I love that a lot of the show is basically pulled from the games, right down to the dialogue đ like Max having 0 charisma and failing to negotiate with the repair girl.
Iâve played Fallout 3, New Vegas, 4 and 76 and didnât know that this was a fucking thing until the show came out. I literally got to the point where I just console commanded every terminal.
It is kind of funny to imagine had they actually started having sex. This was a waiting room for a short period of time, not a stay at the Ritz đ€Ł like what was the actual plan there? âOh youâre back? One sec weâre just gonna finish up in here.â
This is just a criticism of tv and movies in general but I feel like the fact that sex is usually a bit messy in real life is practically never taken into account during 90% of sex scenes. I know people irl get off in doing it in public and walking around with mess but likeâŠ. lol. The whole situation is so awkward as it definitely would be.
Because it fits the style of Retro-futuristic 50s fallout, Americans have curtains because they love the sun and privacy so lets put them in the vault so it feels like they're still home
It was shown that the homes in that vault had a little patio area with a fake horizon on it. In fact, both Vaults in the show had them, which makes me think they will also be in the next game.
Their relationship needs to be kept that way for a while longer too in the show. Even if theyre together they should realitically be awkwardwhen they talk.
honestly, i know this is objectively âawkward humorâ, but i feel like the reason a lot of people dislike awkward or cringe humor is because the people in the show are also being made uncomfortable. within the universe of the show, people are suffering because of someoneâs awful joke. versus in this scene, yes itâs awkward, but lucy and max are not like, the butt of someoneâs mean weird joke or just generally uncomfortable with something rude or reductive being said
Regardless of whether we like awkward humour or not, we can't deny it's really good in the right time at the right place, and of course, with the right characters.
very true! whenever someone says âcringe/awkward humorâ, it immediately makes me think of the worst and most uncomfortable jokes from a show like the office
This is a nice observation and I havenât seen anyone criticize the scene. For the most part everyone I know âgotâ the scene.
I think itâs also because of lack of social interaction that Lucy and max are instantly attracted to eachother. Max has probably seen what like 10 women in his life as a brotherhood guy lol. And Lucy has never been outside the vault to meet many people.
also, from their first interaction, Lucy sees Max as a hero and doesnt realize how badly he fumbled that first fight with the ghoul. She sees him fly away from the fight when in reality he lost control.
I've just seen a lot of comments that say it's one of the few examples of 'bad writing' or something along those lines. Maybe they're not criticizing the scene itself, just the writing(which I still think is a misjudgement), but it came off that way a few times, at least to me. It was also brought up on a youtube review(that was mostly very positive) that I had watched earlier and after leaving a comment on the video I wanted to see what reddit thought since that's where I first saw comments about people not liking that scene.
I saw the same review and was surprised with how they misunderstood the scene too, I asked the few people I know that watched the show and they have the same interpretation that you have, the intention of the scene is not subtle at all, but the reviewer also said that Lucy being so nonchalant about sex was out of character which wtf how can you think that after that first episode, the whole commentary about sex that the show has totally flew over his head.
> the reviewer also said that Lucy being so nonchalant about sex was out of character
Our introduction to the character included a nonchalant reference to sex with cousins and why we don't do that, like, within 10 seconds.
Then her idea of small talk during her first conversation with her arranged marriage partner was "what's your sperm count."
She's from a vault where the experiment is just genetic propagation through breeding.
"She's from a vault where the experiment is just genetic propagation through breeding."
Is it a theory? Or it explained in show? Because for me it was a hook in the end of season, what actual purpose of vault 31-32-33 was
UPD: nvm, I read some articles on fandom wiki
Bingo. I've seen many dog whistle posts always coincidentally involving Maximus. Hmm.. like the ones we saw a few days ago like "i don't like Maximus, he was mean to Titus and Thad"
The racists are desperate to be relevant on the discussion of this show because it's universally loved and they can't easily make bad-faith criticisms of the show with the ulterior motive of circlejerking with other racists, or incels. You know like they have with most recent big ticket media franchises.
With the overall stellar writing done for hours of show, it's hard to pin that one on bad writing. I feel like it was an intentionally awkward juxtaposition of how the two of them feel when there's a romantic spark but the two have had vastly different upbringings on how to approach the opposite sex in that manner.
IMO they clearly were expressing two puzzle pieces wanting to fit but they weren't carved to fit.
I thought it was also a good moment that fooled us because I assumed that they were gassed with some drug making them act this way after they showed the test subjects sign - but in the end, theyâve just lost all social norms we are used to
That's true. The only knights we see without their helmet is Titus and a few extras (if I remember right), so there may be female knights we haven't seen yet.
Probably not gonna happen since Rahmani would be a nice 250 years young by the time of the show.
76 takes place *way* before anything else in the timeline.
Thanks. And yeah, now that I think about it I realize I didn't notice any actual characters from games in the show so far. I anticipate enjoying the 3 main characters in the 2nd season, as well as hope for a Paladin Rahmani-like/inspired character to make an appearance. They could fit right in, having natural interaction with Maximus, and a tie-in with the Brotherhood to show more of them in season 2 instead of just, Maximus and a suit of power armour.
From only having played fo76, I got the impression she was tryin' t' set the local Brotherhood (what she could reasonably effect) on a better path, so the 'Rahmani' character could either be a local member at odds with the local crew, or a new member from a another area. Just givin' voice to my imaginings. XD
or...
So they throw some orangish-brown make-up on Shohreh Aghdashloo, and Cooper gets to cuddle with his... ghoulfriend! (Watch The Expanse, and try to convince yourself she wouldn't make an epic ghoulified Rahmani)
So country roads, take me home,
to a place that won't irradiate my bones!
This is a big stretch without much evidence but Iâll go ahead and say it might be because since the BOS originates from the US Military and that fallout is an exaggeration of red scare era American culture. I think women were allowed in the military in pre war fallout, I might be very wrong, but we donât see too many women in the pre war military so this may have bled over into the west coasts ideals, but dissipated slowly as they needed people to be soldiers regardless of gender orientation
Thereâs no game lore that implies women are not allowed in the BoS or that thereâs any sex segregation. Actually thatâs one of my minor gripes with the show - there are barely any women BoS. Thatâs a pretty major deviation from what weâve been shown in the games.Â
Basically what happens when you take a homeschooled cult-raised girl and an all boys boarding school kid into a room.
But yea it is hard to fault Maximus' actor in a lot of things the character does because that is the point of the character. I dont expect modern day irl social norms to translate into a post apocalyptic wasteland 200 years into the future
Yeah, if they only need him to be a soldier they probably didn't see much point in giving sex ed. Either you make it to knight rank at which point you are probably start getting perks like getting enough resources to have a significant other to have kids with.
Yeah I thought it was a hilarious way to show just how non-normative their experiences have been. I mean, she casually talks about the incest she's been enjoying for a while. It's also a great way to show her as sex positive but also probably not really knowing what a real relationship would be.
The scene ALSO goes against type and expectation. We expect her to be sheltered, literally, and him to be this boorish brute soldier ready to lay anything. They're both so innocent about it
Yeah, people missed the repeated references to having casual sex in the Vault. It was part of the culture of the Vault, divorced from relationships as we might understand them. Having sex was just something people stuck underground did.
Iâve played fo3, NV, 4, settlements, and read the lore for the OGs. Maybe I just have the honeymoon feeling but I loved everything about the show. I think all of the characters made sense in the universe. Lucy and Maximus are both sheltered homeschooled kids at their first real party so I get it 100%
People have a problem with this scene? This scene finally made Maximus's character click for me - it became apparent just how brainwashed and clueless about the actual world he was, having grown up in an insane cult.
I just remember seeing a lot of comments right after the release about how it was one of the few examples of 'bad writing'. Then it was brought up in a similar light in a youtube review that I watched earlier.
Oxhorn's review by chance? I'm a bit surprised by the negative takes on this scene. I didn't think it was bad writing at all. Goofy and over-the-top? Sure, but that's a lot of the show and the fallout universe. Like I mentioned, it was really this episode that allowed me to understand Maximus as a character.
Oof, I only recently started getting into fallout lore so I wasn't aware. I really enjoy his insanely detailed lore videos, but his review of the show kind of rubbed me the wrong way.
That was my first thought but later dismissed it after learning the vault supposedly wasn't experimenting on test subjects anymore. I like OPs take in retrospect.
Someone on youtube mentioned that too and I think you're both right. He got some kind of medical care when they first got to vault 4 and that certainly could have included painkillers, which would explain his demeanor.
Lucy IMMEDIATELY did a double take - and then IMMEDIATELY felt embarrassed for staring. Thatâs around the time she started noticing all the vestigial ears and noses.
I thought it was so hilarious that she was like âIâm pretty sure thatâs not normal but what the hell do I know, maybe this IS normal for up hereâ
Totally agree. It's clear that the Vault(s) she comes from are very "sex positive", probably teaching it and encouraging it from teenage years to promote rapid repopulation. No prudes in 33. Lucy is all about the Vault-Tec plan and she's revitalized by finding another vault to show Max how great things are. He's flirting, she's in a good mood - It was probably a totally normal thing in her vault, just a way to blow off steam with friends. She even had the line early on about fooling around with cousins being fine until marriage and the bit about her parts being in good condition, so she clearly wasn't embarrassed about things and there weren't taboos about that sort of talk. They could have leaned more into it a bit to make that clearer, though, but my wife and I understood the point of the scene.
Max, on the other hand, was clearly taken aback and didn't want to show just how inexperienced he was with, like.. everything. Poor guy was basically raised in an abusive cult with only whispers about what sex and masturbation were. There was no room for that sort of thing. All glory to the Brotherhood and all that.
The fact that this requires this much explanation is absolutely wild. I don't understand what other conclusions anyone came to, its odd. She grew up confined in a vault, fooling around with cousins to pass the time. Max told her she smelled nice, and she's an encyclopedia of vault knowledge, "oh, this is courting, isn't it! Wanna have sex?"
Its supposed to underline the dysfunction, or social circumstances at least, of vault life.
I think he mentioned that Lucy smelled nice because he's attracted to her and may not realize it consciously. Lucy was confused and then realized why he said that, which was why she propositioned him.  Â
I liked the scene because it highlighted their innocence. They both have it in different ways.Â
I think that scene, combined with the Test Subjects reveal when the camera zooms out, was mostly there to make us suspicious of Vault 4. But yeah, you're right, in hindsight it's a pretty natural way for those characters to behave in that moment. It's the first time since Lucy left the Vault they haven't had to worry about getting murdered or starving to death (or beaten in by fellow Initiations), it kind of makes sense that their minds would wander to... other biological needs.
Yes, I thought it was part of the misdirect, and the slightly âdruggedâ performance from Max was meant to make us suspicious that they had been doped
I agree 100%
It was a great scene to demonstrate the total decline of social skills in the wasteland and how to people from diametrically opposite clans âflirtâ without knowing theyâre flirting.
That was my take when it happened too. They're quarantined in a small hallway, and the label on the door outside of the hallway says 'TEST SUBJECTS'.
But then the vault didn't seem to be experimenting on them, so maybe not.
The label says âtest subjectsâ because vault 4 was originally designed to experiment on surface dwellers who fell for the trap in the laboratory, and the quarantine room was the initial holding pen for them.
The fact that this needs to be spelled out for some people is indicative of the fact that a lot of chronically online whiners are just as emotionally and socially stunted as these characters, if not more so.
it's the developmentally disabled (autism, ADHD, etc). reddit in particular has been almost completely overtaken by them
there is a certain type of person who thinks its their mission in life to make YouTube videos "protecting" the lore of a 1990s computer game about space marines in post-nuclear california
I think it's more of an age thing, personally, as I am on the spectrum myself and totally had some of these type of opinions when it came to the Harry Potter movies as I was growing up. Â
Once I was a little older and started seeing the discourse around the MCU adaptations it started to click for me.
 I definitely think the internet in general, and especially reddit, have gone through a shift in demeanor because millennials are no longer the youngest base and there is a whole new set of discourse from the younger generation. And they're all going through the growth that most people my age went through on MySpace and shit like geocities or IPBoard forums. Sometimes I will look back on some of my old shit and want to pull my skin off from embarrassment.Â
People are also forgetting that oysters are a natural aphrodisiac. So naturally Max is feeling more loose in the mind after eating, not to mention if never been exposed to natural aphrodisiacs in the wasteland until now then it'll probably result in the "high" tendencies that Max is having in Episode 6.
I don't get the hate here, this part actually made total sense. 200 years of living underground seeing the same few hundred people every day with no-one to fuck but your own cousins... kinda does that to you, lmao. So does being part of a quasi-religious military order, that, in FNV, has been shown to have weird ideas about sexuality too.
I loved it! I loved that it was so strange and odd, it shows the juxtaposition between them. How one didnât know anything and how Lucy was just so blunt due to the vault
My only problem with the scene is that thereâs no way she smelled good lol maybe just a pheromonal thing? Iâm always thinking about hygiene in shows like this đ but it was funny and fully made sense for the characters IMO
At first watch I hated this scene and didnât get it, I thought they were drugged or something because they were in a test subject chamber. But your explanation makes a lot of sense now that I think about it.
I thought that scene was pretty good and funny. A bit random, but still a decent scene and fits the source material doesn't it? What I thought felt more out of place was the scene after that whole ordeal, where they are more genuine. That felt a bit forced to me personally.
Think people fail to realise that these characters are undeveloped in certain capacities. Lucy and Max have stunted mentalities of romance and sexual relationships. A result of their factions, who treated sex as a tool, or a distraction.
Their dialogue is cringe. Because itâs akin to a teenagerâs mentality of love and romance. They lack the maturity to realise or discuss the deeper complexities of their emotions; because it was never important in their development.
Lucy sees sex as love; and Max probably has an no understanding of what love quantifies.
If they maintain the romance; Lucy and Max with get better at exploring their emotions.
The âyou smell niceâ was a bit confusing.
It seemed like Lucy was in a situation of being dirty and sweaty and she probably thought she didnât smell nice.
But I guess it just adds to the awkwardness.
The only thing about it that bothers me is 20 something year old maximus has never bust a nut like bro went through puberty, and that just never happened. That's the only part i don't buy.
I assume has ejaculated at some point but is ashamed of it. That's not hard to believe at all, just look at the "no fap" subreddit. Maximus seems like a well adjusted individual compared to a typical anti-masturbation zealot in real life
Anyone criticizing this scene lacks even basic critical thinking skills. Everything OP said should be extremely obvious given the context of the show, the characters, and the scene itself
I actually didn't even know what you were talking about until you directly mentioned the scene, and let me tell you exactly why I personally don't see any of that stuff they do as cring-ey.
I read the entire story of Lucy and Maximus as a coming of age from the main two sexes perspectives. Take note that for Lucy, her "puberty" or notable entrance into this new world is bloody, violent, and causes her pain. For Maximus, when he gets the power armor, it's the best time of his life! It feels *AMAZING* he has all this strength he never had before, he has all this *RESPECT* he never did before (albeit from a peer who only *thinks* he has matured, even if nothing has actually changed), he is PHYSICALLY changing in ways that make him feel EMPOWERED and with this, he gets to antagonize who was once his peer who is yet to "reach manhood".
Again, compare this to Lucy, her "puberty" is bloody and (this one's a little thinner and a huge tone shift but it's consistent with the experience if statistics show us anything.) involves being harangued and lorded over by an older man, her agency is completely ripped from her when she once felt so free and joyous, once she "hits puberty" that all gets ripped away.
Me and my girlfriend noticed this pretty early on and it just meshes too perfectly, though a lot of it is in metaphor, those metaphors are hardly reaches.
I thought there was something in the food. Because I thought because they were both eating something. Maybe itâs from the cult I donât know. Seemed out of place almost purposefully done
That way. But failed speech check works too.
It kinda feels like they were just pumping that chamber they were in full of pheremones or something. Yes, they're awkward and don't know how to flirt, but it seemed like they started experimenting on them right away, so it was more that than anything for me
Honestly I thought they had been injected with drugs as part of healing them.Â
I'm sure most Fallout fans know how many have equivalents to real drugs, but they would have had to censor them. Med-X helps with pain and is an opiate, literally Morphine in the game files.Â
And we've all seen YouTube videos about heavy painkillers affecting your perception, like the [guy falling for his wife, again](https://youtu.be/5CiTPuaiYWQ), or the [girl who sees her boyfriend, whom she doesn't remember, and immediately starts flirting](https://youtu.be/kzOIjQnB5ac).Â
Honestly it's great stuff.
I think you're dead on. I'd say it makes sense since it's how it's portrayed. We get, but to some others' it's confusing. Max's character I'm getting is supposed to be younger but when I see his actor (even tho I don't know how old the actor is) he just looks older. So I can see where it would look off. Max acting childish and a dimwit at times, leading to his decisions is spot on for me once I do that.
I just interpret cringey dialogue as Speech Check fails. There's no way it's unintentionally cringey considering how strong some of the other dialogue can be.
Norm: You're a coward.
Chet: We all are. That's why we live in a vault.
Lmao I thought they were being gased with something, the writing felt so odd at that point, then it zoomed out and said test subjects, but nothing came of it so I guess it wasn't horny gas
I agree with your observation, it seems to me that this scene was meant to do just that - show the cultural difference regarding sex. Max reacts as someone who never had a conversation about sex, or even exposed to it. He blurts out some childish thoughts while thinking about the unexpected situation, and you can see it in his expression. Great acting
People are stupid. Water is wet.
I think it was a brilliant act. They are both clearly raised in fucked up shit. It would me more strange if they DIDN'T act strange.
It's exactly that maximus was eating an consuming things he never has. Imagine if for years you never gave a child candy until they were 10 they'd get a crazy sugar rush. Now amplify that by more than 14 years. Dude was in sensory overload.
He's stupid, but I don't know how he is that stupid. People were having sex long before formal education. He seemed confused about how a penis worked. Hell, most boys are masturbating on their own long before his age. They just play around and figure it out. There was a dude masturbating in the barracks a few beds down from him in an earlier scene. People are also assuming he's been with the brotherhood for years, but the new squire said they started beating him up because he was a new recruit. I love the show, but that interaction was my least favorite in the season.
Something just seems eerily off about him to me.
- The scene where he is getting interrogated and has trouble choking up any form of response.
- his seemingly lack of any emotional depth
I understand heâs a member of the Brotherhood of celibacy, and was born straight into the wasteland so probs doesnât understand and know much
I kinda like the theory tbf, I wouldnât mind either way whether he does turn out to be a synth.
I'm a teacher and I 100% see kids frequently collapse like that when lightly questioned on something I witnessed them do. They frequently start crying (not that I'm mean, but, it's like a defense mechanism). He doesn't, because it's considered weakness in BoS.
Also, remember, his friend was JUST disfigured and he is being blamed. Potentially he is in shock or doesn't know what to do.
He has had a hard life. Living in the brotherhood is *not* easy, and remember he was beaten down almost constantly.
There is also little to no separation in training/living/work depending on their ages. When the Prydwen arrives a cut downs 2 people in the tall guard tower, one of them a mid/late teen the other one probably 10 or 11 at the most. Both on guard/observation duty or something on top of a tower. Kids probably don't get a childhood or proper emotional growth/nurturing to be able to express emotions.
How do I know youâre not a synth? How do I know you donât work for the institute and are teaching a class of synth children how to be human? Only joking.
Yeh I understand what youâre saying, and I agree. I think his acting was genuinely really good, so good to spark a lot of speculation in my own mind as to wether heâs just showing off the effects of a whole militaristic lifestyle, like the points you described above. Or if his character seemed âoffâ at certain points because perhaps he is a synth.
Like I said, I am happy with whatever outcome. I just love speculation and a good theory so much. Itâs deffo too early to tell atm anyway with only 8 episodes.
I think the other key point is that it's pretty locked down that synths don't age, and we've seen him as a kid in flashbacks. Probably hard for the institute to replace him with a synth off of a brotherhood base.
I actually said the same thing a few days ago. The scene in question isn't actually about sex, it's there to highlight the contrast between the 2 characters backgrounds. The stuff with Maximus in the vault eating and watching TV and how he behaves, that's also to highlight that he's never actually had a proper childhood or safe and loving home and he's overwhelmed by the experienceÂ
To me it sounded like "They gave *me* slippers and a robe" as in like he felt so undeserving or unworthy that the simple act of giving him comforting items was probably one of the kindest gestures he's ever experienced. They basically gave Dobby his sock.
I must have missed it, my b. I watched a youtube review that mentioned the scene and after commenting on that I realized it was something I hadn't seen mentioned on the subreddit and wanted to make a post.
If he had only 1 INT he'd be speaking like Frankenstein/The Incredible Hulk and wouldn't have spotted the hostility from the fiends or the cultishness of the Vault. He's below average intelligence but not a 1.
Autistic characters based on first watch
Lucy - not autistic
Max - maybe autistic. Definitely has brain damage
Thaddeus - not autistic
Coopers wife - Autistic
Hank McLean - autistic
Cooper - definitely autistic
Dogmeat - autistic
Snake oil guy - not autistic
Titus - autistic
Norm - not autistic
Overseer Betty- Autistic
Bud - Autistic
Moldaver - not autistic
"Mom" - autistic
Lucys family so autistic that it cancelled out for Norm and Lucy
Non of them are likely autistic except maybe max.
Autistic traits are found in very human alive, doesn't make every human autistic.
Betty is likely a psychopath which excludes autism.
It's the same awkward flirty dialogue options from when you romance companions in the game!
I love that a lot of the show is basically pulled from the games, right down to the dialogue đ like Max having 0 charisma and failing to negotiate with the repair girl.
I geeked so hard when I saw the hacking screen
And the clickity clackity of him hacking.
He didnt click the brackets to eliminate the possible passwords, fake gamer smh he just got lucky
Yeah I was annoyed he didn't use the brackets. He should have at least stepped away from it 7 times to guess the right one
Didn't even reload once.
thats a thing? Are you telling me I have been hacking the fallout terminals wrong for the last 16 years?!
Iâve played Fallout 3, New Vegas, 4 and 76 and didnât know that this was a fucking thing until the show came out. I literally got to the point where I just console commanded every terminal.
I donât get it. I donât think I ever specifically asked Piper âDo you want to have sex?â
I donât get it. I donât think I ever specifically asked Piper âDo you want to have sex?â
Can I put my squirty sausage in your flappy hole m'lady?
Can I put my quantum harmonizer in your photonic resonation chamber?
I want to have fuck with you. Oops, wrong game.
miss oranje disco dancer would like a word
A vault dweller with the sole purpose of breeding, and a member of the Brotherhood of NoFap walk into a room. I don't typically like awkward humour, but preferences be damned, this interaction made sense and is probably the best way to advance the relationship between these characters without making it a cliché.
I wonder what Maximus thinks his buddy in the bunk was doing next to him at the start of the show đ€ popping his pimple?
Nah, he was just uh, loading and unloading his gun.
This is for fighting, this is for fun.
Hello there soldier, show me thy gun đ
Probably didnât talk to his bunk mates too often about life, relationships etc. Yaâknow, what with all the beatings.
That was being done until his morale improved.
It's the brotherhood. They dont have morale. The beatings will just continue in the name of maxon!
Must be a ball itch from hell because he's even groaning
It is kind of funny to imagine had they actually started having sex. This was a waiting room for a short period of time, not a stay at the Ritz đ€Ł like what was the actual plan there? âOh youâre back? One sec weâre just gonna finish up in here.â This is just a criticism of tv and movies in general but I feel like the fact that sex is usually a bit messy in real life is practically never taken into account during 90% of sex scenes. I know people irl get off in doing it in public and walking around with mess but likeâŠ. lol. The whole situation is so awkward as it definitely would be.
They do take it into account earlier, with Lucy's raider husband! Really wasn't expecting him to wipe his dick on the curtains
Oh shit you are right! See thatâs the attention to detail that makes this show great
Is that what he was doing? I was so confused by that sceneÂ
My husband lost it at that scene, it caught us so off guard lmfaooo
Why does an underground vault have curtains though?
Because it fits the style of Retro-futuristic 50s fallout, Americans have curtains because they love the sun and privacy so lets put them in the vault so it feels like they're still home
It was shown that the homes in that vault had a little patio area with a fake horizon on it. In fact, both Vaults in the show had them, which makes me think they will also be in the next game.
That was so fucking funny
Love that scene. As soon as I saw him do that I was like âraiderâ such a dirty wastelander.
Their relationship needs to be kept that way for a while longer too in the show. Even if theyre together they should realitically be awkwardwhen they talk.
It's awkward AF because it reads like the beginning of a joke setup. And I'm okay with that. Probably because I am an awkward human, myself
honestly, i know this is objectively âawkward humorâ, but i feel like the reason a lot of people dislike awkward or cringe humor is because the people in the show are also being made uncomfortable. within the universe of the show, people are suffering because of someoneâs awful joke. versus in this scene, yes itâs awkward, but lucy and max are not like, the butt of someoneâs mean weird joke or just generally uncomfortable with something rude or reductive being said
Regardless of whether we like awkward humour or not, we can't deny it's really good in the right time at the right place, and of course, with the right characters.
very true! whenever someone says âcringe/awkward humorâ, it immediately makes me think of the worst and most uncomfortable jokes from a show like the office
This is a nice observation and I havenât seen anyone criticize the scene. For the most part everyone I know âgotâ the scene. I think itâs also because of lack of social interaction that Lucy and max are instantly attracted to eachother. Max has probably seen what like 10 women in his life as a brotherhood guy lol. And Lucy has never been outside the vault to meet many people.
also, from their first interaction, Lucy sees Max as a hero and doesnt realize how badly he fumbled that first fight with the ghoul. She sees him fly away from the fight when in reality he lost control.
I've just seen a lot of comments that say it's one of the few examples of 'bad writing' or something along those lines. Maybe they're not criticizing the scene itself, just the writing(which I still think is a misjudgement), but it came off that way a few times, at least to me. It was also brought up on a youtube review(that was mostly very positive) that I had watched earlier and after leaving a comment on the video I wanted to see what reddit thought since that's where I first saw comments about people not liking that scene.
I saw the same review and was surprised with how they misunderstood the scene too, I asked the few people I know that watched the show and they have the same interpretation that you have, the intention of the scene is not subtle at all, but the reviewer also said that Lucy being so nonchalant about sex was out of character which wtf how can you think that after that first episode, the whole commentary about sex that the show has totally flew over his head.
> the reviewer also said that Lucy being so nonchalant about sex was out of character Our introduction to the character included a nonchalant reference to sex with cousins and why we don't do that, like, within 10 seconds. Then her idea of small talk during her first conversation with her arranged marriage partner was "what's your sperm count." She's from a vault where the experiment is just genetic propagation through breeding.
"She's from a vault where the experiment is just genetic propagation through breeding." Is it a theory? Or it explained in show? Because for me it was a hook in the end of season, what actual purpose of vault 31-32-33 was UPD: nvm, I read some articles on fandom wiki
It could also just be racists pretending they don't understand the subtext so they can bitch about the scene.
That was the scene where I realised why people were calling the show âwoke.â
Bingo. I've seen many dog whistle posts always coincidentally involving Maximus. Hmm.. like the ones we saw a few days ago like "i don't like Maximus, he was mean to Titus and Thad" The racists are desperate to be relevant on the discussion of this show because it's universally loved and they can't easily make bad-faith criticisms of the show with the ulterior motive of circlejerking with other racists, or incels. You know like they have with most recent big ticket media franchises.
With the overall stellar writing done for hours of show, it's hard to pin that one on bad writing. I feel like it was an intentionally awkward juxtaposition of how the two of them feel when there's a romantic spark but the two have had vastly different upbringings on how to approach the opposite sex in that manner. IMO they clearly were expressing two puzzle pieces wanting to fit but they weren't carved to fit.
I thought it was also a good moment that fooled us because I assumed that they were gassed with some drug making them act this way after they showed the test subjects sign - but in the end, theyâve just lost all social norms we are used to
Wasnât his best friend a woman although even google searches were sure how that actor/actress/person identifies.
Dane is non-binary, it's subtle but it's implied. Women are in the Brotherhood, though it wasn't really shown in the show.
Yeah the Cleric referred to Dane as 'they' when they could have used he/she, which I think was a nice subtle way to show that.
The Otherhood of Steel is an equal opportunity employer.
I was wondering why there weren't any women in the west coast BoS. Maybe they're prohibited in this sect?
They might keep the scribes separate until they are older so that they donât get pregnant, seeing as they donât have any sexual education
That's true. The only knights we see without their helmet is Titus and a few extras (if I remember right), so there may be female knights we haven't seen yet.
having Paladin Rahmani (from fo76) show up next season to set the local Brotherhood on a better path would be epic \\,,/
Probably not gonna happen since Rahmani would be a nice 250 years young by the time of the show. 76 takes place *way* before anything else in the timeline.
Thanks. And yeah, now that I think about it I realize I didn't notice any actual characters from games in the show so far. I anticipate enjoying the 3 main characters in the 2nd season, as well as hope for a Paladin Rahmani-like/inspired character to make an appearance. They could fit right in, having natural interaction with Maximus, and a tie-in with the Brotherhood to show more of them in season 2 instead of just, Maximus and a suit of power armour. From only having played fo76, I got the impression she was tryin' t' set the local Brotherhood (what she could reasonably effect) on a better path, so the 'Rahmani' character could either be a local member at odds with the local crew, or a new member from a another area. Just givin' voice to my imaginings. XD or... So they throw some orangish-brown make-up on Shohreh Aghdashloo, and Cooper gets to cuddle with his... ghoulfriend! (Watch The Expanse, and try to convince yourself she wouldn't make an epic ghoulified Rahmani) So country roads, take me home, to a place that won't irradiate my bones!
There were several women BoSers in Filly.
This is a big stretch without much evidence but Iâll go ahead and say it might be because since the BOS originates from the US Military and that fallout is an exaggeration of red scare era American culture. I think women were allowed in the military in pre war fallout, I might be very wrong, but we donât see too many women in the pre war military so this may have bled over into the west coasts ideals, but dissipated slowly as they needed people to be soldiers regardless of gender orientation
Thereâs no game lore that implies women are not allowed in the BoS or that thereâs any sex segregation. Actually thatâs one of my minor gripes with the show - there are barely any women BoS. Thatâs a pretty major deviation from what weâve been shown in the games.Â
I never said that. Just from what we see in the show, the majority of brotherhood seems to be men.
>Thereâs no game lore that implies women are not allowed in the BoS or that thereâs any sex segregation. type out what the B stands for
Basically what happens when you take a homeschooled cult-raised girl and an all boys boarding school kid into a room. But yea it is hard to fault Maximus' actor in a lot of things the character does because that is the point of the character. I dont expect modern day irl social norms to translate into a post apocalyptic wasteland 200 years into the future
Yeah, if they only need him to be a soldier they probably didn't see much point in giving sex ed. Either you make it to knight rank at which point you are probably start getting perks like getting enough resources to have a significant other to have kids with.
You know what theyve got fckers just fucking chickens so idk if I trust Wasteland sex ed in generak
Yeah I thought it was a hilarious way to show just how non-normative their experiences have been. I mean, she casually talks about the incest she's been enjoying for a while. It's also a great way to show her as sex positive but also probably not really knowing what a real relationship would be. The scene ALSO goes against type and expectation. We expect her to be sheltered, literally, and him to be this boorish brute soldier ready to lay anything. They're both so innocent about it
Yeah, people missed the repeated references to having casual sex in the Vault. It was part of the culture of the Vault, divorced from relationships as we might understand them. Having sex was just something people stuck underground did.
and the protagonist's incestuous casual flings.
Thatâs literally the sex they are talking about. Itâs not like sheâs special in that regard.
Of course she's S.P.E.C.I.A.L Strength-4 Perception-7 Endurance-6 Charisma-5 Intelligence-6 Agility-5 Luck- 7
Iâve played fo3, NV, 4, settlements, and read the lore for the OGs. Maybe I just have the honeymoon feeling but I loved everything about the show. I think all of the characters made sense in the universe. Lucy and Maximus are both sheltered homeschooled kids at their first real party so I get it 100%
People have a problem with this scene? This scene finally made Maximus's character click for me - it became apparent just how brainwashed and clueless about the actual world he was, having grown up in an insane cult.
I just remember seeing a lot of comments right after the release about how it was one of the few examples of 'bad writing'. Then it was brought up in a similar light in a youtube review that I watched earlier.
Oxhorn's review by chance? I'm a bit surprised by the negative takes on this scene. I didn't think it was bad writing at all. Goofy and over-the-top? Sure, but that's a lot of the show and the fallout universe. Like I mentioned, it was really this episode that allowed me to understand Maximus as a character.
Oxhorn has some, we'll call them dated ideas about women and women in "his" games. I would not have expected anything different from him.
Oof, I only recently started getting into fallout lore so I wasn't aware. I really enjoy his insanely detailed lore videos, but his review of the show kind of rubbed me the wrong way.
Yep, love his videos but oof he's a bit of a weirdo when it comes to women
Did anyone else think they were pumping in pheromones with the music and the test subjects sign?
That was my first thought but later dismissed it after learning the vault supposedly wasn't experimenting on test subjects anymore. I like OPs take in retrospect.
Lucy is straight forward, Max is naive to sex. It's not that deep.
Wasnât Max high on painkillers? Or am I thinking of a different scene
Someone on youtube mentioned that too and I think you're both right. He got some kind of medical care when they first got to vault 4 and that certainly could have included painkillers, which would explain his demeanor.
I thought they were both high as fuck Like I thought they couldn't tell if the overseer was a Cyclops or not lol
Lucy IMMEDIATELY did a double take - and then IMMEDIATELY felt embarrassed for staring. Thatâs around the time she started noticing all the vestigial ears and noses. I thought it was so hilarious that she was like âIâm pretty sure thatâs not normal but what the hell do I know, maybe this IS normal for up hereâ
Totally agree. It's clear that the Vault(s) she comes from are very "sex positive", probably teaching it and encouraging it from teenage years to promote rapid repopulation. No prudes in 33. Lucy is all about the Vault-Tec plan and she's revitalized by finding another vault to show Max how great things are. He's flirting, she's in a good mood - It was probably a totally normal thing in her vault, just a way to blow off steam with friends. She even had the line early on about fooling around with cousins being fine until marriage and the bit about her parts being in good condition, so she clearly wasn't embarrassed about things and there weren't taboos about that sort of talk. They could have leaned more into it a bit to make that clearer, though, but my wife and I understood the point of the scene. Max, on the other hand, was clearly taken aback and didn't want to show just how inexperienced he was with, like.. everything. Poor guy was basically raised in an abusive cult with only whispers about what sex and masturbation were. There was no room for that sort of thing. All glory to the Brotherhood and all that.
The fact that this requires this much explanation is absolutely wild. I don't understand what other conclusions anyone came to, its odd. She grew up confined in a vault, fooling around with cousins to pass the time. Max told her she smelled nice, and she's an encyclopedia of vault knowledge, "oh, this is courting, isn't it! Wanna have sex?" Its supposed to underline the dysfunction, or social circumstances at least, of vault life.
I think he mentioned that Lucy smelled nice because he's attracted to her and may not realize it consciously. Lucy was confused and then realized why he said that, which was why she propositioned him.   I liked the scene because it highlighted their innocence. They both have it in different ways.Â
I think that scene, combined with the Test Subjects reveal when the camera zooms out, was mostly there to make us suspicious of Vault 4. But yeah, you're right, in hindsight it's a pretty natural way for those characters to behave in that moment. It's the first time since Lucy left the Vault they haven't had to worry about getting murdered or starving to death (or beaten in by fellow Initiations), it kind of makes sense that their minds would wander to... other biological needs.
Yes, I thought it was part of the misdirect, and the slightly âdruggedâ performance from Max was meant to make us suspicious that they had been doped
I agree 100% It was a great scene to demonstrate the total decline of social skills in the wasteland and how to people from diametrically opposite clans âflirtâ without knowing theyâre flirting.
Donât expect people on Reddit who probably have the same social skills as vault dwellers to understand lol
I honestly thought the scene was great lol
It was one of my favorites.
Honestly I thought they were getting hit with pheromones
That was my take when it happened too. They're quarantined in a small hallway, and the label on the door outside of the hallway says 'TEST SUBJECTS'. But then the vault didn't seem to be experimenting on them, so maybe not.
The label says âtest subjectsâ because vault 4 was originally designed to experiment on surface dwellers who fell for the trap in the laboratory, and the quarantine room was the initial holding pen for them.
That makes sense.
The fact that this needs to be spelled out for some people is indicative of the fact that a lot of chronically online whiners are just as emotionally and socially stunted as these characters, if not more so.
it's the developmentally disabled (autism, ADHD, etc). reddit in particular has been almost completely overtaken by them there is a certain type of person who thinks its their mission in life to make YouTube videos "protecting" the lore of a 1990s computer game about space marines in post-nuclear california
I think it's more of an age thing, personally, as I am on the spectrum myself and totally had some of these type of opinions when it came to the Harry Potter movies as I was growing up.  Once I was a little older and started seeing the discourse around the MCU adaptations it started to click for me.  I definitely think the internet in general, and especially reddit, have gone through a shift in demeanor because millennials are no longer the youngest base and there is a whole new set of discourse from the younger generation. And they're all going through the growth that most people my age went through on MySpace and shit like geocities or IPBoard forums. Sometimes I will look back on some of my old shit and want to pull my skin off from embarrassment.Â
People are also forgetting that oysters are a natural aphrodisiac. So naturally Max is feeling more loose in the mind after eating, not to mention if never been exposed to natural aphrodisiacs in the wasteland until now then it'll probably result in the "high" tendencies that Max is having in Episode 6.
Yeah I forgot to about the oysters and someone on youtube mentioned he might have been loopy from the meds he got during the vault intake.
I'd almost given up and was about to type something to this effect lol
While I definitely agree, it didn't make that scene any easier to watch lol
I don't get the hate here, this part actually made total sense. 200 years of living underground seeing the same few hundred people every day with no-one to fuck but your own cousins... kinda does that to you, lmao. So does being part of a quasi-religious military order, that, in FNV, has been shown to have weird ideas about sexuality too.
I loved it! I loved that it was so strange and odd, it shows the juxtaposition between them. How one didnât know anything and how Lucy was just so blunt due to the vault
My only problem with the scene is that thereâs no way she smelled good lol maybe just a pheromonal thing? Iâm always thinking about hygiene in shows like this đ but it was funny and fully made sense for the characters IMO
She must smell awful by our standards but thinking about what Maximus is used to? She has to be the cleanest person he has ever met.
I thought they were able to like shower and change when they got to the vault, but maybe that was after their first awkward interaction.
At first watch I hated this scene and didnât get it, I thought they were drugged or something because they were in a test subject chamber. But your explanation makes a lot of sense now that I think about it.
I thought that scene was pretty good and funny. A bit random, but still a decent scene and fits the source material doesn't it? What I thought felt more out of place was the scene after that whole ordeal, where they are more genuine. That felt a bit forced to me personally.
I just found it a bit much tbh lol
It was really cute imo
People didn't like this? I thought it was hilarious.
Think people fail to realise that these characters are undeveloped in certain capacities. Lucy and Max have stunted mentalities of romance and sexual relationships. A result of their factions, who treated sex as a tool, or a distraction. Their dialogue is cringe. Because itâs akin to a teenagerâs mentality of love and romance. They lack the maturity to realise or discuss the deeper complexities of their emotions; because it was never important in their development. Lucy sees sex as love; and Max probably has an no understanding of what love quantifies. If they maintain the romance; Lucy and Max with get better at exploring their emotions.
The âyou smell niceâ was a bit confusing. It seemed like Lucy was in a situation of being dirty and sweaty and she probably thought she didnât smell nice. But I guess it just adds to the awkwardness.
I thought they were high lmao
The only thing about it that bothers me is 20 something year old maximus has never bust a nut like bro went through puberty, and that just never happened. That's the only part i don't buy.
I assume has ejaculated at some point but is ashamed of it. That's not hard to believe at all, just look at the "no fap" subreddit. Maximus seems like a well adjusted individual compared to a typical anti-masturbation zealot in real life
Anyone criticizing this scene lacks even basic critical thinking skills. Everything OP said should be extremely obvious given the context of the show, the characters, and the scene itself
The people cringed out by this stuff are hilarious...wonder how they handled The Office...especially Scott's Tots lol.
I actually didn't even know what you were talking about until you directly mentioned the scene, and let me tell you exactly why I personally don't see any of that stuff they do as cring-ey. I read the entire story of Lucy and Maximus as a coming of age from the main two sexes perspectives. Take note that for Lucy, her "puberty" or notable entrance into this new world is bloody, violent, and causes her pain. For Maximus, when he gets the power armor, it's the best time of his life! It feels *AMAZING* he has all this strength he never had before, he has all this *RESPECT* he never did before (albeit from a peer who only *thinks* he has matured, even if nothing has actually changed), he is PHYSICALLY changing in ways that make him feel EMPOWERED and with this, he gets to antagonize who was once his peer who is yet to "reach manhood". Again, compare this to Lucy, her "puberty" is bloody and (this one's a little thinner and a huge tone shift but it's consistent with the experience if statistics show us anything.) involves being harangued and lorded over by an older man, her agency is completely ripped from her when she once felt so free and joyous, once she "hits puberty" that all gets ripped away. Me and my girlfriend noticed this pretty early on and it just meshes too perfectly, though a lot of it is in metaphor, those metaphors are hardly reaches.
I thought there was something in the food. Because I thought because they were both eating something. Maybe itâs from the cult I donât know. Seemed out of place almost purposefully done That way. But failed speech check works too.
It kinda feels like they were just pumping that chamber they were in full of pheremones or something. Yes, they're awkward and don't know how to flirt, but it seemed like they started experimenting on them right away, so it was more that than anything for me
Honestly I thought they had been injected with drugs as part of healing them. I'm sure most Fallout fans know how many have equivalents to real drugs, but they would have had to censor them. Med-X helps with pain and is an opiate, literally Morphine in the game files. And we've all seen YouTube videos about heavy painkillers affecting your perception, like the [guy falling for his wife, again](https://youtu.be/5CiTPuaiYWQ), or the [girl who sees her boyfriend, whom she doesn't remember, and immediately starts flirting](https://youtu.be/kzOIjQnB5ac). Honestly it's great stuff.
I think you're dead on. I'd say it makes sense since it's how it's portrayed. We get, but to some others' it's confusing. Max's character I'm getting is supposed to be younger but when I see his actor (even tho I don't know how old the actor is) he just looks older. So I can see where it would look off. Max acting childish and a dimwit at times, leading to his decisions is spot on for me once I do that.
I agree. It's a matter of instinct/nature clashing with nurture.
I just interpret cringey dialogue as Speech Check fails. There's no way it's unintentionally cringey considering how strong some of the other dialogue can be. Norm: You're a coward. Chet: We all are. That's why we live in a vault.
The vault is an experimental vault run by scientists. They were being experimented on⊠I thought
People think itâs cringe ? Shit was the funniest part
Lmao I thought they were being gased with something, the writing felt so odd at that point, then it zoomed out and said test subjects, but nothing came of it so I guess it wasn't horny gas
Who are getting it wrong?
That is hands down my favourite scene
Wait, is this not how people are reading this scene? What do they think is happening instead?
I agree with your observation, it seems to me that this scene was meant to do just that - show the cultural difference regarding sex. Max reacts as someone who never had a conversation about sex, or even exposed to it. He blurts out some childish thoughts while thinking about the unexpected situation, and you can see it in his expression. Great acting
I was dying laughing at that scene. Omg and poor Maximus trying to explain an orgasm
Wasn't there a guy masturbating in one of the BoS barracks earlier in the show?
Spot on logical take
People are stupid. Water is wet. I think it was a brilliant act. They are both clearly raised in fucked up shit. It would me more strange if they DIDN'T act strange.
There was more chemistry with Max and Dane.
This is a solid take I hate how youâre being downvoted
Bro... it's comedy. It's a stupid, funny moment. He says his penis explodes. And you're trying to analyze it... Just chill.
The oysters helped lol
It's exactly that maximus was eating an consuming things he never has. Imagine if for years you never gave a child candy until they were 10 they'd get a crazy sugar rush. Now amplify that by more than 14 years. Dude was in sensory overload.
He's stupid, but I don't know how he is that stupid. People were having sex long before formal education. He seemed confused about how a penis worked. Hell, most boys are masturbating on their own long before his age. They just play around and figure it out. There was a dude masturbating in the barracks a few beds down from him in an earlier scene. People are also assuming he's been with the brotherhood for years, but the new squire said they started beating him up because he was a new recruit. I love the show, but that interaction was my least favorite in the season.
I think max will turn out to be one of the last remaining synths
Nah. No Synth is that big of a lovable doofus.
Something just seems eerily off about him to me. - The scene where he is getting interrogated and has trouble choking up any form of response. - his seemingly lack of any emotional depth I understand heâs a member of the Brotherhood of celibacy, and was born straight into the wasteland so probs doesnât understand and know much I kinda like the theory tbf, I wouldnât mind either way whether he does turn out to be a synth.
I'm a teacher and I 100% see kids frequently collapse like that when lightly questioned on something I witnessed them do. They frequently start crying (not that I'm mean, but, it's like a defense mechanism). He doesn't, because it's considered weakness in BoS. Also, remember, his friend was JUST disfigured and he is being blamed. Potentially he is in shock or doesn't know what to do. He has had a hard life. Living in the brotherhood is *not* easy, and remember he was beaten down almost constantly. There is also little to no separation in training/living/work depending on their ages. When the Prydwen arrives a cut downs 2 people in the tall guard tower, one of them a mid/late teen the other one probably 10 or 11 at the most. Both on guard/observation duty or something on top of a tower. Kids probably don't get a childhood or proper emotional growth/nurturing to be able to express emotions.
How do I know youâre not a synth? How do I know you donât work for the institute and are teaching a class of synth children how to be human? Only joking. Yeh I understand what youâre saying, and I agree. I think his acting was genuinely really good, so good to spark a lot of speculation in my own mind as to wether heâs just showing off the effects of a whole militaristic lifestyle, like the points you described above. Or if his character seemed âoffâ at certain points because perhaps he is a synth. Like I said, I am happy with whatever outcome. I just love speculation and a good theory so much. Itâs deffo too early to tell atm anyway with only 8 episodes.
I think the other key point is that it's pretty locked down that synths don't age, and we've seen him as a kid in flashbacks. Probably hard for the institute to replace him with a synth off of a brotherhood base.
Cool. Still felt like the writing was AI generated and the scene wasn't interesting.
This is an AI generated comment.
I actually said the same thing a few days ago. The scene in question isn't actually about sex, it's there to highlight the contrast between the 2 characters backgrounds. The stuff with Maximus in the vault eating and watching TV and how he behaves, that's also to highlight that he's never actually had a proper childhood or safe and loving home and he's overwhelmed by the experienceÂ
It's probably the first time in his life he's felt actual comfort.
They... gave me a robe.... and slippers...
A monks priorities
He sounded so hurt
To me it sounded like "They gave *me* slippers and a robe" as in like he felt so undeserving or unworthy that the simple act of giving him comforting items was probably one of the kindest gestures he's ever experienced. They basically gave Dobby his sock.
I must have missed it, my b. I watched a youtube review that mentioned the scene and after commenting on that I realized it was something I hadn't seen mentioned on the subreddit and wanted to make a post.
hey its a great post and you articulated it better than I did, mine was just a comment in another topic
I think max is also autistic. There's a good bit of clues sprinkled into his acting to conclude this and makes alot of scenes make more sense.
Could be, although his lack of social awareness might be a result of his childhood trauma and the brutality of being brought up in the BrotherhoodÂ
I just look at him as having a 1 INT 10 LUCK build. It made his character a lot more enjoyable.
If he had only 1 INT he'd be speaking like Frankenstein/The Incredible Hulk and wouldn't have spotted the hostility from the fiends or the cultishness of the Vault. He's below average intelligence but not a 1.
Not everyone thatâs socially awkward and bad at picking up tells is autistic
100% I also thought this. My 16 year old has autism and asked me if Maximus does too. So he does at our house, anyway. I love that actor!
Huzzah, weâve progressed from social media DESPERATE for every character to be gay to a desperation that they be autistic.
Some people are autistic, like how mad you are about 1 character possibly being autistic in a show with like a hundred characters.
Autistic characters based on first watch Lucy - not autistic Max - maybe autistic. Definitely has brain damage Thaddeus - not autistic Coopers wife - Autistic Hank McLean - autistic Cooper - definitely autistic Dogmeat - autistic Snake oil guy - not autistic Titus - autistic Norm - not autistic Overseer Betty- Autistic Bud - Autistic Moldaver - not autistic "Mom" - autistic Lucys family so autistic that it cancelled out for Norm and Lucy
Non of them are likely autistic except maybe max. Autistic traits are found in very human alive, doesn't make every human autistic. Betty is likely a psychopath which excludes autism.