If there were ever a sure bet in life, it’s that a video game adaptation will always make someone unhappy. As it turns out, translating a game from an interactive format with no defined time constraint to a non-interactive medium with a limited view time means that some concessions need to be made. In the case of the Fallout TV show, there’s an extra problem in that it takes place after Fallout: New Vegas, a beloved entry in the franchise with a lot of potential player-defined endings.
You obviously can’t please everyone due to how each of the endings could potentially have massive in-universe consequences. Thus the billion dollar question is which ending did the Fallout TV show go with, or did the writers make up a new ending entirely? Perhaps the best way to answer that would be to examine the status of the Wasteland’s major powers as presented by the show.
MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD
Fallout TV | The Brotherhood of Steel
Unsurprisingly, the Brotherhood of Steel has the most screen time of any of the major factions in the Fallout TV show. The fact that Maximus, one of the main characters of the show, is a member of the Brotherhood means that we get a lot of insight into what the faction has been up to since the end of Fallout: New Vegas. Interestingly enough, the Fallout TV show makes a distinction between both individual Brotherhood chapters and the larger Commonwealth and West Coast divisions of the Brotherhood.
The Commonwealth Brotherhood of Steel faction is pretty much a direct continuation of the Brotherhood from Fallout 3 and Fallout 4. At this time, the show suggests that the writers are going with either the Minutemen or Brotherhood ending of Fallout 4. That being said, the Fallout TV show states that the Commonwealth Brotherhood is having some hard times, insinuating that their war with the Institute and possibly the Railroad expended a lot of manpower and resources.
The West Coast Brotherhood of Steel division is represented by Maximus’ chapter and three other Brotherhood chapters. Interestingly enough, the Fallout: New Vegas Brotherhood chapter is nowhere to be found. Given that the show would take place in their backyard, one would logically conclude that this particular chapter was rendered non-existent, either directly as per the game’s endings or indirectly as a result of their isolation and potential hostility to most of the major players in the region.
Unfortunately for the Brotherhood of Steel as a whole, they are in the midst of a massive civil war. The West Coast chapters have already started fighting each other, and the Commonwealth-based Brotherhood would almost certainly not be happy that their representative was killed at a meeting organized by the West Coast chapters. To make matters worse, whoever comes out on top on the West Coast will control Area 51 and all of its pre-war tech, guaranteeing that this civil war will be incredibly destructive.
Fallout TV | The NCR
While the NCR has been portrayed favorably by the Fallout TV show, the state of the NCR in New Vegas is dire. Indeed, one of the major plot points of the show is that although the NCR was on a path to relative normalcy, the destruction of Shady Sands has contributed to the NCR’s current diminished state.
The small pockets of NCR soldiers that we do see in the show are invariably under-supplied, disorganized, and isolated. Even if the show writers decided to go with the NCR ending of Fallout: New Vegas, it is mostly for naught as their military has withdrawn from the New Vegas area. That the NCR’s local detachment of elite Rangers have been reduced to glorified scavengers bodes poorly for a faction that, by all accounts, should have reasonably sturdy logistics and communications systems.
It should probably be noted that Freeside’s inhabitants appear to be quite fond of the NCR. This all but confirms that the NCR had conquered New Vegas for a decent amount of time and then withdrew. If this is the case, then the likelihood of a Pyrrhic NCR victory at the end of New Vegas increases dramatically.
This is further reinforced by the finale as a full NCR detachment finally shows up, complete with Veteran Rangers and fresh-looking gear. The difference cannot be any more stark as this group is clearly organized and disciplined enough to reclaim Freeside without much trouble. While it remains to be seen if this is indicative of the overall status of the NCR, the fact remains that the manpower and equipment had to come from somewhere. Not to mention the time it would’ve taken to muster such a force and then march to Freeside.
Fallout TV | Caesar’s Legion
In a rather amusing historical parallel, Caesar’s Legion is experiencing a civil war after Caesar’s death. While the Fallout TV show doesn’t specify how Caesar died, the fact that both sides of the civil war are fighting over his not so fresh corpse almost certainly means that Caesar’s tumor killed him.
Regardless, Caesar’s death and the subsequent civil war all but guarantees that the Legion ending of Fallout: New Vegas is not canon. In fact, it is explicitly stated that if the Legion won the battle for Hoover Dam while Caesar is dead, then Legate Lanius is crowned as the new Caesar. It makes little sense for that to change just because Caesar dies after the Legion conquers New Vegas. In fact, Lanius is never mentioned in the show at all, which would make even less sense if the Legion won.
One can go so far as to imagine a scenario where Lanius suffered a similar fate to Joshua Graham, punished for failing to conquer New Vegas and forgotten by the Legion. Otherwise you would have to explain how the Legate would allow a civil war with two self proclaimed Caesars to break out, leading to a third, completely different Caesar to be crowned and only then finally rallying the Legion to «reclaim» New Vegas.
Fallout TV | Mr. House and New Vegas
The New Vegas Strip finally makes its onscreen debut, and one of the first things that Mr. House says is that things did not go according to plan. For starters, the Strip and all of its casinos are abandoned. To make matters worse, Deathclaws have moved in relatively recently and turned the area into their nest. There clearly isn’t an army of upgraded Securitrons on the Strip, active or otherwise, and there didn’t appear to be any signs of conflict regardless.
Freeside on the other hand appears to be thriving. Granted, Fallout: New Vegas’ portrayal of Freeside wasn’t exactly flattering, but that is more of an issue with hardware limitations than artistic intent. At the very least, it’s implied that Freeside is important enough for both the NCR and Legion to have fought for control of the area, with neither side ultimately prevailing over the other before the «robots» and Deathclaws moved in next door.
As unfortunate as it may be that some of the Kings were Ghoulified in the Fallout TV show, it does shed some light upon the possible canon ending of Fallout: New Vegas. The Legion endings can be ruled out as they explicitly wipe out the Kings no matter what. A Mr. House ending is an option, yet it doesn’t explain why the Strip is abandoned. The Independent New Vegas scenarios match the state of Freeside better, though it must’ve collapsed quickly as it’s explicitly stated that the NCR and Legion controlled the area long enough to implement some form of taxation.
Fallout TV | The Enclave and Vault-Tec
As one would’ve expected from the games, the remnants of the pre-war United States government are specters haunting the wasteland. Although the Enclave has the least amount of screen time of all the major factions, they are directly named and still active by the time of the Fallout TV show. To no one’s surprise, the Enclave are doing evil things again and it’s almost certainly leading to direct conflict in future seasons of the Fallout TV show.
As far as the Vaults are concerned, they have begun falling into the usual problems. Some are on the verge of running out of resources, others have collapsed due to the experiments being conducted in them, and some have (unintentionally) saved their inhabitants as advertised. Unfortunately for the show’s named Vault dwellers, FEV is really being pushed to the forefront this season and we all know how much Vault-Tec loves to store bio-hazardous material in a safe and secure location.
Which Fallout: New Vegas Ending Is Canon?
The writers for Fallout TV’s season 2 may not have explicitly chosen any particular Fallout: New Vegas ending to make canon, but there’s just enough clues to glean out two possible scenarios. The first possibility is that the writers went with the NCR ending. However, the NCR couldn’t maintain control over the area and the destruction of Shady Sands prompted their withdrawal from New Vegas. The other likely scenario is that New Vegas won their independence for a while. Yet a handful of Securitrons can only do so much when a city is caught between two competing nation states.
While this is a rather nihilistic viewpoint, it’s not entirely unrealistic. Fallout: New Vegas itself points out that the Courier is not able to fix the wasteland on their own. It doesn’t matter if you have the perfect playthrough, you’re not solving the NCR’s institutional rot. There’s nothing preventing an independent New Vegas from falling into anarchy once the credits roll either. Even in the event that Mr. House or the Legion won, the Courier is still treated as a useful pawn, nothing more.
It’s a not so subtle rebuke of the great man theory, though that still doesn’t explain why every major faction imploded at the same time. The simplest answer might be that Bethesda wants to avoid a scenario where any game’s ending could snowball into the creation of a wasteland superpower.
We can already see hints of this with the Commonwealth Brotherhood of Steel. They went from being the savior of the Capital Wasteland in Fallout 3 to potentially the dominant East coast faction. According to the TV show, the Commonwealth Brotherhood now has credible force projection capabilities that can reach the West Coast as well. At that point, you’d be hard pressed to ignore them in the narrative of future games, especially if old world technology is involved.
With that in mind, perhaps the show is leveling the playing field in preparation for Fallout 5. Bethesda might have decided that they want to explore all of the United States in the next Fallout game, so it would be helpful if there wasn’t one overwhelmingly powerful faction outside of the Enclave. If anything, the Fallout TV show’s finale has more or less set up the perfect background for Fallout 5 (whenever that releases). You’ve got a coast-to-coast Brotherhood of Steel civil war, a resurgent NCR and Legion fighting over New Vegas again, the Enclave, and Mr. House all on the board as potential questlines that probably won’t be fully resolved by the TV show.
