{"id":652188,"date":"2025-12-24T09:10:17","date_gmt":"2025-12-24T09:10:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/652188\/"},"modified":"2025-12-24T09:10:17","modified_gmt":"2025-12-24T09:10:17","slug":"fallout-season-2-episode-2-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/652188\/","title":{"rendered":"Fallout Season 2, Episode 2 Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

This review contains spoilers<\/strong> for Fallout Season 2, Episode 2, \u201cThe Golden Rule,\u201d which is available to stream now on Prime Video. <\/p>\n

Last week<\/a> I wondered if, by holding back the return of Maximus and the Brotherhood of Steel beyond the premiere, we\u2019d have to spend a chunk of this week\u2019s episode further recapping events and re-introducing ideas. Thankfully no such issues weigh down Fallout Season 2\u2019s second chapter, \u201cThe Golden Rule,\u201d which wastes no time not only expanding the scope of the Brotherhood, but also sowing the seeds of violent rebellion among its members. <\/p>\n

Uneasy friction between factions is the defining factor of Fallout: New Vegas, the video game this season draws most heavily from, and it\u2019s a great idea to replicate that in the movements of the Brotherhood, which turns out to be an uneasy alliance of multiple chapters rather than a unified force. Now conspiring with groups from the Grand Canyon, Yosemite, and Coronado, it\u2019ll be fascinating to see how Quintus (Michael Cristofer) attempts to seize control of the Brotherhood from the Boston-based Commonwealth chapter \u2013 especially with the last-minute arrival of its liaison, Kumail Nanjiani\u2019s Paladin Harkness. <\/p>\n

The Elder Cleric\u2019s first steps on that journey provide quite a spectacle. The circling vertibirds, spinning wind turbines, wide-angle desert shots, and Ramin Djawadi\u2019s exceptional Brotherhood of Steel signature theme all combine to lend the reveal of Quintus\u2019 new military base a little Dune-flavoured grandeur. Of course, Fallout can\u2019t deliver all that with a completely straight face, so the base is Area 51 and there\u2019s an alien hidden in the freezer \u2013 both among the episode\u2019s funniest reveals. These sequences also never forget to emphasise that the Brotherhood\u2019s incredibly imposing, efficiently violent, power-armoured knights are hilariously stupid. This episode is perhaps the best example so far of their child-like tendencies, with the warriors constantly beating each other up or fiddling with live plasma grenades. <\/p>\n

With civil war brewing, it seems like the Brotherhood itself will have one of the season\u2019s most significant storylines, rather than simply being the background fluff for Aaron Moten\u2019s Maximus again. That\u2019s not to say he\u2019s been reduced to simply part of an ensemble, though. Now an obedient Brotherhood dog who\u2019s totally numb to violence, he\u2019s been crushed and reshaped by Quintus in the weeks that bridge each season\u2019s events, so much so that the sneering Cleric finally admires him. Maximus has always been weak, unsure of what to do and easily manipulated, but it\u2019s now clearer than ever that he has no control of who he is or his own destiny. Yes, he\u2019s finally the knight he lied his way into becoming, able to kill a man twice his size, but none of it is his doing. <\/p>\n

Maximus\u2019 pathetic existence is made all the more tragic by the episode\u2019s cold opening, which takes us back to his childhood in the ill-fated Shady Sands. Writer Chris Brady-Denton successfully captures the emotion of Maximus\u2019 family saying their hurried goodbyes, knowing full well that they\u2019re about to be nuked off the face of America. As the boy is bundled into the kitchen refrigerator (a tactic presumably taken from the Indiana Jones school of survival), his father reassures him that \u201cyou will be a good man.\u201d How disappointed he\u2019d be, then, to see what a spineless creature Maximus has become. The two time periods contrast perfectly, and establish the path down which Maximus must surely walk this season. It\u2019s time to make dad proud. <\/p>\n

Maximus has always been easily manipulated, but it\u2019s now clearer than ever that he has no control of who he is or his own destiny.<\/p>\n

Talking of proud dads, Shady Sands\u2019 demise was, of course, the work of Hank MacLean. The flashback really does cement him as a truly evil piece of work, as this is the first time we get to see what the town had flourished into. Once little more than a few crop fields and buildings during the timelines of Fallouts 1 and 2, it became an incredible bastion of progress with access to clean water\u2026 and Hank took it all away in a flash. We always knew that he was motivated to do so because his wife and daughter ran away from his vault to live there, but Season 1 left the half-answered question of how the bombing was linked to Vault-Tec\u2019s wider corporate plans. That question only gets more complicated now we\u2019ve seen that the explosion was achieved through the use of the mind-control chips that Mr. House was testing in last week\u2019s flashback. Hank, House, and Vault-Tec are all linked, but I don\u2019t think the relationship between the three is as simple as the Season 1 finale\u2019s board meeting made it seem \u2013 this will be a great mystery to be unpicked over the next few episodes. <\/p>\n

Of course, anything with Kyle MacLachlan in it can\u2019t be 100% sinister, and his mouse-testing trial-and-error montage is one of the episode\u2019s comedic highlights. There\u2019s so many fun details \u2013 the cheerful tune, the tiny rodent Vault-Tec office, the constant yo-yoing, and the perfect timing of each bursting mouse. And while it\u2019s fun, it\u2019s all in aid of showing how flawed the control-chip tech is. A similar trick is executed in the Shady Sands flashback, with the mind-controlled travelling trader repeating \u201cPatrolling the Mojave almost makes you wish for a nuclear winter\u201d on a never-ending loop. That\u2019s a nod to the New Vegas video game, where budget restrictions meant dozens of characters across the wasteland would parrot the same line ad nauseum. But here, the meme becomes a smart, funny way to depict the tech\u2019s deficiencies. <\/p>\n

Also providing a few chuckles is Norm, who has found himself in charge of a gaggle of clueless middle managers after thawing the entire population of Vault 31 last week. In a smart recognition of how little screentime this storyline has, things move at a rapid pace, and the entire group are out on the surface before the credits roll. Norm\u2019s story was a slow burn last year, and while it ultimately paid off, it did require patience as it built from frivolous distraction into one of the show\u2019s key reveals. I\u2019m pleased the momentum continues here, rather than being reset, and does so while still dropping a bunch of \u201cidiot vaultie\u201d jokes along the way. It fulfills the show\u2019s more dedicated comedy needs without feeling inconsequential \u2013 something I hope the storylines of vaults 32 and 33, which are absent this week, will adopt when we rejoin them in later episodes. <\/p>\n

As Norm sees the ocean and sky for the first time in his entire existence, his sister continues her long walk to find dad almost 300 miles inland. Slightly frustratingly, Lucy and The Ghoul are once again stuck in recap mode this week, as they go on a side quest that closely echoes the events of last season\u2019s trip to the Super Duper Mart, where Lucy could have abandoned The Ghoul after he betrayed her, but instead gave him the life-restoring drugs he needed. It\u2019s largely the same story here \u2013 Lucy is poised to leave him for dead after yet another bout of needless violence, but she promises to return for him, proving that she\u2019s \u201cnothing like\u201d him in the process. The parallel between these two scenes is made all the more clear by having the duo\u2019s original tiff in the \u201cpreviously on Fallout\u201d recap, and so once again it feels like this relationship is treading water\u2026 or perhaps it\u2019s such an incompatible pairing that growth is impossible. Only with the entire season in the rear-view will we know if this sense of arrested development worked or not. <\/p>\n

That\u2019s not to say Lucy and The Ghoul don\u2019t have any fun, though. Far from it. We have an enjoyably chaotic run-in with radscorpions, a quintessential Fallout monster brought to life with some top-notch visual effects. Also brought over from the games is the classic \u201cchoose between these two people in need\u201d dilemma, in which Lucy must decide which dying person is most deserving of her final stimpack. Of course, to have Lucy pick the tunic-wearing woman, seemingly the obvious choice between a vulnerable mortal and a 200-year-old mutant, only for that choice to lead her right into the den of Caesar\u2019s Legion, New Vegas\u2019 cruellest faction, is a wonderful translation of the video games\u2019 unforeseen consequences. Next week\u2019s episode, where we\u2019ll learn more of Lucy\u2019s infamous captors, is sure to be a treat.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This review contains spoilers for Fallout Season 2, Episode 2, \u201cThe Golden Rule,\u201d which is available to stream…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":652189,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3937],"tags":[77,382,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-652188","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-tv","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/652188","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=652188"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/652188\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/652189"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=652188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=652188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=652188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}