Did anyone else have to turn Chernobyl off?

[HarryPotterFan436]

I got half an hour into the first episode and I have had to turn it off as I found it so harrowing. It was so well done and so interesting but heart breaking at the same time. I had to switch it off at the point where so many people were standing watching the fire and they took the baby out the pram. Has anyone else had to turn this off or are you managing to watch it?

I’ve watched the first 2 eps so far. It’s incredibly well done but it is quite harrowing. I really want to reach into the tv and give the idiot officials a good smack.
Re the residents only taking one case and leaving their pets, I believe they were told they would only be away for a few days.

You know, Mumsnet based charity Woolly Hugs supports another charity who bring Chernobyl children over for a holiday to various parts of the UK once a year. They provide them with blankets, but also basics like underwear, hair accessories, sanitary wear, gloves, hats, stickers, toys, sensory equipment... Even ice cream money! You can read more about it here. www.mumsnet.com/Talk/woolly_hugs/3479501-A-warm-woolly-welcome-to-C2019-Chernobs-ahoy

I'm sure they'd welcome further donations or gifts from their Amazon wishlist to help make these poor children's holidays even better.

Sorry for soliciting but hopefully you know it's a worthy cause!

I’m watching. It’s not nice but I keep in mind these are actors playing a part not the real thing.

Awful just how many fuck ups there were.

I've only seen episodes 1 and 2 so far and haven't found it too distressing, which surprised me TBH as I am quite prone to getting upset/anxious about TV dramas. It is so well made and the podcasts really complement the episodes.

@ElizaPancakes I've been listening to the accompanying podcast and the writer has mentioned Voices from Chernobyl a few times. Apparently the fireman's wife strand in the series is taken pretty much directly from her account in the book.

I'm normally a bit of a wimp but am watching this like a historian, I think. It feels like they're trying to be very respectful to what actually happened, without over dramatising (if something like this can be under dramatised?) and acknowledging the sacrifices so many people made, voluntarily and otherwise.

We are watching. It’s exceptional TV-making.

I’m finding the historical and political context very interesting. Gorbachev was heralded as the bringer of light, modernity, new beginnings, hope. But he was a Soviet man through and through. Makes you wonder about that fulcrum, that point of historical change and what actually happens after revolution. Makes you wonder about Putin, and whether the apparatus was ever intended to change (much).

I don't think I could face watching it. I know someone whose husband was involved in the clear up and suffered awful health problems as a result. Just hearing their stories is harrowing enough!

It’s also important to remember this was the first time anything like this had happened (bar Hiroshima - different circumstances, different event but also cataclysmic). It’s easy with the benefit of hindsight to say how things should have been done. But in real time, on the ground, with technology and politics as it was, I can see that the sheer enormity of the fallout might have been incredible/unbelievable (I mean those words literally). There was no blueprint for how to deal with such a thing.

The real lesson, for me, is to never underestimate a scientist, and to never be afraid of stepping out of your box and getting your hands dirty. Those miners and plant technicians were real heroes, self-sacrificial lambs. They knew what they were doing, adjusted quickly to their new reality, and did it. They deserve posthumous recognition (don’t know if they got it).

A bit of that spirit mightn’t go amiss amongst the architects of Brexit, these days...

It is an incredible piece of TV. Harrowing and fascinating. Every detail is so precise. I agree with PP that no other country would have been so compliant.

I think part of what makes it so harrowing is that it is so matter of fact, no sensationalism(hope I spelt that right!)

i dont think i would watch it if i were pregnant/hormonal. it IS distressing.

dh feels its too explicit in its awfulness esp the hosp scenes in ep 3. he thought it was more powerful when the prof was explaining what would happen. i disagree, feeling it has to be harrowing...

for me, its theme is cover-ups- and the dreadful way the powerful behave- i saw arthur millers play 'all my sons' written in 1947 last week - and to me it felt - while entirely different, quite similar.

heart-breaking

My family had to move from Pripyat, a lot of them have died from cancer. I was born a few years later, thankfully unharmed.

oh monstrance, it must have been horrendous for your family

They didn't really understand what was happening, they just left to stay with relatives in St Petersburg and my father took my older siblings to Cornwall where his brother lived.

I thought that miner was Trevor from EastEnders! It was the voice I recognised, could hardly see his face! He's packed it on a bit hasn't he? Maybe it was especially for the part. I must admit I did have a chuckle at that scene but then remembered that they were literally exposing themselves to so much more of the radiation and were likely to end up suffering terribly for it. Heroes, all of them.

Nobody really talks about the effects of Chernobyl any more but I wonder if it could have anything to do with the increase in cancers all over North Western Europe?

Thank you for posting that link ilovedavegrohl. It was very sad viewing. The lives of so many people just completely uprooted.

We've just watched episode 1 and I found that harrowing enough. Absolutely sickening

We've had to put the radio 1 big weekend coverage on to break the state.

I’ve watched episode 1 but am gonna wait for next 5 to download and then watch alltogether so I can get it out of my system in one go... bit of a mind fuck 😬

It’s an excellent drama. My step-son who isn’t normally interested in history has now become interested in the whole event so it’s good if it prompts people to learn more about it. I’ve been listening to the podcast with the writer and they took a deliberate decision for the actors to speak in their normal accents and not attempt a Russian accent. For me this is the right decision as I think I would have found a lot of non Russians attempting the accent would have spoilt it for me and been distracting. The acting is so good I’ve just been drawn in anyway (think Jared Harris is brilliant in this role).

I've just watched episode 3, it was very sobering, the hospital scenes of what happened to the firefighters was so graphic it really made the enormity of it hit home.

Its a good series.

Seeing Vasily in that hospital bed knowing that his real life counterpart likely looked like that in his final moments was heartbreaking.

It really shows that no one had a clue on what they actually dealing with and then all the denials too.

It is horriffying but we are really "enjoying" it the dying from the outside in speech from the scientist sent chills down me those poor poor people!

I think my Dd learned about it in school from Modern studies she seemed to know a lot of the history of it so she has been watching too.

(Modern studies is taught in scottish high schools its a social science subject)

Just realised we started with episode 3. 😫

I'm now on episode 2 and it's brilliant but so viscerally disturbing