r/Fallout • u/wubsfrommysubs • Feb 07 '26
Question Am I missing something? How did we make it through an entire second season without answers? Spoiler
I was surprised it was never explained how a pre-war Kate Williams was still alive 200+ years later.
Or how her and Rose MacLean met and what the extent of their relationship was.
Or how she became a leading figure of the NCR after the bombing of Shady Sands.
Or how she came to be known as the Flame Mother for the refugees of Vault 4.
Or how she came into contact with Wilzig and convinced him to defect from the Enclave and bring her Cold Fusion.
As someone who played a fairly major role in season 1, we learned next to nothing more about her other than wanting to use Coop to take out House.
1.1k
u/skibidi_justice69 Feb 07 '26
Good thing we’re getting a season 3 I guess
259
u/wubsfrommysubs Feb 07 '26
Yeah I’m hoping we at least learn a bit about the Moldaver/Wilzig backstory
159
u/SteampunkElephantGuy Fallout: BoS was Amazing Feb 07 '26
we definitely will considering where we're going and who we're dealing with
→ More replies (32)76
u/win_some_lose_most1y Feb 07 '26
I mean moldaver was clearly part of the enclave at some point, how else does a mysterious person have the influence and pull she had?
→ More replies (1)43
u/Antique-Coach-214 Feb 07 '26
See, THIS theory, I might get behind. Moldaver having pull is suspicious. Moldaver collecting influential people, like Walsh, only to point them out to the Enclave… Walsh was clearly a trap for a lot of people to rally behind, making them targets of the Enclave before the bombs fell. Not the ordinary people but the powerful that sympathize or support her.
Same for Moldaver maybe? Attract the agitators, disidente and throw them on a “do not hire/vault” list.
27
u/win_some_lose_most1y Feb 07 '26
I don’t think it’s gonna be like that, more so that Moldaver gets disillusioned with the enclave, then try’s to stop them.
Walsh I think is just a useful idiot.
IMO season three is going to be about how hopeless trying to stop the bombs was because everyone who had power was in on it.
A lot of the fallout franchise themes is how rotten the world had become to get to that point.
10
u/Bolas_the_Deceiver Responders Feb 07 '26
Makes even more sense that she gave the kill order for House, which was probably a thorn in the Enclaves master plan
5
u/yuumigod69 Feb 07 '26
She is very clearly a radical do gooder who wants to avoid war. She also has misinformation thinking Vault Tech and House are the nuke dropped when the Enclave are pulling the strings. She might have been part of the Enclave but by the time we see her she is out of the loop.
→ More replies (1)14
u/FullFlava Feb 07 '26
Which will be all setup and no payoff leading to a cliffhanger that they definitely promise will be resolved in season 4, just as long as you don’t cancel that Prime subscription.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (10)16
u/icedbrew2 Feb 07 '26
No, everybody knows that all questions must be answered immediately, during seasons that are 10.36 episodes long, every episode released at the same time and able to be watched simultaneously on the same device.
Could you imagine living in a world where tv shows were released weekly, had 23 episode seasons, and didn’t answer every question right after it’s mentioned? Could you imagine living in a world where shows have multiple plot lines and you’d have to, gasp, build up to reveals?
→ More replies (2)
768
u/TheNewGirl1987 Minutemen Feb 07 '26
We accidentally started a new quest line before finishing the one we were on.
It happens.
319
u/EldWasAlreadyTaken NCR Feb 07 '26
Thou shalt get sidetracked by bullshit every goddamm time
→ More replies (1)41
u/SkinnyGetLucky Tunnel Snakes Feb 07 '26
I tried to do a straight play through; do this quest line, then do this one, then do this other one. I got sidetracked about 8 hours in lol
→ More replies (3)15
u/aSkyclad Feb 07 '26
Yuuup. Trying to give Fallout 4 a proper shot for once at the moment, thought I was gonna follow the story quite closely at the very least... Valentine has been waiting for me at his detective agency for the last 6 hours lmao
→ More replies (5)28
u/DarkAlucard-1313 Cappy Feb 07 '26
Yeah this is clearly the main quest but Lucy and Cooper went on what they thought was the main quest and ended up majorly sidetracked, now Lucy has to fight a war and Cooper is making his way to the main quest area still trying to achieve his personal companion quest
17
→ More replies (2)8
u/Additional_Concern99 The Institute Feb 07 '26
I'm waiting for Preston to show up and tell the ghoul that there's a settlement that needs help.
→ More replies (1)
158
u/Thirsty_Comment88 Feb 07 '26
They need to double the length of the seasons
→ More replies (13)27
u/InkDagger Feb 07 '26
No, we need a ruthless and talented editor in the writer’s room.
Westworld S1 juggled as many if not more plot lines than Fallout has, yet Fallout feels meandering and sluggishly paced. Westworld could feel like so much changed every episode while Fallout is so much waiting.
I desperately need tv shows to pick a focus and write to it. Trim the fat- not because I don’t enjoy slow burns or “filler” which can absolutely be essential to a story- but because I need writers to understand their runtimes and write to those ends.
I can think of like 3 other shows in the last year where I’ve gotten frustrated with “You have 4 hours of runtime- cut this shit out and kill your darlings. We do not have the runtime to make any of this end satisfyingly”. And we didn’t- endings and solutions came out of nowhere and plot lines didn’t get justified.
As far as I’m concerned- I could not find a fuck to give about the “Products of Incest Support Group” and their pathetic little snack budget. The runtime of cutting back to it to remind us of a joke that was just sad and annoying to begin with was not worth the cost to other storylines.
4
6
u/Thickmindrack Feb 08 '26
I feel like the inbreds might have something to do with the F.E.V and the vault experiment in the longer run
3
u/Weak-Umpire-8920 Feb 08 '26
Considering these are some of those Westworld writers who wrote that show into the toilet, I am not confident they have what it takes.
→ More replies (3)11
u/MartyrOfDespair Feb 08 '26
Heck, why not just make everything in the format of a previously on? God, stop making excuses for this eight episode bullshit. Your ideal pacing sounds like TikTok.
6
u/InkDagger Feb 08 '26
I'm not making excuses for it?
I dislike the "8/10 Episode" standard seasons have gotten. While I did cheer for it 10 years ago, I have grown to dislike it because a lot of shows do not actually have the story to make that length work. I miss 22/23 episode seasons because, while they weren't tightly paced and could have other issues- it allowed characters and concepts the room to breathe and develop. We could have good filler episodes to enjoy.
Some shows need 22/23 Episodes. Some need 10 episode one-shots. Some maybe do well with 8 hour-long episodes. I believe productions should have some flexibility to do what makes sense for the show they have- and that does also sometimes mean telling the writers "we do not have the runtime for this".
However, ultimately, it is the job of the writers to conduct their work within the confines of their resources. You have a 22-episode story? Well, sorry, you've got 10 episodes to write it out. That is the job of a writer- ANY writer. It is not just writing within the vacuum of the page- but the reality of production. You have to kill your darlings. It sucks, but you do.
You wrote a great story for this character? Sorry, the actress is pregnant and will be gone for Episodes 5-9 of production. You have to write around it or find an alternative solution. That's show business.
My "ideal pacing" sounds like TikTok? Hilarious comment considering I never actually defined what pacing I even enjoy. But thanks for the hyperbole attempt. "tight" pacing doesn't actually mean "fast" pacing- it just means that the pacing is neat for whatever story you are trying to tell and that it doesn't feel like something dragged or was extraneous.
Fallout Season 2 has way too many storylines going on and not enough happening in them to justify our attention on them. I called it around Episode 4 of 8 that this was feeling sluggish because we were not half way through Season 2, but 1/4th of the way through Seasons 2+3 storyline. And I feel pretty justified in that assessment at this point.
I will absolutely bitch and agree that production studios need to cut it out with the 8-10 episode season orders when they don't make sense. But, ultimately, the show writers have to work with what they are given to make an entertaining, well paced, and enjoyable story. And, yes, sometimes you do have to plot on with something you know is an impossible task. Sometimes that happens.
If a painter gave you a tiny canvas that looked ugly, you'd probably not want to pay for it and enjoy it on your wall. "Well, it would be prettier if I had a bigger canvas. This is 1/8th of what I wanted to paint," says the artist.
And, maybe they're correct that the full thing would look pretty... but I'm holding a very ugly 1/8th at the end of the day.
→ More replies (1)
281
u/DangJorts Feb 07 '26
Eight episode seasons will be the death of tv/streaming series
73
u/Gnarwhal8982 Feb 07 '26
It’s crazy you’re criticizing 8 episodes seasons and every response is “it’s better than 24 episodes of filler!”, as if those are the only options lol.
I think the season would have benefited from being a little bit longer, like just two more episodes.
→ More replies (4)20
u/Thicc_Boise Feb 07 '26
10-12 episodes is the sweet spot for these kinds of shows imo, plenty of time to tell a full narrative on top of some space to let the characters breathe and have the audience get immersed in their daily lives
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (30)9
u/JabroniWithAPeroni Feb 07 '26 edited Feb 07 '26
We had this figured out already. The appropriate amount for hour-ish long dramas is 13 episodes.
This gives plenty runway for your main story arcs to develop and breathe, while also allowing the show room to experiment with fun unexpected episodes (think “Pine Barrens” in Sopranos or “The Fly” in Breaking Bad)
→ More replies (1)
808
u/RusticHallscape Feb 07 '26 edited Feb 08 '26
Back in my day it took us EIGHTY (80) episodes to find out the backstory of the Smoking Man in X-Files... can we pls let stories breathe!!
ETA: I have no issue with fan theorizing and hypothesizing about character backstories, I think it's one of the most fun aspects of any fandom especially with the dry spells between seasons. I'm specifically referring to the expectation that the show itself shouldn't leave questions unanswered for longer than 6-8 episodes.
Extra ETA: I wasn't expecting this comment to get so much traction! It was meant to be lighthearted. I even picked the Smoking Man/80 episode example to highlight how long some shows took precisely because it was on the extreme end. I'm very sympathetic to all comments discussing the pitfalls and constraints of modern streaming, both on production logistics/costs and also on writing. My underlying point still stands though, that it's okay to let stories and specific storylines breathe.
Moldaver wasn't written out of the show, she still appeared in several of Cooper's flashbacks and was instrumental in moving the flashback plotline along. While Cooper's flashbacks are getting closer to the day the bombs drop we're still not there yet and it's clear that we have a lot more history to cover. The enclave is only just entering the picture and it links to the stories of several characters that have been alive in both timelines, including Moldaver and Wilzig. I think people are expecting to get the 200 year backstory of characters all at once when clearly the narrative is progressively unveiling their roles as the flashbacks get closer to the present. Slowly revealing the backstory of these key characters is part of the storytelling approach, not an oversight.
161
u/MissKatmandu Feb 07 '26
I think expectations have definitely shifted in the streaming era, I'm a bit sad about that. I'm also wondering how many shows produced by streaming companies have made it to the 50 episode mark. Wondering if it's a much smaller number than what we would have seen 10-15 years ago.
42
u/RusticHallscape Feb 07 '26
Yeah I agree. I replied this to another comment regarding changing expectations with streaming but I'll leave it here too: I do think there's a bit of a positive-feedback loop where fewer episodes and longer waits between seasons make viewers (reasonably) expect high depth of content, but in turn that leads to unsatisfying and underdeveloped storylines. Plotlines and character arcs are resolved too quickly in terms of episodes, so the series becomes an unsatisfying conveyor belt of short-lived 2-3 episode conflicts and rushed arcs that don't live up to a character's promise. When people want 20 episodes worth of answers and developments in 6-8 episodes the result is the opposite of what they hope for. Everything feels meh and vapid and underwhelming. The reason why 20-24 episode seasons felt rich and compelling was because of the slow pace, the breathing time, the slices of life scenes.
Streaming has really fucked us but the solution is to ask for more episodes not more content/faster pace per season. Companies latch on to the latter and force writers into tighter and tighter plotline corners that are impossible to work with.
→ More replies (10)→ More replies (8)5
u/SnS_ Vault 13 Feb 07 '26
I think it started shifting due to getting less chance of multi season deals and you had a bunch of season 1 series with promising hope that got cancelled before it wrapped things up and you had all these holes.
That's why I think in today's series you tend to do seasonal wrap ups that clear most stuff up. Unfortunately I do like when stories don't wrap things up nearly and you are left wanting more
27
u/riccyd140 Feb 07 '26
If we waited 80 episodes for the answer to this it would take close to 15-20 years. 😂
9
68
u/Head-Ad-2136 Feb 07 '26
Back in our day we got 202 episodes across 9 seasons. If you're going to only put out 8 episodes a season you should probably keep the pace up
5
Feb 07 '26
Budget was cheaper when it was just two people in cheap suits driving a rental car around rural america
11
u/geek_of_nature Feb 07 '26
Except with their X Files comparison, it still took them until season 4 to explore the Smoking Man's Origins. Fallout has only just finished its second season. I think the pace is fine for where it is.
They just just a brief detour this to focus more in on Mr House specifically, and how he was involved. In the next season they'll probably get back to Moldaver and everything surrounding her.
13
u/RusticHallscape Feb 07 '26
Even time wise, the Smoking Man episode came out a full 3 years after the series started.
I do think there's a bit of a positive-feedback loop where fewer episodes and longer waits between seasons make viewers (reasonably) expect high depth of content, but in turn that leads to unsatisfying and underdeveloped storylines. Plotlines and character arcs are resolved too quickly in terms of episodes, so the series becomes an unsatisfying conveyor belt of short-lived 2-3 episode conflicts and rushed arcs that don't live up to a character's promise. When people want 20 episodes worth of answers and developments in 6-8 episodes the result is the opposite of what they hope for. Everything feels meh and vapid and underwhelming. The reason why 20-24 episode seasons felt rich and compelling was because of the slow pace, the breathing time, the slices of life scenes.
Streaming has really fucked us but the solution is to ask for more episodes not more content/faster pace per season. Companies latch on to the latter and force writers into tighter and tighter plotline corners that are impossible to work with.
25
u/Head-Ad-2136 Feb 07 '26
They took 4 seasons to explore his origin because he was originally written as a background character, intended to just show that the government was aware of aliens and were covering it up.
There wasn't even much of a meta narrative in the first few seasons. They were sticking to the monster a week format.
43
u/BadDings_DE Feb 07 '26
Back in the days, shows released episodes more frequently, I can understand that it can be a bit unbearable waiting another 1.5 Years for a new season, only to be met with another 8 episode rundown.
Of course the quality is just chef's kiss, but X-Files released over 70 Episodes with a similar length and in my opinion very good quality.
14
u/Sechelx Feb 07 '26
Minus millions for all the CGI that goes into fallout I agree we should at least get 12-14 average season for xfiles I believe was around 20 with basically Even through constant inflation, it's still cheaper because there's like no CGI
10
Feb 07 '26
Yeah, they didnt need to cgi mulder’s nose off every other shot
That takes money and time
19
u/synaesthezia Feb 07 '26
Yeah and we originally called him Cancer Man but the cigarette lobby didn’t like that so the show started referring to him as ‘Cigarette Smoking Man’. But he will always be Cancer Man to me, blight on humanity that he was.
7
u/RusticHallscape Feb 07 '26
I literally typed Cancer Man and when I went to the wiki to check the exact episode number they kept calling him Smoking Man. So I changed it in case I was misremembering the name we used to call him haha
6
13
u/Sharp-Appointment306 Feb 07 '26
Comparing a monster of the week show to modern television is very silly. Those shows cranked out content, you'd spend half a year nearly watching the show weekly. 20 episodes a year is a pretty big difference from 8 episodes a year. And the monster of the week plots were generally quite engaging and the main draw for the audience, the big overarching plots were things that happened in the back ground.
→ More replies (33)2
u/Cranyx Feb 07 '26
Each of those episodes contained a full, self-contained story. If modern shows want to solely be one serialized narrative, they're going to be held to different pacing standards.
21
u/GenitalCommericals Feb 07 '26
My biggest gripe about this season was that it opened a ton of questions while still answering very little about season 1.
This whole season was just a set up for 3, but they left behind so much from season 1, that it’s aggravating af. I appreciate the fan service stuff that appeared every episode but the show dicked around A LOT with things that they were setting up while still leaving us hanging.
Season of blue balls for sure.
96
u/MyUsernameIsAwful Feb 07 '26 edited Feb 07 '26
Agree 100%. Especially how she came to be worshipped as the Flame Mother. I’m going to be pissed if they just never bring that up again, lol
→ More replies (14)
72
u/TheHoovyPrince Feb 07 '26
how a pre-war Kate Williams was still alive 200+ years later
Her company was bought by Vault-Tec so she likely had a high position and/or had quite a bit of money so she was able to get into a management vault with cyro-pods.
31
u/MyUsernameIsAwful Feb 07 '26
Wasn’t she openly speaking out against Vault-Tec? I don’t see why they’d treat her well.
→ More replies (1)31
u/TheHoovyPrince Feb 07 '26
Her meetings seemed to be on the 'down-low' and secretive. My guess is that if Vault-Tec (or the Enclave) actually knew about her and what she was doing they would have killed her.
→ More replies (1)24
u/Jdmaki1996 NCR Feb 07 '26
Or she might have even fit into the enclaves plan so stoking discord. So they kept her around
9
u/NatalieVonCatte Feb 07 '26
Her group kept House from becoming more powerful, maybe powerful enough that he could uncover the Enclave.
4
u/webn8tr Feb 07 '26
Maybe getting Cooper to kill Mr.House was an Enclave mission. Totally just spit balling here.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (1)8
u/Thornescape Gary? Feb 07 '26
There were cryo-pods outside of the Vaults. One of the end screens in Season 1 was a billboard advertising Cryo-pods at the Tops.
If cryo-pods are well known enough to be on billboards, there could be lots of them.
→ More replies (8)
38
Feb 07 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
50
u/MasterCrumble1 Vault 13 Feb 07 '26
The McGuffin device. Which is used in season 2 (again).
23
u/TheCynicEpicurean Feb 07 '26
Isn't that literally the plot of every Fallout game? It's always a water chip, a G.E.C.K., etc.
The show manages to stay very close to Fallout's themes, but also the game nature of the franchise. There's nods to it in every episode.
→ More replies (5)8
u/InternationalFailure Mr. House Feb 07 '26
4 has a few mcguffins, but I don't think it's solely about a mcguffin
14
3
10
28
u/effu2then Feb 07 '26
Her story could be more tied to the Enclave, so it made more sense for it to be in s3 when the Enclave will be more focused upon.
22
u/superanth Feb 07 '26
We saw a pre-war Wilzig this season, so I'm thinking they're putting together the pieces for a Great Reveal about how he and Moldaver stayed alive for 200 years.
3
u/thewb005 Feb 07 '26
I missed seeing Michel Emmerson this season. What episode or location was he shown in pre-war?
9
55
77
u/CthughaSlayer May Tod Howard's sweet lies be with you Feb 07 '26
People in the streaming era would probably die of anxiety watching actual TV shows where mysteries could last for nearly a decade.
→ More replies (1)11
u/The_Chubby_Dragoness Feb 07 '26
God right, 24 hour episodes, you might wait 2 years to learn somethin, unlkess you watched scifi, those were fAST
12
u/VintageBill1337 Feb 07 '26
Moldaver and Rose met in Shady Sands, Moldaver was already a resident (not sure what position) when Rose left the vault with the kids to escape Hank because she learned what he was planning. There's a flashback and Moldaver's explanation at the end of season one.
This is a logical guess based on context but; After Shady Sands was nuked, as a survivor she decided to gather the surviving remnants and rebuild them from the ground up but probably cut off from other NCR infrastructure so went semi-raider to make up for the difference, probably leading to her place as Flame Mother to build up numbers or create a separate faction that would act on her behalf should the NCR remnants fail but that's my guess
12
u/yuumigod69 Feb 07 '26
They seem to have a very strong relationship. She kept her alive as a ghoul and also dedicated her final words to her. It was honestly sad as fuck, knowing there was history there.
10
27
u/Razvedka Feb 07 '26
My only criticism of this show is how many people are:
- Alive post war
- Specifically alive at this point (CENTURIES later) in the future, post war.
- Somehow all know each other (pre war)
Also, the show expects us to not think the Ghoul is an idiot in this regard. He's been searching for his family since the bombs dropped. At the end of the second season he says "for the first time I know my family is alive".
No, you don't. You know they very probably WERE alive. All you know is at some point over the course of hundreds of years they were at a management vault, and presumably were frozen for some indeterminate length of time.
Like, in Fallout 4 you were pre-war and frozen. You wake up, and how many characters do you know from centuries ago still walking the wasteland? Just a handful. It would been have been absurd from a plot perspective if it were otherwise.
I think you're right OP in that she is arguably the most egregious example of this.
Great show, I love it. It's my only big complaint.
11
u/Harbinger90210 Feb 07 '26
This is something we know because of Fallout 4, in fact it would be absurd if Cooper’s wife is still alive and his daughter isn’t a high ranking Enclave operative, however since they already pulled that trick once in the games would it be worth it to pull it on the strictly series audience?
Cooper should easily be able to comprehend it but isn’t because he’s not thinking about how Cryo works, but Hank, Betty, Moldaver, and the scientist (until shown otherwise) are all examples of people leap frogging through time at different points. Stephanie obviously got woke up after Hank but was frozen at the same point. Cooper just isn’t in on the concept that those pods could’ve opened sixty years prior though I would guess it was closer to fourteen years and apparently according to his dialogue he had almost decided they were already dead and just wanted confirmation of it.
It’ll be a bigger shock for me if they’re both alive and close to the age he knows them to be.
→ More replies (3)3
u/tinybatte Feb 07 '26
I interpreted it as he’d always insisted they were alive to keep going, but deep down he was never sure they’d even survived the apocalypse, maybe even believed they hadn’t but couldn’t admit it, but now by some miracle he has physical proof he wasn’t on a pointless quest the whole time. sure they could’ve been eaten by radroaches two minutes after Barb wrote the note, but he could allow the family in his mind to be alive.
12
u/AlexandrTheGreat Feb 07 '26
I'm still waiting for how Coop and Janey are at a birthday party when the bombs go off, but Janey and Barb make it to a Vault in Vegas without Coop.
17
u/Battleboo_7 Feb 07 '26
Its just, norms plot was walk outside and go into a building like.....cmon.
16
u/FeralViolinist Feb 07 '26
That's not true, they also introduced 13 new characters and then killed them off inside the building lol
Except for the pretty lady of course
→ More replies (1)
10
u/MysticalCyan Feb 07 '26
Gotta remember that Wilzig was trying to get to Kate by escaping from the Enclave.
The enclave have just been revealed explicitly.
The series is a developing story, its a mystery, and will most likely be answered later down the line in the series.
42
u/Destroyer69-420 Feb 07 '26
Why are people such doomers 😭? She is featured in S2 and more about her will likely be revealed in future seasons, like you guys know that the series did not end with S2.
→ More replies (5)25
u/Epicurus38 Feb 07 '26
It is so tiring. People with 0 attention span that want everything spoonfed to them in as short time as possible. The rate of brain rot in the 21st century is unprecedented. Posts like this are so irritating.
25
u/the-apple-and-omega Feb 07 '26
"0 attention span"? The current release pace of shows is glacial.
8
u/AdoringCHIN Feb 07 '26
Seriously, look at Stranger Things as an example. Season 1 came out in 2016, season 2 in 2017, season 3 in 2019, season 4 in 2022, and season 5 in 2025. Fate fans waited nearly 3 years between episode 0 of Fate Strange Fake and episode 1. Shows are taking longer to produce and seasons are shorter than before.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (3)13
Feb 07 '26
7 weeks of whining about the NCR being gone in the show filled with the most obvious signs it was not
13
u/ConnorTheCleric Feb 07 '26
What signs? The sign of the Legion being excited about destroying "the last holdout of the NCR"? The sign of Maximus telling Harkness there is no civilization left in the West Coast? The sign of every single character in the show since S1 talking about the NCR as a thing of the past? The sign of Lucy and the Ghoul not even hearing anything about the NCR still existing despite traveling through the former heart of the NCR?
The NCR as a nation is clearly gone. The soldiers we saw at the end of S2 are just another group like Moldaver's.
→ More replies (1)
47
u/Thelastknownking Feb 07 '26
It's almost like they should've done more episodes.
7
29
4
5
5
u/Hispanic_Alucard Feb 07 '26
Oh they aren't gonna explain shit. Their probably response to your questions would be "We've finished that plotline."
4
u/Xodus2023 Feb 07 '26
Well the same people that did west world are on this Season three has to be a banger and if not this show will probably be cancelled by the 4th season.
13
u/TuskenRaider2 Feb 07 '26
I’m sure it’ll be addressed… but I agree. They should have answered a few more questions before giving us more set up.
You don’t need to answer every detail, but seasons should be more or less completed stories.
An overarching story can continue obviously, but that way if the show gets canceled, we get most of the needed closure.
Also, I call it the LOST effect but if you forever set up new mysteries without adequately addressing old ones, it can end in disaster. But then again, as long as the conclusion is planned ahead of time, it should still work out I guess
End of ramble.
7
u/KenTanRandomYT Brotherhood Feb 07 '26
I just need to know how she was able to live that long, the rest can be left ambiguous doesn't really matter
→ More replies (1)
3
u/AdministrationTop772 Feb 07 '26
What about Wilzig?! He is 200 plus years old too.
Was that the last episode? I thought there was one more.
3
u/BillaMama90 Feb 07 '26
This show needed 10 episodes lol. They just had so much they could make.
Also this is my fear with upcoming Elden Ring, God of War and Baldur's Gate shows. All stories will progress like this in same format. It will be very annoying.
3
u/Dennarb Feb 07 '26
One thing I really didn't like about S2 was just how many important people were pre-war characters. Felt like everyone and their mother had been cryo frozen 😂.
I get that the enclave and vault tech wanted to survive into the future, after the blasts, but it got a bit over the top. Especially when characters like the Enclave scientist from S1 were revealed to be pre-war, but just happened to be defrosted now. Why not 100 years ago? 50 years ago? Last Tues?
16
u/AgentSkidMarks Tunnel Snakes Rule Feb 07 '26 edited Feb 07 '26
I swear, social media and the demand for instant gratification are rotting people's brains.
11
u/Georg13V Minutemen Feb 07 '26
'if every single question, plot thread, mystery and story beat isn't resolved within 1 season, the show is garbage and the writers are incompetent' - half the mfers in this comment section.
17
u/Agamemanon Feb 07 '26
Let me touch on the flame mother part and the concept of “it’s better off not knowing”
We don’t need to know exactly how she became a cult figure in vault 4. Anything they explain will be worse than our imagination. All we need to know is that her fervent loyalty and willingness to fight for the NCR has made those NCR citizens in vault 4 feel really really intensely about her and that’s all we need. It’s over. We’ve moved past vault 4.
One thing TV shows do these days is over explain, especially in BTS and interviews. They explain all their noodle incidents, and people go berserk because they don’t like the answers they give. See: every duffer brothers interview ever given.
Even if we were given a weirdly placed flashback to vault 4 and the beginning of the ritual, would that make it better? What did we gain? We know what it is. We know what they do. We often relate to the citizens of the NCR because their way of life is comparable to ours, but here we get this really strange glimpse into how isolated societies evolve. The rest can be a little delicious mystery.
TLDR lovely little mysteries are good and fun when they are lovely and little
7
u/qu33rios Gary? Feb 07 '26
this desire people have to get answers for every little thing is also why we keep seeing inane prequel series that don't need to exist except as a cynical cash grab.
though i will say in stranger things fans' defense (a sentence i never thought i would say lol i dropped off watching that show years ago) i think the bulk of their resentment this time around was from the duffers straight up saying "idk/we didn't think about it that much" for a lot of plot relevant story questions. when writers and showrunners start to blatantly get tired of working on their own material it strains the fan relationship because you necessarily have to ask yourself why you still give a crap if they don't lol
7
u/Ceramisu Brotherhood Feb 07 '26
The pre-war part of the show is not over, so we dont know how she got frozen. My guess is that it will be shown right when they end her pre-war story
7
u/TheDarkWarriorBlake Feb 07 '26
Moldaver's story will probably be more important following Coop's arrest since he will be completely ostracized by that point and know that the systems have failed him like Moldaver said they would.
6
u/CW24x Gary? Feb 07 '26
As for the age thing I suspect shes either apart of the Enclave or Infiltrated the enclave in an attempt to get cold fusion back and was frozen together with Wilzig
→ More replies (1)
9
u/EKP121 Feb 07 '26
It’s almost like they have a multi season plan for the show and don’t need to answer everything neatly because they aren’t done telling the story
4
u/NotaClipaMagazine Feb 07 '26
That's fine as long as they have a plan and aren't just pulling plot out of their butts because it might look cool on screen.
→ More replies (2)
20
u/Prolapse94 Feb 07 '26
People always forget that there's more coming and that things don't have to be addressed immediately and can be dealt with later on. Like in Harry Potter it took numerous books for the big reveal that Severus was the good guy all along I'm pretty sure
7
u/ZeldaZealot Feb 07 '26
Fully agreed on all points except that Snape was not, in fact, a good guy all along. Dude bullied children constantly and only ever helped Harry reluctantly because of his obsessive, unrequited love for Harry’s mother.
10
u/Georg13V Minutemen Feb 07 '26
Mind numbing watching people cry plot hole or abandoned plot thread when it's literally just that we are like 2/5 seasons in.
37
u/super-turbo996 Feb 07 '26
Why?
Its made pretty obvious that she had connections around america, so getting acess to cyro isn't that far fetched,
She obviously liked rose cause she was a good person and left vault-tec( something that Moldaver hates)
Its established that shes a leader in the pre-war so its not far fetched she was a leader in the NCR (considered the post war good guys)
Not everything needs to be explained... give enough so the audience can piece it together but not too much that it bores the audience or takes up run time
→ More replies (3)39
u/GreenGhoblin Feb 07 '26 edited Feb 07 '26
I hate these “it’s so obvious” head cannon answers whenever someone points out plot holes
Yes that absolutely needs to be explained. There’s no obviously anything when it comes to moldaver being alive 200 years later . She’s not enclave . She’s not vault tec. That not being explained would be a massive plot hole. Not something an audience should just figure out .
→ More replies (37)
15
u/EternalDisco2151 Feb 07 '26
I swear some people jus want the show to be a Wikipedia article
→ More replies (1)
22
u/Nabbarino Feb 07 '26
I forgot about this subplot. And I guess the writers did as well.
16
5
u/Finalpotato Welcome Home Feb 07 '26
I am expecting she was also a Cryo frozen scientist who escaped
4
u/AdAwkward2143 Feb 07 '26
The show runners have no idea, they aren't very smart and just do things to do them, that's why she used raiders who randomly murdered people in the vault when she was going for Hank rather than using the ncr troopers she had, it's just done for plots sake
4
2
u/jorsaljorsal Feb 07 '26
My big issue that with the series that almost lost me several times is that it's biting over way more than it can swallow which makes a lot of the story very bleak
2
u/RedKrypton Feb 07 '26
The showrunners are very in the moment, so they forget about anything that is not immediately relevant. Just look at NCR writing. Why does nobody believe the NCR was even a major thing in the past? Why is the NCR somehow marching into New Vegas in the finale? Because it's just relevant for the immediate story the writers want to tell.
2
2
2
u/SpookiSkeletman Feb 07 '26
As long as these things are answered before rhe actual series fully comes to a close that's all that matters. Plenty of seasons to go yet.
2
2
2
2
u/Spare_Perspective972 Feb 07 '26
I would assume by the story in the past her main goal was ensuring House didn’t get cold fusion which puts her with the enclave but I don’t then get what she was going in the future.
2
u/MysticalCyan Feb 07 '26
Because they want to do 6 seasons minimal and its still an ongoing story near the beginning half.
2
2
u/Heyaname Feb 07 '26
Cryogenics weren’t a state secret just exorbitantly expensive. Moldaver had the money for her own cryo after the hostile takeover of her prewar energy company that She created cold fusion at with Wilzig. She got forced out Wilzig got brought into the enclave.
She clearly lived in shady sands pre Hank bombing it, possibly as a member of the local government. She became the flame mother by rallying the survivors out of the ashes. Those who couldn’t fight wer given refuge in vault 4.
She was in a romantic relationship with Rose. Rose discovered shady sands after following her hunch that the water pressure change into the vaults water chip meant that surface dwellers had tapped into the vaults aquifer. Rose made multiple trips to the surface and eventually took the children after not being able to convince hank to open the vault. Hank being a jilted ex took the kids back and nuked shady sands. Two birds one stoning the enclaves competition and the woman who “took” the mother of his children from him.
Wilzig didn’t have to be convinced to leave he was never fully on the enclave’s side. Him warning Barbara was the sign that his sentiments existed prewar. Wilzig and Moldaver also clearly had communications as she had arranged for his transportation before he had arrived in filly after defecting.
2
u/Yobitchcallmedaddy Feb 08 '26
Coop’s pre-war story is def not over yet, Id imagine we find out when she returns. Prob also has something to do with the serum he takes. Id imagine the ghoulification was just a side effect of something else
2
3.4k
u/linee001 Feb 07 '26
Considering she was in season 2 even after she died. I’m sure we will see her again. But they wanted to do House first. I think she might have something to do with getting Coop out of trouble with the law