Chernobyl

Chernobyl  EP4: The Happiness of All Mankind  This is not an easily digestible hour of television. I think it’s pretty easily to make the argument that this is the saddest episode of the series so far. The brutal cold open that gives us a closer look on what It might have been like for the people forced to evacuate, and sets a tone for the rest of the episode. There are almost to many terrible moments to count as the episodes continues, such as Lyudmilla losing her baby due to radiation it absorbed, as well as the killing of all the pets and probably countless other animals as well.  The highlight of this episode for me is the one take that follows the worker as he clears the graphite off the most radioactive part of the roof, nicknamed “Masha”. The portion of roof that is labeled “the most dangerous place on earth”, and was originally never supposed have men anywhere near it. Having this moment shot in one take makes this feel like the longest ninety seconds of your life on one hand, but also shows how ineffective and tedious the process is. It’s an extremely anxiety inducing scene, and probably one of my favorite of the entire series.  It feels slightly fucked up for me to say that I wish this show was longer, or that there was more out there like it. Given that this is a very real tragedy. It’s true though these disaster type movies and shows rarely fail to captivate me, this show has been particularly fascinating so far and I am slightly sad that there’s only one more episode to go. 9/10