Amazon Prime series Fallout is a brilliantly gory romp, even if you've never heard of the video game

We’re hoping for a second round, with Maximus, Moldaver, Lucy et al

HOLLYWOOD, CALIFORNIA - APRIL 09: Signage is seen during the "Fallout" Global Red Carpet Premiere at TCL Chinese Theatre on April 09, 2024 in Hollywood, California. (Photo by Anna Webber/Getty Images for Prime Video)

In recent months, I’ve been in something of a televisual wilderness.

Absolutely nothing has grabbed my interest.

Until I watched this sci-fi series, released earlier this month on Amazon Prime.

It turns out that it’s based on the video game of the same name, which I’d never heard of, since I’ve been out of the loop since, well, Pac-Man.

Indeed, the episodes have a linear, quest-like feel, but you don’t have to be a gamer to watch.

The Amazon Original programme is based in a post-apocalyptic version of the US, where some seemingly lucky people live in cultish underground vaults, which are billed as ‘a Camelot for the nuclear age’. Down there, they still have a democracy, listen to Fifties vinyl on record players, and live in Jetsons-esque homes.

Meanwhile, outside on nuclear-bomb-scarred terra firma, other less fortunate humans battle it out in a murderous and miserable mash-up of the Wild West meets Mad Max.

There are constant wars, drug addiction (to RadAway, which the ghouls take to retain control of their wizened bodies), and the presence of quasi-religious groups, like the Brotherhood. Not to mention funky-looking monsters, like the blacmange pink axolotl beast that inhabits the radioactive water.

Our antihero is The Ghoul, who is played by the excellently named Australian actor Walton Goggins. There are other excellent turns, from Kyle Maclachlan, as well as Ella Purnell, who plays Lucy and was also in Yellowjackets, and Aaron Moten, as Maximus.

I especially enjoyed comedian Matt Berry’s cameo as an organ-harvesting robot.

Steel yourself, because Fallout is gory. Guts galore. I’m talking impaled eyeballs, mangled feet and dismembered heads. Most of the major fight scenes play out in slow motion, to the ironic strains of something like Dinah Washington’s song What a Difference a Day Makes.

I am a hardened horror film veteran, but even I got slightly squeamish in parts. Apparently, the video game version was banned in some countries, for exactly that reason.

However, it was the first time in ages that I’ve watched an entire series without guessing what was going to happen next. Each episode was a bonkers romp, with spectacular sets and quirky detail, and my enjoyment increased incrementally across the eight.

There is plenty of pathos, and it all boils down to a battle against good and evil.

The first thing I did after the final credits rolled was Google to find out if there would be a second series. Yes, and we can probably expect its release in 2025. I’m not the only fan, as 65 million watched it in its first two weeks of release.

We will all be counting down.