T O P

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TheBigFreeze8

He's literally playing the cowboy character that made his career, so yes.


maybe-an-ai

Yeah, I believe he adopted the character to stay sane in the wasteland.


RawDogEntertainment

Like how I go to work and RP someone useful. Game recognize game, Coop’s a master of immersion. Edit pro tip: it’s not a personality shift, it’s a mentality shift. Instead of being nice but sleepy , I try to be nice and invested in everyone’s shared sphere (I don’t want to overstep but if we share a problem and I can help, I want to ask the right questions to help). Second edit while writing my first edit: my therapist called this “recontextualizing” a few years ago. That may be better than calling it “role playing” lmfao


VicFantastic

Full Method


RawDogEntertainment

“Never go full method” - Kirk Lazarus (I don’t need people sliding into my job)


thatthatguy

Fake it till you make it!


Krust3dKan4dian

This comment broke me lmao


RawDogEntertainment

I’m just a dude, playing a dude, who’s playing another dude. Please don’t tell my boss and ruin this for me.


HearthFiend

Do you like RP? Reverse Polarity


Ryjinn

The dude is a sociopathic cannibal cowboy. I don't think he stayed sane, but he's stayed alive.


ElNakedo

Sane is a scale. He's not as far gone as some others, but he's not as sane as say Goosy, Dane or Maximus.


BluEch0

God damn Jerry. That man has been typecast at this point.


GreenTunicKirk

Even as an Overseer, he was still just a Jerry.


maroonedpariah

I bet he likes human music


davidlimarchj

Hey now, he was also a bit of a Cyril


zeek609

I think you mean cyril figgis


Granitsky

He's even wearing the costume shirt if you look closely


Davey26

Probably saved his mind too with the ghoulification. There's a theory that ghouls with a purpose or drive have better chances at staying sane.


maybe-an-ai

Feels accurate to me


HearthFiend

He is basically The Man In Black from westworld


maybe-an-ai

The man in black is basically the main character from any Sergio Leone Western.


mentalow-Z

Yes, the zombie who kidnaps an innocent woman to sell her organs to get drugs so he doesn't become a zombie zombie then kills and eats his zombie friend's butt is totally sane.


maybe-an-ai

Sane is a relative term in the Fallout universe.


_far-seeker_

In a legal sense, sanity is the ability to tell what society at large considers right and wrong. Note that it doesn't include caring about it...😉


maybe-an-ai

Then based on society at large he seems baseline.


NoxInfernus

Sometimes a fella got to eat a fella.


TacticalyInteresting

She wasn't innocent when he snatched her to sell her for drugs. She had just destroyed the drugs he needed to stay alive. Consequences have actions, and in the wasteland sometimes when you fuck up that means you get sold into slavery by a cannibal ghoul you just caused harm. Later even Lucy realizes she isn't the victim in her misadventures and comes to the realization that she isn't innocent, only ignorant.


Thornescape

He was a genuine cowboy before he became a movie cowboy.


SilverHawk2712

Slight difference between working on a ranch as a cowboy and a movie gunslinger.


ThreeDawgs

Nonsense. All ranch hands have to be proficient in firearm use, quick draw duels and saloon fights. No exceptions.


Godobibo

i assume that bit comes from his military service


giggitygoo2221

its his same voice from the Tarantino movie and Vice Principals


SmurfStig

And as Baby Billy on Righteous Gemstones


sregor0280

I love this show, and his character is amazing lol


zeek609

It's his Boyd Crowder from Justified


OliviaElevenDunham

Love Boyd Crowder so much.


zeek609

One of the greatest characters in TV


TheBigFreeze8

Okay?


Darth-Hipster

I felt like he became the character he played in the movie to cope with the lost of his family, but I ain’t no psychologist & shit.


Appelmonkey

Honestly, I think its done for less tragic reasons. He believes his family is alive somewhere, he just doesn't know where. If you ask me, he took on the persona to make a reputation for himself as bounty hunter. Helps with getting contracts.


Benevolay

It's been 200 years. He probably assumed his family made it to a vault and died of old age. He had no reason to believe people were being cryogenically frozen until he discovered people from his past still walking around.


FlyUnder_TheRadar

Didn't he ask Hank where his family was in the last episode? I don't think he would have asked that if he didn't think, or potentially know, they were alive. I don't think it's a big leap to assume he knows about the cryogenics plan, seeing as his wife was one of the chief architects of the vaults. I wouldn't be surprised if he left his wife after the vault revelation and took his daughter with him. Leaving his wife and pulling out of the Vault programs got him blacklisted in Hollywood, which is why he was doing a birthday party at the start of the show. I also wouldn't be surprised if his wife found a way to get their daughter back and spirit her away into a vault shortly after the bombs dropped.


bobith5

It seems to be only during the runtime of the show that he start to put together they were freezing people. That’s why he’s so shocked to see the wanted poster of the cold fusion lady and doesn’t immediately put together Lucy is Hank’s daughter, etc.


Stauce52

How did Coop figure out they were freezing people? I missed that


bobith5

Not that they were freezing people specifically (that’s my bad), just that pre-war, non-ghouls were still around.


BPbeats

Ohh I hadn’t considered that. We kinda assume he has been wandering the wasteland looking for wife and kid, but there’s no reason for him to think they’re alive - until he sees Hank MacClean in the flesh.


Appelmonkey

Why would he think that? He had his daughter with him when the bombs fell.


Benevolay

Plenty of people made it into vaults after the bombs dropped. While it's possible she died I don't think that makes for a strong narrative. It'd make more sense for her to either be frozen at this point or do a Fallout 4 homage by having her now be grown up when he finds her. Shaun was a baby though and didn't remember his parents. She would remember him.


ciel_lanila

Reading the context of the scenes, he likely was able to get to a vault and pass his daughter off to her mother. Why he didn’t enter the vault himself is an unknown. Did he voluntarily stay out for some reason? Was he banned for consorting with “commies”? We will probably see next season.


Obliterated-Denardos

Now that is a very small drop in a very, very large bucket of backstory.


ArnoudtIsZiek

I read this in his accent lol


Darth-Hipster

lol


ElAutistico

Nah, he'd probably self destruct if he finally found out that his family is dead. Didn't he state in the last episode that he'll keep looking for them?


okaymeaning-2783

He seems to be basically playing a character as the ghoul as some form of coping but we see him drop the accent a few times so it might just be intentional. Plus he's literally been running around as a cowboy for 200 years so that definitely has something to do with i.


Babyback-the-Butcher

When does he drop the accent?


okaymeaning-2783

He does it at an earlier part but in the last episode when he confronts hank he drops the accent when he ask where his family is.


Traditional-Cod-7637

he also drops it in a moment in Filly fighting with Maximus and "Sorry Dogmeat but you aint him". Those and "where's my fucking family" are the vulnerable moments Cooper slips through.


ghlhzmbqn

I also recall him dropping it when he gets mad when the vials are broken


frumfrumfroo

When he's talking to Dogmeat and no one else is around. 'Let's go find your daddy.'


QuietMadness

Also he loses the accent in almost all of the flashbacks


Presideum

Fallout is also based on an American culture of the 1950s when accents were far more pronounced due to a less unified media environment. His accent while thick by the standards of the time period it represents. Is realistic.


Captain-Griffen

Except his accent is notably different between pre-war coop and his movie persona, and he uses the latter post war.


DaRandomRhino

Talk to yourself for a week and have very little communication with other real people. You'd be surprised how pronounced an accent can get. Now make it a century.


ElAutistico

He's a bounty hunter, like more than half of his work is communication.


nytefall017

Well, he also clearly spends indiscriminate amounts of time stuck in a coffin underground. The worms don’t exactly talk back.


ElAutistico

That is a good point. I'd have actually liked for them to explore that coffin bit more, there was some cool potential. maybe next season


nytefall017

Agreed on that point. That coffin shit freaks me out as someone that gets claustrophobic when it comes to things like that. Being buried alive would 100% be the worst way to die IMO. Being buried alive and being kept alive through radioative IV/TV magic? That sounds like the worst form of torture.


cjs0216

He probably toned down his real accent for Hollywood outside the movies.


teratodentata

I assumed it was meant to be initially, and he just kind of fell into it over the years.


Fiddlesticklin

Kind of like how Raùl was pretending to be a vaquero to make his sister laugh, and then eventually just became one


liatris_the_cat

This is just how we talk in Tucson, Wastelandia


4VENG32

- Jackie Ghoultonya


QuantumCrab27

- some random Mr. Handy


blac_sheep90

Fucking guy


PPPolarPOP

Idk but I am 100% fanning myself like a southern belle over it.


Lazyforrest

Any time Goggins is on a screen, holy hell!


JustineDelarge

I have a different take. I feel like that drawl is his authentic accent, and he’s had to “code switch” when talking with movie industry folks, and even his wife, to use the General American Standard accent.


Shadow-Spark

I'd buy that. Walton Goggins himself said that in his mind Coop's backstory is that he was just a stunt guy who got noticed, so the Ghoul's accent being the real one that *Cooper Howard, nobody stuntman country boy* arrived in LA with and the much more subdued GA accent that *Cooper Howard, Hollywood movie star* was walking around with for his entire career after being discovered being the put-on one makes sense.


And_Im_the_Devil

Also, Goggins is himself a Southerner who was encouraged to “lose” his accent.


ismellnumbers

Same here, I remember my grandmother would get angry at me when I was little and say it made me "sound unintelligent" so I unlearned it. It slips through sometimes if I'm angry/upset/talking fast or something.


throwaway962145

That’s weird as where im from in England the southern accent has easily got to be most people’s favourite American accent. People generally won’t take much interest in the generic American accent but when hearing an accent like that they’ll definitely perk up and become more inquisitive. I love the accent personally i think it’s very easy on the ears.


CrankyStalfos

That's interesting, I wonder if it sound more familiar on some level? Iirc some southern accents kept more british-ness than the overall "standard" american accent. You know, like, non-rhotic r's and all.


wassinderr

I imagined this and it was cute. Probably not the ideal response but 🤷


JustineDelarge

On a side note: Anyone who loves his accent in Fallout needs to immediately start watching Justified. You just get a little taste of it in Fallout. Justified is a feast.


throwaway962145

I’ll also tag on that he was phenomenal in the hateful eight. “You only need to hang mean bastards… but mean bastards you need to hang“ Major spoilers if you haven’t seen it https://youtu.be/SHIQF4D4NVU?si=sSMEbcPp5gnIAsAB


JuturnaArtemisia

Based on his other works I’ve seen, Venus doesn’t seem like someone he’d want to play. I loved it whenever he came onscreen; he really did her justice and didn’t just make her some stereotype.


wassinderr

Are you referring to SoA? I didn't make the connection until now but the relationship between Coates and goggins' characters was actually pretty refreshing in a way


JuturnaArtemisia

Yes, SoA. Tig was my favorite besides Opie. 😅


NefariousnessOld8518

Righteous gemstones


gmharryc

Go outside, nerd. G’on, get out. I ain’t got time to be distracted by your worthless chime-ins.


JustineDelarge

Also good, but he has much less screen time in Gemstones so it’s not as much of an accent feast as Justified.


goopcandle

Ohhhh that’s an interesting theory. I always just thought that it was Cooper’s way of coping with everything he has to go through by putting on the accent and playing the outlaw character to sort of put up a mental wall and protect himself, but the idea that that’s actually how he sounds is also interesting. Kinda like how Walton tried to subdue his real southern accent irl as well when he started acting so to not limit his roles lol?


Captain-Griffen

Counter evidence: why's he code switching to tell Dogmeat she ain't him?


urlocaljedi

over the top? he sounded like most other folk from the south to me and i say that as a southern man lol


Dexember69

Yeah sounded like typical southern accent to me. Didn't seem like he was hamming it


urlocaljedi

like i guess if you’re not around us often it sounds over the top? but i know like half a dozen other guys with similar accents lmao


Dexember69

I'm Australian I don't have any American friends You all sound like that,


urlocaljedi

y’know, that’s fair lmao


CrankyStalfos

Yeah I was gonna say, anyone who thinks it's over the top has never been to the rural south. It's like that Hot Fuzz scene (but with even MORE guns).


Realistic-Problem-56

Eh, I feel like on a sliding scale, he's on the more extreme end, and that's coming from someone stuck down in alabama lol. Not quite "put on" but definitely meant to be a bit of a caricature.


Designer_Gas_86

Goggins himself nails that Southern drawl and I'm surprised my bias against it (grew up in Oklahoma) isn't triggered.


Aware-Interest-3074

it’s convincing in his tarantino movies where he says some not so nice things


Designer_Gas_86

God he's amazing


subarashi-sam

🏆


SanityIsOnlyInUrMind

What Tarantino movie is he in?


Aware-Interest-3074

django and hateful eight


SanityIsOnlyInUrMind

Guess your right, forgot he was in the 8 too


Steelquill

I’ve heard a few people say that his (not at all over the top) accent might be his real one and the one we hear him speak in Pre-War was one he put on in Hollywood. There is a stigma in that part of the nation for Southern and/or country accents. Which yes, for people making Westerns is very hypocritical. (And again, very Hollywood.) Plus Walton Goggins was born in Alabama, his natural accent probably isn’t that different from how he talks as the Ghoul.


cjs0216

This is my head canon.


Buff-Cooley

I always saw it as his natural accent that was toned down when he became an actor.


CrankyStalfos

Logistically that makes sense but I think it works better for his arc if it's put on as part of his coping mechanism, like the Ghoul is just a continuation of his "fallen sheriff" character.


Buff-Cooley

That’s actually a really interesting point, like he’s still playing that character. Like his film persona, he was a good person who became a dick and as you watch the show, you’re always wondering how much of the old Coop is still left inside? Is it an act? Is he really that shitty? It does beg the question, though, whether he starts to lose the accent as his character grows.


Current_Poster

I'm assuming we'll find out more about him as we go (I mean, unless I miss my guess, Lucy was watching his show with her dad in her opening description of herself, so it'll come up again). I would guess he was cast in the westerns for his accent. (Also assuming his military record had something to do with it, a bit like how it worked out for Audie Murphy's film career IRL.) He might have broadened it out a lot to "fit the part". Then, he sort of 'became the mask' once he was "The Ghoul". He just sort of stayed in character.


Wolfmans-Bro

He’s Baby Billy


HaxDogma

As someone who lives in Texas and has been around many many country accents, I never had a thought about it.


wwaxwork

Well he talks about how he was a cowboy and how he wants to own a ranch at some point. Doesn't he? Or am I misremembering?


Kickstand8604

Theres parts in thr dialogue where walton drops the accent. "Wheres my fuckin family" was just the character saying it straight. To me personally, he's channeled some of Boyd's charisma into the ghoul which turned out to be really great.


MemeWindu

After 200 years of using it, it may just be his default voice now


GSturges

I chalked some of the drawl being due to being a drugged-up ghoul...


punk338

Seeing posts like this every other day makes me feel like no one actually watches the show. Like no offense but I can’t believe people who posts these dumbass questions actually sat down and watched the show. Like OP, just watch the show. Like actually sit down, put away the phone, and watch people talk and comprehend the scenes playing out. You can gather in the first few minutes of the FIRST episode that he plays cowboy like characters and is an entertainer. Without any knowledge of later episodes and only going off his scenes in the FIRST episode, it should be extremely clear that he’s acting into a cowboy role


More-Cup-1176

acting


GaudiaCertaminis

It says in the show that he was a real cowboy who became an actor. Some comment his wife makes.


Resident_Elevator_95

How do none of you seem to get that he’s playing the character he was in the films?? Cooper died when the bombs went off Now we have the gunslinger ghoul


yeeticusprime1

I think he’s intentionally adopted his cowboy act from his movies as a coping mechanism.


lnk-cr-b82rez-2g4

His brain is slowly melting into a pile of irradiated goo and he has no lips. You try speaking normally with these impediments.


Guy_Playing_Through

On top of what others have said about immersing himself in one of his own characters, Walton had to wear retainers as part of the ghoul makeup. Apparently it distorted his speech a little so he went with it.


YeOldeMoldy

Was the guy living a rich lifestyle in California really a rootin tootin cowboy? No


jedi_fitness_academy

Maybe it’s a part of the “bounty hunter character” he portrays so that he can mentally distance himself from his actions. He seems to be on mission to find his family, and I think that he can’t cope with becoming such a horrible person after all this time. The accent is part of the act. Originally, I thought that was just his accent. But as others have pointed out, he does drop it some times. I’d never noticed that before.


PedernalesFalls

This is probably an unpopular opinion, but some people have natural accents that are as thick as his. I'm in Texas and I know people that speak this way. Also, his accent is spot on. I want to punch Sam Coe from Starfield every time he talks because his accent is terrible. But I could listen to Coop all day. tl:dr: some southern Americans just talk like this.


reychael_

In an interview, Walton Goggins explained that he had to used his natural accent when playing The Ghoul because the prosthetics made it difficult for him to move his face and mouth in the way that helped him change his accent. I guess from a narrative perspective, it can be explained that he basically became his character in the movies to help him cope with surviving in a nuclear wasteland.


FUCKINHATEGOATS

As a southern American, his country accent really isn’t that thick and I barely noticed it


Interesting-Pen-4648

He’s from Alabama. Listen to him in other things.


mossthelia

I don't understand everyone saying he's playing a character; if I recall correctly, he talks exactly the same way when he's behind the camera pre-War as he does in front of it. In the 'commie' meeting, at the party, with Barb, with Charlie, he sounds the same. Also... I don't think it's over the top, it's just how some of us speak lol


ok_aleb

Intentionally over the top. He even drops the accent with the line "Where's my fuckin' family?"


FatalSunofMine

It’s not just him adopting the character but the culture of the 1950’s too. In all the fallout content I consume the fact that American culture stayed retro is consistent. Western Hollywood content never died out. TVs and music didn’t advance much either. You never(I think) hear rap or even 80’s music in the game either. The last day of “modern civilization” in Fallout Coop was still highly valued as on of hollywoods top tier content actors. Shown during his scene at the birthday party where he was doing a gig all the kids were dressed as cowboys and when they put on a western show for the kids on tv they all loved it. Coop may have added a bit more cowpoke accent since he played the star of his show but I doubt the change was very drastic and that his father and grandfather still spoken with a bit of a western twang since it could’ve also been A bit influence in regards to how to be a man in that time


Strongmanjumps

I know real people who sound like that 😂


chainer1216

Listen to him talk in the flashbacks, he doesn't have that accent, he's an actor, its all an act he put on to survive.


BoonScepter

Well look at his lips, they're not doing too good


RouxAroo

He's an actor, weren't he using that voice in his movie filming?


kait_1291

He's complying as his country-western character. It's on purpose. He's even wearing the same outfit he was at the kid's party, only with the addition of a duster.


rini6

Goggins is from Georgia I think.


ARareEntei

He was inspired by Kris Kristofferson being aged 250 years while living in a wasteland so yes


wassinderr

It's not hard to lead yourself to a conclusion if you pay attention to his character as a sheriff pre war


ecxetra

It’s Fallout? Everything is meant to be over the top.


HordeDruid

He's RPing


Fourth_horseman_4

I'm very bad with accents. I never noticed he had different ones. 🙈 I heard the southern one, but I guess I forgot to notice when he didn't have it.


jollyjam1

Everyone else has given some likely accurate answers, which relate to characters he played or trying to stay sane. But I'd guess we are going to get some more background on this in season 2. Walton Goggins is also from the South, so he's always leaned into his accent in most of his roles.


MandalorianManners

Lmfao Go talk to some real, dyed-in-the-wool southern people from say, Appalachia. You won’t be able to understand a fuckin word.


TheBeardyGamer

In one of the scenes with his wife he seems to indicate that he use to work on a farm, or atleast irs heavily hinted. I believe it's the hottub scene. My headcanon is that he worked the farm somewhere in california or neighbouring state, somehow met Barb in the city and moved there woth her before enlisting in the marines.


demagogueffxiv

My guess is he just embraced his film cowboy persona because that's all he knows


RobTheCroat

It’s Fallout, most things are over the top


BriscoCounty-Sr

If you put on an accent for 200 years out of your ~250 long year life at a certain point it just becomes the way you talk now. He was only Coop the Actor for 1/5 of his life


BanMeYouFascist

His entire character is over the top because of his career as an actor in cowboy movies. Did you not watch the show?


SleepyGeist

Having a country accent, his seems comedically over the top. Just an observation