Amazon purchased the rights to produce a live-action project in 2020, and the series was announced that July, with Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy's Kilter Films joined by Bethesda Game Studios in the production. Nolan directed the first three episodes. Bethesda Game Studios producer Todd Howard, who directed various games in the series, signed on to executive produce alongside Nolan and Joy. Robertson-Dworet and Wagner were hired as the series' showrunners in January 2022, and Goggins and Purnell were cast in February and March, respectively.
Falloutpremiered on Prime Video on April 10, 2024. It received generally positive reviews, with praise for the performances (particularly of Purnell, Moten, and Goggins), writing, visuals, production design, and faithfulness to the source material. That month, the series was renewed for a second season, which is set to premiere on December 17, 2025. In May 2025, ahead of the second-season premiere, the series was renewed for a third season. Fallout has received three Emmy Award nominations, including Outstanding Drama Series and Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series for Goggins, as well as two Creative Arts Emmy Awards out of 14 nominations.
Many survivors took refuge in fallout bunkers known as Vaults, most being unaware that each Vault was designed to perform sociological and psychological experiments on the vault dwellers on behalf of Vault-Tec. More than 200 years later in 2296,[5] a young woman, Lucy, leaves her home in Vault 33 to venture into the dangerous wasteland of a devastated Los Angeles to look for her father, who has been kidnapped by wasteland raiders. Along the way, she meets a Brotherhood of Steel squire named Maximus and a legendary ghoul bounty hunter named Cooper Howard, each having their own pasts and agendas to settle.
In the second season, Lucy accompanies Cooper to New Vegas to discover the truth about her father and Vault-Tec while Maximus prepares for war.
Bethesda had been approached several times about a television adaptation of the Fallout video games since the developer released Fallout 3 in 2008, according to Bethesda's Todd Howard, though he felt none of the suggestions met the vision of the Fallout series.[8] Bethesda's marketing executive Pete Hines had also warned the company in 2015 about the potential impact of a poor adaptation of their video games, saying, "There's way more things that can go wrong than can go right with this," since the adaptation's director may override the vision of the series.[9] Hines pointed to the example of the 2005 Doom film as an example of a bad adaptation.[9]
The situation changed when Jonathan Nolan approached Bethesda with his idea of a Fallout television series, having been an avid player of the game series. Howard, having seen what Nolan had created with the Westworld series, found that Nolan had a clear vision for the adaptation, and agreed this approach was a good way to bring the game series to the television screen.[8][10] Bethesda gave Nolan the freedom to craft a story as long as it remained true to the Fallout universe but served as its unique narrative within the game series and not translate one of the existing games to television.[10]
The television adaptation was formally announced in July 2020 under Amazon Studios (later renamed Amazon MGM Studios) with Nolan and Lisa Joy developing the work.[11] Joy described the series as "a gonzo, crazy, funny, adventure, and mindfuck like none you've ever seen before".[12] In January 2022, Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Graham Wagner were hired as show runners for the series, with Nolan set to direct the pilot episode.[13] The series is canon within the Fallout continuity. Howard wanted an original story instead of an adaptation of the games,[14] though the series incorporates game storylines and factions, such as the Brotherhood of Steel. The series' 2296 setting is the furthest in the future that the Fallout franchise has occurred.[15] On April 18, 2024, Amazon Prime Video renewed the series for a second season.[16] The first season had a budget of $153 million.[17] In May 2025, the series was renewed for a third season.[18]
Casting
In February 2022, Walton Goggins was cast in a lead role as Cooper Howard, a Hollywood actor who became a Ghoul after the bombs fell.[19][20] In March 2022, Ella Purnell joined the cast as a peppy Vault-Dweller.[21] In June 2022, Kyle MacLachlan (Hank MacLean), Xelia Mendes-Jones (Dane) and Aaron Moten (Maximus) joined as regulars.[22] In October 2023, additional casting including Sarita Choudhury (Moldaver), Michael Emerson (Dr. Siggi Wilzig), Leslie Uggams (Betty Pearson) and Zach Cherry (Woody Thomas) was announced.[23]
In November 2024, Macaulay Culkin joined the cast for the second season in an undisclosed role.[24] In August 2025, it was revealed that Justin Theroux would portray Robert House for the second season.[7]
Filming
An overhead shot of Kolmanskop, Namibia, which was used for filming shots in the wasteland.
Principal photography began on July 5, 2022, in New Jersey, New York and Utah,[25] and was shot on 35mm film.[26] Wasteland scenes were additionally filmed in Kolmanskop, a former mining operation-turned-ghost town, as well as on Namibia's infamous Skeleton Coast. The desolate location is where desert sands meet the sea, where the western Namib Desert reaches Namibia's South Atlantic coastline. As a result of the treacherous seas offshore, the "skeleton" coast is dotted with both historic and recent shipwrecks;[27] some scenes were filmed at the wreck of the Eduard Bohlen.[28] Nolan directed the first three episodes of the series, with Stuart Dryburgh and Teodoro Maniaci as cinematographers.[29][30]
Filming for the second season is occurring in Los Angeles and Toronto, to take advantage of a $25 million tax incentive offered by California.[31] Filming was scheduled to begin in November 2024, and had begun by early December that same year.[32][33] Filming was paused in January 2025, due to the Los Angeles fires.[34] Filming for the second season wrapped on May 7, 2025.[35]
The first-season soundtrack was released by Amazon on April 8, 2024.[39]
Post-production
Jay Worth was the production's visual effects supervisor,[40] returning to work with director Jonathan Nolan and executive producer Lisa Joy following Person of Interest, Westworld, The Peripheral and Reminiscence. Grant Everett was the on-set visual effects supervisor who brought together a variety of visual effects studios for the environment, creatures, hard surface work and more. Framestore in Montreal took on the Yao Guai and Gulper creature work, RISE FX in Germany handled the Vertibird shots, Power Armor work and numerous environments, Swedish studio Important Looking Pirates took on the Cyclops overseer of Vault 4 and Snip-Snip.[41] FutureWorks in India did the Ghoul nosework. Refuge, CoSA, Mavericks, One of Us, Studio 8 and Deep Water FX were also involved across the 3,300 visual effects shots of the season.[42]
Release
Fallout was scheduled to premiere on Amazon Prime Video on April 12, 2024,[43][23] but this date was later moved forward to be released on April 10, 2024, at 6 PM Pacific Time (GMT-8:00).[44] The second season is set to premiere on December 17, 2025, with the remaining episodes released weekly through February 4, 2026.[7]
The first season of Fallout was released on Ultra HD Blu-ray, Blu-ray and DVD by MGM Home Entertainment on July 8, 2025. A limited edition Ultra HD Blu-Ray steelbook will be available exclusively through Amazon's website and will come with six collectible art cards.[45]
Reception
Viewership
According to Amazon, Fallout pulled in 65 million viewers in its first 16 days of availability, and was the second most-watched title in the history of the platform after The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power in 2022.[46] As of October 2024, the series has surpassed 100 million viewers.[47]
The adaptation's success on Amazon Prime Video has led to renewed commercial success of the Fallout video games, including the original game; according to Steam Charts, it experienced the highest percentage increase in player base at 160%.[48]
Critical response
Fallout received positive reviews from critics.[49] The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported a 93% approval rating based on 132 critic reviews, with an average rating of 8/10. The website's critics consensus reads, "An adaptation that feels like a true extension of the games, Fallout is a post-apocalyptic blast for newcomers and longtime fans alike."[50]Metacritic assigned a score of 73 out of 100 based on 33 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[51]
Kristen Baldwin of Entertainment Weekly gave the series a B+ and said, "The eight-episode season exists in a vivid and captivating universe that will be familiar to gamers—though knowledge of the franchise isn't required to enjoy its darkly comic dystopian pleasures."[52] Reviewing the series for the San Francisco Chronicle, Zaki Hasan gave a rating of 3/4 and wrote, "With a raft of unfolding mysteries, protagonists we care about and a quest we want to see through to the end, Fallout is well situated to grow the loyal fan base that has kept the video game franchise going for 27 years."[53]
Multiple critics called Fallout one of the best video game adaptations of all time.[49]Film and television adaptations of video games as a whole have garnered a negative reputation due to multiple high-profile failures (such as the aforementioned Doom film). In this regard, commentators have compared Fallout to The Last of Us, another well-received video game adaptation for television.[54][55] In a YouTube video, Tim Cain, the creator of Fallout, praised the adaptation for matching the mood of the series and for its easter eggs and characters. He also defended the adaptation from accusations of contradicting the Fallout canon.[56][57][58]
Sue Gamsaragan Cahill, Daniel Colman, Joseph Fraioli, Jane Boegel-Koch, Sara Bencivenga, Jonathan Golodner, Karen Triest, Randall Guth, Christopher Kaller, Clint Bennet, Nancy Parker, and Katie Rose (for "The Target")
Jonathan Nolan, Lisa Joy, Geneva Robertson-Dworet, Graham Wagner, Athena Wickham, Todd Howard, James Altman, Margot Lulick, James W. Skotchdopole, Stephen Semel, Karey Dornetto, Carson Mell, Kieran Fitzgerald, Jill Footlick, Noreen O'Toole, Jay Worth, Crystal Whelan, Halle Phillips, Gursimran Sandhu, and Skye Wathen
1 2 Credited as part of the main cast only for episodes in which they appear.
References
↑ Bardini, Julio (April 28, 2024). "'Fallout' Borrows From This Classic Sergio Leone Western". Collider. A lot about Prime Video's Fallout series screams Western. It has been so since before it ever came out, as the games themselves already draw a lot from the Wild West theme to establish their stories and overall look. The series, however, takes it a step further, drawing on the typical looks and archetypes of the Western genre to tell its own story.
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