Fallout’s Perfect Replacement Show Is Streaming On Peacock (& Season 2 Is On Its Way)

Warning: This article contains spoilers for Fallout and Twisted Metal.

Fallout was beloved by audiences for being a faithful adaptation of its gaming source material and for finding the balance between dark humor and violence characteristic of the Fallout universe, but there is a different video game-inspired TV show that is the perfect fix for fans needing a streaming binge. Twisted Metal, a Peacock original television series, adapts the vehicular combat video game of the same name, shares post-apocalyptic DNA and macabre humor with Amazon’s hit series, but adds a buddy-romcom road trip element as well.

Fallout was a massive success for Amazon, reaching 65 million viewers in the first two weeks, as reported by Variety. According to Deadline, Twisted Metal had strong viewership numbers on Peacock, but didn’t have nearly the same numbers or impact. The half-hour action-comedy is high-octane fun but also has elevated story-telling at both the character and world-building levels. Twisted Metal tells a satisfying character journey in its first season, teasing at the institutional rot, and the show sets up its second season to be even bigger in scope. It’s the perfect show to watch while waiting for Fallout season 2.

Twisted Metal Has A Similar Energy To Fallout

The main characters for each show are incredible foils for one another: Ella Purnell’s Lucy MacLean begins her journey as naive and trusting, part of a community she never wants to leave; by contrast, Anthony Mackie’s John Doe is an amnesiac, mistrustful lone ranger who has never known security or even his family. John ends the season willing to walk away from everything he thought he always wanted because his life on the road with Stephanie Beatriz’s Quiet is preferable to the comfortable life he fought all season to obtain.

Fallout is about characters growing apart, both literally and figuratively. Lucy ends Fallout season 1 separated from her father, physically and ideologically, though on the road to confront him instead of save him. Conversely, Twisted Metal is about people coming together – John and Quiet begin as reluctant road mates and end willing to sacrifice their dreams for the other. They make a lot of friends in their story-of-the-week adventures, so it feels organic when they converge in the final two episodes to defeat their common enemy.

Both shows do a brilliant job mixing tones, though Twisted Metal is a half-hour comedy and Fallout is an hour-long drama. For example, when Lucy bids her romantic interest goodbye, both holding severed heads, they kiss, and the camera pans down to show the heads are also mashing lips. In Twisted Metal, when a young John finds a car that will become everything to him, and beautiful score swells. John brushes away the vines to reveal a skeleton in the driver’s seat and a stash of porno magazines in the back. The genre balance is deftly handled in both shows.

Returning Characters And Exciting New Faces Have Been Confirmed

John ends the season being forced into the first-ever racing tournament of its kind. The best drivers in the world will compete for the prize of their heart’s desire, and the only rule: survive. John is ordered to leave every other driver a heap of twisted metal. Quiet, barred from entering the city where John is now trapped, becomes a Robin Hood figure, stealing food deliveries between protected cities to distribute half the bounty to the disenfranchised outsiders. Quiet is trapped by a gang of women, whose ringleader reveals she is looking for her brother, John.

John is told that Calypso, a mysterious puppeteer he and Quiet met only as a disembodied voice with an obvious flair for the dramatics, will be the master of ceremonies for the inaugural demolition derby. Quiet speculates that the atmospheric fog around them is dry ice used purely for effect. Calypso tells them that there is power in anonymity, but the casting has already been announced. Best known for Barry and Bill and Ted Face the Music, Anthony Carrigan will play Calypso. Per NBC, several actors are joining the cast of Twisted Metal season 2 ahead of the tournament.

Three contestants that audiences know from the first season are Jamie Neumann as Miranda Watts, Jason Mantzoukas as Preacher, and Chloe Fineman as Bloody Mary, in addition to John. Twisted Metal season 2 is currently filming, and no premiere date has been announced. While Twisted Metal season 1 was good, the show has a lot of room to improve and can be even better in season 2. Between Fallout‘s success on Prime Video and Twisted Metal‘s promising future on Peacock, it seems like the video game adaptation curse is long gone.

Source: Variety, Deadline