The Fallout TV show contains a lot of nods to the original video games and the wider world of the series. But one tiny, easy-to-miss Easter egg was included in the show by the head of its makeup department. It was so tiny, nobody working on the show noticed it. But when the series hit Amazon Prime, Fallout fans spotted it instantly, proving just how obsessed they are with the radioactive franchise.
Amazon’s live-action Fallout TV show premiered earlier this year and received rave reviews from critics and fans. It also helped all of the past games in the franchise (yes even Fallout 76) become more popular than ever. It’s a genuine cultural phenomenon and it’s getting a second season, as you might expect. But buried in the popular series is a small but direct reference to Fallout 4 that went unnoticed by the show’s director and most of its staff. And the person who snuck it in assumed nobody would spot it once the show was live. He was wrong.
In an interview with PC Gamer, Fallout’s makeup department head Michael Harvey said that the series’ creator and director, Jonathan Nolan, wanted the show to feel authentic to the games. But, he didn’t want anything to be ripped directly out of a Fallout game.
“[Nolan] explicitly told me, use the game as a reference,” Harvey told PC Gamer. “Lean into the world for what it is, and take the elements from that world.” But, “Don’t carbon copy anything,” Nolan told Harvey.
However, when costume designer Amy Wescott dressed up a character in a way that made them look nearly identical to an NPC from Fallout 4, Harvey saw a chance to sneak a little Easter egg into the show.
“So I took that character and that likeness and literally made it one of the characters from the game, and I figured, you know what? It was such a [minor] character. Nobody’s ever going to catch it,” said Harvey.
And he was correct, at first. But then the show aired and fans spotted the character instantly.
“[Nolan] didn’t catch it. The writers didn’t catch it. But boy, Reddit caught it, and they went wild for it,” explained Harvey. “They went nuts over it, and they’re like, ‘We know exactly who that character is. We can tell you what game, what map, and what that person was’.”
If you are wondering, the character Harvey snuck into the show was Cricket, a minor NPC vendor from Fallout 4. In the live-action series, she is named Rink and appears on screen for just a few seconds. But that was more than enough for fans to spot her.
“That was my one little Easter egg that I was hoping nobody would catch right away,” admitted Harvey. “[Fans] jumped on that so fast. So, kudos to the level and the depth that these fans will go.”
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