TV

Walton Goggins Wanted You to Have a Crush on Fallout's Ghoul

Walton Goggins Wanted You to Have a Crush on Fallout's Ghoul
Image credit: Prime Video

Absolutely no shaming here!

Summary:

  • Fallout is Prime Video 's newest sci-fi hit dominating the charts
  • Walton Goggins portrayed Cooper "The Ghoul" Howard on the show
  • His character turned out to be one of the most charismatic in the series with his lich-cowboy (excuse us) vibes

Prime Video's Fallout is many things: a great adaptation of an iconic video game, a nice addition to the already blooming collection of modern dystopias, and just a generally good evening binge. But also, it's an assembly of your new crushes.

And while Ella Purnell's Lucy, Aaron Clifton Moten's Maximus or Sarita Choudhury's Moldaver are all great, let's not pretend that we aren't hugely into Walton Goggins' Ghoul. There, we said it. We the fans of quality TV can't help but fangirl when Cooper Howard appears on the screen, be it for giving a heartfelt speech as an actor or shoot everyone as a Ghoul.

Well, worry not: we all fell into the trap that was carefully prepared for us all along.

Walton Goggins Wanted You to Have a Crush on Fallout's Ghoul - image 1

Speaking to Entertainment Tonight, Walton Goggins admitted that in fact, he plays almost two different characters in Fallout. Cooper Howard 200 years ago was a suave man who loved his family, loved his job, and tried to be a decent person making decent money (even though it all went horribly wrong in the end).

Cooper Howard two centuries later? An entirely different creature ravaged by radiation who has zero hope and zero mercy. Still, according to Goggins, there is "a charisma between both men that bridges time."

As pointed out by the interviewer, the Ghoul version of Cooper Howard sends one into a full "I can fix him" mode, and Goggins admitted that was exactly the point.

"We wanted him to be kind of sexy, with a deep dark tan," he said, agreeing that he tried to create a character that was "oddly hot."

Well, mission accomplished!

Don't We Want Ghouls To Still Be Terrifying, Though?

In fact, it's not even about the TV adaptation turning a ghoul character into a thirst trap. Even Fallout gamers have noticed that ghouls have slowly evolved from truly terrifying creatures from nightmares to "almost normies."

"In Fallout 1 & 2, ghouls were heinously, terrifyingly disgusting. They didn’t just look charred — they looked melted. In Fallout 3, they still looked pretty gross, but definitely toned down. And in Fallout 4, they almost look like “normies”/“smooth skins” without noses. Some even had hair!! Bring back the horror in ghouls," Redditor Bit_of_a_Degen noted a year ago — long before the Fallout TV show was released.

Still, the game tried to make a difference between "normal" ghouls and feral ghouls — the ones who turn crazy and start attacking everyone around them, like poor Rodger and Martha did in the show.

After Prime Video's Fallout release, fans noted that the trend to "yassify" the ghouls has only gotten stronger — and Walton Goggins' character is proof.

Walton Goggins Wanted You to Have a Crush on Fallout's Ghoul - image 2

It's worth noting that the TV adaptation also introduced us to the ghoul drugs that help to not turn into a complete monster. Apparently, if you know how to get more of those drugs, they also turn you into some sort of a ghoul model, huh?

All eight episodes of Fallout are available for streaming on Prime Video.

Source: ET