Fallout Season 2 Episode 7 Review: The Handoff

As Fallout Season 2 reaches its endgame, many fans are hoping that these last two episodes will deliver a powerful narrative conclusion to our time in New Vegas. While Fallout Season 2 Episode 7 does show potential, it feels somewhat lackluster as the focus is placed back on the Vaults.

The previous episode, “The Other Player”, felt like it suffered from having to connect so many pieces together. Although it made it clear who that player was, that being the Enclave, the way it handled these multiple storylines was methodical, if a bit muddling.

Season 2 Episode 7 “The Handoff” does continue to let each respective story flow, but it’s clear that the focus is placed on Steph and her role. Although her Canadian heritage was teased back on “The Demon in the Snow”, this episode dives deeper into her upbringing.

Fans of the game know that the relationship between the Americans and Canadians were strained due to the annexing. However, for newcomers, America’s war with China and other communist countries led the government to desperate measures.

These conflicts, which inevitably led to Canada becoming “Little America”, caused Canadians to rebel against the system. Now that it’s made clear that Steph and her mother also took part in these conflicts, her withheld pain throughout Season 2 becomes better understood.

The words that her mother gives her gives Steph her motivation to move forward. That detail about “staying above the flood” is a bit inspiring, though it’s also worrying as she indirectly states how everyone in America is a threat to them.

Steph wants that power because any semblance of control in the past has been taken away by the American military. She’s had to become this survivalist due to the horrific treatment she’s faced in an internment camp and she’s trying to lay out her pain by managing the Vaults.

It’s also the reason why she wants to gain consolidation in marriage with Chet: she wants to fully fit into the American world since it’s the only way she’ll survive. Though she had a marriage in Season 1, it was short-lived, which allowed her mask to slowly begin slipping off.

However, by now, Steph is dangerously walking that fine line between dictatorial power and being Vault 33’s sweetheart. When Chet tries to question her about what happened with Woody, her assertiveness really starts to show.

When Chet delicately directs the conversation to get an explanation, it’s a nice tension builder to round out the power dynamic the two share. She shows that need to keep up this facade, from that opening sequence to this conversation with Chet, quite well.

However, Fallout Season 2 Episode 7 feels like it really needs to connect everything together. The Vaults’ take on the Resource Wars has slowly fleshed out through Steph and Betty’s negotiations, but the focus on Hank’s keepsake feels off.

The events within the interconnected Vaults want to connect to the larger narrative between Lucy, Hank, and Norm. Yet, by this point, the whole narrative has grown to such a scale where it’s a bit difficult to resonate with something that’s physically detached.

Fortunately, it does try to show why Steph’s a bigger player to keep watch of. In a flashback, it’s revealed that, after Cooper got Hank drunk and retrieved the diode, Steph was the one to take Hank away.

Cooper also told her that Hank could find her a spot in the Vaults through a job opportunity. The conversation is kept brief, but there’s a line that shows that empathy that Steph didn’t think was possible. It’s also a nice touch to Cooper, who’s becoming much more seen within the Ghoul.

This does explain why Steph is particularly interested with Hank’s keepsakes and how she ended up in Vault 31. Unfortunately for her, when Chet exposes Steph’s ID card to everyone, her hold instantly shatters.

Even though we’re supposed to empathize with Steph now, it feels like it’s a bit late in the game to fully feel with her. Of course, those flashbacks do add some weight to her character, but with only one episode left, I hope that her arc will lead to something substantial for the future.

Speaking about Hank, what we get from Lucy and Hank’s time on this episode are some mind games where Hank’s still trying to convince Lucy for the better. However, Lucy’s curiosity about Hank’s plan and how it functions gets the better of her.

There’s a fun father-daughter sequence involving Lucy driving a golf cart, but for the most part, these scenes are further reiterating what we know about Hank’s philosophy. He doesn’t see Caesar’s Legion or the New California Republic working because of their list of issues, with the Legion being the worst.

As for Lucy, she does want to see the wasteland get better, like what her father is promising through his work. However, she only believes that the NCR can do right and, given how she was raised by her mother, this belief is firmly planted within her.

What Fallout Season 2 is trying to do here is rationalizing the critiques that players have when discussing the politics of Fallout: New Vegas. When it comes to the ones creating the lore providing input, it can lead to some divisiveness within the community.

From Lucy’s perspective, it makes sense as she’s had help from them thanks to the Ghoul’s assistance. However, her action to deactivate the system’s mainframe will definitely have a larger impact on the Legion-NCR conflict to come.

On the mainframe, there’s also a surprising reason why everyone that’s controlled by the black box is so jolly: the whole system is run by the literal, physical mind of Congresswoman Welch.

In the Cooper Howard flashbacks, we learn that he met with Welch in order to get cold fusion to the right people. His talk with Welch in the Atomic Wrangler about serving for the good of the public happily emphasizes that good side to him, which becomes apparent in the present.

The Ghoul’s venture with Maximus and Thaddeus has its comedic quirks, perhaps a bit much for its own good. However, seeing Maximus and the Ghoul discuss about their connection to Lucy was satisfying, albeit limited. I just wish that their conversation wasn’t so brief.

To make up for this, the climax of Episode 7 sees the Ghoul and Maximus, in NCR power armor, fighting their way through the Deathclaws to reach the Lucky 38. It’s all rough and tough, but by the end of it, the good news is that Mr. House is finally back online.

Fallout Season 2 Episode 7 is a mixed bag that pushes Steph to the forefront all while trying to get the main storylines to their peak as quickly as possible. While allowing Steph to further develop does show her potential to become a lead, the Vaults storyline has felt a bit diluted overall.

Additional Thoughts:

• Exploring the whole America-Canada conflict in Season 2, especially in today’s time, does feel prescient given what’s happening in real life.
• I’m seriously wondering if anything in Hank’s keepsake box might be relevant in Fallout Season 3. It was teased just once in a previous episode, but now, it’s become very important to the Vaults.
• That destroyed Securitron in the Lucky 38 penthouse has me thinking that that was Yes-Man. I don’t know why, but I feel like it is.
• At this point, I really think that Thaddeus is gonna die at the end of Season 2. That is, unless the Ron Perlman Super Mutant makes him into one.
• Clancy Brown being the President of the United States, and possibly an Enclave member, wasn’t in my bingo card!

Critic Rating:

User Rating:

—

New episodes of Fallout Season 2 release Wednesdays on Prime Video.

Want more from Tell-Tale TV? Subscribe to our newsletter here!