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My theory is that Cooper and other ghouls, needing to survive, all turned to cannibalism. Ghouls who have turned to cannibalism slowly go feral from a dark craving for human flesh.

So they either have to eat others (which they hate to do because it solidifies them as social outcasts and costs them even more of their humanity) or they need to take addictol to stave off the cravings.

Now, tell me why I'm wrong.

I love this show, and while some of this is serious, take it with a bit of fun.

• Is Wilzig new? Has he ever incinerated a dog, and would it be suspicious if he never incinerated a dog?

-- Wilzig declares Dogmeat fit at 10.0 ounces into their system...

• They now have a record of Dogmeat and would it not arouse suspicion if Wilzig hid Dogmeat?

• Was there a further check 'down the line' of the dog weight that would have exposed Wilzig?

• Why not Wilzig claim Dogmeat as 'underweight', then hide her? She would not be 'in the system'

• When Dogmeat is being told to 'sit' she really seems too old to first being taught this? I mean he should have started way sooner for the Dogmeat to be such a badass! 😂

• Wilzig should really lock his doors.

• Really? A highly advanced automated turret with computer reflexes missed them? C'Mon!!

-- I am sure there are reasonable explanations for these, It is just fun to think about!

TY 😀

My BIL had me play some FO4 back when it first came out but I never got that into it. I was pretty surprised when I was watching the show and saw tech priests with a mission of recovering tech from ancient civilizations introduced praying to the machine god with children of the omnissiah playing in the background. And I thought "dang I didn't notice that before". Was this always in the games and I missed it in the maybe dozen hours I played or was it more for the show? Amazon is supposed to be working on a 40k show so maybe it bled in from there?

https://youtu.be/ZLsX9WUdYnU?si=zRC0aI1FHLgFDVQJ

https://youtu.be/NrkepDKA46g?si=aMmqhZPGTEeZBddY

https://x.com/MailOnline/status/1808172323221999830

omg a real life robobrain

Waited too long to get the Ghoul, and now Amazon only has it from a 3rd party for $60. I don't really like the Youtooz or statue one, and I'll wait as long as it takes if we think they're coming back. I also don't wanna overpay for a product if it was originally less.

They submitted in 28 categories for the Emmys (yes, I know most shows do that and it doesn't lead to anything), and I've seen the show pop up on a lot of prediction lists. Though I doubt it'd win anything, what nominations would you anticipate it possibly getting? This year is kind of barren in terms of the drama category (no Succession, Ozark or any usual big winners) so there's a possibility for a surprise.

TL:DR below. Sorry if this has already been mentioned. But I originally thought having an origin to the iconic Vault Boy image was ridiculous and unnecessary. But now [after rewatching the show] I realize there's an amazing circular concept to it.

It's a bit like the boot-strap paradox in time travel: a well known example being Link giving himself the song to play in Ocarina of time, or, another Cooper, in Interstellar giving the gravity math to his daughter in the past.

But the paradox is in the editing and not actually time travel.

We first see Cooper show his daughter how to judge if a nuclear blast is too big, essentially by doing a thumbs up. Something he refused to do for money just a minute ago, but does so lovingly for his daughter.

Later on he does the thumbs up for Vault Tec, creating the iconic figure / macot for the company. But that scene actually takes place chronologically before the scene with his daughter.

The thumbs up has existed for thousands of years, we know at least since the Roman gladiator times, but it's meaning has evolved obviously.

So by showing both the happy thumbs up, and the "oh, that's a bomb, I should run" one it muddles the meaning of Vault Boy. In a good way. Because Cooper has used both interchangeably as he is an actual war veteran during nuclear times.

There's a subtle sadness and patheticism to him initially doing it for Vault Tec, that Walton Goggins displays so masfterfully. And that pathetic display is replaced by a stoic restraint when he refuses to make the gesture at the birthday party.

But the latter scene is actually shown to us, the audience, first, changing the meaning of the image and scene. So the first time we actually see him do a thumbs is when a nuclear bomb goes off: kind of creepy when you think about it.

It's a weird mish-mash of two polar opposite images: one a sign of "all good," the other a horrific portent of mass death.

So is Vault Boy actually happy or is he looking at the horizon and deducing his own fate? It's hard to tell now because even Cooper's own conscious mind may not know, and the image was copied from his own improvisation.

With the information from the birthday party scene it's like his own preconcious mind churned it up for display, and he wouldn't know why either. And the way we see him, and by default,all Vault Boys now, in the games and other media has subtly changed.

So basically the thumbs up by Vault Boy now has two meanings: everything is "A-Ok," and, "oh my God, is that a mushroom cloud?" And now that you know, you can't unsee it.

Every time I see Vault Boy now I can't help but think of poor, pathetic Cooper, getting used, like so many others. Did one influence the other, and come first, or did they emerge at the same time? Is Cooper happy, sad, terrified at what he sees – it's hard to tell because it's just a cartoon image. Or is it?

It's a strange meta thing that the producers snuck in the show, and I haven't heard many people talk about. But I think it's pretty clever because it's given the image even more depth.

Maybe this has been mentioned before on this sub, I never know with Reddit, but I haven't caught it. So let me know if you have, and what you think.

TL:DR: The iconic Vault Boy image has gone thru a subversive change now with Cooper, and the show, and it's quite a meta pickle honestly.

From a civilian perspective, wasting time measuring a mushroom cloud instead of erring on the assumption that you'll live if you take cover ASAP makes little sense.

However! Cooper said this was advice the Army taught to soldiers. If a soldier in combat has already received a lethal dose of radiation, it might actually make more strategic sense to have them continue to fight to the last breath instead of seeking shelter. They will not be living to fight another day. So it might be worth risking a few extra seconds of exposure to have soldiers take a moment to determine if they're dead men walking. If they are, they might as well take as much of the enemy down with them as they can. And a person with nothing left to lose is an especially dangerous thing. They don't have to worry about making it out alive, so strategies that are suicide missions are no longer off the table. Might as well go out in a blaze of glory, right?

There's a lot of great discussion about the implications of ghoul serum and how it fits or changes how we understand the process of ghouls becoming feral. On thing I don't really see mentioned are the context clues that point to it being derived from ghouls themselves. The most glaring is that the serum dispensary literally has a bunch of ghouls locked in cages. The show also makes a point to highlight Coop enjoying various foods and choosing not to engage in cannibalism. For example in his intro, he doesn't eat any of the bounty hunters like they thought he might and even lets the poor chicken go. In the junk town shootout, he really enjoys those cherry tomatoes. Then later when he's looking for Moldaver, he finds it funny that the father thought he was eating the little girl. But what does he do when he visits his friend and finds he doesn't have any vials left? He mercy kills him and immediately starts chowing down + makes some ass jerky for later. Could be he was just trying to get any of the remaining serum in that guy's system, but it still stands out as a calculated act rather than ravenous hunger.

I'm thinking that they could really expand the series by making some feature length movies. The first one that comes to mind is Star Trek for some reason.

Like seriously the actor got the spirit of Mr House right and his raspy voice fits the character of Mr House very well. Oh no he doesn’t sound super eccentric all the damn time and has a raspy voice so therefore he’s a bad adaptation of Mr House. Like nothing about his calculating and charismatic gentleman demeanor that both version of Mr House share? It’s not like Batman has multiple interpretation of him where they sound different from each other and every single one of them from Kevin Conroy to Christian Bale to Ben Affleck got the premise of Batman right in terms of the aesthetics of their character.

I haven’t seen a single valid argument because the majority of the arguments I have seen are just “Different so therefore it’s bad”.

Just a giggle post. What are some of the most ridiculous things you've seen ppl want or think with the show?

I've seen many ppl want to have cameos from the player characters from the games, and I've seen lots of ppl want to see specific characters/factions like children of atom, liberty prime, institute, etc etc when they make no sense lore wise.

What hear ye?

Hi,

Episode 4, Lucy talks about her mother and father having trouble finding food in 2077 after the bombs. But Lucy is in the timeline 219 years later. How come her father and mother was alive 219 years ago?

Also In that same episode vault 33 guys tried to interrogate one of their attackers and said - it must have been lonely for him for those 200 years..

Are all people immortal or what? I only assumed ghouls were immortal a d lasted those 219 years...

Thanks

Watching the show, and rewatching, none of Bud’s Buds seem in any way impressive or notable. Bud himself is fricking clown shoes, and I can hardly believe he’s taken seriously at all. Definitely expect to find that 31’s quest for the managerial Kwisatch Haderach is nothing but another vault game the powers that be let happen to distract from the real goal of Vault Tec and the rest of the plutocracy. (I’ve never played the games, so if this was already obvious well that’s why it’s new to me.)

I admittedly don’t know the ins and outs of the FO lore. But the children of Atom were always my favorite faction. So strange and fascinating. I always kind of thought they had a similarity to the sparrows in game of thrones and I could totally see the story line playing out in the same way.

Do you think there’s a chance we’ll get to see them fleshed out in the show? Honestly I think they have the potential to be more interesting in the show than the games.

Just noticed that. The house with a swimming pool in first episode (the nuking scene) is the same house used in s01e05 scene "a spirited debate" - around 31:08