When and Where Does the Halo Show Take Place?
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The Halo live-action series is looking to become one of the most successful Paramount+ series because of how it has broken the record for most views on any of the shows on Paramount’s streaming service. That said, the Halo series is set in a different universe compared to the games because the showrunners wanted to tell a story that’s different from what we’ve seen in the game counterparts. Nevertheless, the timeline seems to be very different from one another despite some of the similarities. So, when does the Halo show take place?
It can be presumed that the Halo TV show takes place on or before 2552 because that was when the war against the Covenant reached its peak when Master Chief learned more about the Halo weapon. Then there’s also the fact that Reach is yet to fall in the series, and that could happen soon.
The Halo series timeline seems to be a bit confusing because of how the show doesn’t really tell us when the events are happening. Nevertheless, we can still infer from the events that they happen in the middle of the 26thcentury and quite possibly in 2552. That said, let’s look at what we know about the setting of the Halo TV series.
Does The Halo Show Take Place At The Same Time As The Games?
The Halo video game franchise has always been one of the most important and most popular series of the 21stcentury because of how it became one of the biggest sci-fi first-person shooting games of all time. Its main title has reached six games, but there are a total of 16 different Halo games because of how popular this franchise has become. And the timeline of the Halo franchise is something that has always been an interesting topic because of how crucial it is to the entire lore.
We know for a fact that the first Halo game happened in 2552, and the second and third games happened just shortly after the events of Halo: Combat Evolved. Three different Halo games happened in a span of less than a year in the Halo lore because time was of the essence when Master Chief was looking to stop the Halo weapon from being utilized by the Covenant. Of course, while the next Halo trilogy happened five years later, they still happened in a short span of time.
That said, Halo has seen its fair share of live-action adaptations, but the Paramount+ live-action series seems to be the most ambitious of them all. But the one thing that people should know is that the Halo series is not something that was directly adapted from the video games because the creator of the show was vocal about the fact that the events of this show take place in an alternate timeline that’s separate yet parallel to the events of the Halo games.
In a way, this means that the Halo series should be seen differently compared to the Halo video games in terms of its events and characters. And perhaps the same could be said about its timeline. So, does the Halo TV show take place at the same time as the games?
The Halo TV show certainly takes place before the events of the Halo games. In Halo: Combat Evolved, the planet called Reach, which is the second-most important planet for the UNSC and is the center for their naval operations in space, had already fallen after a large-scale attack from the Covenant.
However, in the series, Reach is still alive and kicking as it plays a crucial role as not only the base of operations for the UNSC navy but is also where Dr. Halsey conducts her research regarding the Spartans and the Covenant. In that regard, we can say for certain that the Halo series doesn’t happen at the same time as the games because Reach is still standing. And it is obvious that the Halo series happens before the events of the Halo games, albeit in a separate timeline.
When Does The Halo Show Take Place?
Now that we have established that the Halo TV series takes place before the events of the Halo games, when exactly does the show take place? Well, the show doesn’t specifically state when the events are happening, but we do know that the series happens in the middle of the 26th century.
Of course, based on what we said about Reach, it can be presumed that the events of the Halo show happen before the events of the game. But you are certainly wondering how far back the Halo TV series takes place. That’s something that we’ll try to make sense of here.
In the games, the Fall of Reach happened from July 24 to August 30, 2552. Meanwhile, the first Halo game happened in the same year and must have happened just a few months after the events of the Fall of Reach because the UNSC was still recovering from the Covenant victory in one of the most important planets that the human race controls.
Halo: Combat Evolved was also the game where Master Chief learned about the Halo weapon and what the Covenant was planning to do with it. In the TV show, the Halo weapon is yet to be mentioned, and the UNSC has no idea what the Covenant wants. This means that, in due time in the show, the events could lead to a point where Master Chief learns about the Halo weapon and will seek to prevent the Covenant from activating it.
Of course, there’s the fact that Reach is still standing in the Halo TV series. What we are presuming is that the Covenant will eventually score a victory over the UNSC when the Fall of Reach finally happens in the series, and such an event could coincide with Master Chief learning more about the Halo weapon.
In that regard, we can make the presumption that the Halo TV series takes place before or in 2552, considering that the events of the show coincide with some of the events that happened in the game during the year 2552. As mentioned, the Fall of Reach and Master Chief learning more about the Halo weapon all happen in 2552.
Of course, there’s still a good chance that we could be wrong. That’s because the showrunners have complete freedom in how they want to handle the show, considering that it takes place in a timeline that’s separate from the canon Halo universe in the games. As such, the events that are happening on the show could be before or after 2552, depending on how the showrunners want to dictate them.
Nevertheless, we still do believe that it could be possible that the show is happening on or before 2552 and that it’s only a matter of time before Reach falls. After all, the destruction of Reach at the hands of the Covenant is an important part of the Halo lore in the games, and it would be weird if the show doesn’t include this as one of the major turning points in the war between the human race and the Covenant.
Where Does The Halo Show Take Place?
The Halo TV show is a lot like all of the different sci-fi movies and shows that take place in space. That means that this is a series that doesn’t take place in a definite location, considering that it takes place on several different planets all over the known universe in Halo. Then again, Halo tends to limit the places where the series takes place to make sure that the story focuses more on certain places.
For one, the Halo TV series starts off on a planet called Madrigal, where Kwan Ha used to live before she got taken into custody by Master Chief after they recovered the artifact that the Covenant Elite warriors were looking for on the planet. Madrigal also returned in episode 2 when we got to see a moment where a new governor was imposing his strict rule over the entire planet, as Kwan Ha was left watching the events from a monitor over at the Rubble.
It is interesting to note that the planet Madrigal comes from the Halo video game lore but isn’t exactly shown. The planet is mentioned in a song called the Siege of Madrigal. That is probably where the series got the name for the planet in the live-action version of Halo.
Of course, the planet Reach, which has always been an important base of operations for the UNSC, is one of the most prominent areas featured in the TV series. Reach is the place that the UNSC treats as its base of operations in space and is actually the planet where a huge concentration of its navy is stationed. Dr. Halsey, as mentioned, conducts her scientific research on Reach, and we can probably assume that the Spartan-II Project was conducted on this planet as well.
When the series moves to the scenes involving the Covenant, we are taken to High Charity, which is the planetoid that the Covenant uses as some sort of a floating fortress because it travels through space and doesn’t stay stationary. This planet is powered by Forerunner technology, which allows High Charity to have a star as its source of energy so that it can sustain life and even travel through slipspace. It is worth noting that High Charity is probably a colonized planet because this is not the home planet of the Prophets, who act as the spiritual leaders of the Covenant.
Finally, we have the Rubble, which is not a planet but is a collection of asteroids floating in space. Through the use of an advanced AI, the citizens of Rubble were able to find a way to maintain the different asteroids in such a way that they don’t get hit by the rogue asteroids floating in the asteroid field. Rubble is connected using a series of different tubes that allow the different citizens to travel from one rock to another and is the home of people who feel that they don’t have any other place to live in the known universe in Halo.
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