There seem to be some complaints from a die-hard section of the Fallout community that believes the declared-canon Fallout TV show on Amazon has made the events of New Vegas non-canon. But at worst, it’s a confusing date shown in the show for half a second, at best, it’s totally explainable and New Vegas was not made non-canon at all. And if you watch the entire series, you know just how important it is and will be to the TV series. Spoilers for the show follow.
The complaint is that the “Fall of Shady Sands” takes place before the events of New Vegas, which people are interpreting to mean that’s when it was nuked, as shown in the show. That would mess up the timeline. However, people have pointed out that “the Fall of Shady Sands” could simply mean the beginning of its decline.
The timeline shows the “fall” in 2277. But then the nuke goes off at a different time than that, is the idea. For instance, the “fall” appears to have driven many residents of Shady Sands underground into Vault 4, one of the plotlines from later in the series. This also aligns with Maximus’s apparent age both in the show and when the nuke went off in Shady Sands.
More generally, the reformed NCR is a huge part of the show and of course, the final shot of season 1 is New Vegas itself, hyping fans up that we will be returning to that city in a not-greenlit-but-almost-certainly-happening season 2.
For further clarity, here’s a timeline I saw from Emil Pagliarulo for the entire series:
- Bombs drop – 2077
- Fallout 76 – 2102
- Fallout 1 – 2161
- Fallout Tactics – 2197
- Fallout 2 – 2241
- Fallout 3 – 2277
- Fallout: New Vegas – 2281
- Fallout 4 – 2287
- Fallout TV show – 2296
This idea that Bethesda hates Fallout New Vegas so much that they would try to de-canonize it in the TV show is a conspiracy theory that goes a bit too far and is a bit too based on a date listed on a chalkboard that probably doesn’t mean what people think it does.
It seems pretty clear that the Fallout show is a love letter to the game series, the entire game series, and I think season 2 is likely going to incorporate a lot of elements directly from New Vegas, given that ending and the fact that this only takes place 15 years after the game. A lot of connections to be made. Everyone needs to calm down.
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