Bethesda director and executive producer Todd Howard has said he won’t be making a cameo in the Fallout TV show, despite plenty of opportunities to do so. The Toddster’s appearance or otherwise has been speculated on ever since the show was announced, but Howard says he’s more comfortable in the background.
The topic came up in a recent interview with IGN, and Howard was pretty clear it’s a ‘no’ from him:
“They’ve offered me a whole bunch, even in Season 1,” says Howard. “I was going to be in the sort of Dr. Strangelove Vault-Tec room, where they’re talking [about] all the experiments, and some other things. I think I’m best behind the camera.”
This isn’t brought out explicitly at any point, but a minor awkwardness here would be that Howard is not the creator of Fallout (nor has ever claimed such). Howard is obviously one of the most important figures in what Fallout has now become, and his role can hardly be diminished, but Fallout’s co-creators are Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky.
To me that makes the Stan Lee comparison a little bit of a stretch, though your mileage may differ. Lee made a cameo in pretty much every Marvel film made until the latter years of his life, but in that case had co-created many of the characters and extended universe, as well as leading Marvel creatively for a lifetime before it hit cinematic gold. To put all controversies about credit to one side for a moment, it is indisputable that so much of what made Marvel Marvel was Lee’s fizzing inventiveness and seemingly endless imagination.
So however Howard may rationalise it, I can’t help but feel any unwillingness may have some of that beneath the surface: which honestly speaks well of him. Howard can’t really avoid being presented as the ‘face’ of Bethesda’s various mega-franchises, and deserves all the garlands and praise there is, but he can avoid unnecessary fan service.
Fallout Season 2’s first episode premieres December 17, and this time around focuses on New Vegas, with one episode a week releasing until early February. The good news is, according to PCG’s Jody Macgregor, it’s pretty great so far.
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