Spoiler Alert: This list contains spoilers for Fallout Season 2.Fallout has completed its second season, and it seems like a war is brewing. Enemies haven’t been eliminated, but rather tensions have risen, making you wonder if maybe Hank (Kyle MacLachlan) had the right idea all along. His plans did, after all, solve the issue of so much conflict in the world. But it also meant eliminating all free thought and human agency. Nonetheless, there’s a lot to unpack for the already confirmed third season.
For now, while we wait for that season to arrive, likely not until 2027, there are many burning questions that the Season 2 finale “The Strip” has left us pondering. All the main characters are facing new challenges, missions, and enemies as they move on to continue their harrowing journeys in the wasteland.
1
Who Has Been Implanted Already?
During the last conversation with her father, Lucy (Ella Purnell) learns that the people in the vaults aren’t the experiment — the people outside are. Hank has developed the implants to be tiny, virtually unnoticeable in the back of your neck. He claims there are many people out there already who are following orders that were written for them centuries ago.
This leaves us wondering who these people are, if anyone we have already seen is secretly implanted, or if he’s referring to a virus of some kind that may be impacting people unknowingly. Most importantly, what are these orders and their implications for society? There’s so much to unpack with Hank’s statements, answers Lucy will likely never get, at least not from him. So now, she’s left looking over her shoulder and wondering who is doing what and why.
2
What Is Lacerta’s Plan for The Legion?
In the brief moments we see of The Legion, the man known as Caesar has died. Lacerta (Macaulay Culkin) finds a piece of paper in his armor, which reads that it ends with him, there is no successor. But Lacerta, hungry for power and to fulfill his desires for The Legion, doesn’t agree with this decision. He kills one of his own men who was a witness to the note, eats the paper, grabs Caesar’s crown, and heads out to greet his people.
He declares that it’s time for war, and they need to head to New Vegas to fight the New California Republic and claim the city as their own. Everyone chants in unison, believing him to be the new rightful leader. It’s expected that they will arrive and be ready for battle. But what his ultimate plan is and how this all plays out remains to be seen.
3
When Did Barb Come out of the Chamber?
When The Ghoul (Walton Goggins), one of the greatest TV characters of the 2020s, finds the cryo-pod where his wife Barb (Frances Turner) was preserved, thanks to Robert House’s (Justin Theroux) help, it’s opened to reveal that she isn’t inside. House chides The Ghoul about spending hundreds of years betting on hope only to be disappointed. But this isn’t the case. There’s a postcard inside from Colorado that reads “Colorado was a good idea” on the back. This references Cooper mentioning to Barb just before being arrested that they should go there.
The implication is that Barb was in the chamber at some point and came out of it, or at least that she survived, went to Colorado with their daughter, got into the pod at some point with the postcard, and has since left. The Ghoul seems certain that she is still alive, and likely in Colorado. This postcard was left as a message to him should he ever find them. But the timeline needs to be ironed out.
4
Will The Ghoul Find His Family?
One of the biggest questions Fallout Season 2 needed to address was if Barb and Janey (Teagan Meredith) are still alive, and it sort of is. Now that The Ghoul is confident they are, the question is if he will find his family. Based on the scene of him looking off to the mountains with Dogmeat at the end, he will be traveling to Colorado to look for them.
The distance from Las Vegas to Colorado is about 749 miles, which would take about 11.5 hours to drive. While walking isn’t ideal, doing so in a post-apocalyptic world by someone who is virtually indestructible, it’s certainly possible. But this would see The Ghoul traveling through very dangerous terrain, including the Mojave Desert and the Rocky Mountains. That said, it would make for great TV.
5
What’s Powering the Project Now That Diane Is Dead?
In the finale of the perfect Prime Video show, both The Ghoul and Lucy come across the severed head of Diane Welch (Martha Kelly), a congresswoman from 200 years prior who, it’s revealed, was used as the literal head of the mainframe. Her ISTP personality is considered the most perfect, and Hank decided that made her a candidate for powering his project. He wanted to add a bit of color and personality to House’s plans, which was essentially turning people into robots.
Lucy is horrified, even more so when she realizes that Diane is still alive. Diane begs and pleads with Lucy to kill her, and she does. This begs the question, with both Diane and Hank out of the picture, who or what will power the mainframe now? Will everyone revert to being more robotic? Or is there a contingency plan?
6
Is Hank Really Implanted?
In the final scene with Hank and Lucy, she has decided to implant him with the very same chip he was going to implant into her until The Ghoul saved her. But she hasn’t yet pushed the red button to activate it. Hank explains his plans to her, but he has presumably resigned himself to the fact that it’s over, at least for him. He takes out a controller of his own, tells his daughter he loves her, and pushes the button.
She weeps as her father reawakens in a catatonic-like state, clearly not himself, not recognizing her. But has he really changed? Is it possible two controllers were connected to his same implant? Or did he just activate someone else’s then proceed with fantastic acting to convince his daughter he was now a more docile version of himself when he really wasn’t?
7
What Will Happen to the Brotherhood?
In the post-credits scene, Elder Cleric Quintus (Michael Cristofer) is angry. Dane (Xelia Mendes-Jones) brings him a delivery, and it’s a set of plans to build an even more advanced armor suit. He’s ready for battle this time. He tells Dane that while he tried to be a unifier, that didn’t work, so now, he’s a destroyer. The plans appear to be for the Liberty Prime Alpha combat robot, the same used by the government before Vault-Tec and The Enclave dropped the bombs on Earth.
It’s clear there will be some big changes to the Brotherhood in this great Prime Video action show as they prepare for battle. With enhanced suits, they will become even more formidable fighters. How others, and especially Maximus (Aaron Moten), react to this, will be interesting to see.
8
What Is Norm’s Plan From Here?
Norm (Moisés Arias) is in a precarious position having awakened all the Vault 32 people from the cryo-pods, who end up fighting back against him. He is almost killed until a series of giant radroaches attack, killing pretty much everyone. While Norm hides under a table, he eventually emerges unharmed. But the scene is gruesome.
Almost everyone is dead but for the one person who was nice to him, Claudia (Rachel Marsh). He grabs her, places her on a board, and wheels her out to safety. It’s unclear where he plans to go next and what he plans to do, but it’s likely he’s heading to his former vault. Now, however, he’s armed with a lot of knowledge and a more confident and fearless personality. How he will react to the state of his vault is a big question.
9
Is Phase 2 the Forced Evolutionary Virus?
In the video game on which the show is based, there’s something called a Forced Evolutionary Virus. It’s a bioweapon that can essentially change your DNA and make you effectively function as a robot that is programmed to complete whatever task the overseer wants. A method of biological warfare, it’s likely that this is what Steph (Annabel O’Hagan) was referring to when she used Hank’s Pip-Boy wearable computer to instruct anyone who was listening to put Phase 2 into play. This is further teased when Bud’s (Michael Esper) assistant, Ronnie (Adam Faison), refers to his knowledge of the Future Enterprise Ventures, likely a code-name for what it really is.
Steph could be looking to create super mutants or simply control those in the Vault who are now calling for her head. In the game, FEV can be administered through direct contact, injection, or even aerosol. If this is what’s about to happen, it poses the most dangerous weapon ever to face those in the series.
10
Was the President Cryogenically Frozen?
The last President of the United States just before the apocalypse hit was finally introduced via flashbacks in the penultimate episode. Played by Clancy Brown, he is seen in the back of his car alongside congresswoman Diane Welch, meeting with Cooper to get the cold fusion. Cooper thinks he’s doing the right thing, making sure this powerful solution doesn’t get into the hands of House, who has sinister plans with it. What he doesn’t realize is that, as House tells him today, 200 years later, there are worse men than him in the world. And as it turns out, the president might have been one of them, a member of the dark shadow organization known as The Enclave.
We know what eventually happened to Diane in this apocalyptic show, decapitated to be used to run the brain-computer interface (BCI) technology. But what happened to the president? He did go into hiding at an oil rig, but whether he was betrayed and killed, or put into a vault cryo-pod with others, remains to be seen. The story of what happened after Cooper left that car and with the president up to the onset of the nuclear war is what I really want to see.
Fallout
- Release Date
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April 10, 2024
- Network
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Amazon Prime Video
