"The End"

	For other uses of the term The End, see The End.

"The End" is the first episode of the first season of the Fallout TV series.

Synopsis[]

Summary[]

Prologue: The End[]

On October 23, 2077, Cooper Howard, a famous actor frequently typecast to play cowboys, performs stunts on horseback at young Roy Spencer's birthday party while his young daughter Janey assists. The boy's father, Bob Spencer, suggests to his friend Frank that Cooper is working a job beneath his pay grade to pay alimony to his ex-wife. Mr. Spencer asks Cooper to perform his iconic thumbs up for a picture, but he declines. Janey questions her father about refusing. He explains that one could measure a mushroom cloud's danger by whether it was larger than their thumbs up; if the cloud was larger, they were already doomed. Cooper attempts to soothe his daughter's fears and tells her, "We take it as it comes." He gets her a slice of birthday cake at her request.

A nuclear bomb is then dropped on Los Angeles, but the partygoers initially mistake the flash as coming from a camera. Janey sees the mushroom cloud forming and grows fearful as she sticks her thumb out. Cooper is the next to notice, initially telling Janey that it is merely a fire before he sees the cloud continue to grow larger and the blast wave racing toward them. The bomb's shockwave arrives and shatters all the windows of the Spencer home. The Spencer family takes refuge in their private bomb shelter and prevents the other partygoers from entering; Cooper and Janey leave on horseback. As they flee, several more bombs are dropped on the city.

Part 1: Lucy[]

219 years later, Vault 33 is successfully functioning under the leadership of Overseer Hank MacLean. His daughter Lucy, a self-described "active contributor to the well-being of [her] community," delivers her application for an approved marriage with a "breeder" from the adjoining Vault 32 to the governing council of Vault 33. The Council is comprised of Woody Thomas, Betty Pearson, and Reg McPhee. Her application is approved, and her pregnant friend Steph helps her prepare for her wedding. Hank tells Lucy about leaving his native Vault 31 to marry her now-deceased mother. The gatekeeper, Lucy's cousin Chet, stalls the process as he is in love with Lucy. She reminds him of the negative long-term ramifications of inbreeding, and he reluctantly opens the adjoining Vault door. Lee Moldaver steps forward to introduce herself as the new overseer of Vault 32, also introducing Lucy's husband-to-be, Monty. Seeing Monty, Steph calls Lucy "lucky," causing her husband Bert to give her an appalled expression from behind.

Lucy and Monty marry. At the reception, Hank gives a toast and reports that the Vault dwellers will be able to reclaim the surface within the next generation. At the conclusion of the reception, Lucy takes Monty to their suite, and they consummate their marriage. Monty shows signs that he lacks the social refinement and education like the dwellers of Vault 33. Meanwhile, Lucy's brother Norm enters Vault 32 and is alarmed to discover dead crops and a Vault dweller's heavily decayed corpse, causing him to flee back to Vault 33. Lucy hears yelling outside her suite and puts on her Pip-Boy to discover that her new "husband" contains abnormally high radiation levels; confirming suspicions that he and the other Vault 32 residents are actually raiders from the surface. Monty attacks and overwhelms Lucy, telling her he truly enjoyed their time together as he prepares to end her life. He stabs her in the stomach with a concealed knife and begins to strangle her before she can cut his throat with a broken pitcher. Lucy tends to her injury with a stimpak and arms herself with a tranquilizer gun. A bloody battle has broken out between the raiders and Vault dwellers, claiming many lives on both sides. Woody manages to flee from the chaos, while others are not so lucky. Bert is killed by the raiders, causing Steph to lash out in grief and rage; she is stabbed in the eye with a fork, but manages to grab a raider's submachine gun and shoot back. Meanwhile, a burly raider returns to Chet at the gate while carrying a Vault 33 guard; he attacks Chet, but the guard grabs his leg and trips him, saving Chet and causing the raider to be bisected by a closing door.

Lucy saves Norm from the chaos in the crop field and helps him hide in a storage unit. A still-living Monty tries to strangle Lucy again, but is prevented by Hank, who kills Monty by holding his head in a barrel of pickles in vinegar. They then hear an alarm warning them about the inter-vault door remaining open, causing them to run toward Vault 32. At the door between the two Vaults, Moldaver has taken multiple Vault 33 residents hostage, including Chet and Steph, and planted a bomb in the door. She orders Hank to choose between saving them or Lucy. Hank locks Lucy in a janitorial closet and affirms his love for her. A raider tranquilizes Hank, and Moldaver speaks to Lucy through the door, saying she resembles her mother. The raiders drag Hank towards "the real world" and set the other hostages free. They run to safety as the bomb detonates.

Later, the Vault 33 survivors nurse their wounds, compost their dead, and repair damage to the Vault. In a meeting in the atrium, Lucy proposes sending a team of four to the surface to look for Hank. The council rejects the idea and is unwilling to risk opening the vault door. Norms tells Lucy that if the council were to find Hank, "they wouldn't get to be in charge." Lucy resolves to leave alone and recruits Norm and Chet to help her escape undetected. They take an elevator up to the main Vault door, and Chet tries to persuade Lucy to let him leave with her. She sticks him with a tranquilizer to prevent him from following her. Norms admits he is "too chicken" to leave the Vault and shares a goodbye with his sister.

The door opens as Vault 33 residents Reg and Davey arrive. They beg Lucy not to leave, but she steps into the outside world, and the door closes behind her. Outside, she observes the desert landscape and the remains of people who died trying to enter the Vault. Around the bend, she sees the ocean and the destroyed Santa Monica Pier in the distance, and she dutifully presses forward.

Part 2: Maximus[]

In a military base on the surface, Maximus, an "aspirant" of the Brotherhood of Steel, is beaten up by his fellow aspirants. Afterward, his friend Dane reminds him that "flesh is weak, but still endures." In a class, Cleric Felix outlines the Brotherhood's mission to salvage and hoard pre-war technology. A massive airship, the Prydwen, arrives, and the class watches knights wearing T-60 power armor stroll into the base.

While Maximus is carrying out his assignment of disposing of sewage, Dane beckons him away. They find the shed where the T-60 armor sets are stored and admire them together. Maximus recalls being rescued by a Brotherhood knight as a child after his hometown's destruction. Presently, Dane is summoned away by the Brotherhood officers. That evening, a group of aspirants are promoted, including Dane, who is assigned to serve as Knight Titus' squire. Maximus privately vents his jealousy. The next morning, Dane suffers a gruesome foot injury after someone places an exposed razor in their boot. Maximus is blamed for the incident and dragged before his commanding officers.

Elder Cleric Quintus questions Maximus. He sheepishly defends himself but admits to being jealous of Dane's promotion. He affirms his desire to overcome his weakness and commitment to the Brotherhood. Quintus informs Maximus that he will replace Dane as Titus' new squire, who sheds tears of joy at the news. He later visits Dane in the infirmary, and they assert their faith in his innocence. Maximus is anointed as a squire in a ceremony and has the initial "T" branded onto his back.

Quintus announces the Brotherhood's newest mission to capture Siggi Wilzig, a rogue Enclave "denizen" who carries a valuable artifact in his possession. Maximus and Titus fly away in a heli-carrier to search for the target, assigned to the area around Filly.

Part 3: The Ghoul[]

Elsewhere, a group of bounty hunters sneak into a fortress owned by one Dom Pedro and take out one of the guards. Their leader, Honcho, explains that they are searching for a notorious bounty hunter whom Dom Pedro has held captive for several years. He keeps the hunter buried alive but once a year digs him up, cuts off a few pieces, and buries him again. They find a grave with a pair of IV bags attached and tubes emerging from the dirt. The other two hunters, Biggie and Slim, are shocked to realize the hunter they are looking for is a ghoul. Honcho says that his father once worked with the Ghoul, and Biggie expresses concern that he may be feral. Honcho brings out a chicken and explains that a feral ghoul will instinctively attack it, which will be their cue to kill him.

The hunters dig up the coffin and place the chicken in front of it before opening it up. The ghoul emerges, revealed as an aged and mutated Cooper Howard. He playfully picks up the chicken, terrifying Biggie and Slim. Honcho proposes they work together to secure a large bounty, the same target the Brotherhood is after, and retire on the profits. He details that the target is seeking out Moldaver in California, specifying that he knows the Ghoul is originally from there. The Ghoul takes offense to the mention of his past and claims that, unlike them, he pursues bounties "for the love of the game." He kills Slim and Biggie and drags Honcho into his own grave, asserting that his kind (cowpokes) "take it as it comes." The Ghoul spares the chicken and leaves to pursue the bounty alone.

Credits[]

The credits show a man sitting on the Santa Monica pier before the Great War, reading the Capitol Post, before he is reduced to a skeleton by a nuclear blast. The show then zooms out to show the devastated pier, including a destroyed Ferris Wheel and roller coaster, beached ships, and then pulls back inland to show the ruined city, including a Red Rocket station, a Vault-Tec billboard with the text "Secure your place now!" depicting Vault Boy giving a thumbs-up while people enter a Vault, and a bank.

Cast[]

Starring:

Guest starring:

Co-starring:

Stunt performers:

Uncredited:

Soundtrack[]

• Nat King Cole - "Orange Colored Sky"
• Perry Como - "Don't Let the Stars Get in Your Eyes"
• Connie Conway - "Who Do You Suppose"
• The Castells - "Some Enchanted Evening"
• Mari Jones with Johnny Moore's Three Blazers - "Start It Slow"
• Scatman Crothers - "Keep That Coffee Hot"
• Carl Coccomo - "A Nervous Kiss"
• Johnny Cash - "So Doggone Lonesome"
• Johnny Cash - "All Over Again"
• Connie Conway - "Brighter Side"
• Donald Quan and Rick Lazar - "Mariachi De Amigos"
• Sheldon Allman - "Crawl Out Through the Fallout"

Behind the scenes[]

• Anchorage is mentioned on the television.
• Nuka-Cola, Sunset Sarsaparilla, and Fishbrau pale ale can be seen around the party.
• The television mentions Sugar Bombs and Grognak & the Ruby Ruins.
• The book seen in the book club is Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace which is a real book published in 1869.
• The water lilies painting above Lucy's bed is from Fallout 4 and Fallout 76.
• The fight over the fallout shelter is similar to the The Twilight Zone episode the The Shelter. The celebration ends with the neighbors clashing over who will be allowed into the fallout shelter.
• The syringe Lucy injects herself with is called a stimpak, which heals health in the Fallout video games and has the same sound effect.
• A raider seems to use some Jet before attacking Chet.
• The project displays a "please stand by" message from the games.
• The Good Evening/Morning flip sign can be found in Vault 76 from Fallout 76.
• Walton Goggins and Mykelti Williamson both starred in the TV series Justified, and appeared in the same scene as each other.
• The pre-war weather newscast canonizes the borders of the Thirteen Commonwealths from Josh Sawyer's previously unofficial map.
• The Vault 33 governing council bulletin board includes pages from the Vault Dweller's Survival Guide (the original Fallout game's manual). They include the G.E.C.K. advertisement and the Mushroom Cloud and Desert Salad recipes, along with a Vault Boy version of Tim Cain.

Gallery[]

Norm MacLean

Hank MacLean

Betty Pearson

Hank and Lucy

Lucy leaving Vault 33

Leaving Vault 33

Brotherhood of Steel

Brotherhood

Brotherhood of Steel aspirants

Cleric Felix

The Prydwen

Brotherhood flag

Maximus

References[]