Fallout Season 1 Review - 10 Ups & 2 Downs

Fallout has been a popular staple of the gaming world ever since its first title released in 1997, its various sequels spawning a dedicated fan following and one of the most immersive video game franchises ever made.

But it's never been seen quite like it is in its most recent iteration, a bold TV series from Amazon Studios that enlists the producing prowess of Westworld masterminds Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy. A standalone entry into the franchise, the show's first season acts as a loose follow-up to the games, full of new characters but familiar threats.

Announced back in 2020, it's been a long road to get Fallout off the ground, but few will deny it's been worth the wait. Following a trio of morally embattled characters drawn together by fate, time and a very important severed head, the results of showrunners Graham Wagner and Geneva Robertson-Dworet's vision are simply sublime.

With a host of some of the most acclaimed small screen actors of their generation (Walton Goggins, Ella Purnell, Kyle MacLachlan), an impressive budget utilised wonderfully, and a story that manages to be as playfully fun as it is morally challenging and brutally violent, Fallout's first season is an absolute feast of ideas, and characters bursting with life.

With that in mind, here are 10 Ups & 2 Downs from Fallout's first season. This review will be spoiler-free!

Although the vast majority of its eight-episode first season is tightly wound and expertly paced, there's no denying some of Fallout's drama could have done with some fine tuning. 

Weaving back and forth through time from before a nuclear Armageddon destroyed the world as we know it and two centuries after its effects were first felt, the episodes are careful not to overwhelm themselves with criss-crossing plotlines, but from time-to-time - like in the exposition-heavy fifth episode - there can be a touch too much to focus on.

That's not to say this is a deal breaker, or even something too jarring to overlook once you notice it, but you certainly get the sense that the season could have done with another two episodes or so, fleshing out its biggest storylines - like, say, The Ghoul's pre-apocalypse life, a major subplot so engrossing it could fill a season on its own. 

This is a minor quibble, but Fallout demands attention, game fan or not, and could have benefitted from a longer debut to make its bigger revelations easier to digest at once.