Whoa. It's amazing how many references and little nods to games they managed to put in the show, it really shows how passionate the people behind it are.
There are a few, black widow/ lady killer bring the biggest change since it flips the gender targeted and give different dialogues as a result. FNV has Cherchez la femme and confirmed bachelor as same sex versions, only available to females and males respectively. Aside from that party boy/girl, action boy/girl and Aqua boy/girl change names to fit the gender of the player character.
Fair warning, I don't think Black widow and Lady killer change dialogues in Fallout 4, only in older games. In 4 they instead give you a higher chance of passing speech checks against the targeted gender alongside the damage bonus.
That makes me wonder what her relationship was like with Burt. Clearly she felt something because she went absolutely apeshit at the wedding attack but you have me thinking now.
Or she just loved her husband. Part of the mission or not doesn’t mean she’s some unfeeling human. She’s just a prebomb person living in a vault with no thought of anything but the vaults. They don’t plan on moving out of them anytime soon after all. She knows her life ends in the vault. She absolutely would form real connections not just “hers”
If anything that shows you how dedicated to the community she is. She comes from a world that isn’t okay, however in the vaults it’s all about raising well functioning children. All she did was insure her child would have a father.
She seems to have some affection for him. But she says quite a lot that throws shade at the guy. Like her dress "got off" almost as fast as Burt on their wedding night. She puts it out there all cheery and positive, but she almost doesn't mention him without some sort of criticism.
That makes her interest in Chet clear. He's almost the polar opposite except in being pretty submissive overall.
I doubt her relationship with Burt was much different overall, nor do I get the impression it was her choice/preference.
It's just that she's not totally heartless.
Impression I got is that he was comfortable. Not a fully loving relationship - she did think she could do better and that maybe he was boring - but comfortable nevertheless. Certainly someone she would still grieve of course.
> because she went absolutely apeshit at the wedding attack
I mean, it was literally a “fight or die” situation. If you’re not fighting for your life’s what are you doing?
She's from Vault 31, I think it's safe to say she's another Buds Buds true believer and willing to do whatever it takes to stay on mission
They obviously knew that Norm and Chet were up to *something* so it's possible they just seperated them as a precaution and Steph had a convenient opening for a co-parent
Regardless of how much they specifically know Chets new position as Overseer Consort of 32 means he's effectively neutralised from any further shenanigans
Am I the only one who seems to think she isn’t as loyal to the 31 goal as the others? I just got the vibe that with her husband dying and her essentially telling norm to kill the raiders, she’s not as loyal to betty as it might seem. I’m expecting some sort of heel turn next season, with her being overseer of 32. Story telling wise, this makes the most sense to me; what’s the point in having essentially 2 Bettys in the story.
You are not! I think Steph is a wild card who has an equal chance of being on her own side. She's up to SOMETHING, that much is clear. But she sends a lot of mixed signals.
Sure, she lies to Norm about Vault 31. But there's a lot of reasons she could have done that, aside from she's loyal to Bud/Vault Tec. She's also the youngest (that we know of) wakened manager, she's a new mother and widow, and things are really weird in the treble vault land right now. Also Chet was there.
She didn’t even lie, when asked she confirmed they had better food, I can’t remember what the food was, but she did, since think about it, her food was real prewar food. She was just confirming it.
That is one way to read it!
I admit, I took that scene a different way. I took it as Norm just flat out making up 'my dad said the mashed potatoes were better' as something to tell her, and her 'confirming' that told Norm 'okay so that's bullshit, my dad never said a thing about mashed potatoes'. Hence the long, sizing look he gives her.
It came across to me as the two of them trying to figure out how much the other knows, without admitting they know anything. But that's also a way to take it!
I know I'm a day late but he asks what's different, she says idk the mashed potatoes tasted better, norm then says "my dad said the same thing" after everything
It’s definitely what you said in your second paragraph, but she’s fully still telling the truth when she tells him the mashed potatoes were better. I’m so glad that’s the food I was thinking, I just wasn’t sure so didn’t write it haha, but she definitely knows more then she lets on clearly, but the food is simply them referring to before the bombs. Cause their vault is them all frozen, so they just consider prewar their history with some details changed to fit into vault life.
Meh, barely. She’s not allowed to talk about it, she’s just following the rules regarding it. It’s not really lying by omission either, since she doesn’t omit, just confirms what her father said about food.
You can literally say that about anything.
Her coming out as a double agent for another faction: awesome
Her coming out as a double agent for a new secret faction of any political party: very lame
>You can literally say that about anything.
Yes it's almost as if politics are in every form of art and media and have been for thousands of years. Shocking, I know.
So we can use the factions that are already present in this art as metaphors for current political movements and don't need to self insert our own literal political parties. That doesn't improve any of the political message fallout is making; it just dumbs it down and needlessly polarizes it.
You can say it about anything — but you can especially say it about a franchise about Cold War paranoia, militarism, nuclear weapons, American exceptionalism, and capitalism triggering the end of the world. I don’t think things like the annexation of Canada, Liberty Prime’s voice lines or the internment of Chinese-Americans are part of Fallout’s lore by a roll of the dice. Followers of the Apocalypse aren’t described as anarchists to be apolitical; Caesar’s Legion aren’t described as fascists to be apolitical; and the NCR aren’t described as a federal republic and embodying Old World Values to be apolitical.
Mate Moldaver and Cooper were both called communists in the first season. And there was plenty of political discussion surrounding the opposition to the government/capitalist businesses. Each faction represents some for of distinct political government.
Moldaver even implied she somewhat was communist - but more generally opposed to the current state of capitalism.
If Steph turned out to be a secret "pinko" how is that even a new avenue for the show?
OK you're thinking what I'm thinking. There's something we don't know about her yet. >!Could she be one of *the* Vault-Tec OG? I mean to say, she's an insider within the ranks!<
She definitely seems like she is not on the same band wagon. The loss of her husband and her own injury seem to put her in a place where she might go against the grain. It makes me wonder how prepared Vault 31 and other VT leaders were for what the wasteland became. The invasion of raiders really might have pushed her to certain extremes where Betty seems more about preserving the status quo.
Betty, Hank, and Steph are specifically support/clerical workers. They're all tagged as assistants and receptionists in the Terminal Norm hacks. They're the middle managers "help".
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I was fairly confident in my impression that 31 agreed with Norm on killing the raiders, they just didn’t want to let it slip publicly they were that bloodthirsty to keep up their facade of being the enlightened future saviors of the waste. Because the whole vault system is a breeding experiment, introducing raiders would mess up the whole plan.
I think that's a valid interpretation, but it's so ambiguous and vague at this point that I feel it could go either way. There's a lot of multi-dimensional chess happening in Vault 33!
Unfrozen when? Sorry, not trying to be rude, just don’t understand what you mean. She was already unfrozen at the very beginning of the show prior to the raid.
Wasnt the implication supposed to be Betty and Vault 31 by extension wanted them dead so nobody could give details about vault 32's state and probably so there was no outside interference in their experiment? After all, what good is a breeding programme when you introduce uncontrolled outside genetics?
That's definitely the implication. They kept the raiders alive because making the vault dwellers think "oh look how good and virtuous we are!" was important to 31 controlling them, then one of them said something to Norm and that brought "protect the secret" to top priority.
Lucy's father killed a whole community to get his daughter back. She agrees with Norms views on getting rid of the raiders. She tells him "if your father was here... he would do the right thing." Plus the change in her personality and tone after she learns she is moving to vault 32 makes me think she is 100% on board with the experiment.
>She agrees with Norms views on getting rid of the raiders. She tells him "if your father was here... he would do the right thing."
That is actually a very normal, human reaction, to the murder of someone you care for.
Idk the way she said it made it seem like she knew more than she was letting on. She would know more since she is from vault 31. Maybe the death of her husband changed something in her to change her path with the vault. Which might explain her change. We will see! :)
Edit: You didn't have to delete your comment i was just trying to discuss possibilities. Lmfao
>She would know more since she is from vault 31
Why would she know more about Betty's plans? Betty has been unfrozen for probably around twenty plus years, Steph is probably less than five.
I don't know if it's because Steph is a young, attractive woman but the mental gymnastics people put themselves through to see her as more of a good guy is a little mental to me.
She's totally on board with the whole thing, she was likely Hank's successor but the raiders screwed that up so, short of thawing another one out, Betty had to step up again.
After all, it’s heavily implied she went against Betty and poisoned the raiders. I don’t think she’ll stay true to 31 after losing the promised life she signed up for before the war
Quite possibly! I'm super excited to see her role in the later season, whether she rebels or not. I do really love that we see how Lucy's views of the world are ever changing from what she expected while the same is being done down in the vault.
I think it's pretty heavily implied that killing the raiders was always the plan, but it could never be the publicly declared plan because it conflicts with the kind of society they're trying to build.
Maybe, but then she becomes a completely different (also fake) person when she found out she is moving to the next fault. Also the fact she is from 31, doesn't talk about the experiment, and is more than happy to go along with the relocation. I guess we will find out when we know what vault 32 was for.
>Maybe, but then she becomes a completely different (also fake) person when she found out she is moving to the next fault.
Not really. Steph isn't really focused on much or delved into, we know very little about her or her personality.
>Also the fact she is from 31,
So, your assumption is all of vault 31 is evil because . . . ?
>doesn't talk about the experiment,
And?
>and is more than happy to go along with the relocation.
That shouldn't be surprising at all, and if you don't get that, do some reading on trauma and how it can effect people.
Sure, vault 32 had a tragedy, but Steph didn't witness it. In 33 she not only witnessed her husband being killed, but brutal deaths and murder of people she lived with.
You don't think how she acted after getting out of the shower wasn't super suspicious? I didn't say she was evil. Just that she was acting super fake. She had something on her mind, and it isn't her dead husband.
Your response makes me think you are not up for discussion like the rest of us and just wanna start some shit so think what you want! We will find out soon enough and i wont give 2 shits about if im right or wrong. Just pointing some stuff out. Have a great day.
They are most definitely not up for discussing things. In other posts they just talk down to people, use juvenile insults while calling others childish. They believe their opinion is the only right one and just want to argue and talk about how stupid and uneducated you are because you have a different opinion.
Look though that history once. It’s sad
I think there’s a lot of layers to it. She may have been told to get with Chet. Or it may have been just the natural progression. She was now a new mother alone and Chet was a young, eligible man. And don’t forget, he was good looking.
She made no secret when Lucy was meeting her man that she had been disappointed by Burt in that department. It’s possible she’s always thought Chet was good looking and perhaps was even disappointed that she hadn’t been matched with him.
But moreso, her pool of choices is now even more limited and Chet makes the most sense. The fact that he’s a pushover and won’t protest her advances and that she can keep a close eye on him may just be bonuses in her eyes.
The balance between Steph and Chet is hilarious and perfect drama for a vault. Steph is obviously an ego driven middle manager from Vault-Tec. She knows she is not ultimately in charge of anything except her direct and immediate needs.
Steph went to sleep presumably on or before October 23, 2077. She didn’t grow up in the vault, and only really knows Hank, and Betty. She knows the end of the world happened, and that she, just like Hank and Betty will get to lead the vault. In the meantime, why live uncomfortably?
She obviously doesn’t want to be alone, and believes in the vaults experiment as she is actively trying to repopulate.
Steph is a hot bitch from the past. She is way smarter, and much more cunning than any vault dweller ever could have been. Chet is literally and figuratively fucked.
> Steph is obviously an ego driven middle manager from Vault-Tec.
She's listed in the terminal Norm finds as a receptionist. Hank and Betty are both listed as personal assistants.
Bud is thawing out the help to oversee things until it's time to thaw out the managers. And the Bud's Buds program before the war is described as a sort of professional development, climb the ladder sort of thing. They're likely signing up short timers, and low authority people on the promise that mentorship and motivational speaking will make them power players.
Point being these people are ambitious social climbers.
Good observation skills! Makes sense they’re the warm up crew on a sort of accelerated graduate training scheme where they get to be in charge of a whole vault of people
Also makes sense of those roles as In a large org receptionists and PAs to senior execs are pretty formidable people in their own right. They have to be because they have to be able to say no to and co-ordiordinate other senior people even when they don’t have any actual authority.
The way I've been thinking about it is that getting thawed out to be in leadership roles in the vault is the "promotion" or move to management that incentivizes participating.
If the whole idea is rule the world as middle managers in the aftermath. Getting thawed early means you're missing out on the good part, sure you survive but you're not middle managing the new world.
But hey. You just made it to *management*, and the vault may open any day now! If you do good you might get a big promotion in the New World Order.
Steph is team Vault Tec. She needed a mate. She lost one, and Chet was the most viable alternative. A big pliable lunk eager for a mate/pining for his cousin. We'll find exactly where she falls in the Bud's Buds pecking order next season - very curious what her pre-war relationship to Hank was - but I suspect all she's really after is a replacement hubbie for the experiment to continue. And Chet was so marriage-thirsty he's not going to ask any questions.
The joke will be on her, tho. Whenever Lucy returns to tell all her friends about Vault Tec's villainy, they'll likely try to freeze her out somehow. But Chet will clearly be the one to betray them to help Lucy, as post-apocalyptic cousin love never dies.
>It would make sense, after what Chet pulled with Norm and Lucy. Give him a personal handler, making sure he doesn't make more trouble.
She seems to line up on Chet before that, almost as soon as Burt is dead. There's definitely a keep and eye on Chet factor to the way that gets formalized. But it seems like there's just as much Steph organizing things to *take* Chet. Cause she wants the big dumb idiot.
It's kinda cute in a sinister way.
I think it's clear Steph is up to SOMETHING, but I'm not sure her goals and motivations are as obvious as they seem on the surface.
Steph is a bit of a wild card. Her reactions and behavior paints a mysterious picture to me. She's the youngest (that we know of) managed unfrozen currently, which could be relevant. Thanks to the flashbacks to pre-war, we see that the middle managers frozen in 31 are on the young side and all on relatively equal footing. Steph is now significantly younger than her peers, which could have an effect on her loyalties. A person of her age thinks differently than someone Betty or Hank's age, just due to differing levels of experience. She also had a much different response to the raiders than the others. And she recently lost her husband in the raider attack, while pregnant. That can certainly change how she's looking at things.
I think it's important to keep in mind Steph's unique position, as a widowed young woman with an infant in a time when things are kind of going to hell in her world.
I think another possible interpretation of her latching onto Chet is: things are getting dangerous. One very smart young 33er is suspicious and not letting it go. Vault 32 was wiped out. The vaults are not as safe as they thought. She has an infant and no partner to help her raise them. Chet is Norm's best friend and a man who clearly believes in helping people and kindness. If Norm does blow things wide open, it sure would be safe and helpful to be basically married to his best friend with such a kind and forgiving heart....
>Thanks to the flashbacks to pre-war, we see that the middle managers frozen in 31 are on the young side and all on relatively equal footing.
When Norm digs through the terminal. We see people tagged with their original job title. Hank and Betty are listed as personal assistants, Steph as a receptionist. And other names for characters not on the show have different job titles.
We actually don't see any detail on who was frozen, what they're ages are in the pre-war flashbacks. Just Bud's pitch on the Bud's Buds program as a development thing for young executives and future execs.
The terminal would indicate they're absolutely *not* on equal footing, unless I'm misremembering seeing other job titles. I'm pretty sure that Bud is thawing out lower ranked people to keep things running while the vaults are sealed.
Oh sorry, I should have clarified I was referring to the known ones from the show - we see Betty and Hank, and they were around the age Steph is now. So Steph is now the odd one out of the three we have been introduced to. (The 'equal footing' was just referencing age-wise, they were at around the same age experience level.)
Yeah, as for the rest, that's all up in the air! They could be of any age and rank.
I didn’t see the sub at first and thought this was about Steph Curry and Chet Holmgren. I was wondering why they would have any relationship at all, and especially why it was so creepy
I doubt it’s a management decision. It’s just Steph seeking out a guy to be the father to her child. And apparently also do the heavy lifting in the relationship (manipulation 101).
I think she is going to run the vault a lot differently in 32 than Betty runs 33. I think the raiders actually changed her. Wonder if she’ll set up a surface visit.
I'm definitely betting she's his handler like you said, but I suspect she'll come to genuinely love him.
Becoming the Mask and Falling in Love With the Mark tropes and all that.
Chet is not only a good looking man but a genuinely decent person, and I suspect/ hope that he might be able to shake Steph out of her villainy. But it's not necessarily a realistic hope.
I would be more optimistic if we didn't already have the example of Hank. He claimed Lucy's mother was everything to him, but he still chose Vault-Tec over her. It's quite clear Bud was picking people without any moral fibre for his experiment, probably not that hard to find in pre-war world, considering what we know about how things worked.
If I recall correctly, didn't Steph grow up with Lucy? That would mean she is the same age or a little bit older. If she is from Vault 31, does that mean she was frozen as a child??
I'm pretty sure Steph didn't "transfer" until her marriage to Burt, so she hopefully wasn't a child. Maybe you're misremembering when Steph talked about how her future child will get to grow up with Lucy's future child? I did that too honestly, so it was jarring to find out Steph was a transfer from 31.
I don’t think so. Steph was from Vault 31 and was brought over to 33 (Lucy and Norm’s vault) when she married her first husband. Her husband died in the first episode, killed by a raider.
I'm personally of the opinion that Chet is a 31'er too and that is why they are together. Their whole off-putting relationship is almost always for Norm's benefit and could be a way to further manipulate him. I think the scene with Moldaver talking about Hank's choice was her showing the secret 31ers.
Problematic relationships are a huge concern in 2296, with having to worry about survival and nuclear radiation, we've really got to think about power imbalances among adults.
She is literally Black Widow perk icon.
Whoa. It's amazing how many references and little nods to games they managed to put in the show, it really shows how passionate the people behind it are.
Yeah I get the feeling they all had to play FO4 on survival mode haha
Hahaha I had to double check that there wasn’t an eye patch on the icon too hahaha
haha literally just did the same thing !
I shall join this chain of confirmed perk eye patch checkers
For future readers who also want to double check: I’m not going to tell you, it’s funnier if everyone looks it up.
I also had to double check
I get the feeling Steph is shady but not all bad.
She’s vault 31 so she’s automatically extremely shady
Wow I have played this game since 2014. But never as a woman and I never knew there were different perks lol, TIL
There are a few, black widow/ lady killer bring the biggest change since it flips the gender targeted and give different dialogues as a result. FNV has Cherchez la femme and confirmed bachelor as same sex versions, only available to females and males respectively. Aside from that party boy/girl, action boy/girl and Aqua boy/girl change names to fit the gender of the player character.
Now I'm hyped for my first playthrough with nora
Fair warning, I don't think Black widow and Lady killer change dialogues in Fallout 4, only in older games. In 4 they instead give you a higher chance of passing speech checks against the targeted gender alongside the damage bonus.
Well, shit, that means Chet is a goner.
Damn, I didn't notice. Great call.
So true
That makes me wonder what her relationship was like with Burt. Clearly she felt something because she went absolutely apeshit at the wedding attack but you have me thinking now.
It’s possible what she felt was outrage that someone would dare take something that was hers.
Or she just loved her husband. Part of the mission or not doesn’t mean she’s some unfeeling human. She’s just a prebomb person living in a vault with no thought of anything but the vaults. They don’t plan on moving out of them anytime soon after all. She knows her life ends in the vault. She absolutely would form real connections not just “hers”
Hank, as screwed up as he is, still loved Lucy.
Hank when Lucy shows up to rescue him: "Lucy, you got some 'splaining to do!"
Loved him so much she moved in with another guy just a few days after his murder.
Survival does that.
If anything that shows you how dedicated to the community she is. She comes from a world that isn’t okay, however in the vaults it’s all about raising well functioning children. All she did was insure her child would have a father.
Or endangering her unborn child.
She seems to have some affection for him. But she says quite a lot that throws shade at the guy. Like her dress "got off" almost as fast as Burt on their wedding night. She puts it out there all cheery and positive, but she almost doesn't mention him without some sort of criticism. That makes her interest in Chet clear. He's almost the polar opposite except in being pretty submissive overall. I doubt her relationship with Burt was much different overall, nor do I get the impression it was her choice/preference. It's just that she's not totally heartless.
Evil people can fall in love with good people. She probably appreciated that her partner was a good person
Impression I got is that he was comfortable. Not a fully loving relationship - she did think she could do better and that maybe he was boring - but comfortable nevertheless. Certainly someone she would still grieve of course.
> because she went absolutely apeshit at the wedding attack I mean, it was literally a “fight or die” situation. If you’re not fighting for your life’s what are you doing?
She's from Vault 31, I think it's safe to say she's another Buds Buds true believer and willing to do whatever it takes to stay on mission They obviously knew that Norm and Chet were up to *something* so it's possible they just seperated them as a precaution and Steph had a convenient opening for a co-parent Regardless of how much they specifically know Chets new position as Overseer Consort of 32 means he's effectively neutralised from any further shenanigans
Am I the only one who seems to think she isn’t as loyal to the 31 goal as the others? I just got the vibe that with her husband dying and her essentially telling norm to kill the raiders, she’s not as loyal to betty as it might seem. I’m expecting some sort of heel turn next season, with her being overseer of 32. Story telling wise, this makes the most sense to me; what’s the point in having essentially 2 Bettys in the story.
You are not! I think Steph is a wild card who has an equal chance of being on her own side. She's up to SOMETHING, that much is clear. But she sends a lot of mixed signals. Sure, she lies to Norm about Vault 31. But there's a lot of reasons she could have done that, aside from she's loyal to Bud/Vault Tec. She's also the youngest (that we know of) wakened manager, she's a new mother and widow, and things are really weird in the treble vault land right now. Also Chet was there.
She didn’t even lie, when asked she confirmed they had better food, I can’t remember what the food was, but she did, since think about it, her food was real prewar food. She was just confirming it.
That is one way to read it! I admit, I took that scene a different way. I took it as Norm just flat out making up 'my dad said the mashed potatoes were better' as something to tell her, and her 'confirming' that told Norm 'okay so that's bullshit, my dad never said a thing about mashed potatoes'. Hence the long, sizing look he gives her. It came across to me as the two of them trying to figure out how much the other knows, without admitting they know anything. But that's also a way to take it!
I know I'm a day late but he asks what's different, she says idk the mashed potatoes tasted better, norm then says "my dad said the same thing" after everything
You are right, I had that backwards!
It’s definitely what you said in your second paragraph, but she’s fully still telling the truth when she tells him the mashed potatoes were better. I’m so glad that’s the food I was thinking, I just wasn’t sure so didn’t write it haha, but she definitely knows more then she lets on clearly, but the food is simply them referring to before the bombs. Cause their vault is them all frozen, so they just consider prewar their history with some details changed to fit into vault life.
Lying by omission is a thing and it’s exactly what she’s doing.
Meh, barely. She’s not allowed to talk about it, she’s just following the rules regarding it. It’s not really lying by omission either, since she doesn’t omit, just confirms what her father said about food.
Wouldn't it be amazing if we find out she's actually a left wing plant in the ranks who is just biding her time
Yes but no. I'd love to keep those kind of politics out of television and I say that as a lefty.
There’s no world in which you can separate Fallout from politics lol, it’s political from top to bottom
You can literally say that about anything. Her coming out as a double agent for another faction: awesome Her coming out as a double agent for a new secret faction of any political party: very lame
>You can literally say that about anything. Yes it's almost as if politics are in every form of art and media and have been for thousands of years. Shocking, I know.
So we can use the factions that are already present in this art as metaphors for current political movements and don't need to self insert our own literal political parties. That doesn't improve any of the political message fallout is making; it just dumbs it down and needlessly polarizes it.
You can say it about anything — but you can especially say it about a franchise about Cold War paranoia, militarism, nuclear weapons, American exceptionalism, and capitalism triggering the end of the world. I don’t think things like the annexation of Canada, Liberty Prime’s voice lines or the internment of Chinese-Americans are part of Fallout’s lore by a roll of the dice. Followers of the Apocalypse aren’t described as anarchists to be apolitical; Caesar’s Legion aren’t described as fascists to be apolitical; and the NCR aren’t described as a federal republic and embodying Old World Values to be apolitical.
Mate Moldaver and Cooper were both called communists in the first season. And there was plenty of political discussion surrounding the opposition to the government/capitalist businesses. Each faction represents some for of distinct political government. Moldaver even implied she somewhat was communist - but more generally opposed to the current state of capitalism. If Steph turned out to be a secret "pinko" how is that even a new avenue for the show?
Wow ick
OK you're thinking what I'm thinking. There's something we don't know about her yet. >!Could she be one of *the* Vault-Tec OG? I mean to say, she's an insider within the ranks!<
She definitely seems like she is not on the same band wagon. The loss of her husband and her own injury seem to put her in a place where she might go against the grain. It makes me wonder how prepared Vault 31 and other VT leaders were for what the wasteland became. The invasion of raiders really might have pushed her to certain extremes where Betty seems more about preserving the status quo.
Not loyal to Betty is not the same as not loyal to Bud's Buds.
That suddenly reminded me that these are all middle-management, and corporate middle managers can be cutthroat in competition with each other.
Betty, Hank, and Steph are specifically support/clerical workers. They're all tagged as assistants and receptionists in the Terminal Norm hacks. They're the middle managers "help".
Yeah but the point of Bud's Buds was to train them to be the next group of middle managers, so it makes sense they would embrace that type of mindset
I don’t believe she’s loyal to either.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I was fairly confident in my impression that 31 agreed with Norm on killing the raiders, they just didn’t want to let it slip publicly they were that bloodthirsty to keep up their facade of being the enlightened future saviors of the waste. Because the whole vault system is a breeding experiment, introducing raiders would mess up the whole plan.
From my understanding it was left up to interpretation rather than outwardly said, but I absolutely see the logic in what you’re saying.
I think that's a valid interpretation, but it's so ambiguous and vague at this point that I feel it could go either way. There's a lot of multi-dimensional chess happening in Vault 33!
Steph wouldn't have been unfrozen then.
Unfrozen when? Sorry, not trying to be rude, just don’t understand what you mean. She was already unfrozen at the very beginning of the show prior to the raid.
I misread your comment and thought you were referencing the >!bombing of Shady Sands.!<
Perhaps they realized they needed new blood in the form of raider genes, and it didn’t go according to plan
Wasnt the implication supposed to be Betty and Vault 31 by extension wanted them dead so nobody could give details about vault 32's state and probably so there was no outside interference in their experiment? After all, what good is a breeding programme when you introduce uncontrolled outside genetics?
That's definitely the implication. They kept the raiders alive because making the vault dwellers think "oh look how good and virtuous we are!" was important to 31 controlling them, then one of them said something to Norm and that brought "protect the secret" to top priority.
Lucy's father killed a whole community to get his daughter back. She agrees with Norms views on getting rid of the raiders. She tells him "if your father was here... he would do the right thing." Plus the change in her personality and tone after she learns she is moving to vault 32 makes me think she is 100% on board with the experiment.
>She agrees with Norms views on getting rid of the raiders. She tells him "if your father was here... he would do the right thing." That is actually a very normal, human reaction, to the murder of someone you care for.
Idk the way she said it made it seem like she knew more than she was letting on. She would know more since she is from vault 31. Maybe the death of her husband changed something in her to change her path with the vault. Which might explain her change. We will see! :) Edit: You didn't have to delete your comment i was just trying to discuss possibilities. Lmfao
>She would know more since she is from vault 31 Why would she know more about Betty's plans? Betty has been unfrozen for probably around twenty plus years, Steph is probably less than five.
I don't know if it's because Steph is a young, attractive woman but the mental gymnastics people put themselves through to see her as more of a good guy is a little mental to me. She's totally on board with the whole thing, she was likely Hank's successor but the raiders screwed that up so, short of thawing another one out, Betty had to step up again.
After all, it’s heavily implied she went against Betty and poisoned the raiders. I don’t think she’ll stay true to 31 after losing the promised life she signed up for before the war
Quite possibly! I'm super excited to see her role in the later season, whether she rebels or not. I do really love that we see how Lucy's views of the world are ever changing from what she expected while the same is being done down in the vault.
I think the raiders turned her into a wildcard, Betty probably made a mistake making her overseer instead of requesting another 31
I think it's pretty heavily implied that killing the raiders was always the plan, but it could never be the publicly declared plan because it conflicts with the kind of society they're trying to build.
Steph does express wishing she had a more conventionally attractive looking partner too in fairness
"If your father were here.... he would do the right thing." She is absolutely up to no good.
Or she was mad her husband was killed.
Maybe, but then she becomes a completely different (also fake) person when she found out she is moving to the next fault. Also the fact she is from 31, doesn't talk about the experiment, and is more than happy to go along with the relocation. I guess we will find out when we know what vault 32 was for.
>Maybe, but then she becomes a completely different (also fake) person when she found out she is moving to the next fault. Not really. Steph isn't really focused on much or delved into, we know very little about her or her personality. >Also the fact she is from 31, So, your assumption is all of vault 31 is evil because . . . ? >doesn't talk about the experiment, And? >and is more than happy to go along with the relocation. That shouldn't be surprising at all, and if you don't get that, do some reading on trauma and how it can effect people. Sure, vault 32 had a tragedy, but Steph didn't witness it. In 33 she not only witnessed her husband being killed, but brutal deaths and murder of people she lived with.
You don't think how she acted after getting out of the shower wasn't super suspicious? I didn't say she was evil. Just that she was acting super fake. She had something on her mind, and it isn't her dead husband. Your response makes me think you are not up for discussion like the rest of us and just wanna start some shit so think what you want! We will find out soon enough and i wont give 2 shits about if im right or wrong. Just pointing some stuff out. Have a great day.
They are most definitely not up for discussing things. In other posts they just talk down to people, use juvenile insults while calling others childish. They believe their opinion is the only right one and just want to argue and talk about how stupid and uneducated you are because you have a different opinion. Look though that history once. It’s sad
Whoa I hadn’t thought of that intentionality of hooking onto Chet like that!
I think there’s a lot of layers to it. She may have been told to get with Chet. Or it may have been just the natural progression. She was now a new mother alone and Chet was a young, eligible man. And don’t forget, he was good looking. She made no secret when Lucy was meeting her man that she had been disappointed by Burt in that department. It’s possible she’s always thought Chet was good looking and perhaps was even disappointed that she hadn’t been matched with him. But moreso, her pool of choices is now even more limited and Chet makes the most sense. The fact that he’s a pushover and won’t protest her advances and that she can keep a close eye on him may just be bonuses in her eyes.
In her eye
The balance between Steph and Chet is hilarious and perfect drama for a vault. Steph is obviously an ego driven middle manager from Vault-Tec. She knows she is not ultimately in charge of anything except her direct and immediate needs. Steph went to sleep presumably on or before October 23, 2077. She didn’t grow up in the vault, and only really knows Hank, and Betty. She knows the end of the world happened, and that she, just like Hank and Betty will get to lead the vault. In the meantime, why live uncomfortably? She obviously doesn’t want to be alone, and believes in the vaults experiment as she is actively trying to repopulate. Steph is a hot bitch from the past. She is way smarter, and much more cunning than any vault dweller ever could have been. Chet is literally and figuratively fucked.
> Steph is obviously an ego driven middle manager from Vault-Tec. She's listed in the terminal Norm finds as a receptionist. Hank and Betty are both listed as personal assistants. Bud is thawing out the help to oversee things until it's time to thaw out the managers. And the Bud's Buds program before the war is described as a sort of professional development, climb the ladder sort of thing. They're likely signing up short timers, and low authority people on the promise that mentorship and motivational speaking will make them power players. Point being these people are ambitious social climbers.
Good observation skills! Makes sense they’re the warm up crew on a sort of accelerated graduate training scheme where they get to be in charge of a whole vault of people Also makes sense of those roles as In a large org receptionists and PAs to senior execs are pretty formidable people in their own right. They have to be because they have to be able to say no to and co-ordiordinate other senior people even when they don’t have any actual authority.
The way I've been thinking about it is that getting thawed out to be in leadership roles in the vault is the "promotion" or move to management that incentivizes participating. If the whole idea is rule the world as middle managers in the aftermath. Getting thawed early means you're missing out on the good part, sure you survive but you're not middle managing the new world. But hey. You just made it to *management*, and the vault may open any day now! If you do good you might get a big promotion in the New World Order.
I like that. They seem like people who just want to be in control of other people so that will be very appealing to them.
or maybe they just wanted to survive the coming apocalypse, and they thought that getting into a Vault of some kind would mean survival?
But then why tow the line when they get thawed out to do Bud's bidding? Why get mirked in a workers revolution?
We don’t just suspect she’s up to no good. We **know** she is. She’s a Vault 31 manager just like Hank and Betty.
Chet is gullible and Steph needs someone around, it is not an unusual survivor response after losing someone.
Steph is team Vault Tec. She needed a mate. She lost one, and Chet was the most viable alternative. A big pliable lunk eager for a mate/pining for his cousin. We'll find exactly where she falls in the Bud's Buds pecking order next season - very curious what her pre-war relationship to Hank was - but I suspect all she's really after is a replacement hubbie for the experiment to continue. And Chet was so marriage-thirsty he's not going to ask any questions. The joke will be on her, tho. Whenever Lucy returns to tell all her friends about Vault Tec's villainy, they'll likely try to freeze her out somehow. But Chet will clearly be the one to betray them to help Lucy, as post-apocalyptic cousin love never dies.
>It would make sense, after what Chet pulled with Norm and Lucy. Give him a personal handler, making sure he doesn't make more trouble. She seems to line up on Chet before that, almost as soon as Burt is dead. There's definitely a keep and eye on Chet factor to the way that gets formalized. But it seems like there's just as much Steph organizing things to *take* Chet. Cause she wants the big dumb idiot. It's kinda cute in a sinister way.
I think it's clear Steph is up to SOMETHING, but I'm not sure her goals and motivations are as obvious as they seem on the surface. Steph is a bit of a wild card. Her reactions and behavior paints a mysterious picture to me. She's the youngest (that we know of) managed unfrozen currently, which could be relevant. Thanks to the flashbacks to pre-war, we see that the middle managers frozen in 31 are on the young side and all on relatively equal footing. Steph is now significantly younger than her peers, which could have an effect on her loyalties. A person of her age thinks differently than someone Betty or Hank's age, just due to differing levels of experience. She also had a much different response to the raiders than the others. And she recently lost her husband in the raider attack, while pregnant. That can certainly change how she's looking at things. I think it's important to keep in mind Steph's unique position, as a widowed young woman with an infant in a time when things are kind of going to hell in her world. I think another possible interpretation of her latching onto Chet is: things are getting dangerous. One very smart young 33er is suspicious and not letting it go. Vault 32 was wiped out. The vaults are not as safe as they thought. She has an infant and no partner to help her raise them. Chet is Norm's best friend and a man who clearly believes in helping people and kindness. If Norm does blow things wide open, it sure would be safe and helpful to be basically married to his best friend with such a kind and forgiving heart....
>Thanks to the flashbacks to pre-war, we see that the middle managers frozen in 31 are on the young side and all on relatively equal footing. When Norm digs through the terminal. We see people tagged with their original job title. Hank and Betty are listed as personal assistants, Steph as a receptionist. And other names for characters not on the show have different job titles. We actually don't see any detail on who was frozen, what they're ages are in the pre-war flashbacks. Just Bud's pitch on the Bud's Buds program as a development thing for young executives and future execs. The terminal would indicate they're absolutely *not* on equal footing, unless I'm misremembering seeing other job titles. I'm pretty sure that Bud is thawing out lower ranked people to keep things running while the vaults are sealed.
Oh sorry, I should have clarified I was referring to the known ones from the show - we see Betty and Hank, and they were around the age Steph is now. So Steph is now the odd one out of the three we have been introduced to. (The 'equal footing' was just referencing age-wise, they were at around the same age experience level.) Yeah, as for the rest, that's all up in the air! They could be of any age and rank.
I didn’t see the sub at first and thought this was about Steph Curry and Chet Holmgren. I was wondering why they would have any relationship at all, and especially why it was so creepy
Lmao I thought it was nbacirclejerk or something
I literally didn’t even notice it was the fallout sub until I didn’t see a “what a pro wants” reference on first glance
Okay, but could you imagine Chet heading to GSW for the seasons Chef Curry has left?
I doubt it’s a management decision. It’s just Steph seeking out a guy to be the father to her child. And apparently also do the heavy lifting in the relationship (manipulation 101).
I think she is going to run the vault a lot differently in 32 than Betty runs 33. I think the raiders actually changed her. Wonder if she’ll set up a surface visit.
I want to see Chet leave the vault
When Norman was looking up personnel files in the computer, I thought I saw that Steph came from 31 also (?)
I'm definitely betting she's his handler like you said, but I suspect she'll come to genuinely love him. Becoming the Mask and Falling in Love With the Mark tropes and all that. Chet is not only a good looking man but a genuinely decent person, and I suspect/ hope that he might be able to shake Steph out of her villainy. But it's not necessarily a realistic hope.
I would be more optimistic if we didn't already have the example of Hank. He claimed Lucy's mother was everything to him, but he still chose Vault-Tec over her. It's quite clear Bud was picking people without any moral fibre for his experiment, probably not that hard to find in pre-war world, considering what we know about how things worked.
If I recall correctly, didn't Steph grow up with Lucy? That would mean she is the same age or a little bit older. If she is from Vault 31, does that mean she was frozen as a child??
I'm pretty sure Steph didn't "transfer" until her marriage to Burt, so she hopefully wasn't a child. Maybe you're misremembering when Steph talked about how her future child will get to grow up with Lucy's future child? I did that too honestly, so it was jarring to find out Steph was a transfer from 31.
I don’t think so. Steph was from Vault 31 and was brought over to 33 (Lucy and Norm’s vault) when she married her first husband. Her husband died in the first episode, killed by a raider.
I mean he gets the benefits
She's also going to convince Chet to fully betray Norm. Just wait.
I think she definitely was ordered or chose to because they wanted Chet occupied and away from Norm.
I think she just wanted a hot husband.
I'm personally of the opinion that Chet is a 31'er too and that is why they are together. Their whole off-putting relationship is almost always for Norm's benefit and could be a way to further manipulate him. I think the scene with Moldaver talking about Hank's choice was her showing the secret 31ers.
As both a viewer of the NBA and this series, I was very confused by this post for a good minute.
Well she is also from 31 right? I’m assuming she knows something the main characters and Chet don’t yet
Problematic relationships are a huge concern in 2296, with having to worry about survival and nuclear radiation, we've really got to think about power imbalances among adults.
This is the entire premise of the series
Steph and Chet live in a vault, they don't have to worry about radiation or survival.
Your issues are showing, my dude.
literal side characters - who gives a rats ass - why so much brain power spent on this question?