I'm running out of superlatives for this show. I continue to marvel at the historical accuracy of the events. I was waiting to see if they would recreate one of the most amazing facts about the accident...the clearing of the roof by the "biorobots". 90 seconds. 90 seconds on the roof to receive a lifetime dose of radiation. And going out on that roof wasn't voluntary. Nice government. Also, the scenes of young Pavel being forced to liquidate starving, deserted family pets was one of the saddest things I've ever watched.
The opening scene features an old woman milking a cow while being told by a soldier to leave her farm for her own safety. She tells him she's not leaving and recalls the history of her life under the iron boot of the communist system. The mention of the horrific Holodomor was shocking to me. It seems that kind of reflection on past evils (other than Hitler's Nazis) is never mentioned.
This series has pulled absolutely no punches showing the oppression and brutality of the Soviet government. I hope that support for such a system, no matter how well intended, never sees the light of day again.
human body can literally withstand so much shit.
as seen in this episode, it's terrific, horrific and shocking to see them willingly accept a fucking radioactive duty which can fuck their life up pretty good but the KFuckingGB won't take international help. what a fucked up world. we need better international relationship across the globe to survive in such catastrophic events.
Humanity must strive for a better world from every small aspect to survive as a species
fucking make the whole world pop a tab of LSD and melt into oneness
This show doenst pull their punches, do they? Jesus, that was hard to watch from the first minute to the last.
While I appreciate they showing all the horror that happened there, the second scene of the Animal Control, with the puppies, was just plain cruel and just for shocking. They showed all was this about in the first scene; it was brutal but bearable, and we understood what was happening.
But the puppies man COME ON.
I finished it 20 minutes ago, and I'm just laying here hugging my dogs lmao
I put off watching this episode for as long as I could, because I knew it was going to deal with some incredibly hard scenes for me. But honestly, the whole thing, the every single minute is so full of sorrow and hard choices that it’s futile to try to shield myself. Just one more episode of emotional torture left that is so well-done, but so terrible. Give this show all the Emmys.
Another great episode, but I hated this one so much. The pets being killed made my stomach hurt and they kept going back to that side plot again, and again and again. I don't even like dogs all that much, I much more of a cat person. But having to sit through and watch all the slaughter was low key torturous. Which I guess was kinda the point. Make it hard on the viewer who's only just watching to make them empathise with the people who actually had to perform that horrible job. I'd much rather have to throw radioactive graphite off a rooftop
My favorite part was people being referred to as biorobots, which I guess to the Soviet Union they were. Entities with no real free will. Disposable, insignificant. A means to an end, basically. And these people were giving up their lives just so that the higher ups and the government could perpetrate a lie just so that they didn't have to lose face and take a jit to their pride in front of the US and Europe. Just terrible.
That puppy scene was rough. Episode was super slow as well sadly
Slower episode, but picked up near the end. Some of those scenes were harder to watch, but nonetheless still a great series so far. Can’t wait to see what the final episode unfolds
I was maybe 18 or 19 when I first learned of Chernobyl's great disaster from Kate Bush's song "Breathing". The song is simultaneously chilling and compelling, and it has rooted itself in my soul ever since (among many of her other songs, the woman is a gift to this world)... anyway, it was all I could hear in my head, repeating itself, over and over the entire episode, and then Khomyuk talks about Vasily's widow and baby, and I officially broke. Yep, the knowledge that this monstrous fuck up has damaged the very fabric of some people's dna... for many of those who lived, it has meant genetic mutations, generations of health challenges and medical problems. Truly heartbreaking stuff.
I thought I was coping okay with horrors shown in this but I wasn't prepared for the animals. It brought tears to my eyes. Those poor, beautiful creatures. But they would have suffered a much worse fate and potentially caused further damage themselves. I'm glad the lead soldier at least spared them suffering now.
A morose episode truly highlighting how much damage information control and 'saving face' can truly do.
Heartbreaking what can be done by humanity.
Can you imagine working in the aftermath of this ? I can't and I'm not sure I could've done it. I got sick to the stomach when they shot all the animals.
Rewarding the people who went up on the roof with money is a perversion beyond believe. And what's 800 Rubel worth that day ? Certainly a lot for them but from what I gather you could buy a TV and have some spare. The value of a life.
And there are people trying to bring back a system like that makes me want to vomit even more.
That was so fucking depressing :(
Soldier must be a great shot to kill a cow with a 9mm:joy::joy::joy:
I enjoy this show but I found the pet scenes a little bit unnecessarily cruel. Meh.
This was a badly paced episode with way too many aesthetic shots.
Chernobyl Year
BY JEHANNE DUBROW
We dreamed of glowing children,
their throats alive and cancerous,
their eyes like lightning in the dark.
We were uneasy in our skins,
sixth grade, a year for blowing up,
for learning that nothing contains
that heat which comes from growing,
the way our parents seemed at once
both tall as cooling towers and crushed
beneath the pressure of small things—
family dinners, the evening news,
the dead voice of the dial tone.
Even the ground was ticking.
The parts that grew grew poison.
Whatever we ate became a stone.
Whatever we said was love became
plutonium, became a spark
of panic in the buried world.
What we can learn from Chernobyl.
SECRETS KILL people of the whole world.
SECRETS will be the downfall of humanity.
Hey, that's the iconic shot from the poster.
https://www.doesthedogdie.com --- skip from 26:50 to 32:10 and 43:30 to 49:20
Holy Mother!!! Between the moment of pet annihilation and then the Bio-Robot moment, that's what is called a real SWISS SQUARE in every respect.
It's getting more and more hard to watch....
When it is the people who save the situation at the cost of their lives
Very good but extremely hard to watch episode. What a horror this must have been for these liquidators.
WTF is fkn wrong with you?? Why killing the cow ffs!!!, is that a true story or just a fkn drama?!
This episode is really hard for me to watch, all that animal killing is just too hard... I know it must be done, but still, it is very hard to watch.
Review by FernandoBlockedParent2019-08-16T01:23:19Z
The previous episodes were quite convincing, exemplary even. I found this to be unfittingly sensationalist, with a taste for dramatics. For me question is not necessarily whether to show or not show, but rather how to show it, because if you do it wrong you will suffer from that Handmaid's Tale syndrome. So the dogs scenes, I don't oppose them by nature, but it's your narrative devices that can give you away if you go for a too-on-the-nose staging. If they warn the boy about missing the mark and leaving the dogs in agony it's a bit frustrating that's exactly what happens. The puppies thing was a bit too much, in an annoying way, because of course they had to do it. Same (even worse) with that 'volunteer' and the orders not to gaze at the reactor or the perils of stumbling. It's not that is unrealistic, it could very well have happened and makes sense, but it comes across as weak writing and makes you more aware of the string of catastrophic, explicit scenes you've being showed. It's not that we need to know what happens if they stumble on the roof, we would probably have screamed the same if we weren't told, at least in such a nagging way. At least they restrained from showing the dying baby.