Reading bad reviews of stuff I enjoy is something of a toxic trait of mine. If I’ve stayed in a particularly nice hotel, I’ll get a kick out of reading the reviews claiming it’s the most disgusting place someone has ever laid their head. Same goes for movies, books and, of course, games. But with the Fallout TV series being the current zeitgeist, curiosity got the better of me and I couldn’t help delving into the one-star reviews on Amazon. Hoo boy, what a treat.
Now, I should preface this by saying out of 793 global ratings currently collected by Amazon, only 3% of them have one star. 93% of them, on the other hand, have four or five stars, with the overwhelming majority giving Fallout top marks. It’s been celebrated by critics and audiences alike, getting a 93% score on Rotten Tomatoes and an 88% average audience score. For all intents and purposes, then, according to the vast majority of people, Fallout is good, actually.
So I’m not saying that these one-star Fallout reviews on Amazon are wrong, per se. Hey, everyone’s entitled to their own opinion. But… they’re probably not right, either. And as I’ve had such a good guffaw poking through the best of ’em, I figured I’d share them. You’re welcome, etc.
“I am afraid to say some people will like this, heaven help us.”
At least 93% of people, too. Heaven help us indeed.
“The whole thing just comes across as so childish, leaving me wondering if it was written by teenagers.”
When I was a teenager, I was holed up in my room writing emo poetry, listening to Avril Lavigne and watching endless reruns of my Friends VHS collection. I certainly wasn’t working for Amazon, writing their biggest show of the year. I bet you weren’t, either. Good on those teenagers, I say.
“Amazon could have saved money by not bothering to make this boring programme.”
Solid business advice. It’ll definitely be brought up in Amazon’s next quarterly earnings call.
“The violence was just horrendous. I don’t shy away from anything like that usually, but this was just horrible.”
Tell me you’ve never played Fallout without telling me you’ve never played Fallout.
“This show disrespects everything that was established up to the point of where the timeline for the series is.”
Sorry bro, but that’s how TV adaptations work. You’ve only got ten hours to shove in hundreds of hours of video game lore. You pick what’s important and run with it.
“A pretty rubbish story in my opinion. And I didn’t get the ending.”
OK, cool.
Thankfully, the majority of reviews for Fallout read nothing like this. You’ll find hundreds of reviews praising its writing — which, contrary to one belief wasn’t written by teenagers — and its accuracy to the game, along with its acting, setpieces and more.
You won’t have to look far to see words like “masterpiece”, “one of the best video game adaptations”, “excellently done” and “perfectly imagined”.
But hey, if you’ve got Prime Video or an Amazon Prime membership, jump on in: it’s included in your subscription so it’ll cost you zero to watch. Me, and 93% of other people who’ve watched it, think you’ll have a grand old time.
