television would make it click like that. You know what I mean? Like it's they can they can rack up the fucking sensor to make it sound as dangerous as you want it to sound, and people freak out by the sound of a Geiger counter, but seriously, sitting in front of your computer screen, you get more radiation than any.
SPEAKER_01Especially us in front of a big computer.
SPEAKER_14If there was if there are generations of the same like lineage of family living in the same place without like outrageously high rates of cancer or something, then it's probably not that dangerous anyhow.
SPEAKER_12Maybe a little higher with more health issues than average, and never really attributed why from what I was getting on some of these interviews. Yeah.
SPEAKER_11But not enough for gullification.
SPEAKER_14They still had noses. I'm sorry, I hate to make fun of that situation. That's terrible. I feel bad for the people who have to be relocated, but I'm glad they're being relocated and not have to be, you know, yeah, at least get these things sorted.
SPEAKER_12Exactly. But that's pretty much it for the bits. I already went over the calendar. Like I said, Foshknock will be starting on Tuesday. So you got sock hopping, dancing, mole miners, and foshtop.
SPEAKER_14Alrighty, you guys. I think that means it is time to switch gears, and uh, let's go over to do a little bit of vault talk.
SPEAKER_12To another episode. Today we're going to be discussing season two, episode three, The Profligate. This one was written by Chaz Hawkins and directed by Liz Friedlander. So their first episodes this season. Little bit of difference here. I really enjoyed this episode. Another one where we're continuing with the Brotherhood. We've got a couple major threads here. So we're dealing with continued stories around the brotherhood and what's going on there, and how that's evolving now that the Commonwealth has been involved. We've got Lucy, who we last saw surrounded by uh by legionaries. And it was very she was nice. So we're hoping for the best for Lucy as we get to her.
SPEAKER_11I'm nice.
SPEAKER_12We also have the ghoul left behind in the hospital, so we're gonna be dealing with that. And then we're gonna get a lot of flashback this episode, too. This was a flashback heavy episode. We talked about how they were light on him the last couple episodes, so get a lot of that, but we're not going to check with our friends at the vaults at all. None of the vaulties. Oh, no vaulties, not the froskies, not vault 32, not vault 33. Yep.
SPEAKER_14So you know the next two episodes are gonna be heavy vault stuff.
SPEAKER_12That's exactly how it's gonna go, right? Because they're rotating what they focus on.
SPEAKER_14We also versus vault.
SPEAKER_13I mean, we need to know more about the snack budget.
SPEAKER_14I mean I do I saw the jello cake in mid-episode, and I was like, ooh, we're going to the vault. They totally psyched me out. We were at a different event.
SPEAKER_12Jell O cake is a classic. Classic like that. Yeah, we're not going to get back to the support group either for a little while, but I'm sure when we do get back there, it's gonna have grown a little bit with that snack budget.
SPEAKER_14Yum.
SPEAKER_12So let's hop right into the episode. We're gonna go the recap scene by scene, things that we noticed, references in there, and of course, some of the fun pull quotes Andrew's been doing, which by the way, Andrew, I really like those pull quotes you've been doing, the little sound clips.
SPEAKER_14Yeah, I do I really I think it adds a nice little splash.
SPEAKER_12So we start out in a new scene. What song are they playing? Is it working for the chain gang?
SPEAKER_14Chain gang.
SPEAKER_12Yes. I love that song.
SPEAKER_14And they're timing up the popping of the the bottles with the rhythm of the chain in the song for a few beats.
SPEAKER_12It's really well choreographed. So we get kids working, and Thaddeus, like, oh, finally we're catching up with Thaddeus. What's he up to?
SPEAKER_14And it turns out she's a big old smile creeps across my face because our good bud Thaddeus is back.
SPEAKER_12Right? Love him. And he is now mutating more. Like he's got more marks on his face, more skin getting a little weird. And apparently he's in an old Sunset Sasparilla factory where child laborers are sorting crates of uh soda and pulling off the bottle caps, which I mean that's one way to make caps, right? Just pull right off the source. Yeah. A couple funny things in there. So, you know, the kids seeing them work together and and complain, and let's see, what happens next? One of the little girls there is unhappy.
SPEAKER_14Oh. She's she's not a ghoul. Right. But one of the kids said she looked like a ghoul, and Thaddeus is like, wait a second.
SPEAKER_13You over there, stand up. Hey. That's what a ghoul looks like.
SPEAKER_12But he took it as a good morale boosting opportunity. So yeah, a couple of fun moments.
SPEAKER_13You still have a nose.
SPEAKER_12Couple fun things there. One of the kids getting sleepy and he says, Nothing good happens when you fall asleep on the job, which is fair. Yeah. Only 12 hours into the shift, 10 more to go.
SPEAKER_1410 more to go mean they're doing 22 hour shifts.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, so that was a bit ridiculous. That was a bit ridiculous. But then I wonder, like, do they just crash rate hours and they get back to it? Or are they getting enough caffeine from drinking the soda while they work?
SPEAKER_13Oh yeah, that's right. You know, kids says, Oh, you know, can I have some water? He goes, No, just drink the soda.
SPEAKER_14Drink the pop, yeah. Do ghouls need to sleep? No. It seemed it seemed like there were non-ghouls too, or were there were all of those no, the majority weren't. The majority weren't, okay.
SPEAKER_12No, it was just, it was basically it was a kid's labor camp, a workhouse.
SPEAKER_14Were these like slave kids, or were these like just they roamed in like because their parents died, there were like orphans, like what were you? So here's how I see it.
SPEAKER_12I see it as kind of an Oliver Twist and Fagan kind of situation here. Essentially, these are kids of the family that were found, possibly in some cases, abducted when they were young. Who knows? But most likely just kids who didn't have a home were brought into the to the work camp, and they've got this gang going on. Now, I've raised a lot of questions because okay, Thaddeus is now in charge of this work camp, but he obviously did not put this factory together. A lot of these kids probably been there for a while. He didn't gather all these kids in just a couple couple weeks or a couple months as long as it's been. So who's he working on?
SPEAKER_13I mean, I guess he might have.
SPEAKER_12I can't imagine. He gathered, what, 20-some kids there in that time?
SPEAKER_1430 kids.
SPEAKER_12And he was made the floor manager, but someone had to hire him to do that, unless he just decided he was the floor manager. But he doesn't seem like that kind of go-getter to me that would organize all this in just like a month or two.
SPEAKER_13But you know, he does tell him, hey, you know, you've got a roof over your head, a well-defended perimeter.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, make me some money.
SPEAKER_13What about my clean water?
SPEAKER_14Just drink the pop.
SPEAKER_12Just drink the soda. Yeah, that was good. But he brought them together. He kind of did a little groove huddle for morale, a morale-boosting moment. Not quite as good as a Friday pizza party. You know, like I said, those are pretty good. But uh, it's like, look, what do we always say? Most kids are dead by now.
SPEAKER_04Let's keep it in. Come on, game. Come on, give me this kid, you got ten more to go. Keep it up for those big gross cows' hands in no time. Why don't you make money from me? Believe me. You know what the best part about this place is? Nobody wakes me up in the morning to do push-ups or makes me turn a big old bag all the time. Oh, I'd say that's pretty good. What do we always say?
SPEAKER_14That's so great.
SPEAKER_12That's so good. Yeah. The only thing I want to mention too is they're twisting them off, but they're having a little trouble. And he said, you know, just take off the gloves, use the meat of your hands, put some meat into it.
SPEAKER_14Really, really get in there.
SPEAKER_12I mean, of course, you know, after a while you get your hands thick and blistered. Like, I mean, it's it's awful, okay? Like, I'm not a fan of child labor. And yet, from the situation some of these kids might have been in, maybe it's a little better in some ways. They got a roof over the head, they got a well-defended perimeter. Honestly, all the snowties you can drink, that that alone is uh I might work for that. Yeah. Good stuff. And I thought that song was kind of the best. Uh in some ways, that might be one of my favorite musical moments going into this season so far.
SPEAKER_14I didn't even think about the thematic tying in of slave labor to the chain game thing. Yeah, there you go, too.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, it's really good. Good track. So that scene wraps, and we jump back over to see where Lucy's at, and things have developed.
SPEAKER_13And this is where it becomes very obvious that there's a different team working on this particular episode because you get the big giant splash screen with the block letters Legion across the screen.
SPEAKER_14I didn't notice that, and so that's what you take as an indicator that is okay. Now that I know that different people were working on it, but I don't think if had I not been told that someone else put this episode together, I would have just sort of thought that oh, they're the you just really need to pay attention. There's they're splashing something on purpose, but it is a stylistic change.
SPEAKER_13Yeah, I saw it as a style change.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, they've they use it sparingly. Like I know they they keep an overall style for the show, but there have been a couple times like that. Like, for instance, on episode one, the innovator, they also did that little subtitle that flashed up and it said the man who knew as a splash screen. And we don't usually get splash screens on a lot of episodes, too. You know what I mean? Like, so the title is The Innovator, great, but then they got that line, the man who knew before we go to Mr. House. So they've done a few things like that, but it is unusual. And they definitely wanted to set the tone here because they did for Legion. Did they do it for the NCR as well, Ray, later in the episode, I think?
SPEAKER_13Yes, they did. Yeah, they did it for somebody else.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, makes sense to want to do that. So we got over to the Legion, and Lucy is being walked through, and it's a Legion Work Camp. And I mean, you can see a lot of stuff. So kind of fun things that I noticed. Obviously, they did great with the armor, like the armor and the outfits and all that looked really good. But also the weapons. Did you notice how screen accurate some of them were? Like laser RCW and environment rifle in there and all that stuff.
SPEAKER_13Yeah, and a silenced pipe pistol.
SPEAKER_12Yeah.
SPEAKER_13With the big can on the front.
SPEAKER_12And I think we saw a howitzer, like a big old stand-up howitzer gun. And they have one of those. We just did a New Vegas playthrough for those who don't listen to the main Fallout Feed show. We just did a New Vegas playthrough, and at Fortification Hill at the Legion camp, they had one of those there. So you know, is it the same one just kind of maintained for the last 10 years? I mean, quite possibly. So I thought that was a nice touch that they had all that. So they're marched through and are they marched into a tent or directly? I don't think they're marched to Kaysar yet, right? They're marched in the city.
SPEAKER_13No, it's just right before him.
SPEAKER_12And they're brought before the Laserta legate, I think is what they called him. Let me just check the Latin. Well, it's a constellation, okay? Laserta is a constellation. It means lizard. Oh, interesting. So when they call him the Laserta Legate, Macaulay Culkin's character, he's like s lizard like or snake-like, which is interesting because Vulpus being fox-like, they're kind of continuing that sort of theme. But yeah, he's got that classic mask on, that helmet, and takes it off and it's Macaulay Culkin. Like what a reveal. That was that was well done. And so the girl is immediately questioned, and he mentions you lost your legionary. Obviously, she's a slave.
SPEAKER_14Yeah, what's that mean?
SPEAKER_12They're holding her responsible. She has no worth on her own, and her duty was to release her.
SPEAKER_14The guy who died from the Well, I was gonna say, but it was it was the ghoul was um her and captor.
SPEAKER_12And so he simply made the statement, you lost your legionary, and she was immediately killed. Like just reached out brutally, throat slashed. I so I've seen it a couple times now. Still shocking. Not a shock.
SPEAKER_14The first time I was literally shocked because it was just I just I don't get why she I mean she obviously knew something like that could or would happen just because she'd lived there, obviously, right? So why when she was with Lucy Did she not take a break to run away? Why did she say like no fuck no?
SPEAKER_12Seeing this, I kind of wondered the same thing. But like I said last week, I think that she's just been raised a slave and she's just kind of broken. And she might not have known that this was a definite likelihood, maybe possibility, but maybe in a twisted way, she also thinks she deserves to be punished. I mean, not killed necessarily, but deserved to be punished for it. Yeah, horrible stuff to think about. But that's the Legion. Yeah, you guys, if you thought the Legion was redeemable at all, or you're like pro-Legion, this episode is going a long way to making you say, Oh, I'd be the bad guy. They're pretty horrible. Like, not just kinda horrible, they are awful. I mean, they're still not as bad as Stormcloaks, y'all, but they're bad. Sorry, long running, long running feud. But Lucy is shocked. It's major. So then she's brought in front, marched up to this guy in a throne. And we get, you know, a nice close-up of him on the throne, knees, but it's not the sea, not the Caesar we know. And he's adjusting a weapon and pulls back, and she's marched in front of him. And yeah, so they start talking and call him the Almighty Caesar. And this was pretty great too, because Lucy immediately, so she's trying to, I mean, she's in shock, but she's trying to absorb what's happening, and she's trying to go along with what's going on to get the best result for herself in the situation she's in right now. But she cannot help herself. As soon as they call him the mighty Kaissar, she has to step up. You know, she has to step up.
SPEAKER_14Yeah. Well, actually.
SPEAKER_12Oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_14Don't be a well-actually person.
SPEAKER_12Hi, sir.
SPEAKER_19How dare you address the Greek Kaiser? Kaisar? Do you mean Caesar? I believe Kaisers are German, and you guys have more of a Roman theme, so I I think it's Caesar. I see that this is a work camp. If I may, I I'm a very Shh.
SPEAKER_20You're negotiating the rights to your Primonoctis.
SPEAKER_14We can get into Primonoctus here in a second.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_12But yeah, so the funny thing about that is she's jumping in on that. Like, yeah, they they look Roman, and so it should be Caesar. But what's funny is that this is a common argument in the community. Like, why is everybody saying that? Because in uh the US, we're raised to say Caesar. But she is actually possibly wrong, just like a lot of us who argue for that as well. Like, that is how we pronounce it here in the US. Yes. But there's more to it in that in Latin, Chaisar is actually the correct pronunciation. And so the original original Caesar there, he was part of the followers of the apocalypse, he was really well studied, and that's why he based all his stuff on the legion. And as a linguist, uh, he actually strictly enforced the pronunciation among his followers, which is why I mentioned before that uh true people who were members of the Legion and Legionnaires would often use Kaisar, whereas other people said Caesar. And they made a joke about people being confused. But yeah, so it was actually that is the correct Latin pronunciation originally, even though we say it differently. So I thought it was kind of neat how they projected all that.
SPEAKER_14Well, they could have a Kaisar and a Caesar, you know? They got two of 'em.
SPEAKER_12They do. But afterwards, so he mentioned there, we're discussing your Primonoctus. And nope, there they crossed the line. So Lucy mentioned that she was trying to respect their customs, but that is too much. That is gross. And of course, Primonoctus being first night, i.e. first person they get to sleep with her. And so yeah, she she, you know, she wants to make it clear that they do not have the right. And that also beyond that, she's not a virgin. And that doesn't even include all the cousin stuff that she's gotten up to, of which there was much.
SPEAKER_13And that doesn't even count the cousins though. Yeah. And it's and beyond that, it's it's like one or two pages in my resume.
SPEAKER_14Oh, yeah. Her whole resume.
SPEAKER_13Yeah. Well, and then she also explains to him that three men octopus wasn't even a uh Roman custom. It's a middle e medieval it was from the Middle Ages. And even that was it was only in books and uh and plays that it ever showed up. It would never really happen in real life.
SPEAKER_12Well, Lucy. I don't think I don't think her argument's very successful. So anyway, her being not a virgin and belligerent and lecturing them on the pronunciation of their leader's name and their use of such phrases. Well, well they no longer really cared so much about that. And next thing we see she's being lashed up to a cross. Although, yeah, is it after she's lashed up that they discuss the civil war, or was it while they're still here talking?
SPEAKER_13No, it was while they were still talking. Okay. Explains their their uh situation, and that's when she tells them that uh she's educated in family counseling.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, she's quite a good negotiator, as we've seen many, many times throughout the episode so far.
SPEAKER_13Yeah. And she's great in conflict resolution. Yeah.
SPEAKER_19And as much as I want to respect your traditions, there is a line to all that which I think we have found. And you should know that I am not even a virgin. And that's not including all of the cousin stuff I did, which is at least a page or two on my resume. So looks like we're out of options.
SPEAKER_14My my favorite part of the clip is l let's just say what when she's not a virgin, they all like, ooh!
SPEAKER_19But I am not even a virgin.
SPEAKER_12You could totally hear that intake of breath. Which I mean, I think the assumption would should be that she was not, but maybe because she's from the vault, they thought. I don't know.
SPEAKER_14Yeah, I d I just assume that anyone out in the wasteland is practiced.
SPEAKER_12But then they and many of a distasteful activities talk about the stalemate and the fact that there has been a bit of a fracture in the Legion. That their their leader had died, Caesar, which we are assuming was the original Caesar that we knew from the game. Although it could be that this was another Caesar Kaiser after that. We don't really know.
SPEAKER_13I don't know, because it hasn't been that long.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, I mean, well, 81 to 96, right? So that's says 15 years since uh the events of New Vegas. So it's a while.
SPEAKER_14So but it's two presidential terms.
SPEAKER_12It was their most recent, so whether the original Caesar or the or the newest Caesar, which probably the original would make the most sense unless we killed him in the game.
SPEAKER_13And they don't really they don't say how long the current pair of Caesars have been in.
SPEAKER_12Right. And you gotta assume. So they're at a standoff. So essentially they split, he died, and he had his last will and testament, or essentially his wishes as to who his heir should be on him, they believe. But they can't get to the body to see who that was because the other side will attack them when they do. And probably vice versa, to be honest. You know, he of course they frame it this way. But you would think that if it had been that long, something would happen. Like, how long could they be at the stand at the stalemate and standoff? Like, especially with, and I have to say this, the proximity of the two camps near each other, it makes a great, it looks great cinematography wise, they can seem out. But the idea that you're essentially like the two different Kaisers, two different headquarters are like two or three football fields from each other at most, that's just kind of ridiculous.
SPEAKER_13Yeah, especially when they've got heavy guns.
SPEAKER_12Exactly. They could take each other out. So you gotta assume like if this was real and they were actually at a stalemate, they'd be much further apart than that. And if they are really that close, that it they couldn't have been at the stalemate very long. Like it has to be pretty recent that the leader died, you would think. But so she mentions conflict resolution, she can maybe help with that. And also, doesn't she say she's seen upwards of 15 movies? What is that line?
SPEAKER_13Isn't that when McCaulay Coogan says he's not the bad guy?
SPEAKER_12Oh, yeah, that's great. So, right, this is after that, when she's being put up on the cross, and they're having the conversation about that.
SPEAKER_19This isn't Rome, okay? This is America. Is it? Yeah, it is, at least according to the maps.
SPEAKER_20Maps are drawn by the dead. All that remains of America is the overwhelming evidence of its failure. Now, if you excuse me, we have a war to win.
SPEAKER_19You know, speaking of someone who's seen upwards of 15 different movies, if you think everyone else is the bad guy, chances are you're the bad guy.
SPEAKER_20Of good is not a meaningful vector in history in his strength.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, okay, there's a lot there.
SPEAKER_14Upwards of 15 movies.
SPEAKER_12I mean, that's the funny part. She's seen a lot, okay? And I bet some of them had Cooper Howard in it too. Ironically, as we'll discover since he was one of her dad's favorite actors. But there's so much to pull apart there. So this is America, she says. And look around you. And I love that he says, look around you. The only thing left of America is overwhelming evidence of its failure. Like, wow. I don't know. I thought that was a really well-written line.
SPEAKER_11Yeah, that's heavy.
SPEAKER_12And uh yeah, only strength. That's that's the Legion's point of view. Is that strength is what matters in the wasteland.
SPEAKER_14Good has never been a vector for success or something.
SPEAKER_12Yes, exactly. Except obviously good has been a vector for success, but people will argue all kinds of standpoints. Everyone has their perspective in this show and in this game. So anything else on the scene you guys want to talk about, or should we move on to the hospital and the ghoul? Let's check in with our good pal. So next we show up, and it's the ghoul. When we last left him, he was on the floor. And he's still on the floor, but he's dragging himself. He's dragging himself up to where he can, you know, get a get a decent look and a tool, some kind of way to be able to get the rad scorpion stinger out of his leg. So he gets over, he props himself up, and he grabs a like an old skinning knife, and he's talking to dog meat the whole time, having a bit of a conversation, which I really enjoyed.
SPEAKER_09Yeah, well.
SPEAKER_12Those lines are almost, the stuff you save there is almost word for word, like what I wrote down in my actual notes about the scene, too. Because the way he starts off, you know, went boat, not a boat. Like, and you can hear he's in so much pain here. He's been through it. This is a very human moment for Cooper where he is severely hurt, and you can tell he's been here before. He's been here more than once. And this whole ship of theseus metaphor that he does. So he never said ship of theseus in the scene, but he's describing the ship of theseus theory theory, you know, the idea that you have a boat, you replace planks. It was I and over time now everything is different. I thought it was neat that they used that because I've been hearing people use ship of theseus as a metaphor in common parlance a lot more the last year. And like you even see that in video game discussions, and actually in talking about studio changes and people, different developers at the same studio, is it still the same studio anymore that made this game 10 years ago talking about a city in New Vegas? Which there are actually a lot of people are the same there. A lot of the same planks of wood still there, y'all. But I wonder if them bringing it up here is one of the reasons why it's in the public consciousness. I don't know. Or is it just a common metaphor that you think a lot of people know?
SPEAKER_13I don't know. I I have in the not too distant past remember something about that coming up, but I don't remember where.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_12It's a good metaphor. You can really see that thinking about yourself that way. Like we think about it as obviously inanimate objects, a boat, a house, you know, a a life. But in his case, we're talking about his actual body in some ways. If the ghoul has been through so much, damaged and healed in all that time, like is his body still his body? Is he still himself? Is his soul still there? Like his humanity. You've seen how he's become a bit of a monster, as Lucy called him last week. And I I think that this all kind of plays together in his mentality. But is here saying all this to Dogmeat? I love the fact he says, but I don't need to tell you this. You already know.
SPEAKER_13Yeah. And and dogme is so attentive. Yep. And you know, in only the way a Belgian Malinois can be just you can tell the dog is just ready to go do something.
SPEAKER_12Yeah.
SPEAKER_13You know, it's there's so much pent-up energy in that dog.
SPEAKER_12He'll do what needs done. And uh one thing about this too, I feel like in some ways the way the reason he relates this to dog meat, and but you already know all this, you understand, is partly because the dog's grown up in the wasteland and has had that life, but also because he's having this conversation with the dog just like his old dog. And he mentioned last season towards the end, that you're a good dog, dog meat, but you ain't him, talking about his old dog. But I think in some ways, especially in this moment of pain that he's in and the headspace that he's in, that in some ways he sees dog meat as the long line of dogs that he's had and talked to and can relate to. And he's just happy to have dog meat there. And dog meat is also not his dog, but kind of is.
SPEAKER_14You think he's always had a dog with him over 200 years? There's been a long line of dogs by his side?
SPEAKER_12Maybe not always, but I think off and on. I don't know. I mean, maybe dog meat is the first after his original dog, but I feel like it's been more than once. I feel like Cooper's a dog guy.
SPEAKER_14The good lookouts, and you don't have to make like actual personal attachments that aren't like I can see like having a sidekick as another person that would get on Cooper's nerves really quickly, but having a dog not so much because they don't talk and they can alert you to any approaching danger, etc.
SPEAKER_12They're a good companion, good listener, good helper, understand their motivations, not about to betray you in the same way that you know he might have had a few times. Exactly. A lot to recommend them. No, I as as well.
SPEAKER_13We'd have to see uh a man and his dog to really get a sense of his re his uh connection. Yeah.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_12We got a bit of it though. I don't remember his dog's name, uh Cooper's dog in the past right now. I don't know.
SPEAKER_13I think it comes up It's definitely mentioned relatively soon.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. Yep. So we get all this, and after he says Benoiss has had someone worth talking to, talking to the dog. We go back in and we got the next flashback. We've got a couple of flashbacks here, and this is gonna be Cooper in a high you know difficult headspace, so we want to kind of explain his backstory again is a good opportunity for that. So we start off in the path at home, coming in on Cooper heading in towards the kitchen or area where his wife Barb is packing a vault tech keepsake capsule. So vault tech branded capsule or bringing your stuff into the vault for your keepsakes and all that. And she's crying and upset because she's thinking about they're gonna have to escape to a vault. She's also, as we know, just been through a kind of major scene and done some kind of awful stuff. But here you can tell she's more just scared about her family and worried about it and and having trouble. And uh Cooper catches her crying and she she sees him and looks up and says that she's just she's trying to fit everything, but she can't and she just can't seem to make uh their daughter's teddy bear fit. And just you get that desperation of a mother trying to get everything that that they're gonna need when they go in. But Cooper is thinking about this differently because he is aware of what happened with his wife when his wife said and she seems to think it's foregone's gonna be a war, and now Cooper thinks he knows why because of that announcement. So he kind of pipes in, he's like, Well, it might not happen. And I think he's seeing how she replied because he's seen what she said, it might not happen. And she's like, No, you're right, you're right. But there's this unspoken thing that he knows that she doesn't know he knows that a vault heck could be behind it happening. So he then says he's gotta go to a thing for Charlie. Charlie White knife, his friend there that we saw from before over. And it kind of goes to the uh VFW hall, is where they head next. And he's talking to Charlie. And uh he actually first thing he starts off asking him what he knows about Robert House. And he has some info, and he said, All I know is he's building some kind of weapon system in Vegas. Our Intel thinks it's connected to what you heard Barb talking about, because he shared some of that with Moldaver and with Charlie and stuff.
SPEAKER_22What do you know about Robert House? All I heard is that he's building some kind of weapon system in Vegas. Our Intel thinks it's connected to what you heard. Barb talking about your Intel.
SPEAKER_08It's not a bunch of much of it. Intel, I guess. Well, do you know what your boss wants me to do too? I don't know. Like, I want to help. I'll do whatever I can, but there's gotta be another way.
SPEAKER_14Maybe not the right ones. What does that mean that they should have been not fighting for the United States in the previous war? What does he say in there?
SPEAKER_12Uh I mean, they're getting kind of deep into it, but yeah, essentially that they were fighting for the government, they were fighting for America. Uh, but were the right people in charge? Were they making the right choices? That they go into that a bit several times throughout the episode, and I I think it's gonna be a theme in this season, too. Who are we fighting for? Why are we fighting? Were we right, or did we just do the best we had with the intel we had at the time?
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_12But yeah, but then he says Robert House is just one person. So he didn't know. He didn't know what Moldaver suggested or hinted to Cooper that he'd do. But he also doesn't think it's a bad idea. So next we go to Diane Welch. The speeches are starting. So Diane Welch is their local representative.
SPEAKER_02And uh from Glendale.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, from Glendale. She starts off kind of talking about herself. You've probably never heard, or if you've never heard of me, it's because I'm the only city congressperson who has refused corporate funding. While I might not have as many TV spots and billboards, I don't think America can afford any more corporate influence in Washington. The audience is restless. They're there for their friends and for the VFW function. Get on with it. She says, Okay, well, today isn't about me. It's about you and the sacrifices you've made. And so she starts she's fumbling a bit. She drops her note with cards looking for 'em. It's a very uh disorganized. You can tell she's disorganized but well-meaning. She drops her cards there. And so during all this kind of display, Cooper gets up and he says, I'm gonna go hit the head. By which he means the bathroom.
SPEAKER_14There's some fucking weirdo hanging out in the bathroom.
SPEAKER_12Well, yeah, so so we zoom in and uh he's and at the urinal and we get a view, and there's a guy in a you know, mustache and uh bowling shirt leaning against the wall. Just a nondescript looking dude. And then you look at him and oh wait, it's the guy from the first episode.
SPEAKER_11Wah.
SPEAKER_12Who was identified as Mr. House. So this is a kind of fun scene. So he starts talking to Cooper while Cooper is still peeing. Bit of a bit of a captive audience there.
SPEAKER_11Oh paw.
SPEAKER_12Yep. And uh he starts up a conversation and he drops some hints. And he's very manipulative. You can sense it here. Like Cooper doesn't necessarily know, but because we know more, Cooper is manipulative. So while you're here, oh Mr. Howard, yeah, you're here for your friend Charlie. And he's like, Yeah, but I heard he's a bit of a Pinko. And he says, I I wouldn't know about that. I didn't know about that. Which uh I thought that was interesting. And then he says, How about you, Mr. Howard? And Cooper says, What about me? Whoa, Cooper Howard, American veteran, star of the silver screen, Pinko. So the accusations, he's getting him on the back foot, like he's kind of feeling him out what he's up to. And one wonders, does he know that someone wants Cooper to off him? Like he's three steps ahead of everyone. I mean, that's who Robert House is, right? Anyway, Cooper flushes and he goes over to the sink to wash his hands and says, Don't believe everything you read. And this is when Robert kind of swoops in and he's like, No, don't get me wrong. I sympathize with the Pinko point of view.
SPEAKER_14He hands him a paper towel in a very sort of weird awkward manner.
SPEAKER_13It's it's very much like uh an attendant would have done at the time.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, yeah. Uh you know, it's funny because it's Mr. House, possibly the richest man in the country.
SPEAKER_14It was awkward with the the movement of it.
SPEAKER_12I feel like it was awkward because he was in the bathroom in general. I mean, he's here having a slightly confrontational conversation with accusations. Yeah, calling him a copinist. Subtly. Yeah. Exactly. I mean, I say subtly, it's not that subtle, but it it's an interesting little kind of tete-a-tete that they're having here. But at the same time, he's trying to appear all like friendly and handing him this.
SPEAKER_14In our timeline, this would be known as McCarthyism. When did Fallout Universe split from ours? And did McCarthy exist in that world as well?
SPEAKER_12So even more so, much, much more so. Like, yeah, it's split in the 60s officially, uh, but there are things, there are changes on the all the on the timeline that were in the 20s and 30s as well. You know what I mean? Like there are changes throughout, but the biggest changes seem to happen, you know, in the 50s and 60s on.
SPEAKER_02Okay.
SPEAKER_12But yeah, no, the anti-red, I mean, that was one of the largest things in the Fallout universe as far as movements happening, which is very much like McCarthyism on steroids.
SPEAKER_14Their red was all China though, and our our red was all Russia.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. Yep. But still the communist scare either way.
SPEAKER_14Yep. Same thing.
SPEAKER_12But he mentions that he sympathizes with the with the Pinko point of view and kind of talks about how everybody has these solutions, which kind of harkens back to Max's famous line of first season, you know, everyone's trying to save the world, they just disagree on how.
SPEAKER_14Yep. No one knows how.
SPEAKER_12He's here saying that he understands the point of view. But you get someone backed in a corner and they're dangerous. You get billions of people backed into a corner, and he just kind of leaves that hanging. Then a fun little quote from Cooper, kind of moving on. And uh he says, I take it you're not a vet.
SPEAKER_14Oh, whatever do you mean?
SPEAKER_12A vet would know better than the talk politics when a man has his dick in his hand.
SPEAKER_07Are you getting any awards tonight? Uh no. No, no. I'm just here for an old front. Corporal Charlie Whiteknife. Yeah, yeah, Charlie. Rumor has it, he's a bit of a Pinko. Is that right? I wouldn't know about that. What about you, Mr. Howard? What about me? Cooper Howard? American veteran, star of the silver screen? Pinko? Don't believe everything you read. But don't get me wrong. I sympathize with Pinko's point of view. They have grievances with traditional institutions. Totally justified in asking. I didn't ask you. There's a solution to the problem. You back a body into a corner, you're liable to try anything. You back billions of bodies into a corner at the same time. Everyone trying to solve the same problem at the same time with a multitude of solutions. Take it you're not a vet.
SPEAKER_08What gave me away? Because a vet would know better than to talk politics when a man has a stick in his hand.
SPEAKER_07Till next time, Mr. Howard. Yeah.
SPEAKER_14Till next time. Till next time, I'm creeping on you in the bathroom, Mr. Howard.
SPEAKER_12Well, that's because I just went, like, it's not confrontational, but it is. But he's trying to at the same time act all accommodating and friendly while doing this. Like it's a it's a cool standoff scene and an odd choice location to do it. But hey, who else are you gonna get a guy on his own? That's probably why, right? Hit him when they're vulnerable. Well, speaking of vulnerable, after that we go to the next scene, and we are in the Brotherhood Bath, the BOS B. And people are arguing.
SPEAKER_14So are we arguing about? Oh, uh yeah, because Camel showed up, right?
SPEAKER_12Exactly.
SPEAKER_13So the leader of the Yosemite clan is saying that she's not gonna join the revolution.
SPEAKER_12Right. Right. That now the Commonwealth here, she doesn't want to be part of a rebellion. She didn't sign up for a rebellion. I mean, to an extent, when they all agreed and got excited, and the guy was really excited about the fusion cores last week, they knew that there was a chance that they would get in a fight with Commonwealth, but they were thinking near term. Now that the Commonwealth showed up, they're not having it. So Elder Quintus goes into some serious specifying and he goes over the brotherhood history. This is a chance for a nice little history dump. So for the Lorneerds, we already knew all about Max and you know the story we're getting. But people who don't know, they're being brought in, you know, people who just watch the show don't know that much fallout lore, but also he frames it in his way of thinking. Which again is how it works. You know, the idea that the history that we might have learned from holotapes and on terminals and Nikopedia and such, they've got this verbal lore. And so to him, to him, Maxson was a religious man. He talks about how he discovered about the FEV experiment. And he was forced to choose between his God and his government. And he defied, he defied the government and followed his God. And as a spiritual religious leader, like Quintus is for this chapter, that's what makes sense to him. And so he's giving this propaganda and trying to rally them and say, we are righteous. If our rebellion is righteous, the way will be paved for us. Do you have that whole sound clip? You want to just play through it, Andrew?
SPEAKER_21I do. The codex is clear about chain of command.
SPEAKER_03We mustn't squander this opportunity. I told you, we're out. I acknowledge the arrival of the Paladin from the Commonwealth complicates the issue.
SPEAKER_21But I'm not interested in fighting a rebellion, Quintus. But the Brotherhood began as an act of rebellion.
SPEAKER_03Before the war, an ordinary captain was sent to a research center in California. Roger Maxson. And when he saw what they were doing there, he depraved experiments on human subjects. Well then Roger Maxon had to ask himself: who did he serve? His God or his government? He chose his God. He shot the scientists. He shot the people who tried to stop him. His government had defied God, and for that, he defied his government. But he wasn't punished. He was saved. So that he could found our noble order. If our rebellion is righteous, the way will be paved for us.
SPEAKER_21I told you. I don't go in for the religious stuff. Give the Cold Fusion relic to the Commonwealth.
SPEAKER_14He he wasn't punished, he was saved. What does what does that mean?
SPEAKER_12He's just framing it in religious terms, that rather than being punished by the government or them having a chance to, his faith saved him. That's he wouldn't have founded the Brotherhood if he wasn't. So his his squad, his people, and then the Brotherhood followed. And yeah, he's just framing it all in religious terms.
SPEAKER_14My other favorite part, and I didn't notice this during the episode, but if you listen to the background music, it's all violins and whatever normal background music. But when he launches into the history of the brotherhood, it goes into Gregorian chants in the background.
SPEAKER_03On human subjects. Well, then Roger Maxson had to ask himself, who did he serve?
SPEAKER_14His then music changes to like Gregorian chance stuff. That's really cool. I did notice that during the original when I was watching it.
SPEAKER_12They focus on that. That is, you know, that is Max's chapter, and that's who Quintus is. Some people say, oh, they changed a brotherhood because it this is not how we knew them. But some chapters have been religious. And this chapter. A bit. They they weren't as they weren't as over the top religious as even Quintus's for sure. With where he's taken his chapter. A couple of fun Easter eggs here too that I want to mention while they're having this this talk. So you get the map behind him. That's actually based on a fan-made map that was, I believe, posted on Reddit originally by a user I PLK P I anyway, it's a bunch of numbers and letters. But it was a fan-made map.
SPEAKER_14Shout out to a bunch of letters and numbers.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, yeah, Mr. Letters, bunch of numbers. And uh, but it has locations from Van Buren in it. So the all three that never came out. The third game that Enterplay was working on there, or their Fallout 3 called Van Buren code name. Things such as Tibbetts Prison and the Bloomfield Space Center, those are listed on there on the map, but have never actually been in the game, any of the games that came out.
SPEAKER_14I love that. Such a rich, deep tapestry of stuff to pull from, huh?
SPEAKER_12Yeah, they really paid attention. I I just I love that stuff there. So she doesn't go in for religious stuff. He he does his whole big argument, he sways people, you know, and like his people are nodding and yes, and oh religious fervor, and they're about to say hallelujah. But her and the other leaders, they don't go in for that religious stuff.
SPEAKER_14Give it to the Commonwealth, yeah.
SPEAKER_12I love that. I I just thought it was really well done. But what then what happens next, they don't really highlight, but I think it shows so strongly the differences in the chapter. So she leaves and Maximus starts to speak up and he says, M my lord, this Xander guy, I could just kill him. And they're looking at him like, what? And Max says, Well, that's what we do here, isn't it? And again, this is Max who he is. What he's learned, he's trying to please Quintus. He has his ideas, he's a little bit mixed up. Like he wants to be a good man, he wants to do what's right, but he also just killed that dude in combat a few hours ago, or possibly the day before. Like it hasn't been that long. Yeah.
SPEAKER_14I forgot about that. Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_12So he just killed that in combat. And when he is the sword, he's been being sent out on missions, and they take out abominations and they recover technology. And so to his mind, like that that's what we do here, isn't it? And here's where I say that it shows different chapters. So Max has this conflict, but he's also a true believer. That speech that Quintus just made, it convinced him because Quintus says, Behold the didness of the sword. We just lost the alliance. If we kill Xander, it will be war. And Max says, Yes, my lord, but if our cause is righteous, i.e., he just followed that speech. He was inspired. He's doing exactly what Quintus says. He thinks he's doing the right thing. Quintus says, if we're righteous, we will win. So Max is saying, but if we're righteous, that you said we'll win.
SPEAKER_14You just said it, bro.
SPEAKER_12But guess what? It'll be us. Quintus doesn't believe it. Roll the clip.
SPEAKER_07My lord, this Xander guy. I could just kill him. But that's what we do here, isn't it?
SPEAKER_03Behold, that's what we do here of the sword. We just lost the alliance. If we kill Xander, the envoy from the Commonwealth, it will be war. And without the support of the other chapters, it will end with all our heads on spikes.
SPEAKER_07Yes, my lord, but if our cause is righteous.
SPEAKER_03I have no need for the thoughts of the sword. Leave. Must I repeat myself? No, my lord.
SPEAKER_14The is dimness of the sword a is that a phrase or a reference to something? Cause I really think they should have used like the dull. Dullness of the blade or so. If they're calling him the sword, dim is like a reference to light and and and intelligence, I get it.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, not that bright.
SPEAKER_14Make him a dull blade or something if he's the sword. You know, come on, Quintus.
SPEAKER_12Would have fit the analogy better. Yeah, Quintus isn't as smart as he thinks he is. Max is so I mean, he's hurt by that. Like he was stepping up to do what he thought might need done for this man that he tries to respect despite having some issues with. And he is just smacked down. And yet he half believes it. You know, maybe he I think to s to an extent he's like, Well, maybe I'm not that bright. You know, I've been told most of my life I'm not that bright. Maybe I'm not that bright. But he just wants to do the right thing and he wants to please Quintus and he wants to advance the Brotherhood's goals.
SPEAKER_14Maybe Quintus shouldn't have been so hard on him.
SPEAKER_12Pushing him into the arms of another Yeah, it was a big mistake because Max is already questioning what the Brotherhood's doing here. But he was still trying to stick with them, and I feel like it's another time where he's just been smacked down enough, pushed down enough, that no my lord, he's walking away and thinking about what to do.
SPEAKER_14What was the cold fusion relic box thing they found? That that that was that the object that gave them the power to refill all the fusion cores, I assume?
SPEAKER_00Yes.
unknownYep.
SPEAKER_14So they had the like the little vial of lightning, but they couldn't get it out of the vial until they had that box thing.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, it was just it was the source of power, but it needed the device to be able to channel it.
SPEAKER_02Okay.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. Which of course they were they had in the at Moldaver's base. She had built all of that for when it was delivered. So they got that there, but now they're able to use it here in the Area 51 base. And yeah, they're using it. I mean, it's unlimited power. It's not being depleted. So we next follow Max outside of the location, and he's walking and thinking and digesting what just happened, what he's gonna do next. And uh we see Xander and Xander is just kind of hanging out, telling watching what's happening on, bemused as the paladin from the Commonwealth. And he sees Max and he calls over to him. He just wants to talk. He just wants to talk and making small talk. And again, Xander is also pretty manipulative, and he's really you can see why he's the um liaison here.
SPEAKER_11Charismatic.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. Yeah. So he says, My arrival seems to put a damper on the situation. You know, your conversation starts when I get here, which is kind of his kind of way of prying what you guys are up to. I know you guys were planning this, this revival. But he's flattering Maximus. Essentially, he starts to flatter Maximus, and he's he essentially says, You seem like a real soldier. You guys have a lot of clerics, don't you?
SPEAKER_14He starts trashing on his clerics.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, which is I mean right? That's what we're saying. That's what's different about this chapter. Your clerics won't even look at me. You guys have a lot of clerics. And Max says, Yeah, I guess we do.
SPEAKER_14Xander's like cockroaches chittering around.
SPEAKER_12Skirting around everywhere. Like we got clerics back in the Commonwealth, they're just like not in charge, you know.
SPEAKER_14Yeah, they don't boss us around and have our balls a device.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. Every chapter's a little different, but this one uh sucks. No offense. And Max Max is still, you know, Max is we've talked about how he's kind of deliberate in what he says. And it's not that he's slow, but that he's he's kind of slow to speak sometimes. And he says, I I shouldn't be talking to you, chain of command. And Xander uses that to hook him in even further. He's like, Good man, see? That's a soldier for you. You know, your elder clerk's about to make a mistake. The brotherhood that you believe in, that I believe in, he's ripping him in here. We're the last bastion of order. We're a bulwark against chaos. And fomenting a rebellion, that seems a lot like chaos.
SPEAKER_14I love that phrase, the bulwark against chaos. That was great.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And he then he goes on to how back east it's guys like us who call the shots. Soldiers like us, people who put their ass on the line, who bleed for it. And your clerics, what do they do? They stand around, they give speeches. We're the ones who bleed. Basically equating the the clerics priest like politicians, which in this chapter they basically are. Ooh, I like the connection. Lee and chat just mentioned plans are hard, chaos is easy. So, yeah, this is another chaos reference books as well.
SPEAKER_02There you go.
SPEAKER_12I like that theme there. You want to play the uh clip of them talking here, Andrew? Like maybe both of them.
SPEAKER_14Let's get the ballwark.
SPEAKER_06What do you want? Well, my arrival seems to have put a damper on the conversation. Your clerics won't even look at me. You guys have a lot of clerics, you know that. Yeah, I guess we do. Yeah, scurrying around everywhere like little cockroaches. I mean, we have clerics back in the Commonwealth. They're just not like in charge, you know. I know every chapter of the Brotherhood is a little different, but this one sucks. No offense. I shouldn't be talking to you. Chain of command. Good man. See, that's a soldier for you. Your older clerk is about to make a mistake. The brotherhood that you believe in, that I believe in. We are the last bastion of order in this country. If you ask me, fomenting a rebellion sounds a lot like chaos. You know, back east. These guys like us accomplish. People who put their ass on the line. That is foundational to the brotherhood ethos. Your clerics. What do they do? Stand around, give speeches. We are the ones who bleed. What do you want me to do about it? Just talk to me. You know, this isn't the first time that the Brotherhood has been on the verge of civil war. But if us soldiers figure something out, it won't be the first time that cooler heads have prevailed. What do you say? Yeah, let's talk.
unknownHot dog.
SPEAKER_14Hot dog. That's hot dog number one.
SPEAKER_12Hot dog number one. We got a lot of hot dogs coming up.
SPEAKER_14I uh I made a super a hot dog supercut. Hot dog. I swear there was a fourth one, but I couldn't find it.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, I think there's another hot dog in there for sure. There's gotta be, right?
SPEAKER_14I thought there were four, but yeah.
unknownFunny.
SPEAKER_12Paladin Harkness. I think of him as Paladin Hot Dog. But he's great. Kumel is so charismatic in this role. Like the jacket, the haircut, the way he talks. Like I really wish we had more of him.
SPEAKER_14I was just thinking how remarkable it is that he came here from another country, not really speaking much English, and then became a stand-up comedian. The actor, yep. And now he's an actor in in Marvel movies and shit. Like what?
SPEAKER_12Yeah, yeah. He's just he's had an amazing career, you know. Like we both listened to him as a podcaster and comedian back in the day.
SPEAKER_14Yeah, when he had a silly little podcast about video games. Awesome. Wait, does that mean we get to be in Marvel movies someday?
SPEAKER_12Keep working at it. Get get nice and buff, Andrew. Who knows?
SPEAKER_14Yeah, I need a six pack of eight, eight or wait, they got like twelve pack of abs. Installing more packs.
SPEAKER_12No, but I mean Camille's just a great actor and he's wicked funny. But why I love his character. And admittedly, he's gonna go a rough way this episode, but man. I mean he should have his own show. Like seriously, he's so good.
SPEAKER_14A spinoff of the Brotherhood Adventures of Paladin, what's his name?
SPEAKER_12Hot Dog.
SPEAKER_14Paladin Hot Dog.
SPEAKER_12Paladin Hot Dog in the Commonwealth.
SPEAKER_13He sounds he sounds more like he's from LA than Boston, though.
SPEAKER_12Yes, he he definitely. That's true. His accent is more West Coast. But accents and fallout are weird.
SPEAKER_13Diversity.
unknownHot dog. Hot dog.
SPEAKER_02Hot dog.
SPEAKER_12So now we move over to the ghoul. So we're actually we're zoomed in and and we're seeing Lucy on a cross from a distance, then we see the zoom. The ghoul is zooming in. And he and dog meet her on the outskirts of the camp and figure out what's going on. And uh he sees they got themselves a situation here. So first he's looking at Lucy and what happened. He's not surprised. She's in a predicament. And then and then he looks and gets the wide view and sees the civil war and what's going on. And so he says, Okay, well, we're gonna need some help taking these guys on.
SPEAKER_14I know that the Legion they're considered brutal, but at least they only tied people's hands to the crucifixes. They didn't drive spikes through their hands or whatever. That would have been a lot worse for Lucy.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. Yeah, she would have been a bad shape. I have a feeling they did sometimes. But here's the one.
SPEAKER_13She's she's already got the bad finger.
SPEAKER_12True.
SPEAKER_11That's funny.
SPEAKER_12So he says, okay, we're looking for help. And uh they head off and you know, whistles for dog me to follow him. And so they are heading off and we come outside, what is it labeled as? I mean it's camp golf. But did they label it as the house resort or something on the sign? Or does it say camp golf?
SPEAKER_13It is such I think it just said country club or something like that.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, like country club in Hask. Yeah. But it was camp golf from the games, and he's walking up between the tents and towards the building. And it is so accurate to the game here, which is also a little bit of a weird thing again because of the fact that it's been 15 years. Like you wouldn't think that maybe the same tents wouldn't be out there, but hey, the NCR was stationed there for a while while they were, and it's been a bit. But yes, you got the tents, and it is just like where you're doing the Misfits quest in there and the little bit of uh land up the hill to the main building there for to the camp building. And he goes inside and he's looking, and I just I love how accurate it all felt.
SPEAKER_13Yeah, the first thing I noticed was when he was kneeled down talking to Dog Me. You could see the the golf balls laying on the ground around him.
SPEAKER_14Oh that's fun.
SPEAKER_12I didn't even catch that.
SPEAKER_14It goes up for two plastic, man.
SPEAKER_12So was Camp Golf maybe a golf resort before?
SPEAKER_13Yeah. Okay. Yeah, that's why it's called Camp Golf.
SPEAKER_12I had no idea. Never put that together, but I guess it would make sense why the fields are around you. Oh, actually, yeah, because on the far side it is kind of like a fairway. Like when you're trying to get into camp golf in the game from the far side, you gotta try to get over that stone wall. And it is like a golf fairway behind it. So I mean in miniature, but still. So he's exploring and he hears uh whirring and clanking and moving, and then a voice says, Ha howdy partner. And the ghoul startled, like he knows this. Is that you, Victor? Oh, as he's walking on.
SPEAKER_13So that's a thing. So I'm gonna look up and see because I I'm wondering if the if the voice actor for Victor is the same one in the TV show.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, I honestly don't know. I I don't think it was, but that would be cool if they used the same actor for sure. So definitely check that out. But Victor, anyone who's played New Vegas knows that Victor is uh a major character that you meet in the beginning. In fact, he's the one who rescues your courier in New Vegas start. And then, you know, just happens to casually be following them around and coincidentally running into them regularly. And we kinda have the same thing here. So the discussion comes up. And oh when the ghoul's coming up, also, I want to mention he says this is the best place to give some help, or it used to be anyway. So the light still have power, the ghoul's exploring, pill can. Victor wakes up, and Victor says, I'm having a bit of a problem in memory, but yeah, that seems right. That sure does sound familiar. Spent the last ten years thinking I was a soda machine. Okay. Do you have the scene to play, Andrew? Because there are a couple of things I want to mention.
SPEAKER_10That's you, Victor. Victor! This sure does sound familiar. Spent the last ten years thinking about the soda machine. What the fuck are you doing here? Well, beats me, partner. Someone did a number on my numbers. Memory's all jimble jamble.
SPEAKER_09Is that right? Well, I gotta save a dipshit Baltic from the Legion. Came here hoping to get some help from the NCR.
SPEAKER_10NCR?
SPEAKER_09I think who's running these parts these days?
SPEAKER_10Well, you know how it is around here? The NCR and the Legion going at each other like cats and dogs. Oh, now we got the Legion fighting the Legion like cats and dogs, too.
SPEAKER_09Is that so?
SPEAKER_10But you know what they say in Vegas. Everyone's a winner. Eventually.
SPEAKER_09Same goes for losing in my experience, except for one man. Man built you. Where's Robert House?
SPEAKER_10He's gone. He had all the money in the world. But all he really wanted was to live forever. Just stay fair, I guess.
SPEAKER_09Well, typically, I would agree, but you should know better than anyone that House had a knack for planning ahead.
SPEAKER_10Oh, he had plans alright, but he needed that cold fusion to dad from before the war. Didn't you have something to do with all that way back when? Oh, you're leaving already. I ain't nobody around to keep poor Victor company these days. Just them rangers up in the hills.
SPEAKER_09Rangers in the hills?
SPEAKER_10Well, you know how it is. The NCR and the Legion, they can't stop fighting. Like cats and dogs.
SPEAKER_09Much obliged, Victor.
SPEAKER_10Well, I'll be seeing you.
SPEAKER_14I'm sure you will. With like cats and dogs, evidently.
SPEAKER_12That's so good. He repeats the same line twice, too. Like he says cats and dogs originally, and then he says it again. This whole scene is one of my favorites in the episode. Here's why. Like I said, Victor was an omnipresent character in the first you know, in New Vegas. And felt like he had an agenda. He was working for house, but we didn't know it early on. Follows you, always knows more than let's on, just friendly like, coincidental, all that. But really, he's guiding you and leading you the whole time. Same thing here. So he says, someone did a number on my numbers, all jimble jambled. You know, he doesn't know what's been going on, and like, oh, it's been 10 years. But then as they keep talking, he's asked to run into parts, and Victor's mentioned the Legion going at each other cats and dogs, but now we got Legion fighting the Legion like cats and dogs, too. I he he knows exactly what's happening, despite what he said. About 10 years thinking he was sewing a machine. Like he's manipulating this whole thing.
SPEAKER_14So he's pretending that his memory was scrambled.
SPEAKER_12Oh, he's just being he's just being Victor. Yeah, he knows more than Latzon.
SPEAKER_13Yeah, very affable. Yeah, so in the in the game it was William Saddler who a big TV actor. In the TV show it was Jesse Birch.
SPEAKER_12So different actors. He does the he does the voice really well. They're very similar.
SPEAKER_13Yeah, William Sadler was uh was in a ton of stuff. Like Bill and Ted's bogus journey.
SPEAKER_02Oh really?
SPEAKER_13Yeah. But uh just a lot a lot of stuff going back quite away.
SPEAKER_12So But Victor here, so we mentioned everyone's a winner eventually. He's just giving me the lines and he asked about Robert House because the ghoul is still thinking about that. And House is really very much a central part of the entire. Season so far again, too. And we don't have an answer to how the ghoul knew Victor or met Victor before. Now we're assuming we're going to see some stuff later on the season, possibly. Or maybe just wandering the wasteland. He's running Victor himself too. Victor's been around a long, long time. We don't know. But yeah, here Victor says he's gone, had all the money in the world, but he really wants to live forever. Life ain't fair. But once again, we know Victor knows when he's letting on. And he probably knows the house had backup plans on backup plans and survive. And he also seems to know something about Cooper's past that we, as the viewers, don't know yet either. Because he mentions he needed that cold fusion dude ad. Didn't you have something to do with that way back when? So now we're hinting at the ghoul's past and the stuff we haven't seen. So Victor knows a lot too. So I just like all this. And again, then, you know, when he's leaving, he says, Oh, I got nobody to keep me company except those rangers up in the hills.
SPEAKER_14Well, isn't that just convenient that he's dropping that line on purpose? Yeah.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, isn't that convenient? He doesn't know what's going on, but oh, there'd be rangers in the hills, exactly who Cooper's looking for. But he didn't say until now when Cooper was leaving. Yeah.
SPEAKER_14And then the last Cooper already asked about the NCR earlier, so yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_12And he mentions NCR Leads you can't stop fighting, and then he says, I'll be seeing you, which is a great reference to. So those who I've talked about it before, but a major influence on Fallout and on Christopher Nolan, especially, and uh his previous works that he's done, is a TV show from the 60s called The Prisoner, which is a classic TV show. Well, one of its iconic lines was be seeing you when they leave instead of saying goodbye. And uh Jonathan Nolan has dropped it in his other shows, and he drops it here too. And it's the whole idea is always from characters who know more than they're letting on. So that whole thing is just kind of tying it all together here with Victor. And I thought that was really cool.
SPEAKER_11Very cool.
SPEAKER_12Okay, next scene, scene seven, as I have it labeled. They don't actually label them in the script, but we are in the vertebird now. So oh, I love on when they're running. Also, after they say, Let's talk, and Max is running over, following him to the vertebird. Uh, Max is gonna stop and get his armor. And Xander says, Oh, don't worry, you can use my spare.
SPEAKER_14They give you spares? They give you spares.
SPEAKER_12I love it. It was very much like you guys are getting paid moment. It was really funny. So we log in on the vertebird, and Max is looking at this set of armor and looking good, and Max is excited about it because we know Max is a bit of a power armor nerd and he enjoys that stuff. He's like, he mentions they have motion-assisted servos, even referencing, you know, the mod. Obviously, Max doesn't have that. Yeah, so he's excited about power armor mod, and Xander's like, yeah, I don't even know about all that stuff. I just know that it helps me kick ass.
SPEAKER_14Which it's your nerd stuff, but I love kicking ass.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, he's definitely uh seems to strongly believe in the division between the soldiers and the scribes and the clerics and all that. And they do their thing, we do ours, we're out here fighting, that's what we do. But it's also part of his charm, I think, like acting like he doesn't care about that stuff so much. So there they got a bit of a repartee and they're chatting. And to kind of break the ice, he asks if you've ever flown one of these about the vertebird as Max settling. He's like, No. He's like, Well, here you go, transfer control. And he acts like he's going to, and Max is all nervous. He's like, ah, just joking with you. They're having a bit of a moment. But you can tell they're starting to bond a little bit, like Xander's charm is working on Max. You know, it's having the intended effect on relaxing him. So now they've gotten this kind of stuff out of the way and they've got this little connection, like, hey, we're soldiers. We we have this bond. You and I can see things better than they can. He's kind of doing this whole us and them situation, which has a bit of a conflict resolution to get him on their side, because currently the us and them is Max's chapter, the other chapters, the Commonwealth. And now Xander's reframing it as in the soldiers, the paladins and knights is in us, and the other is them. And so that's how he's kind of getting this bonding in and bringing Max in. And so he says, Hey, can we talk hard dick for a minute? Which don't really know that phrase, but okay. So, getting into it.
SPEAKER_14I haven't heard that either.
SPEAKER_05I'll be honest with you, man. We are really up against it, back home. Without that relic you found, we risk losing the commonwall. And if the common one falls, civilization won't last much longer. What do you mean? Look at it out here.
SPEAKER_14Hot dog count number two.
SPEAKER_12Get another hot dog in there. But yeah, again, Xander being clever here. So he's letting them know we actually have a need for it. He's expressing a need for the uh for the culture technology. They're really up against it. And without that relic, we end up we risk losing the Commonwealth. And if Commonwealth falls, civilization won't last much longer. And of course, Maximus is like, yeah, well, civilization isn't exactly doing great a lot of places right now already.
SPEAKER_14Have you looked around?
SPEAKER_12And Xander says, it can get worse. Kind of hinting.
SPEAKER_14It can get worse, believe me. Like he's lived worse. What is what do you think that's from?
SPEAKER_12I think it's he's mostly using it as a persuasion, but he's also seen worse. For instance, say in Legion Territory, like we've seen worse in Legion territory right now, and Max has never been exposed to that. You know, he's only been exposed to the NCR and then kind of trying to survive and then we're time with the Brotherhood, you know?
SPEAKER_13So and the the Vegas area was not as damaged. Damaged as the Commonwealth was.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, Commonwealth and of course and the Capital Wasteland, if he's been there. Obviously, they've seen much areas that were destroyed, much worse. Uh nuke zone. Like, as far as I know, Maximus has never been in a serious nuke zone, or you know, like a glowing sea type situation. Maybe he has, don't know. But yeah, it can get worse.
SPEAKER_13But not likely.
SPEAKER_12But then he does the most manipulative line of all, which again, I'm not saying that he's trying to be manipulative, but he's trying to be persuasive. He says, just think about it. I trust your judgment, Max. So should you.
SPEAKER_14You should too. Yeah.
SPEAKER_12And this is after what he just went through with Quintus, talking about the dimness of the sword and these people not looking up to Max, not giving him any credit, treating him as just a blunt object to be used. Well, or maybe a sharp object being a sword, but you know what I mean. Quintus only values Max for his ability to fight, and that's it. But we know Max a lot more than he's from him, that's for sure. And Lucy values his spirit and his heart and his character. And now we're hearing Xander's trying to appeal to the same kind of thing, but in a much more manipulative way, if you ask me. And then they detect the they detect power signatures from rogue robes.
SPEAKER_14Some sort of automated signal, and they assume it's robots.
SPEAKER_12Yep. Well, they can kind of tell, you know, number of power signatures, unauthorized automated activity. Well, to be fair, to the Brotherhood, generally speaking, robots that aren't aren't under their control are probably unauthorized automated activity. You know, any robots that they any robot. Yeah. Yeah. There are maybe situations where they have to look the other way, but this is here in a facility, probably somewhat abandoned. So you need to check it out.
SPEAKER_13Just a good opportunity for a fight.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. Another honestly, it's a bonding opportunity. Again, this is what Xander's doing. He's pulling out all the stops to bond with Max, make that connection, and get accomplish his mission, which is getting the cold fusion.
SPEAKER_14He's just looking for an excuse to yell hot dog again. Hot dog.
SPEAKER_12Hot dog.
SPEAKER_14Hot dog.
SPEAKER_12I like this. Is what we do. This is what we get to do.
SPEAKER_14This is what we get to do. Yeah, we get to destroy these small children.
SPEAKER_12Xander's a true believer.
SPEAKER_14Spoiler. Spoiler. My bad.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. Well, actually, I mean, Max is a is a true believer, although he's questioning. And Xander may not be a true believer per se, but he's he seems like he acts like one. But just like Quintus, I feel like there's a little bit of it that's disingenuous here that is just happening to convince Max, to convince others.
SPEAKER_14I feel yeah, I feel both sides are, of course, both a little disingenuous in trying to manipulate Maximus into or or influence, as you would say. Uh a little in their direction. But yeah, I don't think either either side is being fully outward and trustworthy with him.
SPEAKER_12Between the two though, I'd say Xander is more charismatic for sure.
SPEAKER_14Oh yeah, Xander didn't call him a fuck face.
SPEAKER_12Honey over vinegar for sure.
SPEAKER_14Exactly.
SPEAKER_12So then we switch over to the next scene with the ghoul and dog meat walking through the desert into the hills a little bit. And do we see Prim in the background here?
SPEAKER_13No, not until we actually are at the camp.
SPEAKER_12Okay.
SPEAKER_13Yeah.
SPEAKER_12So they're walking along with the ghoul and dogmeat. And dogmeat, you know, is looking a little nervous, and he growls and barks a little bit. And the ghoul says, Oh, I know. In other words, he knows they're being watched and they're about to be seen. And yep, a gunshot happens, bullet ricochets, rifle cocks comes in, and guy comes up to the ghoul, and the ghoul's not fighting back or attacking anybody yet. Then the guy comes up and hits him on the side of the head, which the ghoul doesn't defend himself, but again, I think he realizes he's not in any major danger right now is the NCR. And then the we get the splash screen. Captain Rodriguez runs up and she says, Captain Rodriguez of the New California Republic. And then we get a flash screen, NCR, New California Republic, just like we did with the Legion before. And the ghoul says, Well, I see your salutations haven't changed. And the guy starts to like go in to hit him again. And Rodriguez says, Stop, don't hurt him.
SPEAKER_15Stops! Don't hurt him! Why not? This ghoul and the NCR go way back.
SPEAKER_14Way back.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_12But the guy does uh so this the ranger who hits him and is about to hit him again. This is Biff. So he's not all there, as we see when we get back to the camp. Because once we're there, he's sitting at the table, he's got his mask off, and he realizes not he he's an older guy who is he's holding on, but he's like, gotta be ready. They're coming any day now. We gotta be ready any day now. Like he's waiting for the cavalry to come in for things to be better again, and he's a little focused. And Ghoul looks around and has another great one-liner. He says, New California Republic may want to drop the word new because y'all looking dusty as hell.
SPEAKER_14Dusty as hell. Yeah.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. Where is everybody? And Rodriguez explains that it's just them. They've been cut off from reinforcements for more than a decade. And the other guy says they're coming. But yeah. Time takes a toll on some more than others. And she goes on to explain that when Shady Sands fell, they had a battalion out east. We could still get to them. And the goal's like Shady Sands. You do know that was over 20 years ago, right? Now, timeline discrepancy. Okay, we're not just reloading, I think we're changing timelines again. If this is currently 2196, and New Vegas was 2181, and the fall of Shady Sands was listed as 2177, although I suppose it wasn't nuked until 2181. Fixing there, oopsie there. 20 years ago. It's only been about 16 years, 15, 16 years since Shady Sands.
unknownNo.
SPEAKER_14But he's over exaggerating for emphasis.
SPEAKER_12You'd have to be really pedantic to care about that sort of thing, right, Andrew?
SPEAKER_14We are incredibly pedantic on this show.
SPEAKER_12I mean, we aren't, but I'm just mentioning it because you know it's a little off there. Yeah, so they want the ghoul's help contacting a battalion.
SPEAKER_14Did you know the dinosaurs facing the wrong direction?
SPEAKER_12Oh my god, who would do that? Move a city, face the wrong direction. They literally changed the timeline. They time traveled.
SPEAKER_14There's about eight years missing there, Mr. Ghoul.
SPEAKER_12But yeah, so they are just they are just kind of scrabbling survive. There's only a couple of rangers here that we see. There may be more than just the three or four we see here, but there's only a small troop stationed here. And so the ghoul laughs when she asks for his help because he was there for their help coming to them.
SPEAKER_14Yeah.
SPEAKER_09I'm in a minor predicament. I came to the MCR looking for help based on the cozy ass assumption that the good guys will prevail in the great state of Nevada.
SPEAKER_15We're winning the war. We are.
SPEAKER_09Well, if this is winning, I would hate to see what losing looks like.
SPEAKER_14It don't look pretty.
SPEAKER_12Mm-hmm. But she's our speech fine too. Everybody's speech fine this episode. You know, she talks about the stuff they're fighting for. Clean water, schools, rights for folks like you, ghouls. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_15Which a lot of other people fight for clean water, schools, rights for folks like you. Story has it. You used to believe in those things too. Please help us before we're captured.
SPEAKER_09Ain't nobody coming. Because I ain't nobody left. Little piece of advice is help me sleep at night over the years. Something's dead. It's usually because it deserved to die.
SPEAKER_14That's a good line, too. Something's dead usually means deserve to die.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, that that that was a good line. But I like she tried to prevail on his sense of decency that she knows that he has, or at least has had in the past, you know, as a rumor says from from what's going on. Cause the ghoul, he's a he's a known quantity, he's a little bit legendary. And she even, in order to help bribe him and say, as an act of good faith, really, she pulls out some of the ghoul serum because he they sh he starts coughing. She can tell that he's not doing that well right now. And so she pulls out the ghoul serum, and so he takes it and then he offers his advice and leaves the camp with dog meat. So at this point, we assume he's not gonna help them. He's gotta go deal with the Lucy situation and come up with a plan. But who knows? And yeah, as he's walking off with dog meat, offering his advice, we got Prim here in the shot. Which looks really great. Checking if I had anything else on that. I don't think so. Just the fact that the whole thing was ironic. And they are, yeah, they're boxed in. They admit that they're boxed in, there's Legion all around them. And then we're back to Max and Xander breaching the bottling factory. Did you have any you guys have any other thoughts on any of these scenes you want to mention before we get to the next part?
SPEAKER_11I don't think so.
SPEAKER_12All good. Okay, so we get the robot voice and malfunctioning Securitron. And uh, if you have subtitles turned on, it says, it says, I believe, extremely malfunctioning or very malfunctioning Securitron. Like it has an adjective there.
SPEAKER_14It seemed like it had at least two, if not multiple personalities going on there.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, it's like its programming got messed up. So it's got your classic Securitron, defense police training, army training, and then yeah, a masseuse.
SPEAKER_14I thought that was what was going on. I couldn't really tell. I thought it was like a masseuse or it's like a trainer of some kind. Yeah.
SPEAKER_12Yep. And Xander's all like, let's do this. Come on, Max. And the Securitron, extremely broken Securon. That's what it said. I wrote it down here. Says, halt, display your credentials, and then would you prefer a neck or foot massage today? And then the robot says, There will be no massage. Identification is please remove your clothing and apply a complimentary tell. Cancel massage, intruder. Yeah, so it keeps on going like that. And then the gun comes out, and uh Xander's like, whoop, pushes him back, get back, and he starts shooting.
SPEAKER_14Kaboom. Did you notice the background music?
SPEAKER_12Yeah, oh it's about to happen. It's about to happen. So Xander next says, Have you seen one of these? And pulls out a super sledge, which is just super cool. And it's like the classic super sledge that we get in Fallout 4 and 76, the newer model, which would come from the Commonwealth as opposed to the version we used to have here in the Mojave. So I like that too. And yeah. And then the music starts.
SPEAKER_14Yeah, I thought it was really cool that it was like the Star Spangled Banner or whatever, but in a minor key.
SPEAKER_12It was really weird to hear them with the emphasis on uh Yeah, it's all in the rocket's red glare. But I don't know if it is it a minor key. I mean it just a different it was slowed a little bit. It was definitely slowed a little bit. And it did. It sounded it was intense, slightly industrial. I really like it. And so he's jumping in there, and yeah, we get that with the rocket-powered super sledge. And there's a fight, and Xander is obviously enjoying himself. I guess if you whacks in a hits, jumps back, comes in, does a big old leap at him and hits it, and then is doing a little physical standoff, and then he's Max, you want a piece of this? And Max, of course, is like oh hell yeah. Jumps on in with it, punches right through the screen and takes it out. And the robot collapses.
SPEAKER_11Another hot dog. And he ri he rips the uh the power core out of it.
SPEAKER_12Yep.
SPEAKER_11Oh, smart.
SPEAKER_12And he says, gee whiz. That felt good. So Max is really he's really on board at this point. The super sledge and all this, like the whole thing is. And then uh then Xander offers him the super sledge. You want to try this out? Hell yeah, absolutely.
SPEAKER_13Oh yeah, I do. So that was the well-defended perimeter.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. That was gonna be part of the well-defended perimeter. I yeah, I mean, it's probably more than just that. But is there Yeah, we don't know. We don't know. So he hands him the uh super sliders, you want to try this? And yeah, you want to turn with this? And thank you. But then they hear a bottle break and gets their attention. So they're gonna go after the next robot or whatever, rock and bottle sound. And the scene switches again.
SPEAKER_14This is one of those biological robots.
SPEAKER_12Mm-hmm. And so the ghoul enters the Legion camp and he's walking through, but he's not here as a prisoner, right? He's walking to negotiate. And we see him escorted partly, and they bring him up to Caesar to the leader. And you get all kinds of sounds at this point. So it's a bit of a it's a bit of a montage. Because you see Lucy on the cross and she sees, you know, her visions kind of blurring. So we start Lucy on the cross, her vision's blurring, she looks over, she sees we see the crow landing, and then we see from her point of view, and she's seeing two or three crows double vision. And then she's getting more and more desperate for a drink. And then the crow jumps over and lands on Lucy's cross. And then we see the ghoul walk into the camp along with Macaulay Culkin, the legate, walking through. And he ends up walking past. Oh, also, if you have subtitles on, it mentions flesh squelching.
SPEAKER_11Yeah, soft portion in the background.
SPEAKER_12Singling, yeah, crow squawking, flesh squelching, rifle cocking, like all these different sounds and stuff that you see while while they're walking through. And Lucy kind of sees the ghoul, but she can't quite focus, you know, because she's too out of it. And then we go to his perspective, and they go up and they meet Caesar, and the ghoul says, Away. Whatever y'all say to each other.
SPEAKER_02Away.
SPEAKER_12Mm-hmm. What sound club do you have for this scene, Andrew?
SPEAKER_14Let's see, I have the soft sea stuff.
SPEAKER_09Well, I understand that the Legion ain't fans of the linear progression of time, or the soft sea for that matter. But you still understand cause and effect. Now I give you something you want, and well, you give me something I want.
SPEAKER_20Or you can put you up on a cross until you give us what we want.
SPEAKER_09Well, yeah, you could do that. Or you could exterminate a last hold out of the new California Republic.
SPEAKER_14Much like the grave, couldn't the ghoul just stay on the cross for a hundred years and wait for all the legionnaires to die and then hop down and be fine or whatever? Like putting him on a cross wouldn't do anything to him, right?
SPEAKER_12It would take a little more to kill him, but it would still torture him to an extent. It would still be torture. And they could ultimately put him down. But yeah, I I like that. So Caesar, the way he cocks the rifle there that's on his lap. And when he off makes offers to make the deal, I like how the legate says, or we could just take it from you. And the ghoul says, You could do that, or you could exterminate the last hold out of the NCR. So we get, okay. The ghoul, we thought, trying to be a good guy, but we never know with him. He's back, he went to the NCR for help, they couldn't help. So now he's gonna trade their location, he's gonna trade that information to get Lucy back.
SPEAKER_11Or it looks like that is gonna set them up or something.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, or so we think, exactly. Exactly. But then we go right into a flashback. And they're in the VFW hall, and you hear it's Charlie, he's up on stage and he's talking, relating a story, talking about T forty five being hard as hell to walk in, 'cause it was T forty five that they had at that point in in Alaska, up in the Operation Anchorage and all that. And he talks about he's dragging a guy along, helping him out, gets him down, uh dragging him in his power armor. And he sets him down, opens up the visor. And who does he see in there? None other than Cooper Howard. And you know what that man said? And the audiences, they're all listening to the story here, and Cooper's in the audience with him. And so Cooper kind of looks around and smiles and says, How do I look? How do I look? And gets a good gets a good laugh. And uh Charlie says, No. Nope, I remember. I remember what you said. That is a lie. Maybe movie star Cooper Howard would have said that. But this man said, How are the others? Went through hell, went through all that, and he was thinking about the other troop.
SPEAKER_14Burn half burned alive or something, yeah.
SPEAKER_12Mm-hmm. And he says, so we all like to tell stories. Well, we don't like to tell all of them. Because obviously there's things they see in doing war that they do not want to share.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_12But it's what keeps us going. So he then goes on to talk more about why they were there. And uh if you want to roll that clip, Andrew.
SPEAKER_22They told us that it was all on the line. We didn't get much choice, did we? And I guarantee you, as on the end of the side, I'm told the same shit. At the end of the day, we just gotta hope that we've been on the right side. Side that protects the people you love. Because if it did, I guess that's worth doing pretty much anything. Even something bad.
SPEAKER_14Did you catch that last part? Even something bad. Yep. Charlie White knife is in on it. No, Charlie.
SPEAKER_12I told you everybody is speechifying and manipulating this episode. So we get our fourth. Is this the fourth? This gotta be the fourth speechifying of the episode. And Charlie's telling the story and bringing people in, but then that last bit is to Cooper. That sometimes we did things with might not have been the good thing, but it was the right thing.
SPEAKER_11To save your family.
SPEAKER_12Yep. Exactly. Other side was told same stuff. And some things they're not proud of. And so he's just encouraging Cooper to think about it. And of course, then he gets his reward and the acknowledgement. He gets a commemorative lighter. And he gives that lighter to Cooper.
SPEAKER_14Yeah. I thought there was a nice line here, too. Oh yeah, I do have that. Yeah, here's here's his line about the lighter. They gave that to me for saving a man, not for killing the three it took to do it. Not for killing the three it took to do. He is so sympathetic and acknowledging the like the human sacrifice on not just his side, but the the the aka air quote enemy side as well. They are also in the same flip situation as as he was. You know, they're just guys doing their job or whatever, being told this stuff to make them want to hate these other people, but the other people are literally just them, just from a different country.
SPEAKER_12Perspective and time, recognizing after the fact that they were grunts on either side, and that maybe they had more in common with the other soldiers than they initially have with the people in charge who are forcing them to do it.
SPEAKER_14Empathy and sympathy both.
SPEAKER_12Feeding their air with poison, just kind of like Quintus was just doing, in a different sort of way. And so he's got the lighter, he flicks it, and then it flips over. And let's see. Oh, right, because during all this scene, I'm sorry, we're talking through this scene, but interspersed on the scene, you see the ghoul walking up to the cross, you see Lucy being cut down, just interspersed with Charlie's speech and all these comments. And then he gets the lighter.
SPEAKER_14Earlier I see you, you see a crow hopping around on the cross thing. And I was sort of like taking notes and like punching clips and like watching it out of the corner of my eye. I thought a crow had cut her down when I like wasn't clearly watching. I was like, and then it was clear like the ghoul had taken her down. But for a second there, I was like, Whoa, did a crow just untie her?
SPEAKER_12But if you look, you can see there are two hands reaching over the top of the cross. If you slow it down. But so there in the in the room, he clicks the lighter and then it switches back to him with Lucy because he's managed to kind of pull her away and walk her through the camp during all this, looking around as the Legion troops are rallying and they're shouting and they're ready to take out, you know, they're gonna fight the NCR with the information they got. And he also pointedly looks at some of the dynamite and explosives nearby. And so it flips from him on that scene, flipping the lighter to him, flipping the lighter here in the present in the Mojave. And Lucy says, What did you do? And he says, Maybe something good. Maybe something stupid. Yeah, she says, Oh, right. The ghoul says maybe this was a mistake. And she says, Why? What did you do? And he says, Maybe something good or maybe something stupid. And then you hear the gunfire and shouting. And is this where it starts blowing up? The Legion camp right then.
SPEAKER_14Yeah, as as they're walking away. Like it it caught me by surprise because it was just it seemed like an odd amount of time. But I guess if you're gonna do a time bomb or whatever, then I guess it makes sense.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, somehow, so somehow he used the lighter. And we saw the lighter, we saw all the explosive barrels, this and that.
SPEAKER_14Either he lit like the longest wick in history.
SPEAKER_12Might have been a long fuse.
SPEAKER_14I don't know what the fuck it was going on.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_12Maybe planted a slow burning rag somewhere. That's that's possible. Such a thing that it caused the explosion. So once the explosions start and things start blowing up with the troops rallying each other, it starts both of the camps fighting again. So both camps erupt, and now the Legion is actually finally their battle, their standoff is coming to a head. And he just walks away. So what I liked about this, we questioned for a minute again the ghoul's motivations, like we often do. Is he trading the NCR's location to save Lucy? Is that like him doing a bad thing for a thing that he thinks is right or good or whatever? Or simply that he needs, as we're gonna find out as the show goes on. But uh but or was he fighting for the good guys? And I I I think he was. In my mind, he because he talks about when he entered the NCR, is like I was hoping the good guys were doing good in the Mojave. And uh so he actually he was never gonna turn in the NCR. I mean, he might have if he had to, but he didn't here. And it was a ploy to get into the camp, rescue Lucy, and cause havoc amongst the Legion to help the NCR after all.
SPEAKER_14Yeah, they're just leaning into the anti-hero thing. Yep.
unknownYep.
SPEAKER_14Trying to make us say he's a bad guy, but he's really good at heart.
SPEAKER_12I mean, I definitely see that. That's that's how I look at it. Then the final scene we're coming up to, we're back to the factory, and we see Xander and Max tromping through the hall into a room, and there's a spinning bottle there. And we recognize the location we're in. Oh wait, this place where they were fighting the robot is actually the avanna factory where the kids were from the very first scene. The chain game.
SPEAKER_14And now I get what Ray was saying about the well-protected perimeter.
SPEAKER_12Yep.
unknownYep.
SPEAKER_12And I look around and Sandra's like, shh, and they look. And you can see these shoes sticking out front of one of the machines. So he does. And he's like, Oh, it's just a baby abomination because it's a kid ghoul. And he says, Where there's one, there's usually more. Come on out, people. And he calls the kids. And they come from the woodwork and they're hiding all over. And he smiles and he's being friendly. And oh, were you playing hide and seek? But you can see right away he saw the abomination. He saw they were ghouls, and his version of the brotherhood that's they they take ghouls out. They really don't they don't differentiate between intelligent ghouls and unintelligent ghouls.
SPEAKER_13Yep, so he separates all the kids. Because he sees there's some non-ghoul kids in there.
SPEAKER_12Yep. He's smooth skinned, so you go over there. And the ones with wrinkles, y'all with wrinkles, you just you stay right here, okay? You go over there. And of course, in front of me, Max realizes what he's doing here. And he's like, No, me, don't. Oh no. Because he's worried about what's happening, but he's not saying it out loud yet. Like he's saying it out loud, like, oh no, but he's it's all right.
SPEAKER_14Yep. It's okay.
SPEAKER_12Meanwhile, Xander is saying, Oh, good little ones, jackpot. You guys playing hide and seek? And yeah, he's like, See you guys over there, smooth skins, close your eyes. And Maxim's trying to stop. He's like, wait, Xander, Xander, please stop. Do you have the scene, Andrew, to play?
SPEAKER_14Uh no, I just have the abomination.
SPEAKER_06Oh, it's just a baby abomination. They're not kids, they're abominations.
SPEAKER_14That horrifying phrase.
SPEAKER_12That's it there, though. Yeah, that's it. Like, because at this point, when Max is like, please stop, but they're both in the power armor. So we're flashing into them in the helmet, like through their regular voice, but then from the outside, it's like, you know, please all like they're in the power armor voice. And then Thaddeus, finally, before this can happen, Thaddeus is there and he pops out. Hi, hello, if I may, I'm the manager here, and please don't do what you're about to do. I know I don't have a lot of leverage here or anything, but you know, they're just they're just kids. They're just kids, so who cares, right? And that's when Xander says, they're not kids, they're abomining, and he with such a smile on his face. This is when you go from everything that you were starting to like about Paladin Hot Dog, like all the good things.
SPEAKER_14Suddenly, no, he is he is the evil side of the brotherhood as far as both charisma and goodwill go right out the window.
SPEAKER_12Right, as far as their stance on this. And Maximus was really identifying with this guy. But here's we get where his upbringing and his idea of what he means to be good is different from the brotherhoods.
SPEAKER_13And he recognizes his stadius.
SPEAKER_12Right. Well, of course he recognized Stadius here too. Yeah, beyond that. But here's what I don't like here. It's almost taken as a given that the Brotherhood hates ghouls and kills ghouls. Like, because he even says the codex is clear on this. And without the rules, where are we? You know, when Max is trying to stop him and saying, please stop. But the Brotherhood, some sections of Brotherhood, they didn't just kill ghouls on site. They worked with ghouls occasionally. Like, yeah, the uh Brotherhood in the Capital Wasteland, the group under during Fallout 3, they were fine with ghouls overall. They're acting more like the enclave here. Now when Max What did he say? Elder Lions, yeah, Elder Lions. Thank you. Lions Brotherhood were fine with ghouls. And even the Brotherhood on the West Coast, like I don't think they killed all ghouls on site, but Arthur Maxson's version of the Brotherhood in the Commonwealth, they were a little bit stronger. Like they were more anti-ghoul and okay with killing ghouls. And I think that's just gotten worse from what we see here. But it wasn't ever in the codex. Like they're acting a little bit enclave here, the way they're written, if you ask me. And it was much more the enclave are all about blood purity and get rid of all the mutants and such. Yeah. But anyway, Daddyus is trying to stop him, and Max says their kids and he says, Please stop. The Codex is clear on this. And Maximus actually says, F the Codex, Vander, listen to me. Because he's desperate here. He doesn't want this man to kill a bunch of kids. And of course not. I mean, it's just wrong. Daddy says, No, no, no, no, no. And he pulls out his gun and from behind gets hit in the head. Max jumps with the super sledge and knocks him right to the ground.
SPEAKER_13Caves in his helmet. Yeah. Yeah. Square in the middle of the top of the helmet.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. That's awful. And it's such a moment because Max is like stock frozen. What did I do here?
SPEAKER_13And then he flips open his uh visor.
SPEAKER_12Yep. And you realize it's Max. Well, Thaddeus realizes it's Max. And Thaddeus is like taken aback. Like, whoa, hey man. It's the most awkward singing ever. Like it's hilarious. Like after that, they're all about the murderers.
SPEAKER_14What? Oh no. Yeah. Just the interaction between these two is just gold.
SPEAKER_12They're great together. You know, I was a big fan of Thadimus, and it's good to see them together again. But how it goes, that is just like, hey man. Hey, what have you been up to? And Max says, I uh think I just started a war.
SPEAKER_14I think I just started a war. Oh yeah? Well, I'm the manager. What's he say? I'm the floor manager.
SPEAKER_12I'm the floor manager here.
SPEAKER_14That's hilarious.
SPEAKER_12Sounds like we both got a lot going on right now. What you been up to?
SPEAKER_16I think I just started a war.
SPEAKER_04Okay. Yeah. Well, um, I'm the floor manager here. So it sounds like we both got a lot going on right now.
SPEAKER_12Just what a scene. Like the way of the swings in this episode. The swings from us liking Xander to us hating Xander to everybody about to be murdered to oh my gosh, these two are reunited. The kids almost died. And now what do they say? Like Thaddeus tries to make small talk. It's messed up. And so this is where it ends. It's a pretty massive cliffhanger. It's a great last line.
SPEAKER_14Yeah. So you know they won't touch this story for about two weeks, so we're gonna go get some some vaulties for a couple weeks here.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, they both got a lot going on right now. And then Bill Haley and the Comet starts up and is playing a song called Hot Dog Buddy Buddy, which I hadn't heard before. Like I knew Bill Haley and the Comets, but didn't know the song.
SPEAKER_14Yeah. Cute little song here. I've got it queued up too.
SPEAKER_04Cold as a cottage, hot as a cold, hot dog, buddy. Well, bless my soul. I'm a lot.
SPEAKER_14Hot dog, buddy, buddy. That's pretty cool.
SPEAKER_12And this is where it starts the pan out. And we're getting a look at the uh at the Robco factory. And first we see like a little screen that says launch sequence complete, and then it pulls out from the panel, and there's a there's a skeleton there, and then it pulls out, and we see we're in a facility, and then again past the doors, and it's a Robco facility.
SPEAKER_14Yeah.
SPEAKER_12And then the Rad Roach is scurrying, jumping over everything.
SPEAKER_14Rad Roach just overtook the facility.
SPEAKER_12Yep. And it pulls up out from this underground facility up a big old shaft, and it goes up the shaft, and then you see, yeah, you're just outside New Vegas.
SPEAKER_14And you realize, oh, that was a uh rocket launching place or it's some Yep, one of the Robco places for the defender. Missile defense. Missile deterrent place. Not yeah, not deterrent, but yeah.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. During the pan, too. I don't know if you noticed, but as they go up and out the silo, one of the skeletons against the side there actually has a White Glyph Society mask on.
SPEAKER_11Uh-uh. Yeah?
SPEAKER_12For real. There's a white glyph society mask there. That was just they stick all these little references, like just barely off screen, like Ray catching those golf balls earlier that I didn't I didn't see. Makes perfect sense.
SPEAKER_14They've done teddy bears and skeletons scenes yet anywhere.
SPEAKER_12We had a lot of skeletons posed. I don't know about teddy bears.
SPEAKER_14Just not toilets or whatever.
SPEAKER_12Yeah. What's their daughter's name? What's Cooper and Barb's daughter's name? Her teddy bear, though.
SPEAKER_11Oh, there you go. We've seen it a couple times.
SPEAKER_14Maybe the work came in, yeah.
SPEAKER_12Oh, that would be a haunting scene in the future if we just find that teddy bear that has been in several scenes that way. Probably not that, but who knows? Who knows? But yeah, so a couple of references in there. We mentioned the mask, you mentioned uh the guns and the fact that we saw like the Howard Cern stuff. Background landmarks, of course, you could see the Helios 1 facility when they're flying in the vertebird in the background. Um obviously we see the town of Prim along with the Bison Steve and the roller coaster. The armor worn by Biff by the Ranger there, who you know pops him in the head at first and is uh a little bit out of it watching the birds saying they'll be coming soon. Um he was wearing Ranger Combat armor, but he also had the shoulder armor from the riot gear on his side. So uh we mentioned the map, and I think that's about it. Songs played in this one. We had San The Chain Gang by Sam Cook, Yellow Rose of Texas by Mitch Miller and his orchestra during the VFW fundraiser, a song called Sugar Doll, which is playing as Max is looking at the power armor, the spare suit of power armor there. Star Spangled Banner, of course, and then Hot Dog Buddy Buddy. Some great ones there. But yeah. And I feel like we got a bit about Max here again. Max, more and more, two episodes in a row, he goes from trying to be a good brotherhood soldier and saying, Okay, this is what I am now. I'm back with the brotherhood, I'm now in charge, I'm gonna try to be good, be a role model, be an example, to everything going wrong with the brotherhood. Quintus obviously not caring about as much as he says he does, putting him in the bad situation where he had to kill a man for no reason. And then here, he killed a man for a reason, but this was the one that he actually identified with maybe his good reasons for the brotherhood. But no, there's still not the values that he really holds. And this is where I think Max realizes he's not Brotherhood Material, or he's about to realize for sure. Any other thoughts on the episode, you guys?
SPEAKER_14Better, better than Brotherhood Material. For a second there, I was wondering Thaddeus should have recognized Maximus's power armor because of the bear claw marks, and then I was like, wait a second, he's in the spare borrowed set from what's his name. That's why he didn't recognize him immediately.
SPEAKER_12They totally thought of that. Yeah. It's funny because I didn't even think of that at the time. But uh because I I've you know it just seemed natural that Thaddeus wouldn't recognize that it was Max. But yeah, if he was in his power armor, he would have.
SPEAKER_14He has those like yeah, the huge tear across the battle damage he-man power armor. With action grip.
SPEAKER_12Fantastic. Okay, well, this was episode three, and yeah, overall, I liked this one a lot. So I thought there were some really good scenes. I missed seeing the Vaultys, but I thought the flashbacks were good. They're the flashbacks were kind of heavy on exposition. We had maybe a little more flashbacks than we needed in some ways, but I enjoyed it. And the scene with Mr. House and Cooper in the bathroom. Yeah, there was so much beautyfying this episode for sure.
SPEAKER_14No, but I really did like the feel. I like I like the the bam of the title cards, the splash screen, stuff like that. So it makes me think there's an overall controller, executive producer of the project, of course. But like when they go to direct and write the episodes, do they like team up? Like you get episodes two, four, and six, and they're loosely based on this, go write a script and bring them back.
SPEAKER_12You know, that like Yeah, they they have a shared writer's room, but they have the showrunners. You know, obviously Geneva and Graham Wagner are the showrunners, and they wrote the first episode, but then this season. So this this one was someone named Chaz Hawkins. We had a Chris Brady who did the last episode. Next episode is written by Jane Espenson, who I'm sure some people in the audience know she was a prolific writer across sci-fi for years, including Star Trek and a lot of other shows like that. Yeah, we have actually looking at the list again, we have a different writer every episode on this one. The only one written by the showrunners was the first episode. And then different directors a couple times. It's mostly Frederick Toy, is most of the direction, but the woman who did this one is also gonna do episode five. So let's see if they did more title cards and a few of those similarities in the fifth episode, right? To keep that going.
SPEAKER_14Seems like TV direction is is different than film direction. Not sure why. Seems like the executive producer and TV shows have the control that directors have on movies.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, it depends on the studio. I mean, the director is obviously making a lot of the choices on the cinematography and cuts, but like in some systems, the executive producer is actually very active and in charge of things. Yeah. And in others, they're just kind of the big idea guy and they don't do the day-to-day.
SPEAKER_14I'm the money person.
SPEAKER_12Yeah, usually the showrunners are the ones that have the most control, and they're kind of layer in between the EP or the production company and and the directors. The showrunners are there. And in this case, for this show, showrunners set the tone, they do all the consulting and and big picture stuff, and they do a lot of the writing.
SPEAKER_13And then it all gets filtered through Todd.
SPEAKER_12Todd consults for sure.
SPEAKER_14Todd Father blesses us all.
SPEAKER_12He lets them know if they're too far off on the timeline. Some.
SPEAKER_14We're only eight years off here, so that's pretty good.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_14Don't show that chalkboard again. That's all I ask.
SPEAKER_12Well, I think that'll wrap this episode.
SPEAKER_14All right. Beautiful. Thank you for that uh lovely episode of Vault Talk. Did you guys have any other things you'd like to bring up on the Fallout feed this evening? All good here. In that case, I'll let you know you can find Ray and his BBC ISS, which is the butcher, baker, and candlemaker in space. And at Ray LB. Ray, thanks so much for hopping on, sir. Good times. Jess can be found at Sleep is for T. He has many other projects. Go to Sleep. Uh Sleep Is for Tea. For any information on Jess. Jess, thanks so much for hopping on.
SPEAKER_12Thanks, guys. I'm excited to march with y'all at Foshknock soon.
SPEAKER_14Oh, yes.
SPEAKER_12Fosh knocked in the summer. Summer Flash knocked. Get your mouse ready.
SPEAKER_14We all tend to hang out in the uh Discord there. The show can be found at the Fallout Feed. I'd like to thank everyone for downloading this edition of the Fallout Feed. We will see you in the Wasteland.
SPEAKER_17Thank you for downloading this episode of the Fallout Feed Roundtable. If you are interested in doing a play-along character with us, you can be contact me by emailing Fallout Roundtable at gmail.com.