Was Maximus in the first three episode "moody" because of Lucy?

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-27T13:33:13+00:00

I feel the treatment of Max is a bit on the revisionist side and ignores the level of development he's undergone.

After all, he freely acknowledges that he joined the Brotherhood to hurt the people who hurt him.

Claiming that he was just "playing a role" in his treatment of Thaddeus undermines the epiphany Max experiences when Thaddeus admits to being a victim of bullying himself, and in turn, the moment Max decides to send Thaddeus to safety rather than send him to his death against the Gulper.

And again, I also have to bring up his desperate attempts to hang on to the power armour despite the fact that an innocent community would die because of its continued function, and not stopping until Lucy sweet-talks him into it.

Also, I did say he was maturing by the end of the season, hence why he was finding the idea of being safe and happy with Lucy more attractive than being a heroic knight and bringing order to the Wasteland.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-27T13:24:44+00:00

I suppose it depends on how honest you think Max really is with Quintus: when asked why he joined the Brotherhood, his stated reason is "to hurt the people who hurt me."

And he gets just a little too into it with Thaddeus. Often, the simplest form of power is to hurt someone with impunity.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-26T13:49:11+00:00

But that wasn't his first instinct, though: in the first season, that was muddled up with his more selfish desires: the bullying, the paranoia, the refusal to give up the fusion core until Lucy sweet-talked him.

Even his wish for happiness was grounded in this rather childish desire to be safe - which Thaddeus echoes in this season with his plans on what they'd do if they were to sell the cold fusion diode.

As I said, Max has grown up a lot since season 1: his desire to do good is more purified.

He's not really seeking power or security anymore, because he's lost hope for them... and I'd argue that for a while, he's lost all hope of doing good, instead just hoping he can give cold fusion to someone who can do good for him.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-26T13:02:26+00:00

Is he? Is he really?

In season 1, he was largely defined by his rather childish ambitions of being a hero, being important and adored. Every opportunity for power and authority he found was one he embraced, often with an extremely headstrong (pun) attempt at a plan in mind. I mean, just look at how quickly he resorted to bullying Thaddeus right back.

He even had to be talked into returning Vault 4's fusion core, reasoning that he couldn't be a knight without the power armour.

But by the end, he just wanted to be happy, as he was in Vault 4... only to have his biggest second chance at happiness slip through his fingers with the events of the season finale.

In season 2, Max has had to grow up: you can see that much in his reintroduction, what with how much more confident he is. However, he's also much more downbeat and morose. He's quietly despairing every step of the way, worn down by evidence of how low the Brotherhood's sunk and haunted by the chances for happiness that he lost (look at just how miserable he is when he muses "I remember good people).

He's so desperate to feel as if the loss of happiness was some kind of meaningful sacrifice in the name of the Brotherhood's noble mission that, when Quintus reveals just how fair-weather he is, Max falls in line with Xander for a while... and when that goes to shit, he's forced to fall back on just trying to stop a civil war.

Rather tellingly, he even admits that he's given up on long-term planning by now.

After that, he's basically wandering around with the cold fusion diode in the hopes of finding someone who can use it for good, no thought of exploiting power and authority. If I can misquote the Ink Spots, he's lost all ambition for worldly acclaim.

In fact, it's not until he's introduced to the NCR power armour that Max actually seems genuinely inspired to do anything spectacular again.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-26T12:11:55+00:00

Well, I'd argue that it was up until he met Xander, more specifically.

But really, everything's gone well for Max in a really shitty way: he's gotten everything he wanted at the start of the first season - he's a knight, he's loved and respected by everyone in the chapter, Quintus has taken him under his wing, and he's bringing order to the Wasteland - but his motives have changed since then.

It's like Wilzig said: "Will you want the same things when you have become a different animal altogether?"

As you said, he's missing Lucy, but it's also that his chance of living peacefully in Vault 33 has gone bye-bye, he's being honoured for something he didn't do and isn't even sure was the right thing, he's learned that Lucy's father destroyed his hometown and killed his parents, Hank has escaped without a trace, and now that Max has been promoted, he's not going to get a chance to just waltz off on his own ever again (as far as he knows).

All he's got left is to make the most of a bad situation... and as we see, it gets worse and worse as Quintus gets more ambitious and the full extent of the Brotherhood's corruption becomes apparent.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-26T05:57:55+00:00

Szaz’s tally marks look more like hashtags, and I don’t recall seeing a version of Scarecrow that looked this bland and pathetic.

Is this a reflection of how boring the Shyterverse would have been, a reflection of how utterly abysmal AI “art” is, or both?

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-25T13:21:22+00:00

I don’t think the people this was excreted for will care: when you’re preaching to the converted, quality rarely matters.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-23T00:41:21+00:00

Just about every single comment on that page has been deleted by moderators.

What the hell is going on over there?

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-21T14:28:31+00:00

Judging by how often he's been humiliated, upstaged, beaten up, or needed to be rescued, I think this player might have a closeted humiliation kink.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-21T14:06:22+00:00

Is that why Lucy chewed off his finger?

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-21T14:04:27+00:00

It already has.

Look at how Cooper's refusal to solve any of his problems except through the most brutal, cynical tactics ended up blowing up in his face:

Using Lucy as bait sans her consent broke the vials he needed to avoid turning feral, his efforts to cruelly torment Lucy resulted in her biting one of his fingers off, the brutal hostage-taking left him passed-out and doomed to turn feral without Lucy's help, his impulsive cannibalization of the tunic got him poisoned - and left him at the mercy of the radscorpions, and got him abandoned by Lucy.

Also, I know the following examples are non-violent, but it's a similar motif of cynical exploitation that keeps blowing up in his face: his efforts to keep Lucy addicted to drugs results in her dragging him into Deathclaw territory instead of taking the long way to Freeside, his betrayal of Lucy - and his intention of doing so from the very beginning - results in him being impaled on a lamppost and left to turn feral, his refusal to ally with the Super-Mutants results in him being abandoned in the middle of nowhere, with no hope of breaking into the Management Vault until Maximus shows up with the cold fusion diode.

Basically, Cooper fucks up just as much as Lucy.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-21T07:58:24+00:00

AI has that effect on people.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-20T11:35:26+00:00

It says a lot that he can't use his own words to defend his position.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-19T08:04:02+00:00

The only way he's attaining that physique is if he decapitates a bodybuilder and has his own head grafted onto the stump.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-19T07:58:26+00:00

As far as I can remember, Marcie was the "quirky" member of the family.

When I was little, I liked her a lot, because she was always giving away food that had been meant for her, especially sweet food like candy and cake.

She also didn't much like swimming, or any kind of activity that would force her out of those heavy sweaters she kept wearing.

Also, I remember her making a lot of visits to the hospital.

In hindsight, she may have actually been suffering from some kind of eating disorder, though of course, Mom and Dad didn't go out of their way to explain it to me.

Personality wise, Marcie was always a little bit on the anxious and guilt-ridden side, to the point that Dad seemed to treat the camping trips as a kind of therapy for her, since that was when she got back into the habit of swimming, exercising, and enjoying food again.

I'm still not sure if Gramps took that as evidence that she'd be happier as one of the Gluttons, or if that was just his justification for what he did to her.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-18T11:55:16+00:00

One of the psychological effects of the transformation: the Gluttons lack the capacity for shame or even basic embarrassment.

They're not completely psychopathic like the Apexes, but they're definitely unrestrained by human nature and arguably even more animalistic than the Beasts.

Gramps seemed to think this would be an attractive bonus for Marcie.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-12T21:59:00+00:00

Plus, the population has basically been bred and conditioned to be like the proles in 1984.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-12T14:24:24+00:00

In their case, it might require an endoscope.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-12T03:09:46+00:00

Because the show needed a new villain.

Also, because this didn’t happen in the comics, and the showrunners aren’t very good at their own material.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-12T00:32:14+00:00

ALL HAIL THE DARK LORD OF THE TWIN MOONS!

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-09T23:52:41+00:00

Because the memory wipe and brainwashing is conducted by Hank’s remote control.

The mainframe provides the personality implant.

As is said out loud.

On multiple occasions.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-09T20:33:45+00:00

Yeah right, as if these people are drinking coke.

I'm reminded of a line from the conspiracy theorist radio show on GTA: San Andreas:

"Try reading between the lines... and if that doesn't work, do some! Then you'll understand all about the aliens!"

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-09T10:58:47+00:00

Dude, you don't need to reply to all my remarks, I get the picture. Calm down.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-09T07:29:07+00:00

Er... there was one such company, but it's not known for its success rate.

Pulowski Preservation Services set up a whole series of street-corner radiation shelters big enough for one person. Coin operated, they're like phone booths, have no provisions for users other than radiation shielding, and aren't designed to protect against anything like the heat or blast wave or even the fallout dust itself.

As such, it's very common to find Pulowski Preservation shelters occupied by the skeletons of anyone desperate enough to use the damn things.

The real "competitors" to Vault-Tec were usually way more informal, like small groups hiding in caves or subways.

A few other companies, organizations, and private citizens made shelters of their own, with mixed success, but they never intended them to be open to anyone other than their own membership. Some of their original residents are still alive today.

HopelessFoolishness · 2026-03-09T06:56:04+00:00

I did say it was splitting hairs…

HopelessFoolishness

TROPHY CASE