The second season of Fallout will begin on December 17, 2025, meaning that we’ll get to see what’s next for Ella Purnell’s Lucy MacLean just over a month from now. The next installment of this dystopian sci-fi action series looks set to emulate a previous movie featuring Purnell in a strangely similar role.
Zack Snyder’s post-apocalyptic movie Army of the Dead also saw the actor play a young woman living in quarantine who’s estranged from her father, and the similarities don’t end there. In fact, Fallout season 2 is about to feature a storyline that brings Lucy MacLean even closer to Purnell’s 2021 role as Kate Ward.
Army of the Dead likely won’t go down as one of the best movies of Ella Purnell’s career. But what it shares in common with the trajectory of her Fallout character will allow the actor to redeem this previous portrayal of a post-apocalyptic scenario in which a young heroine clashes with her father.
Fallout Season 2 Has Many Similarities To Ella Purnell’s Role In Army Of The Dead
As the anticipation builds for season 2 of Prime Video’s celebrated post-apocalyptic video game adaptation, it might be giving Netflix’s Army of the Dead a watch. In this movie, Ella Purnell plays someone living in a quarantined version of Las Vegas following a zombie apocalypse, who embarks on a dangerous mission with her estranged father.
Scott Ward ends up being killed by his own daughter, Kate, who shoots anyone she finds has been infected by the zombies. Fallout season 2 will likewise see Purnell’s Lucy MacLean killing anyone dangerous she comes across, especially those who’ve mutated into ghouls. She’s on a mission to bring her father justice, which also happens to take her to Vegas.
New Vegas, that is – the city built on the ruins of Las Vegas in Fallout’s futuristic dystopia. We don’t yet know what exactly MacLean plans to do with her father when she finds him, but we do know that she’s capable of killing one of her parents if necessary.
She famously killed her mother, Rose, in the show’s season 1 finale, when she realized she was a feral ghoul living in agony. In many ways, it was similar to what Purnell’s Kate Ward did in Army of the Dead to relieve her father of suffering as a zombie. In both cases, we saw the actor reduced to tears.
Fallout Season 2 Can Make Up For Army Of The Dead’s Failures
Ella Purnell’s Army of the Dead character has clearly informed her work in Fallout. In both cases, she plays similarly strong female characters fighting their way through post-apocalyptic situations involving strict quarantines and dangerously mutated humans, who have strained relationships with their fathers. However, it’s the courage of Kate Ward’s convictions that’s really inspired Purnell for her latest role.
Army of the Dead underperformed with audiences and received middling critical reviews when it was released in theaters and on Netflix in 2021. It’s generally regarded as a frothy and ill-disciplined movie, despite being genre-savvy with punchy dialogue and humor. In any case, Fallout season 2 can make up for its shortcomings, by serving Purnell better in a similar context.
