It’s reductive to refer to every big-budget TV adaptation of a popular video game as “[studio]’s answer to The Last of Us.” But there is some basis for comparison between HBO’s Emmy-winning zombie drama and Fallout, the new series from Amazon based on the popular game franchise. Both take place in the aftermath of a global calamity that’s left civilization in ruins. Both follow scrappy protagonists who must survive the lawless wasteland, exposing the violent, selfish nature of a starving humanity. But where The Last of Us is a largely joyless and unoriginal enterprise, Fallout has the courage to be fun, imaginative, and even a little bit hopeful. I would be shocked if Fallout won any Emmys or the attention of mainstream adult audiences, but I’ll take it over The Last of Us any day of the week.

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The world of Fallout is a unique mash-up of discordant genre tropes unified by common themes and interconnected mythology. It’s a radioactive post-apocalypse built overtop of a space age retro-future, populated by Wild West raiders and bounty........

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