Fallout Season 2

Profit is god, politicians bow to shadowy conglomerates, humanity is splintered into warring factions driven by warped ideologies and led by sociopathic megalomaniacs… and meanwhile, a privileged few look on, enjoying this game they created, untouched by the horrors that befall the masses, horrors they inflicted and that they have the power to stop. Yep, the world of Fallout is basically our current world dialled up to nine thousand.

I really enjoyed the satire, action, and violent absurdity of Season 2. Lucy and Maximus continue to blunder naively from one scrape to another, seemingly the only two people left alive who believe in anything, somehow shaping the future of the world around them even as they fail to fully understand it. I love retrofuturistic settings, and this one continues to use music choice in a gloriously chilling way (the “When You’re Smiling” song moment was particularly chef’s kiss.)

Reclamation Day - the day when the vault dwellers will emerge, is defined as “When there’s no one left on the surface to disagree with us” and oof, that feels apt for our times. A couple more quotes:

“Every dollar spent is a vote cast.”

“Don’t think of them as human beings… think of them as Americans.”