Notes on Fallout TV (Return to the Nolanverse complete, Review notes complete)

[Hassknecht]

Well before the retcon of the show, I thought all of the crazy tests the Vault-Tec folk were doing were for the Enclave with the latter being the setting's ultimate big bad.



Yeah, I wouldn't make that comparison. "Native Americans are drug dealing raiders who engaged in constant unprovoked atrocities against the United States." That's not a sentence I'd want my name associated with.

The Great Khans aren't without sympathy but they're a criminal gang first and foremost.



I mean, the crazy tests weren't made by bethesda. They were made by Fallout 2 and gathering information for the Enclave. While the Fallout Bible is no longer canon, things like the broken door on Necropolis and other "tests" were done for people other than Vault-Tec itself.

So these contractors were directly answering to the people ordering them about.

The Tests in Fallout 2 were not crazy. They were mostly mild social experiments, with the worst one being a faulty vault door to study the effects of prolonged heightened radiation exposure. Which, under the background of potential interstellar travel, made kinda sense.
The whacky evil experiments came later.

 

[R.Graves]

This is just CT Phipps in general, just arguing nonsense for the sake of arguing.

I thought that was me

 

[CT Phipps]

Everything you just said is total nonsense. Why do you even think it matters if Wilzig knows the code? The point is that the Enclave should know what the code is. How would Cold Fusion not help facilitate the Enclave's plans? You're just saying shit to say shit.

I just don't get this argument.

1. Wilzig doesn't know the code, so they need Hank or another Vault-Tec executive.

2. Cold fusion doesn't facilitate the Enclave's plan because they have no desire to rebuild the surface. They're an isolationist genocidal group that has no need for cold fusion anymore than Vault 31.

3. The Enclave and Vault-Tec aren't running out of power. They already have fusion and nuclear power. Cold fusion is far more valuable to a group like the Brotherhood or NCR.

But that's just my take.

And I'd like you to know I appreciate your fascinating deconstruction of all this.

 

[Bradylama]

All of your takes are total nonsense. I actually don't understand you. Hank is totally irrelevant, we're talking about all the reasons that the Enclave and Vault-Tec are at odds and how that fucks up the whole inciting incident of the entire plot. Easy to produce, cheap energy, would be appealing to anybody. Pre-war society already had fusion batteries outputting massive amounts of energy in backpacks, and cold fusion would have been way more efficient and transportable.

The reason Fallout's timeline never fully developed transistor technology is more than just an aesthetic choice, vacuum tube-based computing and electronics is insanely inefficient by comparison. They're burning down the world's supply of uranium because all the practical applications for nuclear power are extremely wasteful, even with a handful of commercial fusion reactors. Just look at energy weapons for instance. What's the practical application of plasma rifles against an enemy that doesn't have power armor? It's excessive for the sake of excess, which was the whole basis of American consumer culture. The idea that Vault-Tec or the US government would want to repress a more efficient power source that's even easier to control is absolutely insane. Cold Fusion could have saved capitalism and the United States, but it's irrelevant because Vault-Tec was committed to their nonsense managervolk ideology.

You keep bending over backwards and pulling mental gymnastics to try and make sense of plot threads and concepts that make no sense whatsoever. You put more effort into defending this show than your literary output.

 

[CT Phipps]

The idea that Vault-Tec or the US government would want to repress a more efficient power source that's even easier to control is absolutely insane. Cold Fusion could have saved capitalism and the United States, but it's irrelevant because Vault-Tec was committed to their nonsense managervolk ideology.

Dude, I live in Appalachia where the energy companies killed everything better than COAL and still campaign on it constantly. Vast amounts of effort have been done to kill the attempts to modernize the industry and that includes turning down payments from the government upgrade.

What NONSENSE have you been spread that groups will switch to more efficient and better technology?

The idea that a corporation would undermine their own existing infrastructure for a better one because of long term profits is INSANE because it has NEVER happened and the opposite has happened constantly.

Just look what oil does to solar.

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.co...olled-the-solar-industry-2011apr17-story.html

Big Oil has no incentive to replace fossil fuel; whether it is with inexpensive photovoltaic technology or clean algae bio-fuel,it would render Big Oil’s already-owned mineral rights worthless.

Which is simply why Vault tec would not do it. Groups like Poseidon Energy control uranium, they control nuclear plants. They don't need or want something that renders that infrastructure worthless.

 

[Bradylama]

You're just plain wrong and no amount of sophistry can get you out of the corner you've painted yourself into. You think that capitalists are an undifferentiated mass who share all the same interests, rather than being limited agents whose interests are directly tied to their personal investments, and that those investments are at odds with other interests. Capitalists only collude to repress working class action, but they are in a real way each others' enemies in direct competition for control of a market. Vault-Tec does not have the same interests as Poseidon Energy. Poseidon Energy is the only company with a fiduciary incentive to repress cold fusion. From Vault-Tec's perspective cold fusion would have accelerated vault construction, made the vaults more secure, and commercial cold fusion could have ballooned Vault-Tec's consumer market divisions.

That is why, in real life, it's not Wal-Mart or Target who repress fuel efficient vehicles and EVs, but the automakers and oil companies who profit from excessive consumption in fuel and vehicles. But that's not what happens in the show. What happens in the show is cartoon nonsense that would be stupid to a child.

Clearly Vault-Tec DID think they could get use out of cold fusion or else the Vault-Tec branded core would have never been made. Moldaver's stories don't add up, which is likely intentional but it all comes back to further proving why Vault-Tec is a ridiculous faction with no existential raison d'etre. So the real question remains why does the Enclave have the core but not the code? How did Vault-Tec lose the core to the Enclave?

 

[CT Phipps]

You're just plain wrong and no amount of sophistry can get you out of the corner you've painted yourself into. You think that capitalists are an undifferentiated mass who share all the same interests, rather than being limited agents whose interests are directly tied to their personal investments, and that those investments are at odds with other interests. Capitalists only collude to repress working class action, but they are in a real way each others' enemies in direct competition for control of a market. Vault-Tec does not have the same interests as Poseidon Energy. Poseidon Energy is the only company with a fiduciary incentive to repress cold fusion. From Vault-Tec's perspective cold fusion would have accelerated vault construction, made the vaults more secure, and commercial cold fusion could have ballooned Vault-Tec's consumer market divisions.

Like I said, my experience is the Evangelical Right, Corporate America, and Far Right politicians in my state are all one giant circle that does not compete against one another but have each other's hands in their pockets. They collude rather than compete because their enemies are not other corporations but the American people. Many of these companies have extensive business relationships with one another and large scale investments within one another's activities.

or to point out:

Vault Tec represses cold fusion because they have a longstanding contract with General Atomics to build Fusion Reactors and Poseidon Energy to provide the uranium.

Mind you, the lack of both companies in Fallout and making Vault-Tec "the largest company in America" opens up its own questions. Is Vault-Tec now the owner of Poseidon Energy somehow? Like RobCo owned Repcomm?

That would be stupid, IMHO.

That is why, in real life, it's not Wal-Mart or Target who repress fuel efficient vehicles and EVs, but the automakers and oil companies who profit from excessive consumption in fuel and vehicles. But that's not what happens in the show. What happens in the show is cartoon nonsense that would be stupid to a child.

Wal-Mart, Target, and General Motors are all going to be supporting the same politicians who support the same sorts of policies because they have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo. These companies all have a vested interest in unregulated corporate-controlled markets. There's no real competition left in the United States because it's much better for everyone to crush everyone else within the circle.

Clearly Vault-Tec DID think they could get use out of cold fusion or else the Vault-Tec branded core would have never been made. Moldaver's stories don't add up, which is likely intentional but it all comes back to further proving why Vault-Tec is a ridiculous faction with no existential raison d'etre. So the real question remains why does the Enclave have the core but not the code? How did Vault-Tec lose the core to the Enclave?

Like I said, I think the show is almost certainly going to be using Vault-Tec and the Enclave interchangably.

But yes, I'll stop arguing the point. You've said your piece and I've said mine. Sadly, we remain unconvinced by the other's arguments.

 

[Hassknecht]

You're just plain wrong and no amount of sophistry can get you out of the corner you've painted yourself into. You think that capitalists are an undifferentiated mass who share all the same interests, rather than being limited agents whose interests are directly tied to their personal investments, and that those investments are at odds with other interests. Capitalists only collude to repress working class action, but they are in a real way each others' enemies in direct competition for control of a market. Vault-Tec does not have the same interests as Poseidon Energy. Poseidon Energy is the only company with a fiduciary incentive to repress cold fusion. From Vault-Tec's perspective cold fusion would have accelerated vault construction, made the vaults more secure, and commercial cold fusion could have ballooned Vault-Tec's consumer market divisions.

That is why, in real life, it's not Wal-Mart or Target who repress fuel efficient vehicles and EVs, but the automakers and oil companies who profit from excessive consumption in fuel and vehicles. But that's not what happens in the show. What happens in the show is cartoon nonsense that would be stupid to a child.

Clearly Vault-Tec DID think they could get use out of cold fusion or else the Vault-Tec branded core would have never been made. Moldaver's stories don't add up, which is likely intentional but it all comes back to further proving why Vault-Tec is a ridiculous faction with no existential raison d'etre. So the real question remains why does the Enclave have the core but not the code? How did Vault-Tec lose the core to the Enclave?

Ooor, hear me out here, all that polsci bollockery is thinking way too hard about a show written by hacks who just wrote some arbitrary conflict between a bunch of parties they had on a whiteboard saying "use these factions". The writers surely didn't have some whatever political theory in mind when writing this, just "McGuffin is taken from Enclave by dude, everyone wants it".
That's all there is to it. Any resemblance to whatever mental acrobatics can work into the shape of the plot is pure coincidence.

 

[Bradylama]

Ooor, hear me out here, all that polsci bollockery is thinking way too hard about a show written by hacks who just wrote some arbitrary conflict between a bunch of parties they had on a whiteboard saying "use these factions". The writers surely didn't have some whatever political theory in mind when writing this, just "McGuffin is taken from Enclave by dude, everyone wants it".
That's all there is to it. Any resemblance to whatever mental acrobatics can work into the shape of the plot is pure coincidence.

Denying political content exists because the writers are too stupid to recognize it isn't a real argument. CT is arguing from the same false consciousness that the showrunners have. It's pure liberal background radiation.

CT keeps coming up with bullshit after bullshit to excuse away why capitalism isn't a big conspiracy, and that capitalists have interests that are at odds with each other. He doesn't even understand that limitations in bourgeois politics create imperfect market conditions to satisfy immediate demands. A two party bourgeois dictatorship is not capable of representing every sector of capital perfectly. We've seen over and over again that measures which would support the interests of broad sectors of capital, like relieving employers from the burden of health insurance, are denied any possibility of being realized through the lobbying interests of the sectors which profit directly from those inefficiencies in the market. Like the insurance companies and the HMOs. Politicians are easily captured by private lobbies because they depend on private sponsorship to win re-elections, and private funding to finance the parties themselves. The Republican and Democratic parties both represent identifiably different capital interests.

CT, your perspective is limited by your lived experience. The world is bigger than East Kentucky. There's more to the world system than the holler. Your total lack of any Marxist critique is leading you down an endless cul de sac where you are doomed to repeat the same platitudes over and over again.

 

[Hassknecht]

It's like those paintings made by someone swinging over a canvas with a paintbrush up their butt and writing and essay about how the painter was referring to certain 19th century schools of impressionism to evoke certain emotions.
No.
He was just swinging over a canvas with a paintbrush in his ass.
There is political content, sure, but it ain't that deep. Anything involving "Marxist critique" is bullshit in the first place, anyway.

 

[Bradylama]

You only say that because you don't understand it. Meanwhile China grows larger.

 

[Hassknecht]

I understand it, it's not that hard. Just uses a lot of superfluous words to make it seem it's intelligent so people waste their time at college on this nonsense instead of getting a degree in a real subject.

 

[CT Phipps]

Just to be clear, which is it, am I making up shit or am I limited by the real life conditions of my region?

Also, I am the one who is fowarding conspiratorial monopolist tendencies.

But sure, I concede the argument, @Bradylama. You have demonstrated I have no evidence to prove that Vault-Tec and the Enclave are the same or the world-building provides sufficient evidence of thought to the idea that they are making a commentary on the self-destructive nature of capitalism or its tendency to favor shory-term gain over long term planning. Or even that it'd rather burn down the world and rule the ashes than have everyone have a cherry pie.

No sarcasm at all.

Just not enough material to justify any of my conclusions.

 

[Bradylama]

The whole problem is that they'd rather burn down the world than be capitalists. You don't recognize the contradiction here because your idea of a capitalist is like the boogeyman waking up every day to perform ontological evil. It's literal cartoon stuff and it's part of why the TV show sucks. Captain Planet villains had a more coherent strategy for teaming up to ruin the world. At least when Horace Greedly trashes the environment he gets to enjoy the money.

 

[CT Phipps]

The whole problem is that they'd rather burn down the world than be capitalists. You don't recognize the contradiction here because your idea of a capitalist is like the boogeyman waking up every day to perform ontological evil. It's literal cartoon stuff and it's part of why the TV show sucks. Captain Planet villains had a more coherent strategy for teaming up to ruin the world. At least when Horace Greedly trashes the environment he gets to enjoy the money.

 

[Hassknecht]

Turns out it's a show written by and for people on the level of Saturday morning cartoons. Big shocker, I know.

 

[CT Phipps]

Turns out it's a show written by and for people on the level of Saturday morning cartoons. Big shocker, I know.

Let's face it, fucking morons thought, "oh, no one would actually pollute and destroy the environment if they could make just as much money sustainably."

Dipshits.

Thankfully, we're finally waking up to the realization that no one actually gives a shit about doing the right thing and will do it because they can.

 

[Hassknecht]

Let's face it, fucking morons thought, "oh, no one would actually pollute and destroy the environment if they could make just as much money sustainably."

Dipshits.

Thankfully, we're finally waking up to the realization that no one actually gives a shit about doing the right thing and will do it because they can.

Not necessarily. The whole "sustainably" thing isn't as easy as some make it out to be. And yeah, people don't want to give up their bottom lines for that.

 

[CT Phipps]

Not necessarily. The whole "sustainably" thing isn't as easy as some make it out to be. And yeah, people don't want to give up their bottom lines for that.

There's also the fact, and this should have been obvious but lots of so-called progressives don't fucking understand basic human psychology so they think otherwise, a lot of people in power don't give a shit.

"Oh, this will destroy the world in two hundred years. Whoop de fucking do."

Ditto pollution from their factories having more direct effects.

It's the most human thing in the world to go, "Not affecting me, not my problem."

 

[Bradylama]

Capitalists are ok with destroying the environment because that's a long term consequence proposition that they're betting on not having to deal with personally. One way or another they believe they can insulate themselves from the consequences behind their walled gardens and resort destinations while everyone else is left to clean up their mess.

What capitalists are not ok with is global thermonuclear war so they can live like communists underground. That's blowing up the walled garden and everything inside of it. There are no other ways to illustrate this point, it's inarguable. It's literally too stupid for Captain Planet villains.