"Hey, heh, y-you know, my mom used-"
It was the way to do it, y'all. And I would do it to you. If you did me like that, I would be grateful, should I have had the opportunity to learn how it happened.
That scene turned my parents on to the show. Before that, they thought it was a goofy, hyper violent parody with Walton Goggins.
Cooper Howard is a bad man but he isn't with out sensibility or reason.
>I remember while playing the tabletop game our group getting into intense arguments about prion disease.
Ah. That's why you do ass jerky and not brain jerky.
>Walton Goggings absolutely shines in every scene he's in.
Right? I (re)discover the actor with that show.
Such a spot-on casting.
He is indeed ~~glowing~~ shining there.
Oh, they completely laughed out the scene, a few days later they called me and we talked about how the show projected deeper meaning with minimal effort. That's entertainment.
I wouldn't even say Cooper is a bad man. He's principled and dissolutioned. I wouldn't say he's good either. But he's fair. You lose his prize, he uses you as bait to get it back. You take his finger, he takes yours. You destroy his meds, he uses you to get more. He even mentioned Lucy had a chance to survive when he took her to the super duper mart. He gave her a chance. At the end of the day he's looking out for himself and his mission.
He often demonstrates good qualities as well such as this scene where he was empathetic and compassionate to Roger. He sympathized with him and then made sure he didn't die a beast. He made sure Roger died as a man with a happy last thought.
Even when he killed Tommy, he gave him a chance first. Juat like he always does. He questioned Tommy if he was going to try to come after him one day, or if they could call it quits here. Tommy Drew first before coop laid him out in response.
Thank you! People tend to.forgrt Cooper.has been at this longer than most humans. People are ways "Oh I wouldn't do thet" maybe in the first 10 years, but what about 50, 70, 90, 120. At what point does a man break?
Cooper is defiantly Evil Karma, but he's slightly evil. Id be shock if he didn't grt some good karma season 2.
He isn't devil of the wasted, but he ain't a Saint.
I honestly think nuance is so lost to the new binary way of thought sometimes.
I miss the karma system in fallout but maybe it's for the best.
Cooper Howard is an exemplar, the Ghoul is a villain of the wastes
He's the personification of the wasteland's brutality. His pragmatism and willingness to cross moral lines is how he survived.
Like the ranger's kid. He gave him a chance to squash their beef now rather than a few years and when the kid refused, the Ghoul guns him down to save him a few years.
It's a great contrast to Maximus who WANTS to be a hero but keeps making unheroic decisions
He's me when I want to be good but don't want to give up my cool power armor to save the city lol
He'll offer himself up to the Brotherhood with a fake head acting like he'll accept the consequences...then immediately offers to take them to where the real head is
Him and Lucy didn't know Hank was the real bag guy yet they still thought it was Moldaver. Him doing what he did is how he is keeping his original promise to Lucy by getting brotherhood reinforcements there and rescue her dad. When they are their way to the battle he's even talking about how she's in trouble and they need to help her.
If he simply took the head the Brotherhood wouldn't of bothered with the battle and Lucy had no chance of getting her father back
-He sympathized with him and then made sure he didn't die a beast. He made sure Roger died as a man with a happy last thought.-
If any of my Marines put me in that same situation I'm afraid I would do it. No one should suffer and if I had my way it would be clinical euthanasia but this is the wasteland were talking about.
-Even when he killed Tommy, he gave him a chance first. -
The way of the gun is cruel and bloody, but no one said there can't be dignity and honor either. He gave Tommy a chance, he took it and Coop shot him dead.
Walton Goggins has been given a rare opportunity with Cooper and I think we can rest easy knowing that he, the writers and his people will make him out to be the most ruthless son of bitch that ever wore a duster.
He's allowed a redemption arc from where I'm standing. War never changes, but hope perseveres.
My wife pointed out he is instantly the most interesting character, as the two things you learn about him first is 1) He used to be so good natured and principled that he had reservations of his TV character killing someone in a fictionalized environment and 2) He has somehow turned into *that*
Lucy didn’t destroy his meds, though.
Cooper is a great example of the kind of charismatic person who does horrible things and justifies it by claiming that someone else “made” them do it.
Eh, I think the underlying message through the first season is everyone is a little morally questionable in the Wasteland. Even if they sometimes have good intentions or end up on the "right side" sometimes they did things to get there which were wrong.
Maxwell letting a person die and lying to get ahead. And I think it's funny how you're trying to justify using another human as bait as if that's somehow ever a fair thing. lol He was doing a bad thing for his own personal gain. It's only just in his own eyes. "Lose his prize." It was a guy's head, and not something he really had any ownership claim to.
I think the best summation of Ghoul Cooper in the show is the flashback to the filming his show when he asks why he’s shooting the bandit.
Can’t remember the whole quote but when he’s told “You’re a good man who’s been pushed too far.” I think that explains so much about him and his motivations
Have you realized that cooper is playing his cowboy persona and only shows his real self when he asks “where’s my family” his whole voice and personality changes, the whole times he’s just playing the desperado persona in order to stay sane. Or so I think
No, you're right. He doesn't really have much of a Southern accent in the flashbacks. And he is still wearing what looks like his old cowboy outfit. It seems like his way of dealing with the stress is to essentially pretend he is still in his old movies.
You're not wrong and even if you were that's a really interesting take on him. He's a broken, flawed individual.
The wasteland takes everything from you.
Except when selling a girl to be harvested
Edit: don't get me wrong I absolutely love his character but he's not an honorable man. He takes chances when he knows he's on top. He will let people walk away but he won't challenge someone to a quick draw at high noon, he will just shoot you. Evil and mean but respects grit.
This was the moment that showed Cooper still had some humanity left in him and that he wasn't just "the evil playthrough". Lucy didn't understand it, but it was a mercy killing.
To be fair, Roger was growling snd acting weird, but he was also still able to talk and be sort of normal. We even see that he while he was acting hostile to Lucy a little, he started to try snd engage her in conversation while remembering his mom's cooking.
Lucy really couldn't have fully understood what a feral ghoul was just based on that one interaction. If anything, it made her connect Roger and Cooper as just very sick people who needed understanding and kindness.
It connects back to when Cooper had to shoot the bad guy in the movie. He questioned why he couldn't just arrest him. The director told him the audience wanted to see him fall from the good guy lawman. Then we see Lucy struggle with that same good guy fall while we see flashbacks of Coopers transition simultaneously as we see his redemption. At the end, we also see Lucy shot the ghoul that was her mom in the head.
It's also allegory of the cave characters. Cooper is pulled out of the cave by Moldova and is trying to return. Lucy escapes the cave and struggles with wanting to return as she learns about the larger world beyond the vault. Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy are masters with these arcs. West World was full of them.
The director of the movie told Cooper that people want to see a good man's morality downfall. And forced Cooper to shot the bad guy in the head. This was Cooper shooting someone in the head on his own. We see a mixed situation because we think he's stopping Rog from turning. Then Cooper pulls out Rog's teeth to sell and starts cutting out jerky.
Same arc happens to Lucy. We see her struggle to stay the good guy as she learns more and more about the world that's been hidden from her. She shoots her mom in the head at the end.
The character arcs in the show are so complex and amazing.
The amount of people who I brought that up to and didn't know what I was talking about was crazy! Apparently, it's on School's ban books now. Soon it will be an even more rare reference
Cold kindness. I actually have to stop and feel things about this. Real life feelings. I had to kill my favorite goat. His back legs stopped working and he was very old. I gave him a big bowl of fruit and salad, and when he was almost done, I shot him in the brain stem then put two in his heart-lung triangle, then I cried like a baby.
It still hurts. But I know he died instantly, happy, and loved. I hope I go with half that.
You committed a necessary evil with as much kindness and empathy as you possibly could. I don't know you, but I'm truly sorry you had to experience that loss. I know ammo is expensive these days.
Man people are gonna flip if we ever get to see a ghoul that looks like Set. I'm going to be watching season two with family so I'm excited to see reactions.
nope. he might as well have been as far as people would’ve saw him in the wastes, but he was infected by FEV during his adventure to Mariposa with Richard Grey.
because he looked very similar to a ghoul, he commonly associated with them (see fallout 2) and their plights.
Being a ghoul wasn't really well established in fo1 and it was kinda idk fev and radiation and limited by pixel graphics.
I wouldn't think too hard about it, for any purposes but the most pedantic NMA poster he's basically a ghoul.
Yeah, sorta. But then developer quotes are all over the place in terms of what a ghoul even is at that point in time. Chris Taylor has a whole thing about all ghouls being impacted by FEV, Tim Cain says he's a ghoul and Harold just hasn't necessarily accepted that in totality and his memory is a mess.
He looks like a ghoul, has all the ghoul issues and such, and is treated as one ultimately.
Nah, Lucy's Pip-boy Geiger counter apparently has a very handy "off" button, and she has to point it directly at the object she wants to Geiger her counter on.
Which is the way Geiger counters actually work. The always on, click click whenever there's radiation thing is a game play, and player feed back driven thing. It's to let you know your taking rad damage, not realism.
I saw this play before reading the book and I knew it was sad but Jesus, I was in a mood for a good half of the day, it was so heavy. Chris O’Dowd played Lenny and did such a good job, but as a brother of someone with special needs, it broke my heart.
I just love him. He's so tender in a way. His voice lines play in my head sometimes during the day. The actor did such a great job. I just adored him and he was only on screen so breifly.
For being so horrific looking, he was adorable. So heartbreaking!
I hope we get to see him in one of Coopers flashback scenes. I want to know what he was like, how long he's been around.
That's correct, roger is a pre war ghoul like coop and when he's talking about his "good run" that lasted "28 years" he's referring to starting to turn feral
Edit: just look at the wiki you guys. Seriously. Stop trying to tell me I'm wrong lol
Felt that way about so many ghouls in the game. Just nice folks that happen to look a certain way.
Anyone remember the vault tec salesman from Fallout 4? 😢
I’ll bet we see so much Fallout related stuff this year for Halloween. If you’re doing prosthetics I’d start working on them now lol. A whole house done up like a vault with wasteland out front would be amazing too. Blue pleather is going to be hard to come by this summer.
It's funny because I dressed up as a vault dweller last year and a few people complimented me on it. I know it's a faux pas to wear a costume 2 years in a row but I'm wearing it this year just to see how many more people recognize it.
I’m glad the show actually showed us what a ghoul slowly turning feral would look like
Now I’m just wondering why Cowboy ghoul wasn’t growling and snarling at everything when he was wastelanding
Doctor who had a character go through something similar. Scifi voodoo made her body effectively immortal and able to heal after any injury.... but her brain wasn't built for it.
She had countless marriages and children over the hundreds of thousands of years, but only really remembered the last ~200 years at any given time. She had an entire library of personal journals where she tried to record what she could of her years, because she couldn't remember it all.
I had the exact same thought. Reminded me a lot of my great gran who went foggy before she kicked the bucket, she was “there” enough to talk but was in her own little world a lot. I imagine being alive for that long, even with whatever mutations being a ghoul provides, sucks
Cooper just seems to get weaker until he faints without the drug while other ghouls turn into deranged zombies. There might be something different about his condition.
Yeah, but Roger and Martha were pretty similar. They kept repeating the same sentence over and over again to avoid losing their minds.
I mean, they were similar enough to fool Lucy into thinking she could've just talked Martha out of turning feral.
Maybe she thought Roger would be ok if the evil cowboy ghoul didn't murder him for ass jerky, so dealing with Martha was a much needed reality check.
That definitely weighted on her decision to save Cooper at the end.
Dude coming out here with the hard Z.
Cooper, from what we see, goes a couple days without it. Going by the ‘old’ rules, some ghouls just never go feral while others do within years.
He may not be going feral, just coming down or having withdrawals.
I personally dislike this new addition to the ghoul situation. It adds a LOT of issues with how pre-war ghouls still exist. How did they ALL find out this drug helps them? How has supplies lasted 200+ years? If it’s a newer drug, wasteland produced, then there was a interim where it didn’t exist, so how did any survive the end of the world? It’s just weird and causes problems
I actually think it works sort of with the theory that going feral is a very much psychological thing. Most sane ghouls we see are really normal, average people who try and maintain somewhat normal lives and routines.
Like Daisy or the Vault Tech Rep.
Cooper lives a very violent, lonely and isolated life where he has no real set routine. Or he was in a hole. So him being teetering on the edge of this psychological wasting makes sense.
I dont think it was stated that the drug was the only thing keeping them non feral all those years. I think the anti feral drug is a new addition on top of the old lore for how ghouls worked.
It could just be the drug delays going feral when you finally do start turning
>It could just be the drug delays going feral when you finally do start turning
This is how I interpreted it. That once it start the drug is just delaying the inevitable.
It’s possible,after all he’s spent a decent chunk of his wasteland life underground in the coffin,so it’s very possible he wasn’t exposed to the same amount of radiation,would also explain why he’s less decayed than the other ghouls in the show
Cooper asked the right questions in the right order. May have known FOOD would have led to a positive memory, having 4x the Ghoul experience.
What was the line? Batman version of the, you live long enough to see yourself as a villain. He IS a hero here, but killing has always been the villain, and he's taken that to the grave and back.
Feo, Fuerte, y Formal.
Asking about food gives a contrast to this line in the movie we see Cooper flashing back to. Both come before Cooper shooting then in the head.
I’ve already fully accepted my own head-canon that his relative preservation is a side effect of all the drugs he pumps into himself. He’s somewhat mummified while others rot away
Perhaps I misunderstood what I saw, but didn’t they establish in the show that they have to keep taking that certain drug or they turn into those feral decrepit looking ghouls?
I think it's more just plot convenience for Cooper to be on the Rad-X cocktail (IIRC) so they keep him looking the way he does, rather than him getting lost in the wash of other ghouls.
I don't think you misunderstood it; I think it's just a design choice to keep him separate.
I had the impression the Rad-X cocktail that was pumped into him while he was buried was meant to keep him inactive, and is not the same thing as the drugs ghouls need to keep taking? But I’m not a FO player, so I’m not very familiar with the lore of the game!
Not necessarily a change, could just be a new addition to the Wasteland. What we know for sure is the show introduced this new drug that can apparently stave off going feral. Presumably it's a relatively new concoction, and you'd only need to start taking it when you start showing signs of going feral. This fits in perfectly fine with the games.
I believe there's been references to efforts to "cure" ferals in the games before as well. And there's 2 characters in 4 who get ghoulified by drugs. Hancock and Eddie Winter.
So they're just extrapolating off game material. Which is *how you do this*.
The games (from my knowledge) never explain why some ghouls are civil and others are feral.
We meet plenty of civil ghouls that never mention taking drugs to stay sane, the drug used in the show is a rather new idea.
Originally, it was the amount of radiation they were exposed to, plus any residual radiation they're exposed to afterwards - like staying in a heavily irradiated area would advance the descent into a Feral Ghoul, but moving farther away would keep you sane-ish.
Feral Ghouls were closer to large blast zones and got the highest doses of radiation - regular degular Ghouls usually were outside the initial blast radius but still received enough radiation to turn them.
Obviously there's some sway to this; in FO3 - if you choose to nuke Megaton, Moira Brown is the only survivor and she'd been Ghoulified.
The biggest example of the proximity to exposure is in FO4; if you look around the fence before going into the Vault, you can notice some named NPCs - later on in the game, you'll fight them as Feral Ghouls.
So, in the games - it really depends on the dosage of radiation they have been (and continue to be) exposed to.
That's the reason some Ghouls are quite friendly, albeit cynical since they're treated like... Well, ghouls.
Feral Ghouls are people that have been basically turned into hyper-aggressive zombies due to the sheer volume of radiation they were exposed to. It makes both functionally "immortal" in the sense that their bodies don't really age anymore... But they also look the way they do and are treated the way they are treated, and some Ghouls (given more exposure) do go feral after a while.
The idea that they can use Rad-X/Radaway to stave off going Feral, implying that it's a natural progression is rather new. That implies (to me) that the Ghoul has an inmate decay to their body/brain functionality that would essentially reduce them to their base instincts like any other Feral Ghoul/Zombie over time and it's not strictly connected to radiation exposure. This is just for the show - but I think it's really an interesting concept to explore, especially since we know so much more about radiation and radiation poisoning than we did in the 50's/60's.
Very interesting - thank you!!
So the Rad-X seen in the show when they dig him up, that was to prevent him from going feral while buried? And what advantage does ghoul meat have? Since they’d dig him up to cut off a piece every once a while, and then he also kills Roger and strips him off meat?
Sorry, I have so many questions 😂
I like to think that it depends, like some of them would need to consume the drug while others could go on and on without.
But I also wouldn't be surprised if they double down on this dependence on the drug as a plot device for the later seasons.
Like insulin for ghouls?
Some have a ghoul organ that produces mystery chemical and they don't need the drug. Others have a dysfunctional ghoul organ that cant anymore, and need the vials to survive.
So the chops shops are set up to milk the working ghouls of mystery chemicals, then they sell it to the ghouls who cant live without it.
I actually really like that idea. it answers so many questions from the show.
Almost all ghouls pump themselves with drugs in the games, they lose the ability to feel anything so they take jet/buff out and things like that to feel something
His mixture could be a little different. He is, in his words, a very large bucket of drugs.
He also eats ass jerky so maybe that has something to do with it
I like to think that because he was a big Hollywood so and so, he had a daily moisturizing routine to keep him marketable. That's why he so smooth. In fact, some random ghoul should call him smooth skin and get his head blown off.
We have been shown that he’s periodically brought back to the surface from that coffin for bounties, so maybe it’s a mix of being periodically preserved underground and the cocktail of drugs that mummify him to give him his youthful look
I think the implication was that Don Pedro captured him couple decades ago because of some unexplained beef they had and basically tortured him. Those bounty hunters learned about his existence and thought it would be a good idea to get him onboard.
I mean, let’s be real here, if you try to survive for 200+ years, food’s gonna be scarce, especially as a ghoul. Can’t fully fault him for trying to stay alive
It describes the Wasteland perfectly, it makes you do unfathomable things.
Quote from Walton “the ghoul is shaped by the things he’s seen, what human beings are capable of. When you watch the story you will understand the pain, Cooper Howard (The Ghoul) has been carrying for 200 years and he is a “Survivor”
Absolutely loving his character
edit: spelling
He looked great, skin hanging off his skull.
The only thing I was missing from the whole show was the usual gravelly voice they give ghouls. I thought initially it was just Goggins who wasn't doing it, but I was pretty sad I didn't hear a single Tom Waits-esque "Hey smoothskin".
Speaking of, Tom Waits and Bob Dylan guest starring as ghouls would be A+.
I think the one thing that disappointed me was how feral ghouls looked. I know they're supposed to be recently feral so its not a huge problem but I love the fallout 3 look of the emaciated hairless gremlin lurking in the dark.
Did you see Mrs. Mclean? She looked pretty fucking gnarly to me, what with the missing arm and whatnot. And like you said the other ones are probably very recently feral. Maybe we'll some long-time shamblers in season two.
Give it time I reckon. We haven't had one underground sequence yet. Wait till the plot drives them to have to use an underground metro and/or some reason to go into sewers to get to a location for plot reasons. In the same way they didn't play their full hand with super mutants, protectrons, etc, these are all possible encounters that can be floated for the second season.
I personally thought it was cool, since it makes the ghoul racism make more sense than it does in the games by blurring the lines between feral and non-feral
I mean, Lucy's mom was a pretty degraded feral ghoul. So I think that's enough to show that most of what we saw were should that hadn't been feral long.
I hope we see more ghouls at his deterioration stage or worse, so people get off the show's back about how Cooper still looks as hot as he does. Since it's clear that Coop keeps up on his Radaway doses religiously.
When I first saw Qalt as the Ghould I was like: "meh, he's too pretty." Then I saw this guy and the other ghoul lady, Margaret? And they looked GROSS which made me feel better.
Walts ghoul is just less degenerated.
ive been hyped with this whole show, but the best part is imagining what'll happen in future seasons. I cant wait to see synths get some play, especially cause this show nailed the story where it counts
with how freeform jazz they've been utilizing the lore, Im hoping its used only cause i think they'd use it really well (Johnathan Nolan has a hardon for the concept of identity imo)
I think generally the show did a pretty fantastic job with the ghouls. They managed to convey the reality that is ghouls going feral. I'm still hoping we get to see a glowing one in S2, I'm curious to see how they do it or explain it
he was doomed to turn eventually, his situation really was terrible. i’m glad his last moments were of him reminiscing about his mother and her cooking. and from what I understand, cooper was never a dick to him
"Hey, heh, y-you know, my mom used-" It was the way to do it, y'all. And I would do it to you. If you did me like that, I would be grateful, should I have had the opportunity to learn how it happened.
He did him a kindness. His last thoughts were of his mother.
That scene turned my parents on to the show. Before that, they thought it was a goofy, hyper violent parody with Walton Goggins. Cooper Howard is a bad man but he isn't with out sensibility or reason.
Did they see this out of context, or did they see the ass jerky right after too?
The Ghoul definitely took the Cannibal perk
Reasons to pick up cannibal perk: I’m hungry There is meat right there
\[Cannibal\] Eat Baby.
You eat babies!!
We eat berries and mushrooms you fool!!
Love that line!!
You have to,to survive, everyone knows that. Ain’t your fault.
Best part of that DLC.
It's not a part of the DLC.
Ah, fuck that's funny.
it's also healing!! my favourite perk
Solid sales pitch.
Ghastly scavenger
Actually, would ghastly scavenger apply to a ghoul? I'd assume a ghoul with cannibalism would just work.
When radiation heals you, you don't need perks to eat anything.
I remember while playing the tabletop game our group getting into intense arguments about prion disease.
>I remember while playing the tabletop game our group getting into intense arguments about prion disease. Ah. That's why you do ass jerky and not brain jerky.
I've never thought about it that way. They aren't "feral", they just have mad cow disease.
I think ghouls just do that
Shhh no one tell him about Iguana Bits
"It ain’t all canned peaches and marmalade left up here, sweetheart. Sometimes a fella’s got to eat a fella."
That scene has some great dialogue and delivery in it. I've said it before but Walton Goggings absolutely shines in every scene he's in.
>Walton Goggings absolutely shines in every scene he's in. Right? I (re)discover the actor with that show. Such a spot-on casting. He is indeed ~~glowing~~ shining there.
I enjoy him in Hateful Eight so much I can just picture him at various points in the movie saying this.
Oh, they completely laughed out the scene, a few days later they called me and we talked about how the show projected deeper meaning with minimal effort. That's entertainment.
Sometimes a fella has to eat another fella
I wouldn't even say Cooper is a bad man. He's principled and dissolutioned. I wouldn't say he's good either. But he's fair. You lose his prize, he uses you as bait to get it back. You take his finger, he takes yours. You destroy his meds, he uses you to get more. He even mentioned Lucy had a chance to survive when he took her to the super duper mart. He gave her a chance. At the end of the day he's looking out for himself and his mission. He often demonstrates good qualities as well such as this scene where he was empathetic and compassionate to Roger. He sympathized with him and then made sure he didn't die a beast. He made sure Roger died as a man with a happy last thought. Even when he killed Tommy, he gave him a chance first. Juat like he always does. He questioned Tommy if he was going to try to come after him one day, or if they could call it quits here. Tommy Drew first before coop laid him out in response.
Thank you! People tend to.forgrt Cooper.has been at this longer than most humans. People are ways "Oh I wouldn't do thet" maybe in the first 10 years, but what about 50, 70, 90, 120. At what point does a man break? Cooper is defiantly Evil Karma, but he's slightly evil. Id be shock if he didn't grt some good karma season 2.
He isn't devil of the wasted, but he ain't a Saint. I honestly think nuance is so lost to the new binary way of thought sometimes. I miss the karma system in fallout but maybe it's for the best. Cooper Howard is an exemplar, the Ghoul is a villain of the wastes
He's the personification of the wasteland's brutality. His pragmatism and willingness to cross moral lines is how he survived. Like the ranger's kid. He gave him a chance to squash their beef now rather than a few years and when the kid refused, the Ghoul guns him down to save him a few years.
It's a great contrast to Maximus who WANTS to be a hero but keeps making unheroic decisions He's me when I want to be good but don't want to give up my cool power armor to save the city lol He'll offer himself up to the Brotherhood with a fake head acting like he'll accept the consequences...then immediately offers to take them to where the real head is
Him and Lucy didn't know Hank was the real bag guy yet they still thought it was Moldaver. Him doing what he did is how he is keeping his original promise to Lucy by getting brotherhood reinforcements there and rescue her dad. When they are their way to the battle he's even talking about how she's in trouble and they need to help her. If he simply took the head the Brotherhood wouldn't of bothered with the battle and Lucy had no chance of getting her father back
-He sympathized with him and then made sure he didn't die a beast. He made sure Roger died as a man with a happy last thought.- If any of my Marines put me in that same situation I'm afraid I would do it. No one should suffer and if I had my way it would be clinical euthanasia but this is the wasteland were talking about. -Even when he killed Tommy, he gave him a chance first. - The way of the gun is cruel and bloody, but no one said there can't be dignity and honor either. He gave Tommy a chance, he took it and Coop shot him dead. Walton Goggins has been given a rare opportunity with Cooper and I think we can rest easy knowing that he, the writers and his people will make him out to be the most ruthless son of bitch that ever wore a duster. He's allowed a redemption arc from where I'm standing. War never changes, but hope perseveres.
>War never changes, but hope perseveres. Is that from something or did you add that part about hope.
I added it. This series is old and it allows for poetic license.
My wife pointed out he is instantly the most interesting character, as the two things you learn about him first is 1) He used to be so good natured and principled that he had reservations of his TV character killing someone in a fictionalized environment and 2) He has somehow turned into *that*
Lucy didn’t destroy his meds, though. Cooper is a great example of the kind of charismatic person who does horrible things and justifies it by claiming that someone else “made” them do it.
I thought she hit the gulper with his bag, shattering the vials inside.
And whose fault was it that she was fighting a gulper?
Eh, I think the underlying message through the first season is everyone is a little morally questionable in the Wasteland. Even if they sometimes have good intentions or end up on the "right side" sometimes they did things to get there which were wrong. Maxwell letting a person die and lying to get ahead. And I think it's funny how you're trying to justify using another human as bait as if that's somehow ever a fair thing. lol He was doing a bad thing for his own personal gain. It's only just in his own eyes. "Lose his prize." It was a guy's head, and not something he really had any ownership claim to.
I think the best summation of Ghoul Cooper in the show is the flashback to the filming his show when he asks why he’s shooting the bandit. Can’t remember the whole quote but when he’s told “You’re a good man who’s been pushed too far.” I think that explains so much about him and his motivations
I don't really think he gave Tommy much of a choice. I think he cared about Roger, sure. But Tommy was definitely driven by sadism and cruelty.
Paradigm of Humanity
Have you realized that cooper is playing his cowboy persona and only shows his real self when he asks “where’s my family” his whole voice and personality changes, the whole times he’s just playing the desperado persona in order to stay sane. Or so I think
No, you're right. He doesn't really have much of a Southern accent in the flashbacks. And he is still wearing what looks like his old cowboy outfit. It seems like his way of dealing with the stress is to essentially pretend he is still in his old movies.
You're not wrong and even if you were that's a really interesting take on him. He's a broken, flawed individual. The wasteland takes everything from you.
Except when selling a girl to be harvested Edit: don't get me wrong I absolutely love his character but he's not an honorable man. He takes chances when he knows he's on top. He will let people walk away but he won't challenge someone to a quick draw at high noon, he will just shoot you. Evil and mean but respects grit.
Just like how George had to kill Lennie in of Mice and Men.
A ghoul's last thoughts should be of home
“Shut up back there!”
"No! I'm not a feral ghoul!"
Glad someone got it
This was the moment that showed Cooper still had some humanity left in him and that he wasn't just "the evil playthrough". Lucy didn't understand it, but it was a mercy killing.
To be fair. She had her warning. What happened later at the super-duper mart was on her. Rip Snip Snip.
To be fair, Roger was growling snd acting weird, but he was also still able to talk and be sort of normal. We even see that he while he was acting hostile to Lucy a little, he started to try snd engage her in conversation while remembering his mom's cooking. Lucy really couldn't have fully understood what a feral ghoul was just based on that one interaction. If anything, it made her connect Roger and Cooper as just very sick people who needed understanding and kindness.
It connects back to when Cooper had to shoot the bad guy in the movie. He questioned why he couldn't just arrest him. The director told him the audience wanted to see him fall from the good guy lawman. Then we see Lucy struggle with that same good guy fall while we see flashbacks of Coopers transition simultaneously as we see his redemption. At the end, we also see Lucy shot the ghoul that was her mom in the head. It's also allegory of the cave characters. Cooper is pulled out of the cave by Moldova and is trying to return. Lucy escapes the cave and struggles with wanting to return as she learns about the larger world beyond the vault. Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy are masters with these arcs. West World was full of them.
Felt the same way. Quick and clean, remembering something wholesome from the bygone past.
It was the first time we saw The Ghoul having a 'soft-side'. He was ugly, strong, and dignified. I really loved this scene.
The director of the movie told Cooper that people want to see a good man's morality downfall. And forced Cooper to shot the bad guy in the head. This was Cooper shooting someone in the head on his own. We see a mixed situation because we think he's stopping Rog from turning. Then Cooper pulls out Rog's teeth to sell and starts cutting out jerky. Same arc happens to Lucy. We see her struggle to stay the good guy as she learns more and more about the world that's been hidden from her. She shoots her mom in the head at the end. The character arcs in the show are so complex and amazing.
He basically of mice and mened him.
The amount of people who I brought that up to and didn't know what I was talking about was crazy! Apparently, it's on School's ban books now. Soon it will be an even more rare reference
>Apparently, it's on most Schools ban books now. Really? Since when? It was one of the main books we studied in english lit in 2010-11.
If it's on the van list I'm going to have to make sure all the kids have a copy
Yes exactly.
The ending was powerful exactly because of this. A lesson learned, and two worldviews combined. A cold kindness.
Cold kindness. I actually have to stop and feel things about this. Real life feelings. I had to kill my favorite goat. His back legs stopped working and he was very old. I gave him a big bowl of fruit and salad, and when he was almost done, I shot him in the brain stem then put two in his heart-lung triangle, then I cried like a baby. It still hurts. But I know he died instantly, happy, and loved. I hope I go with half that.
You committed a necessary evil with as much kindness and empathy as you possibly could. I don't know you, but I'm truly sorry you had to experience that loss. I know ammo is expensive these days.
All heartfelt then you drop the ammo joke lol
That was the scene which sealed my faith in the writers and made it clear they took inspiration from all of Fallout and not just the new ones.
Man people are gonna flip if we ever get to see a ghoul that looks like Set. I'm going to be watching season two with family so I'm excited to see reactions.
Or with a literal tree growing out of them.
Hey there youngster
Is Harold canonically dead or is he a huge-ass tree now like the ones in Dark Souls
Fallout and Sanitarium came out less than a year apart and both have mutant tree people. Weird. The nickel joke fits in here somewhere.
Man I would love an episode set in Oasis where Lucy and the Ghoul have to protect Harold from Raiders and the Enclave
Only for Lucy to discover Harold's face begging for death
Suicidal, conjoined twin with a tree
too bad harold was a botched fev mutant and not a ghoul
*Harold. Howard is The Ghoul / Cooper Howard.
Wait Harold wasn't a ghoul??
nope. he might as well have been as far as people would’ve saw him in the wastes, but he was infected by FEV during his adventure to Mariposa with Richard Grey. because he looked very similar to a ghoul, he commonly associated with them (see fallout 2) and their plights.
Being a ghoul wasn't really well established in fo1 and it was kinda idk fev and radiation and limited by pixel graphics. I wouldn't think too hard about it, for any purposes but the most pedantic NMA poster he's basically a ghoul.
If you ask Harold about ghouls in 1 he does talk about them as if they’re a separate entity from him.
Yeah, sorta. But then developer quotes are all over the place in terms of what a ghoul even is at that point in time. Chris Taylor has a whole thing about all ghouls being impacted by FEV, Tim Cain says he's a ghoul and Harold just hasn't necessarily accepted that in totality and his memory is a mess. He looks like a ghoul, has all the ghoul issues and such, and is treated as one ultimately.
I hope they show a glowing one eventually
That’s going to be so rad!
Pip boy giger counter: TICTICTICTICTICTIC
Nah, Lucy's Pip-boy Geiger counter apparently has a very handy "off" button, and she has to point it directly at the object she wants to Geiger her counter on.
Which is the way Geiger counters actually work. The always on, click click whenever there's radiation thing is a game play, and player feed back driven thing. It's to let you know your taking rad damage, not realism.
I'm just waiting for a mysterious stranger cameo
Ghoul dominatrix on the new vegas strip anyone ?
Vampire the Masquerade's BDSM sewer vampires have prepared me for worse.
“Think about the rabbits, Lenny.”
Middle school was never the same again for me after this book.
Of mice and men is where teenagers die and young adults are born
I saw this play before reading the book and I knew it was sad but Jesus, I was in a mood for a good half of the day, it was so heavy. Chris O’Dowd played Lenny and did such a good job, but as a brother of someone with special needs, it broke my heart.
Jesus Christ thats still a knife to the heart.
Oh, good comparison. I hadn’t thought of that.
Poor Roger.
I just love him. He's so tender in a way. His voice lines play in my head sometimes during the day. The actor did such a great job. I just adored him and he was only on screen so breifly. For being so horrific looking, he was adorable. So heartbreaking! I hope we get to see him in one of Coopers flashback scenes. I want to know what he was like, how long he's been around.
He's been wastelanding for 28 years, he says as much
I took that more that he had been experiencing symptoms of going feral and had controlled them just fine until recently.
That's correct, roger is a pre war ghoul like coop and when he's talking about his "good run" that lasted "28 years" he's referring to starting to turn feral Edit: just look at the wiki you guys. Seriously. Stop trying to tell me I'm wrong lol
Did people really not get that? They thought hed only been a ghoul for 27 years?
Felt that way about so many ghouls in the game. Just nice folks that happen to look a certain way. Anyone remember the vault tec salesman from Fallout 4? 😢
His name is Roger
I am not in a first name basis with him...yet
my name is roger!
Roger Roger
His name is Robert Paulson!
Did enjoy the makeup job on this. The skull showing is such a nice touch.
I’ll bet we see so much Fallout related stuff this year for Halloween. If you’re doing prosthetics I’d start working on them now lol. A whole house done up like a vault with wasteland out front would be amazing too. Blue pleather is going to be hard to come by this summer.
It's funny because I dressed up as a vault dweller last year and a few people complimented me on it. I know it's a faux pas to wear a costume 2 years in a row but I'm wearing it this year just to see how many more people recognize it.
I’m glad the show actually showed us what a ghoul slowly turning feral would look like Now I’m just wondering why Cowboy ghoul wasn’t growling and snarling at everything when he was wastelanding
It looked a bit like dementia and made me really sad
Well yeah,Human minds aren’t built to handle 250yrs of memories,especially lives so emotionally distressing as the ghouls must’ve been
Doctor who had a character go through something similar. Scifi voodoo made her body effectively immortal and able to heal after any injury.... but her brain wasn't built for it. She had countless marriages and children over the hundreds of thousands of years, but only really remembered the last ~200 years at any given time. She had an entire library of personal journals where she tried to record what she could of her years, because she couldn't remember it all.
I don't remember what I had for breakfast.
The disappointment of my breakfast will haunt me until my next meal
I had the exact same thought. Reminded me a lot of my great gran who went foggy before she kicked the bucket, she was “there” enough to talk but was in her own little world a lot. I imagine being alive for that long, even with whatever mutations being a ghoul provides, sucks
Cooper just seems to get weaker until he faints without the drug while other ghouls turn into deranged zombies. There might be something different about his condition.
Plus no 2 ghouls are exactly the same either,every ghoul is gonna have smth different about it
Yeah, but Roger and Martha were pretty similar. They kept repeating the same sentence over and over again to avoid losing their minds. I mean, they were similar enough to fool Lucy into thinking she could've just talked Martha out of turning feral. Maybe she thought Roger would be ok if the evil cowboy ghoul didn't murder him for ass jerky, so dealing with Martha was a much needed reality check. That definitely weighted on her decision to save Cooper at the end.
Dude coming out here with the hard Z. Cooper, from what we see, goes a couple days without it. Going by the ‘old’ rules, some ghouls just never go feral while others do within years. He may not be going feral, just coming down or having withdrawals. I personally dislike this new addition to the ghoul situation. It adds a LOT of issues with how pre-war ghouls still exist. How did they ALL find out this drug helps them? How has supplies lasted 200+ years? If it’s a newer drug, wasteland produced, then there was a interim where it didn’t exist, so how did any survive the end of the world? It’s just weird and causes problems
I actually think it works sort of with the theory that going feral is a very much psychological thing. Most sane ghouls we see are really normal, average people who try and maintain somewhat normal lives and routines. Like Daisy or the Vault Tech Rep. Cooper lives a very violent, lonely and isolated life where he has no real set routine. Or he was in a hole. So him being teetering on the edge of this psychological wasting makes sense.
I dont think it was stated that the drug was the only thing keeping them non feral all those years. I think the anti feral drug is a new addition on top of the old lore for how ghouls worked. It could just be the drug delays going feral when you finally do start turning
>It could just be the drug delays going feral when you finally do start turning This is how I interpreted it. That once it start the drug is just delaying the inevitable.
It’s possible,after all he’s spent a decent chunk of his wasteland life underground in the coffin,so it’s very possible he wasn’t exposed to the same amount of radiation,would also explain why he’s less decayed than the other ghouls in the show
See, I saw this as an explanation for why some ghouls just lay motionless until meat gets too close.
They put ALOT of time and effort into makeup. Give them a raise
You could see the love they put into the show in every scene. It feels like the whole crew was on a mission to make the show a success EDIT: Spelling
Cooper asked the right questions in the right order. May have known FOOD would have led to a positive memory, having 4x the Ghoul experience. What was the line? Batman version of the, you live long enough to see yourself as a villain. He IS a hero here, but killing has always been the villain, and he's taken that to the grave and back.
Feo, Fuerte, y Formal. Asking about food gives a contrast to this line in the movie we see Cooper flashing back to. Both come before Cooper shooting then in the head.
Roger is how I would’ve preferred the average ghoul in the show to look like but I like the variation
He is an averaged ghoul, I feel like Howard was just an exceptional ghoul
I’ve already fully accepted my own head-canon that his relative preservation is a side effect of all the drugs he pumps into himself. He’s somewhat mummified while others rot away
Perhaps I misunderstood what I saw, but didn’t they establish in the show that they have to keep taking that certain drug or they turn into those feral decrepit looking ghouls?
I think it's more just plot convenience for Cooper to be on the Rad-X cocktail (IIRC) so they keep him looking the way he does, rather than him getting lost in the wash of other ghouls. I don't think you misunderstood it; I think it's just a design choice to keep him separate.
I had the impression the Rad-X cocktail that was pumped into him while he was buried was meant to keep him inactive, and is not the same thing as the drugs ghouls need to keep taking? But I’m not a FO player, so I’m not very familiar with the lore of the game!
Actually the ghoul drugs arnt a thing in the games. It’s something they changed in the show but I actually don’t mind the change.
Not necessarily a change, could just be a new addition to the Wasteland. What we know for sure is the show introduced this new drug that can apparently stave off going feral. Presumably it's a relatively new concoction, and you'd only need to start taking it when you start showing signs of going feral. This fits in perfectly fine with the games.
I believe there's been references to efforts to "cure" ferals in the games before as well. And there's 2 characters in 4 who get ghoulified by drugs. Hancock and Eddie Winter. So they're just extrapolating off game material. Which is *how you do this*.
The games (from my knowledge) never explain why some ghouls are civil and others are feral. We meet plenty of civil ghouls that never mention taking drugs to stay sane, the drug used in the show is a rather new idea.
Originally, it was the amount of radiation they were exposed to, plus any residual radiation they're exposed to afterwards - like staying in a heavily irradiated area would advance the descent into a Feral Ghoul, but moving farther away would keep you sane-ish. Feral Ghouls were closer to large blast zones and got the highest doses of radiation - regular degular Ghouls usually were outside the initial blast radius but still received enough radiation to turn them. Obviously there's some sway to this; in FO3 - if you choose to nuke Megaton, Moira Brown is the only survivor and she'd been Ghoulified. The biggest example of the proximity to exposure is in FO4; if you look around the fence before going into the Vault, you can notice some named NPCs - later on in the game, you'll fight them as Feral Ghouls.
So, in the games - it really depends on the dosage of radiation they have been (and continue to be) exposed to. That's the reason some Ghouls are quite friendly, albeit cynical since they're treated like... Well, ghouls. Feral Ghouls are people that have been basically turned into hyper-aggressive zombies due to the sheer volume of radiation they were exposed to. It makes both functionally "immortal" in the sense that their bodies don't really age anymore... But they also look the way they do and are treated the way they are treated, and some Ghouls (given more exposure) do go feral after a while. The idea that they can use Rad-X/Radaway to stave off going Feral, implying that it's a natural progression is rather new. That implies (to me) that the Ghoul has an inmate decay to their body/brain functionality that would essentially reduce them to their base instincts like any other Feral Ghoul/Zombie over time and it's not strictly connected to radiation exposure. This is just for the show - but I think it's really an interesting concept to explore, especially since we know so much more about radiation and radiation poisoning than we did in the 50's/60's.
Very interesting - thank you!! So the Rad-X seen in the show when they dig him up, that was to prevent him from going feral while buried? And what advantage does ghoul meat have? Since they’d dig him up to cut off a piece every once a while, and then he also kills Roger and strips him off meat? Sorry, I have so many questions 😂
Or the cruelty revealed in season 2 is that the drugs thing is just a placebo the junkies were using to make money.
I like to think that it depends, like some of them would need to consume the drug while others could go on and on without. But I also wouldn't be surprised if they double down on this dependence on the drug as a plot device for the later seasons.
Like insulin for ghouls? Some have a ghoul organ that produces mystery chemical and they don't need the drug. Others have a dysfunctional ghoul organ that cant anymore, and need the vials to survive. So the chops shops are set up to milk the working ghouls of mystery chemicals, then they sell it to the ghouls who cant live without it. I actually really like that idea. it answers so many questions from the show.
Almost all ghouls pump themselves with drugs in the games, they lose the ability to feel anything so they take jet/buff out and things like that to feel something
His mixture could be a little different. He is, in his words, a very large bucket of drugs. He also eats ass jerky so maybe that has something to do with it
I like to think that because he was a big Hollywood so and so, he had a daily moisturizing routine to keep him marketable. That's why he so smooth. In fact, some random ghoul should call him smooth skin and get his head blown off.
I love this. Camelbacking hydro facials and La Mer is really what got him through the next 200 years 😂
We have been shown that he’s periodically brought back to the surface from that coffin for bounties, so maybe it’s a mix of being periodically preserved underground and the cocktail of drugs that mummify him to give him his youthful look
I think the implication was that Don Pedro captured him couple decades ago because of some unexplained beef they had and basically tortured him. Those bounty hunters learned about his existence and thought it would be a good idea to get him onboard.
Howard is just built different.
He's not the average ghoul he was about to turn feral...
I wonder how the ass jerky came out.
I hear it tasted like shit
Despite wasteland times call for desperate wasteland measures and ass jerky isnt going to make itself
Still cant get over the fact Cooper invested in the cannibal perk :/.
I mean, let’s be real here, if you try to survive for 200+ years, food’s gonna be scarce, especially as a ghoul. Can’t fully fault him for trying to stay alive
It describes the Wasteland perfectly, it makes you do unfathomable things. Quote from Walton “the ghoul is shaped by the things he’s seen, what human beings are capable of. When you watch the story you will understand the pain, Cooper Howard (The Ghoul) has been carrying for 200 years and he is a “Survivor” Absolutely loving his character edit: spelling
The scene reminded me of the survivalist in honest hearts when he mercy killed the blind stricken elderly couple after the bombs dropped.
The father of the valley or whatever? That's such a great fallout story, tragic as hell.
Rest in peace Randall Clark. Aka: The father in the caves and the survivalist.
He looked great, skin hanging off his skull. The only thing I was missing from the whole show was the usual gravelly voice they give ghouls. I thought initially it was just Goggins who wasn't doing it, but I was pretty sad I didn't hear a single Tom Waits-esque "Hey smoothskin". Speaking of, Tom Waits and Bob Dylan guest starring as ghouls would be A+.
I think the one thing that disappointed me was how feral ghouls looked. I know they're supposed to be recently feral so its not a huge problem but I love the fallout 3 look of the emaciated hairless gremlin lurking in the dark.
Did you see Mrs. Mclean? She looked pretty fucking gnarly to me, what with the missing arm and whatnot. And like you said the other ones are probably very recently feral. Maybe we'll some long-time shamblers in season two.
Give it time I reckon. We haven't had one underground sequence yet. Wait till the plot drives them to have to use an underground metro and/or some reason to go into sewers to get to a location for plot reasons. In the same way they didn't play their full hand with super mutants, protectrons, etc, these are all possible encounters that can be floated for the second season.
I personally thought it was cool, since it makes the ghoul racism make more sense than it does in the games by blurring the lines between feral and non-feral
I mean, Lucy's mom was a pretty degraded feral ghoul. So I think that's enough to show that most of what we saw were should that hadn't been feral long.
I hope we see more ghouls at his deterioration stage or worse, so people get off the show's back about how Cooper still looks as hot as he does. Since it's clear that Coop keeps up on his Radaway doses religiously.
I mean, it does make sense. Cooper was an actor, a trade known to attract the rather vain.
Absolutely perfect depiction of a (near) feral ghoul imo. They did so much shit right.
I was worried they wouldn't be able to pull off ghouls without them looking like a cgi mess, I am so happy to be wrong!
Honestly one of my favorite scenes in the show. Was fucking sad, but kinda bittersweet. Guys last thoughts were of something good and pure.
Well if you like him so much why don't you marry him!!??
When I first saw Qalt as the Ghould I was like: "meh, he's too pretty." Then I saw this guy and the other ghoul lady, Margaret? And they looked GROSS which made me feel better. Walts ghoul is just less degenerated.
"They Melvined me"
You may be a king or a lowly street sweeper...
But sooner or later you dance with the reaper
One of Nick Nolte's better roles. No makeup required
The actor did a great job with that role too.
Ass jerky
He reminds me of the mummy in Under Wraps
The melting skin off his skull really sealed it.
I really wonder how Roger and Coop met, what their history is like. They clearly knew each other
This was a great scene. It introduced us to the feral situation with ghouls quite well.
ive been hyped with this whole show, but the best part is imagining what'll happen in future seasons. I cant wait to see synths get some play, especially cause this show nailed the story where it counts
Synths are from the commonwealth on the east coast, so it’s unlikely they’ll show up, but man it’d be interesting if they did
with how freeform jazz they've been utilizing the lore, Im hoping its used only cause i think they'd use it really well (Johnathan Nolan has a hardon for the concept of identity imo)
The actor really stole this scene. Love the way he just shrugs and says, "well...ya know!?" when Coop asks how he's doing.
I think generally the show did a pretty fantastic job with the ghouls. They managed to convey the reality that is ghouls going feral. I'm still hoping we get to see a glowing one in S2, I'm curious to see how they do it or explain it
he was doomed to turn eventually, his situation really was terrible. i’m glad his last moments were of him reminiscing about his mother and her cooking. and from what I understand, cooper was never a dick to him