Summary

• The Halo Paramount+ show retells events from Halo games in a different timeline known as the Silver Timeline, with minor deviations.
• The war between humans and Covenant, led by Spartans like Master Chief, changed the fate of Earth and countless colony worlds.
• The Fall of Reach in 2552 marks a crucial moment in the Halo timeline, leading to the final Covenant advance and threats of galactic sterilization.

Paramount+'s Halo TV series is set towards the end of the Human-Covenant War, taking place in the year 2552 and covering events from both Halo: Reach and shortly before Halo: Combat Evolved. The Halo Xbox games introduced players to a galaxy at war — where the human race had come under sustained attack by a mysterious alien Covenant, who were set on nothing less than the complete extermination of humanity. The Halo Paramount+ show is a retelling of this story, albeit one that's made more than a few changes.

Earth's only champions are the Spartans, genetically-engineered super-soldiers who wear powerful Mjolnir armor, making them a match for the Covenant in ground battles. The most infamous Spartan is, of course, the franchise's most recognizable character — Master Chief, played by Pablo Schreiber in the Paramount+ show. While the Halo show mostly retells the same events as the games, it canonically takes place on a different timeline, the "Silver Timeline", meaning that there are some changes in the chronology.

The Paramount+ Halo TV Show Timeline Explained

The Events Of The Live-Action Adaptation Take Place On The Silver Timeline

The timeline of the Halo Paramount+ series is altered from the games. However, there is an explanation — the Halo show takes place on what's known as the Silver Timeline. This is a separate timeline to the Halo games, with many key events and dates altered. This decision allowed Paramount to keep a balance between honoring the source material while also making creative changes, as any alterations they made didn't disrupt the core canon.

There is, of course, plenty of overlap between the Silver Timeline of the Halo TV show and the timeline of the games.

There is, of course, plenty of overlap between the Silver Timeline of the Halo TV show and the timeline of the games. The first game, 2001's Halo: Combat Evolved, and Halo season 1 begin in 2552. Six months between season 1 and season 2 of Halo, so the second season takes place either later in 2552 or 2553. The exact month of 2552 the Halo show starts in isn't specified, which makes pinpointing a more specific timeframe for season 2 tricky.

Halo season 2 includes a key event in the Halo canon — the Fall of Reach. In both the games and the show this occurs in 2552, so in this sense the Silver Timeline hasn't deviated from the core canon of the franchise. This was depicted in the 2010 game Halo: Reach, which was a prequel to Halo: Combat Evolved. The games are only set weeks apart, so while the Halo series on Paramount+ has repositioned some events, the deviation is only to a scale of weeks or months at most (though this could change in Halo season 3).

The Halo Game Timeline Explained

The Source Material Has A Slightly Different Fictional History

The Halo games take place in a completely different timeline to the Paramount+ show. This has allowed Paramount to make some significant changes to the lore of the franchise without disrupting the established canon, though not all of these changes have been without controversy. For example, the Master Chief in the Silver timeline has no issue removing his helmet, a small detail which nevertheless caused a significant amount of chagrin among hardcore fans of the games.

The war lasted over 25 years, with countless colony worlds "glassed" — obliterated by plasma bombardments from space that fused sand into a hard silicate.

In the Halo game timeline, the Great War between humanity and the Covenant began in 2525. The Covenant discovered a human ship that had dropped out of slipspace due to a malfunction, and after an encounter on the planet Harvest the Covenant's Prophets declared humans an affront to their gods. Thus began a relentless crusade, with Earth's UNSC desperately battling against the invaders.

The war lasted over 25 years, with countless colony worlds "glassed" — obliterated by plasma bombardments from space that fused sand into a hard silicate. It came to a head in 2552, when the Covenant destroyed the major UNSC military base on Reach; only one vessel escaped Reach, jumping through slipspace to the recently-discovered coordinates of the first Halo Ring.

The Fall of Reach is essentially the beginning of the final Covenant advance, with the aliens even launching a precision strike against Earth — a planet whose coordinates had been kept from them for over 25 years.

In the timeline of the Halo games, 2552 is a year of unprecedented conflict. The Fall of Reach is essentially the beginning of the final Covenant advance, with the aliens even launching a precision strike against Earth — a planet whose coordinates had been kept from them for over 25 years.

Meanwhile, the discovery of the Halo Rings unleashed the threat of the Flood, while the possibility of the Rings being used meant the galaxy came close to being sterilized of all life. All this coincided with a period in which human knowledge — both of the Covenant and of their own prehistory — expanded at a dramatic rate.