On January 8th of this year Bethesda Softworks filed an application with the United States Patent and Trademark Office to trademark the name Fallout for use in “Entertainment services in the nature of an on-going television program set in a post-nuclear apocalyptic world.” Naturally, this has lead to some (very reasonable) speculation that the company is at least looking into the idea of developing the beloved video game IP into a TV show.
Trademarks often end up becoming nothing more than a trademark, so this news should not be taken to mean that we will all be sitting down to watch a Fallout TV show in the near (or even distant) future. With that said, there have been some recent events that don’t exactly shoot down the idea.
Earlier this month Fallout 3 voice actor Erik Todd Dellums hinted that we might soon hear some news about the return of his in-game character, Three Dog. Dellums then later retweeted a statement from a fan suggesting that the hint is either for the rumored Fallout 4 video game or a movie based on the franchise. Nothing was said about a TV show, but it does not take too much mental effort to expand that train of logic out to include some acting on the smaller screen.
We will keep an eye out for any official word from Bethesda Softworks on a possible Fallout TV show (same goes for a confirmation on Fallout 4) and let you know as soon as anything turns up.
One quick word of caution before you start dreaming up everything that you would love to see in a Fallout inspired TV series. Hollywood has a long history of taking treasured video game IPs, pulling down their collective pants, and then unloading on them until they are barely recognizable to the game’s fan base. The safest bet here is to wait and see exactly what comes out of any potential Fallout TV show before starting the engines on your hype train.
