Was Fallout Filmed In The US?

Have you tuned into Fallout yet? Perfect for fans of The Last of Us, it’s a post-nuclear-apocalypse drama on Prime Video, starring Ella Purnell, Aaron Moten, Kyle MacLachlan, Moisés Arias, Xelia Mendes-Jones, and Walton Goggins, based on the internationally best selling video game series of the same name. If you’ve already raced through the whole thing, you might be wondering where Fallout was filmed, and whether the wasteland version of the US we see on screen was actually filmed in the huge nation. Lucky for you, we have all the details.

Read the C&TH Guide to Responsible Tourism

Walton Goggins (The Ghoul) in Fallout

Where Was Fallout Filmed?

Fallout was filmed in New Jersey, New York and Utah – but the wasteland scenes in Shady Sands were not filmed in the US. Instead, filming took place in Kolmanskop, a ghost town on Namibia’s Skeleton Coast, dotted with both ancient and recent shipwrecks thanks to the treacherous South Atlantic waters.

Some of the filming locations for Fallout include:

• Pine Barrens automotive graveyard, New Jersey: This area is not open to the public, but was used to create Filly, where Lucy first meets Maximus, The Ghoul and Dr. Wilzig.
• ShopRite, Staten Island: When Lucy is abandoned by The Ghoul and meets Snip Snip at the Super Duper Mart, we’re actually looking at a former Shoprite Grocery store which has now closed.
• On Set: While it would be amazing if Moldaver’s HQ was actually filmed at Los Angeles’ famous Griffith Observatory, these scenes were sadly filmed on set. Makes sense considering the sorry state of the building.

Brotherhood of Steel

Where Is Fallout Set?

Season one of Fallout is set in California, with Lucy’s Vault underneath Santa Monica.

In terms of timelines, most of Fallout is set during Lucy’s life in 2296, while the flashbacks take place around the year 2077. Sound weird? While it looks like the ‘50s, the flashbacks actually show a United States on an alternative timeline to our own that never progressed culturally from that period – hence the Americana vibe, rock ‘n’ roll music and cars with Googie tail fins. In 2077, after years of conflict over dwindling global resources that began with WW2 (and the subsequent Cold War), a nuclear war between the US and China truly begins. The series picks up in 2296, after Lucy and her ancestors have lived in an underground Vault for over 200 years. The games, however, pick up at various points across the timeline: Fallout 1 is set in 2161, Fallout 2 in 2241, Fallout 3 in 2277 and Fallout 4 in 2287. The series jumps between the events of the games and, while some of the characters are recognisable to fans of the game (namely The Ghoul and Dogmeat), others were invented for the series, including Lucy and her family.

Fallout Filming Locations

Prime Video

Shady Sands: Kolmanskop, Namibia

Shady Sands is a post-nuclear wasteland that recurs in Fallout, both the TV series and the game. Since there’s not much left standing, even though ghost towns do exist, it’s hard to imagine such a sand-covered, desolate place existing in our world. But these scenes were not filmed on set: instead, filming took place in Kolmanskop, a ghost town in Namibia, where the desert meets the Atlantic Ocean.

The real town was a very rich mining town in the early 20th century, but entered rapid decline when diamond deposits began to deplete and new diamonds were discovered 270 kilometres south. Most of Kolmanskop’s residents abandoned their homes and joined the rush south, with the town totally abandoned by 1956. Because it’s a desert, the remaining structures are both well-preserved and full of sand – which works very well for Fallout.

Visit: Tourists can visit Kolmanskop, but note that you have to pay to enter. With its eerie atmosphere, it’s very popular among photographers.

Ella Purnell (Lucy)

Red Rocket Truck Stop: Nyack, New York

In episode 7 of Fallout (‘The Radio’), the Red Rocket truck stop is a recurring location, with the characters and their storylines criss-crossing here. It’s an Easter egg for beady eyed fans of the game: players first meet the cute but deadly dog, Dogmeat, at a Red Rocket gas station. Scenes for the series were filmed at a real gas station in Nyack – a small town in Rockland County, New York State – which was transformed into a Red Rocket for filming.

Prime Video

The Brotherhood Of Steel: Wendover Air Force Base, Utah

The military organisation known as The Brotherhood of Steel travel around the nation on the hunt for pre-war technology, but mostly live on base where they train, eat and sleep. Scenes at the base were filmed at Wendover Air Force Base, a real location in Utah with a history dating back to WW2, when it was used as a training camp for the military, especially bomber crews. Today, it’s a museum called the Historic Wendover Airfield Museum.

Visit: You can find the Historic Wendover Airfield Museum at 352 Airport Way, Wendover, UT 84083, United States.

Prime Video

Will There Be A Second Season Of Fallout?

Yes, a second season of Fallout is already in the works. Most of the filming for season two will likely take place in California thanks to a whopping $25 million offered in tax credits to the production by the state. Indeed, it has been reported that Fallout season two will begin filming in Toronto in September 2024.

WATCH

All episodes of Fallout are streaming now on Prime Video. amazon.co.uk