#vault 31

being from canada, this has got to be the funniest part of the show

We're all pretty sure Chet Jr. is ready Hank Jr., right?

That Hank had his own sorta toxic age-gap thing with Steph when she defrosted, right?

I mean........

I saw "Stank" as their ship name on Twitter.

this makes the other 31s like hank, betty, and steph so intriguing because they don't feel at all like the largely nameless group of bumbling middle managers. that leaves me with the question of how the hell did they come from the same group of people?

my answer, dear reader, is the environment and premise they were thawed under.

looking at the named/'relevant' 31s, the closest i can see to the overseer group is ronnie, as he is utterly willing to deceive people to continue the experiment. this is shown in how his demeanor shifts, going from confused (ep2, fresh from the cryopod) to scarily wide-eyed and convincing the other 31s that norm should be killed. seriously, watch his eyes. imo his eyes betray his desperation for the lie to work, for his power to remain.

ronnie so desperately wants to be in control, and that, to me, really parallels hank, and possibly even steph. each have their own reasons, and i suppose we don't truly know ronnie's yet (as he has... about five lines of dialogue and mostly moves from point A to B). he is the leader here, though, so he parallels the other "leaders".

still, though, i do not believe him that there's some rule somewhere that says impersonating management is punishable by death. he just wants to feel safe by killing anyone who would oppose him, and the rest of the 31s are inherently going to follow anyone who gives them orders.

following the order is what makes the rest of the 31s feel safe when everything is uncertain, and that's a feeling that claudia doesn't understandwhen she calls them "crazy". like, girl, the world ended. that bud askins guy allowed them to survive the apocalypse. i'm sure his training program also was fairly close-knit, so they all knew him well. she just wasn't there long enough to get attached to him!

following ronnie, though, makes sense to the rest of the 31s. i too would follow the orders from bud askins' assistant. ronnie is basically the next bud askins, and was probably meant as a failsafe in case something happened to bud. you can't get closer to bud askins than ronnie, and therefore following his orders is the safest thing to do.

clark and pete perfectly show the mentality of the 31s, and for that i love them. for a split second, you can see clark recoil in horror when ronnie says they have to kill norm. of course, he jokes it off, then both he and pete have to convince themselves that it's protocol. protocol is what they know, and it makes sense in a world that doesn't. pete resigns himself to the protocol, even if it's clear in his voice that he doesn't want to follow it. i mean, ronnie is literally telling them that norm will hurt them. they're afraid of what can happen if this strange unknown guy is set free. an appeal to their emotions, if you will. would you follow protocol if you stayed safe? probably.

and tbh, negative emotions like fear are a huge driver for the 31s. most notably, they're scared because just a couple days ago they witnessed the world ending before getting shoved into cryopods for 220 years. they quite literally were trained to live in vaults and they were raised before the war. everything they knew is dead and gone. so why dissent when that can lead to your death, or the death of the entire group? stick together, or die. follow the leader, or die.

i can sense some fear when clark bludgeons norm, and i sincerely don't think clark wanted to do it. he was uncomfortable with it, but was being told what to do to stay alive. in fact, clark was distinctly concerned about norm, thinking about his brain despite the fact that ronnie wants to kill him. it's a funny contradiction, but clark just didn't want to come to terms with killing a guy.

minor theorizing detail to note, in the preview we get of the normplot in ep8, clark and pete are absent. they're not the ones dragging norm around! my theory, in advance, is that they do dissent, because we see claudia in the scene telling ronnie to stop. there's a chance that she's not the one freeing the roaches because... girl does not seem quick enough to be in that scene and then also run down to the elevator. clark and pete, redeem yourselves by freeing the roaches and you will be reincarnated as lotus flowers. do it for me, outlet, your superfan.

but sincerely, i do hope that the 31s (especially the named three, being clark/pete/claudia) can break away from ronnie and have some greater plot relevance. but i know most of them will die. please just spare clark and pete. claudia has norm shaped plot armor so she doesn't need the well-wishes.

speaking of claudia though, i... dunno about her. i feel bad for her because currently she has no motivation of her own. she just does things around norm and for norm. her motivation is a man, and maybe i'm too woke for that, but she literally just does the things for norm. she brought norm to the office, she untied norm, and she will defend norm too. couple this with how the greater fandom objectifies her, i just feel really bad for her. her character just falls so flat for me and i wish she had more to her than "does things for norm". go kill a guy or something.

but also, sincerely, do not look her up in "mainstream" fandom places. it's bad.

side note, it is amusing that her perception is incredibly low. i can forgive her not noticing ronnie that one time, but seriously, how did she not hear the 31s walking into the comms room? there's like twenty of them, there's no way they were all perfectly quiet. you're supposed to be a lookout!!! stay focused!!!

anyways, the 31s in general greatly suffer from a lack of screen time. i think that, if we were maybe given a bit of them exploring the wasteland through their pre-war viewpoints, they could have a lot more going for them. even ronnie could have more depth, but again he's had like five lines. clark has had more lines. clark is more relevant than the literal antagonist of normplot. all hail clark!

speaking of clark, as i like to do, we literally see a scene where hank is talking to clark and pete and i so desperately hope they do something with it. they wouldn't show that for nothing right? right?! will clark and pete hear that norm is hank's son and break from ronnie?! i think that could be a great source of "conflict" for the 31s, but only time (and episode 8) will tell. do they all know about the FEV, or is it just ronnie?

ugh i have so many questions. i hope this plot doesn't get shafted again. like 20 mins of screentime from eps 3-7 is criminal.

anyways, in summary, the 31s are characterized by fear of a world they no longer recognize. a leader negates that fear by bringing order, a group structure, and, importantly, the safety of belonging. clark and pete are the little ducks following ronnie, and claudia, who thinks she's different from the rest, is still following norm. the 31s understandably go where they feel safest.

I am surprised the pip boys barely played a part in season 2. No warning signs of radiation in any scene, whether it's Lucy's, Norm's, or any of the Vault 31's. I was expecting a bit of tension with Vault 31 exploring the wasteland tbh, although they're getting their cumuppance with the radroaches in the finale.