I've been watching it while I work on commissions. It's interesting- I go back and forth on how much patience I have watching it unfold, I'm no expert but when you read the entire wikipedia page all the way through once every couple years you don't get the same dramatic irony as going in blind. :P The first few eps where fascinating though, to see the disaster unfold, just chilling. And they did some great stuff reenacting eyewitness accounts. The politics unfolding are important but less fascinating than the actual disaster, so the further in we are the less it's trapping my attention, but I at least want to watch and see if they cover the elephant's foot or other long term effects.

But heck if I can't get over how this Russian nuclear plant is full of British people! xD They really just decided to do that haha. I guess star power wins over realism. It is significantly less immersive. But you start to get used to it. It just feels like a European plant exploded instead of a Russian one.

I haven't seen it yet but my partner and I just finished Good Girls and need a new show to start. I'm glad there is some realism to it... I hope it's not being exploitative though. It was such a tragedy and then capitalizing on it by making it into a hit show seems... wrong. That being said I will probably still watch it lol

(Beautiful username!) That's always a good point to make when it comes to tragedies, especially one so recent. I haven't found the tone to be exploitative but I do feel like the massive lack of Russian actors is a big factor against it for me! They clearly wanted big names over realism in that sense, which I found obnoxious. There is only so real any TV show version of anything is, another strike just for its existence as a fictionalization, one could argue. Things are bound to be simplified to fit in so many episodes.

But it doesn't focus on gruesome deaths, it seems to be trying for an angle of ethics- the human cost of this disaster that was exponentially bigger because of the government trying to exist in a state of total secrecy even within itself, even during a terrible accident, stuff like that. I'd say there's a lot of effort here.

thank you!

I will definitely give it a try. I enjoy docuseries and nonfiction shows more so than fictional stories, so I was hoping the realism aspect as far as plot goes and chronology of events was up to par haha. I'm glad it's not too gory and there's a visible effort in it. Thank you!