Fallout season 2 episode 6 explained: What is the Enclave?

Fallout season 2 is here, and the stakes are higher than ever. The canon is also canon-ing pretty hard, what with so many characters and entities from the video game franchise being introduced into the show this season.

Fallout season 2 episode 6 introduced the show's biggest antagonist... who's hiding out in the shadows this entire time. Below, we explain who these baddies are, how they link back to season 1, and give you an idea of just how powerful they are...

It goes without saying that there are spoilers for Fallout season 2 episode 6 below, so proceed at your own risk!

What is the Enclave in Fallout season 2?

Though it hasn't been directly confirmed in the TV series, we've got enough speculation and some details from Fallout: New Vegas to give a pretty educated answer.

In Fallout season 2 episode 6, Ron Perlman's Super Mutant rescues the Ghoul from his hours-long impalement and brings him back to his lair. "There's a war coming, and we need you healthy," he says ominously. "They call us abominations, but they created our kind. Ghouls, mutants... we're kin. And we should unite against our common enemy. They took us to the point of extinction and forgot we ever existed. But, we didn't forget them... the people who set all this in motion: The Enclave.

Cut to Barb walking out of her meeting with Robert House about cold fusion. As she steps into the elevator, a voice tells her that she's "just a very replaceable part in this machine." The voice belongs to none other than Dr. Siggi Wilzig, who lost his head (literally) in his season 1. "If you forget your place in the company... you'll die. And so will your family. The same will happen to me... if I don't communicate this message. We're all in the same boat. Not one of us can stop it." It's Wilzig who tells Barb to say that the only way Vault-Tec can "guarantee results" is by "dropping the bombs ourselves."

So...who is the Enclave? And what does Wilzig have to do with it? Well, you might recall in Fallout season 2 episode 5 that House tells Cooper that he believes that the "unknown entity" responsible for the creation of the Deathclaw is also responsible for the inevitable nuke drop. In the video games, Deathclaws were created by the United States government with the intention of making superior battlefield soldiers to fight alongside human soldiers. It's never outright stated who dropped the initial bombs, but we do know (or, at the very least, it's heavily implied) who created and deployed the Deathclaws: the Enclave.

In the video game franchise, the Enclave is a secret military faction full of racist, genocidal freaks that lurks in the shadows and controls what is left of the United States government. Among those freaks are America's most corrupt elite, including former presidents, CEOS, military generals, cabinet members, etc. They are the franchise's overarching antagonist, having been first introduced in Fallout 2. The Enclave's main goal is to wipe out anything that they deem less than human, including Ghouls and mutants, in order to preserve a race of "true humans" (as the Super Mutant explains to the Ghoul). They attempt an all-out genocide in Fallout 2 and go on a crusade in Fallout 76 that involves them unleashing a horrifying plague known as the Scorched Plague. Their exact motivation for dropping the bombs, however, is not clear... but it seems that the Fallout TV series, which is 100% canon to the franchise as a whole, is slowly but surely attempting to explain this.

As for our headless pal Wilzig, he was a scientist working for the Enclave before he eventually defected. In Fallout season 1, the lab that Wilzig is working in during that rather heartwarming sequence with CX404, aka Dogmeat, belongs to none other than the Enclave. Wilzig was working intensely on cold fusion before the bombs dropped, which is most likely why he was so involved with Barb Howard's sale of cold fusion to Robert House. His decapitated head becomes something of immense value in season 1, as it holds the key to cold fusion, which is enough to restart civilization and restore peace. Unfortunately, a mutated creature known as a gulper swallows it whole before anyone else can get to it.

Though it looks like it won't be fully revealed until episode 7 or 8, the Enclave is the big bad that's been lurking in the shadows all along. The Super Mutant does say that a war involving the Enclave is coming, and it's likely that this will unite all of the factions in some epic way.

Fallout season 2 is streaming now on Prime Video. Never miss an episode with our Fallout season 2 release schedule, and if you're still confused, check out our Fallout season 2 timeline.