Halo: The Fall of Reach - The Animated Series

"An unstoppable threat. An unthinkable sacrifice."

- Official tagline

Halo: The Fall of Reach – The Animated Series is an animated series adapted from the novel of the same name by Eric Nylund. The series was created by Sequence in conjunction with 343 Industries. Comprising three acts, the series is featured in the Limited Edition and Limited Collector's Edition of Halo 5: Guardians. It was made available in its entirety upon the game's release (as opposed to having weekly airing dates like Halo: Nightfall).

The series was released on Blu-ray and DVD on December 1, 2015.

Plot summary
The film begins as Blue Team visits the glassed remnants of Reach, where they recalled their friendship with fellow deceased spartan  Samuel-034. The scene then shifts to Jacob Keyes and Catherine Halsey traveling through slipspace to Eridanus II to search for candidates viable for a new super soldier program known as the SPARTAN-II program. They soon find one of the candidates; John, better known as the Master Chief. John was playing king of the hill with several other boys, using some cruel strategies, such as throwing one boy over his shoulder. As the only grownup escorted a hurt girl away, Halsey then approached John. She showed John a coin, and told him he could keep it, if he guessed which side it would land on. John guessed which side the quarter would land on each time Catherine flipped it, and she let him keep it.That night, ONI operatives kidnap John in his sleep and replace him with a flash clone of himself. This process is repeated with all the other cadets. The parents of Kelly-087's, Fred-104's, and Linda-058's parents trying to wake up the lifeless flash clones of their children. Halsey is heard narrating, regretting that she couldn't have just used the flash clones, but she simply couldn't, as they would not stay alive long enough. John has nightmares about his mom before being rudely awoken by an instructor. Multiple instructors go about waking up all the cadets. One rudely wakes up Jorge-052, calling him Jorge. Jorge tries to tell the instructor that his name is George, but the instructor hits him again for "backtalking". He and tells him to get a move on. Their trainer, Franklin Mendez, has them do many jumping jacks and push ups before telling them it was time to do a training exercise called Ring the Bell. When John asked what the prize was for winning, Mendez replied saying that the losing team would have to go without dinner. John misunderstood the concept (working as a team too get to the bell and ring it), and raced ahead to the bell, not stopping to help his teammates, Sam, Kelly, and Fred, much to their anger. They proceed to shun John. John realizes his mistakes and then apologizes. After that, Sam and Kelly formed a strong friendship with John.

Some time later, chief petty officer Mendez had all of the cadets board a albatross dropship, and told them that they would all be dropped off in different areas of the Reach Military Wilderness Training Preserve, and their job was to find each other, and then find an Albatross dropship. Mendez also told them that all of the cadets would have a small piece of the map needed to find the dropship, and that the last cadet on the dropship would get left behind and have to walk back. John volunteered to get off first. While walking through the forest, he heard a bird call, and then told Samuel he could come out. he also remarked how his bird calls were horrible. Soon, all the cadets had found each other, and they had determined the location of the dropship. when they reach the dropship, however, they see two UNSC soldiers waiting near it. The SPARTAN-II cadets, however, think the soldiers are hostiles as they were not in uniform, and they then knock them out with rocks. When Doctor Halsey and Mendez confront John on this, they don't kick him out of the program, or give him any punishment. They instead give him a promotion to squad leader. Soon after, all the spartan II candidates take their augmentations. While observing the spartans take their augmentations, Cathrine Halsey gets a message from admiral Ysionris Jeromi, stating that he was afraid that very few of the spartan IIs would survive the augmentations. At that same moment, a girl dies from the augmentations, with several of her orifices bleeding. After the augmentations were over, the surviving Spartan IIs held a funeral service for their fallen comrades, onboard theUNSC Atlas. Since they couldn't bury the dead, the spartans instead launched their bodies into space using (ironically) ODST drop pods. John then notices that several of the spartan IIs being wheeled off on wheelchairs, he asks Mendez what happened to them. Mendez responded by saying that they were crippled by their augmentations. Mendez also told him that a leader like John must be willing to send men to their deaths. Sam then asks if he wanted to go to the shooting range with him, to which John declined, and then said he was going to the gym. While working out, sam narrated, saying how the new augmentations made them all uncomfortable. Just then, four ODSTs come in for a workout, and when they try to bench press, some of the weights fell on a ODSTs foot, because John had removed the pin holding the weights in place. John apologized, but the ODSTs attacked him. In defense, John accidentally killed two of the ODSTs, and severely wounded the other two. He had done that all in less that five seconds. It was later revealed that the attack was staged to test the strength of an augmented spartan.

Later, John, Sam, Kelly, Fred, and Linda-058 were sent on a mission to kidnap Robert Watts, a leader of the insurrection in the Eridanus system. They find his hideout in a astroid belt. They find the base by stowing away on a freighter, Laden, which is delivering supplies to the hideout. Sam finds out that there is a supply crate filled with cigarettes, steaks, and candy. He then correctly deduces that the crate is for Robert Watts, and tracks it. The spartans then fight their way to Robert Watts's office, and then forced him into a crate, before escaping. During the fight, Sam was about to get hit by a bullet, then John threw him in front of the bullet. The wound was not fatal, and Kelly was able to seal it with Biofoam. Later, they were summoned aboard the UNSC Pioneer, and were greeted by vice admiral Michael Stanforth, who informed them of a new alien threat called the covenant.

Production
Halo: The Fall of Reach – The Animated Series was created and directed by Sequence, along with 343 Industries. The hour-long adaptation was released on October 27, 2015, with the Limited Edition and Limited Collector's Edition of Halo 5: Guardians, though was later made available on Netflix and Blu-Ray. The series is intended to serve as a way for fans to learn the origins of John-117, Blue Team, and the SPARTAN-II program. One of the goals of the project was to bring new life to the backstory of the Master Chief and his Spartan brethren. Halo: The Fall of Reach – The Animated Series features audio, sound, and visual effects from the Halo series. 343 Industries' Franchise Development Director Frank O'Connor has stated that the series carefully aligns itself with the novel, but takes artistic liberties with certain design choices—such as choice of Covenant ships or weapons. The series has been said to tightly adhere to the novel with some additions to help "fill in gaps or smooth over previous errors". One of the main challenges of the adaptation was the decision to drop characters' inner monologues from the novel, while fitting the novel's contents into an hour also proved difficult. As a result, the animated series only encompasses the first half of the novel (Sections I and II), with the battles of Sigma Octanus IV and Reach being omitted entirely. The most significant changes from the novel are listed here.

The series features minor connections to Halo 5: Guardians, which O'Connor claims are "a subtle nod only book readers will even notice". Halo: The Fall of Reach – The Animated Series shares artistic similarities with other works created by Sequence, such as the Terminals for Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, Halo 4, and Halo 2: Anniversary. However, the scale and fidelity of the animation is noted to be more ambitious, fully animated, and largely 3D, unlike Sequence's previous Halo projects. A trailer for the series was released on July 10, 2015. The series' development time was six months.

The soundtrack for Halo: The Fall of Reach - The Animated Series was composed by Tom Salta, who also worked on the soundtracks for Halo: Spartan Assault and Halo: Spartan Strike.

Differences in adaptation
The animated film was not a direct adaptation of the full book, adapting the first two-thirds and ending with the death of Samuel-034. The most notable omission is the titular Fall of Reach; the film ends with the Battle of Chi Ceti and only flashes to the glassed Reach in the bookend scenes.

Greater emphasis is placed on the Blue Team that comprises John-117's team in Guardians, therefore increasing the roles of Frederic-104 and Linda-058. Fred and Linda join Kelly-087, Sam and John in their initial teamwork training session. In the Battle of Chi Ceti, rather than all of the Spartans launching and only Kelly, Sam, and John making it, only Blue Team launches and all five make it aboard the Covenant ship.

In the gym confrontation, the attacking group is made up of three ODSTs instead of four, the Sergeant never appears and John is only interrupted when Mendez orders him at ease. John is clearly bothered with having to injure and kill fellow soldiers while defending himself for a test, saying that the men were "wasted, not spent", and it's stated that he continued to be bothered by the incident even though it was accidental.

During the Battle of Chi Ceti, the Spartans use a HAVOK tactical nuclear weapon taken from one of the 's Pelicans to destroy the Unrelenting. In the novel, they use warheads from Anvil II missiles while the Pelicans did not carry nuclear weapons. Additionally, the Unrelenting is depicted as a while the novel shows it as being around the size of the Commonwealth, a. As well, the Commonwealth itself is depicted as a instead of the canonical Paris class.

The tree-carving scene does not take place in the book, rather the children head directly to a single rendezvous together.

Trivia
The winners of Hunt the Signal got their likeness put in the animation.