Chernobyl - General Discussion

[marinw]

8 hours ago, Calamity Jane said:

At least, thank merciful heaven, they didn’t try to show Lyudmila’s baby, or go into detail about that horrifying death. 

I was braceing myself for that. There were a lot a babies born with birth defects.

Overall, THIS is how you shoot an apocalyptic drama! Gorgeous photography. I felt for the guy who couldn't make himself shoot the dogs. I couldn't either.

I don't understand why people were allowed back in Pripyat only four months after the accident.

Edited May 28, 2019 by marinw

[larapu2000]

13 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

I wonder if the feminist perspective is accurate. 

From what I've read about the Soviet Union, they NEEDED women in the workforce, so women actually had it better in terms of promotion and opportunity than the United States and other western countries.  The Soviets put a woman in space in the 60's, it doesn't surprise me that women were such a large part of engineering and their nuclear programs.  

COME ON, only 5 episodes????????????  So not fair.  I want SO MUCH MORE.  (Something I didn't say the entirety of the final season of Game of Thrones)

Just curious, why couldn't the moon rovers work on the 3rd roof?  Was it that much more radioactive and difficult?  And leave it to the Soviets to fucking lie about the levels the robot needed to withstand.  

Run, kitty cat, run!!!  I was cheering for the cats, even though I knew they would also die horrible deaths.  Were they more susceptible than humans?  If you can evacuate humans, why not pets?   How devastating.

Edited May 28, 2019 by larapu2000

[khyber]

13 hours ago, duddley said:

There's a great documentary on Amazon Prime called Babushkas of Chernobyl that is well worth watching. Inspiring and heartbreaking at the same time.

Thanks for mentioning this. I will definitely check it out.

[Calamity Jane]

5 hours ago, marinw said:

I was braceing myself for that. There were a lot a babies born with birth defects.

Overall, THIS is how you shoot an apocalyptic drama! Gorgeous photography. I felt for the guy who couldn't make himself shoot the dogs. I couldn't either.

I don't understand why people were allowed back in Pripyat only four months after the accident.

People were in Pripyat continuously for a good while. Shcherbina ran his operation from there. Residents were allowed back in for one day to collect possessions, in rotating shifts of about a hundred, as I recall. Anything too radioactive had to be left behind, but apparently a fair number of things were below the mandated level. (Suddenly they had all kinds of radiation detectors.) It really is fascinating to read about. 

And, for others upset about the animal slaughter, some dogs made it out of the exclusion zone and found new homes, some with liquidators. 

[iMonrey]

Ugh, this one was especially hard to watch, especially for this animal lover. But I was confused about where they were. Were they exterminating all the dogs in Pripyat? Or were they somewhere else? Where was that makeshift tent city set up? I didn't understand what was going on there aside from the animal extermination - it seemed like some kind of military camp and they were doing other stuff too. 

[proserpina65]

13 hours ago, Browser26 said:

Episode just ended. I have to agree. I’m not a big animal person nor do I own a pet but this stuff is like Handmaid’s Tale like trigger (can’t think of another recent show to compare to). Watch with extreme care. 

I had to 'watch' with my hands over my eyes during those scenes.

9 hours ago, theschnauzers said:

The reality was that every single one of the farm animals and pets were doomed to die from either radiation or starvation and that wasn’t a happy choice for anyone.

Apparently some of the dogs survived, and their descendants still live in the area.  But those making the decisions couldn't have known that it was even possible.  I appreciated that the soldier in charge of the unit was so insistent that the new recruit not let the dogs suffer.

The giant irradiated cats of Chernobyl will probably take over the world, though.  Cats are like that.  (Imagining that was my way of dealing with the storyline.)

[buttercupia]

On 5/27/2019 at 1:21 AM, mamadrama said:

He was super hot in RIVER. I envy the people who haven't watched it yet and get to go in blind for the first time. 

I love love loved River and especially him. Ripped my heart into tiny shreds.

[proserpina65]

2 hours ago, larapu2000 said:

Just curious, why couldn't the moon rovers work on the 3rd roof?  Was it that much more radioactive and difficult?  And leave it to the Soviets to fucking lie about the levels the robot needed to withstand.  

That was my understanding, the "Masha" roof was the most radioactive, and the radioactivity interfered with the control systems too much.

[marinw]

Speaking of the animals:

https://www.treehugger.com/animals/chernobyls-accidental-wildlife-sanctuary-thriving-life.html

[meep.meep]

2 hours ago, larapu2000 said:

Just curious, why couldn't the moon rovers work on the 3rd roof?  Was it that much more radioactive and difficult?  And leave it to the Soviets to fucking lie about the levels the robot needed to withstand.  

They said that the other two were putting out 2,000 roentgens per minute (?) while Masha was putting out 12,000.  Such much more radioactive.  However, when the Central Committee went begging for equipment to other countries, they said Masha was putting out 2,000.  So, the German's nice new robot couldn't withstand what it really had to face and died.

[Calamity Jane]

1 hour ago, iMonrey said:

Ugh, this one was especially hard to watch, especially for this animal lover. But I was confused about where they were. Were they exterminating all the dogs in Pripyat? Or were they somewhere else? Where was that makeshift tent city set up? I didn't understand what was going on there aside from the animal extermination - it seemed like some kind of military camp and they were doing other stuff too. 

They were to exterminate all the animals in the 30 km exclusion zone, so they were going from village to village, and I would imagine there were multiple teams because that’s a lot of territory. I believe the tent city was outside the exclusion zone, but I’m not positive.

The people who worked on the other three reactors for up to 14 more years lived outside the zone and were transported in every day. Everyone was monitored every day for radiation exposure, and those who reached the designated level were sent home. Some of the clean-up crew would leave their detector badges behind so they could work longer, the work seemed so crucial to them (and was). There are so many stories of heroism and self-sacrifice in this incident!

[JennyMominFL]

1 hour ago, iMonrey said:

Ugh, this one was especially hard to watch, especially for this animal lover. But I was confused about where they were. Were they exterminating all the dogs in Pripyat? Or were they somewhere else? Where was that makeshift tent city set up? I didn't understand what was going on there aside from the animal extermination - it seemed like some kind of military camp and they were doing other stuff too. 

It wasnt just Pripyat that was abandoned, there were 187 smaller communites deserted.. The exclusion zone is like 1000 square miles

Edited May 28, 2019 by JennyMominFL

[StatMom]

14 hours ago, kieyra said:

Dang, I just realized I won’t be able to listen to the official podcast either, or at least not all of it. They’ll certainly be addressing that part some more. 

(I know it can seem silly to watch humans get irradiated to death, but then balk at anything having to do with “pets”. So it goes.)

On the podcast, the animal discussion starts at about 23 minutes in and goes until about 32:30. They might mention things at other points, but that's the main segment. Mazin mentioned that they had filmed another scene that's even worse than what we saw 😯

And I agree with you that, for some reason, pet/animal pain can be more difficult to watch than people. Not sure why, but I had the same thought.

[MadameKillerB]

Oh I definitely had my husband fast-forward through the shooting animals parts. Those poor men having to do that 😞

I am blown away by this series. I'd love it if it were longer but I appreciate the work that went into these few episodes. What a production! The cinematography, acting, incidental music: all stellar!

[MVFrostsMyPie]

Animals are innocent and do nothing but get screwed over by humans, so I’ll always feel like 50x worse when animals suffer over humans. 

I knew that the killing of pets had happened so it wasn’t shocking to view it necessarily, and I didn’t cry, but you can bet I totally cried during an episode of Our Planet yesterday cause there were walruses falling off cliffs (and I mean actual cliffs, not the kind that the famewhore vlogging couple overdramatized recently) and I found myself crying over flying walruses. 

(Ok, I admit I don’t get upset about bugs dying...)

[ChicksDigScars]

On 5/27/2019 at 1:21 AM, mamadrama said:

In a lot of cases I do believe that performing it in the native language adds something to the overall feeling. This time it doesn't bother me. A lot of the information is very confusing for me, someone who knows nothing about how the reactors and other things work, and I find myself watching each episode twice as is. I like that I don't have to read subtitles because I'd rather focus on the details of the scene.

I'm watching the first showing, then rewatching the second one an hour later, so I can pick up what I missed (because, accents). I also stream it a third time during the week, using closed captioning, to fully understand the technical speak. 

Is that obsessive? (/snark)

I went in to the episode softly saying, "no...no...NO," when it because obvious that the mass euthanization of animals was a main topic of this episode. I've volunteered in a no kill rescue since 2001, so I am sensitive to animal death or abuse. My mantra in most movies, "Kill all the adult humans you want, but the dog had better fucking live." 

That said, I thought they did a decent job. No gratuitous gore. Enough to get the point across and have it break your heart, but not torture you. In most parts, you heard the animal before he shot it, and any blood shown was brief.  I just had to tell myself that this was a part of what actually happened, and that the animals would suffer. 

And I think that they were respectful enough to Lyudmilla, who is still alive (isn't she?), by not dwelling too much on her baby's fate. What they said and showed was heartbreaking enough. 

Edited May 28, 2019 by ChicksDigScars

[MVFrostsMyPie]

Speaking of bugs, this is an interesting article about the bugs of Chernobyl (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/chernobyls-bugs-art-and-science-life-after-nuclear-fallout-180951231/)

Edited May 28, 2019 by MVFrostsMyPie

[lidarose9]

A certain percentage of viewers simply will not watch something with subtitles. As much as you might prize the verisimilitude, few filmmakers will willingly give up X% of viewers right out of the starting gate.

 

Generations of young people living now have no memory or understanding of the insanity that was the Soviet Union. The idiots at the conference room table clapping and bragging about how it was all under control, the promotion of obviously unqualified individuals to jobs way over their heads -- all of this is the end result of years of covering your ass, of appearances being more important that facts, in believing a story when the truth is inconvenient. Jared Harris' voiceover at the beginning clearly states this. The Soviet Union had been telling people for years that nuclear power was perfectly safe, and to admit otherwise was treasonous. Treason, at a time when that could literally cost you your life.

It's shocking that they had no video monitors where they could see what was going on with the core. They kept sending guys down to look and report back. The fact that their dosimeters only went up to 3.6 or whatever it was. I burst into loud laughter when that guy suddenly puked in the middle of the meeting.

I saw a very good movie a few years back about a policeman trying to investigate obvious serial murders in the USSR, and people could not even admit the possibility of a serial murder because that would mean something was amiss in their perfect, peaceful, happy, safe country. He literally was risking his life by asking questions. He had to wait until the fall of the Soviet Union before he could actually investigate and ultimately catch the monster who had been murdering children for YEARS. I forget the name but it starred Stephen Rea.

The reason everybody was so ignorant about radiation is because they'd been told it was safe. No need to prepare for disaster when disaster is impossible.

I saw a very good program about Fukishima a while ago, maybe a Frontline episode. Same deal. The sea wall was supposed to be plenty high enough. Nobody ever dreamed there could be a tsunami that huge. 

When decision-makers are utterly ignorant about the area they are responsible for, it's a recipe for disaster. The same thing is happening in the US now.

[TimWil]

2 hours ago, lidarose9 said:

Generations of young people living now have no memory or understanding of the insanity that was the Soviet Union. The idiots at the conference room table clapping and bragging about how it was all under control, the promotion of obviously unqualified individuals to jobs way over their heads -- all of this is the end result of years of covering your ass, of appearances being more important that facts, in believing a story when the truth is inconvenient. Jared Harris' voiceover at the beginning clearly states this. The Soviet Union had been telling people for years that nuclear power was perfectly safe, and to admit otherwise was treasonous. Treason, at a time when that could literally cost you your life.

It's shocking that they had no video monitors where they could see what was going on with the core. They kept sending guys down to look and report back. The fact that their dosimeters only went up to 3.6 or whatever it was. I burst into loud laughter when that guy suddenly puked in the middle of the meeting.

I saw a very good movie a few years back about a policeman trying to investigate obvious serial murders in the USSR, and how people could not even admit the possibility of something as "corrupt" as a serial murder because that would imply something amiss in their perfect, peaceful, happy, safe country. He literally was risking his life by asking questions. He had to wait until the fall of the Soviet Union before he could actually investigate and ultimately catch the monster who had been murdering children for YEARS. I forget the name but it starred Stephen Rea.

The reason everybody was so ignorant about radiation is because they'd been told it was safe. No need to prepare for disaster when disaster is impossible.

I saw a very good program about Fukishima a while ago, maybe a Frontline episode. Same deal. The sea wall was supposed to be plenty high enough. Nobody ever dreamed there could be a tsunami that huge. 

When decision-makers are utterly ignorant about the area they are responsible for, it's a recipe for disaster. The same thing is happening in the US now.

That film was called Citizen X and it was also produced for HBO! And it’s fantastic, albeit extremely grim viewing.

[AuntTora]

That was "Jurassic Bark" levels of un-re-watchability.

[marinw]

9 hours ago, larapu2000 said:

rom what I've read about the Soviet Union, they NEEDED women in the workforce, so women actually had it better in terms of promotion and opportunity than the United States and other western countries.  The Soviets put a woman in space in the 60's, it doesn't surprise me that women were such a large part of engineering and their nuclear programs.  

But we didn't see any woman going to shovel graphite off the roof, although maybe there were some under all that not-that-protective gear.

The Soviets had a large Gulag population. I wonder how many prisoners got "Volunteered" to clean up.

Edited May 28, 2019 by marinw

[MadameKillerB]

2 hours ago, TimWil said:

That film was called Citizen X and it was also produced for HBO! And it’s fantastic, albeit extremely grim viewing.

I was just going to offer the same. Citizen X will break your heart.

[shapeshifter]

20 hours ago, Quilt Fairy said:

There're no winners or losers in the animal slaughter, it's awful but it needed to get done...

I questioned this while watching, in part because why would anything ordered by the bureaucracy that brought about Chernobyl be based on science or truth?

17 hours ago, theschnauzers said:

The reality was that every single one of the farm animals and pets were doomed to die from either radiation or starvation and that wasn’t a happy choice for anyone. That choice was known from Hiroshima, Nagasaki, the various Pacific Ocean Islands, and even on land locations like New Mexico, during WWII with the early test of atomic weapons and the tests by various countries after WWII. 

And yet:

8 hours ago, Calamity Jane said:

And, for others upset about the animal slaughter, some dogs made it out of the exclusion zone and found new homes, some with liquidators. 

Plus, regarding this:

On 5/27/2019 at 7:07 PM, duddley said:

There's a great documentary on Amazon Prime called Babushkas of Chernobyl that is well worth watching. Inspiring and heartbreaking at the same time.

 (reviewed here) demonstrates that some people (and animals) are able to survive toxicity that is statistically unsurvivable. 
There are several questions about the animal extermination in the episode that are lingering in my mind. 
If they had not bothered to kill the animals . . .  

1. would the animals have significantly spread radiation poisoning into the food chain, rivers, etc. beyond the amount already occurring from the "accident"?
2. would the animals have suffered as badly as Pavel's boss said? He admitted that they were surviving by feeding on other animals, so starvation was not (yet?) an issue.
   So, would those that succumbed to radiation poisoning suffer as slowly as the fireman we saw in the last episode? Or would it have been quicker because the stronger animals would eat the weak ones?  
3. would fewer humans have been exposed to radiation because they would not have had to hunt for and kill the animals? Plus, as the article about Chernobyl's babushkas notes, that which either kills or nourishes the soul also effects the survival of the body. 

  

Throughout the series, but especially in this episode, they keep focusing on everyone smoking, which, as we know, also causes cancer, and which was also covered up by U.S. companies.

[Quilt Fairy]

6 hours ago, ChicksDigScars said:

That said, I thought they did a decent job. No gratuitous gore. Enough to get the point across and have it break your heart, but not torture you. In most parts, you heard the animal before he shot it, and any blood shown was brief.  I just had to tell myself that this was a part of what actually happened, and that the animals would suffer.

I actually thought the most horrifying scene was when the shooting team went to dump the day's culling and it was obvious that the entire bed of the truck was full as hundreds and hundreds of corpses were dumped into the pit.  (Being a Face/Off fan and interested in behind the scenes stuff anyway, my next thought was "Boy that must have been fun for the set decorator: 'Get me a couple of hundred fake animal corpses.'") 

11 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

If they had not bothered to kill the animals . . . 

I know this was not one of their reasons, but leaving domesticated pets to fend for themselves in the wild would not have been humane.  

Edited May 29, 2019 by Quilt Fairy

[raven]

8 hours ago, StatMom said:

Mazin mentioned that they had filmed another scene that's even worse than what we saw 😯

I am very, very glad they did not show that scene.  I'm also glad I listened to the podcast on Sunday so I knew what was coming this week.  The podcasts are really good; they've put a lot of thought into everything and I liked hearing them talk about when they used actual dialogue from recordings and such and how that dialogue doesn't sound realistic "but that's what was said!"

I think the show handled the animal killings just right - not explicit but still conveying how truly awful it was, with the jaded/more experienced soldier who insists it be done humanely and taking the young, green soldier under his wing; look at the contrast in the young soldier at the beginning of the episode and then at the end when he's smoking (which he didn't at the start) and obviously getting more worn out by the minute.  That's how they gave us the horror here.

1 hour ago, Quilt Fairy said:

I actually thought the most horrifying scene was when the shooting team went to dump the day's culling and it was obvious that the entire bed of the truck was full as hundreds and hundreds of corpses were dumped into the pit. 

This really got to me too; all those bodies. 

Quote

Come on, didn't you smile at this: 

I smiled at that at also at Shcherbina's deadpan "I need a new phone" after destroying the shit out of his old one.

[theschnauzers]

In discussing the mindset of the decision concerning animals in the exclusion zone, keep in mind they had only the knowledge of what had happened in Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and areas near the various nuclear tests sites, and nothing else. And they were trying to proactively prevent any more radiation exposure and harm, such as consuming food that was itself irradiated with isotopes having a long half-life. 

[formerlyfreedom]

22 minutes ago, raven said:

I smiled at that at also at Shcherbina's deadpan "I need a new phone" after destroying the shit out of his old one.

YES! This was such a nice little moment. The cast is astounding.

[shapeshifter]

41 minutes ago, raven said:

Quote

Come on, didn't you smile at this: 

I smiled at that at also at Shcherbina's deadpan "I need a new phone" after destroying the shit out of his old one.

Okay. I'll give you/them that one. 

Speaking of smiles, I appreciated when the scientist and the bureaucrat were finally able to smile together at one small victory.

And speaking of science:
It was explained that Lyudmilla survived because her baby absorbed most of the radiation to which she was exposed. Is that true? Or was that just blaming the victim?

[MVFrostsMyPie]

Lyudmilla (in real life) said, "Two months later I went back to Moscow. From the train station straight to the cemetery. To him! And at the cemetery I started going into labor. Just as I started talking to him—they called the ambulance. It was two weeks before I was due.

They showed her to me—a girl. “Natashenka,” I called out. “Your father named you Natashenka.” She looked healthy. Arms, legs. But she had cirrhosis of the liver. Her liver had twenty-eight roentgens. Congenital heart disease. Four hours later they told me she was dead."

She later remarried and had a healthy baby, although doctors had told her he'd be born without an arm. I forget where I read it, but I think it was 2011 that she herself died, but couldn't find what the cause of death was.

[shapeshifter]

15 minutes ago, MVFrostsMyPie said:

She later remarried and had a healthy baby, although doctors had told her he'd be born without an arm. I forget where I read it,

Here: 
https://archive.org/details/VoicesFromChernobyl-TheOralHistoryOfANuclearDisaster/page/n37

I can't determine if she died, but there is a Lyuddmyla Ignatovych living not far from me in the Chicago area, who is was age 60 when the data was posted, which would make her 27 in 1986.

[lidarose9]

2 hours ago, theschnauzers said:

In discussing the mindset of the decision concerning animals in the exclusion zone, keep in mind they had only the knowledge of what had happened in Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and areas near the various nuclear tests sites, and nothing else. And they were trying to proactively prevent any more radiation exposure and harm, such as consuming food that was itself irradiated with isotopes having a long half-life. 

As difficult as it must have been, this was also the only humane answer. Not knowing what prolonged agony awaited every one of those animals, a quick death was far preferable. (Full disclosure: I haven't watched the episode yet cuz I am such a huge baby about animals dying.)

But watching those poor firefighter guys melting alive in the hospital, I kept wishing someone would just do the humane thing. I can't imagine having to stand by and let them die so painfully, so slowly. Those poor nurses and doctors. I bet they all had PTSD so bad afterwards.

[akr]

1 hour ago, shapeshifter said:

Here: 
https://archive.org/details/VoicesFromChernobyl-TheOralHistoryOfANuclearDisaster/page/n37

I can't determine if she died, but there is a Lyuddmyla Ignatovych living not far from me in the Chicago area, who is was age 60 when the data was posted, which would make her 27 in 1986.

Lyudmilla Ignatenko was 23 in 1986 (her husband was 25).

Edited May 29, 2019 by akr

[ombelico]

7 minutes ago, lidarose9 said:

But watching those poor firefighter guys melting alive in the hospital, I kept wishing someone would just do the humane thing. I can't imagine having to stand by and let them die so painfully, so slowly. Those poor nurses and doctors. I bet they all had PTSD so bad afterwards.

I was thinking about this contrast as well - the humans had to suffer an unimaginable horror because of the lack of euthanasia, but the animals are given the mercy of a quick death. I understand the hospital may have been uninformed about what the firefighters were going to go through but seeing the shape those men were in, truly a bullet to the head and a quick end would have been far more humane and compassionate.

[shapeshifter]

4 hours ago, ombelico said:

was thinking about this contrast as well - the humans had to suffer an unimaginable horror because of the lack of euthanasia, but the animals are given the mercy of a quick death.

This still happens today, although it may not be quite as physically painful, but still many elderly (including my mother and a former coworker) languish for years in their 90s, no longer able to walk, talk, sit up, or answer a phone with a swipe, barely able to speak, and yet completely cognizant of everything—and yes, there is constant pain, they just can't communicate how much. When my mother was still able to speak, she often repeated "I want to die," not unlike the wailing of "Kill me!" that we heard in the hospital where the firefighter was.

That we are more merciful to suffering animals than dying people could have been an intended message in showing the unspeakable suffering of the fireman vs. the euthanized animals, especially because the emphasis in the episode was  on "not letting them suffer," whereas I read elsewhere that the primary reason to eliminate the animals was because they carried radiation in their fur and would further contaminate the food chain if allowed to roam. 

Also, the choices to avoid showing gratutious scenes of horror during the destruction of the animals (e.g., the shooting was off screen) might be to show that the Soviets were kinder to animals than people—but it might just be wanting to avoid any unfounded accusations of animal cruelty in making the series.

I guess there's also the message that humans are responsible for this horrible plague, so it is somehow fitting that they are kept alive to suffer while the animals are euthanized.

In the earlier episode, when Boris is ordering the helicopter pilot to fly directly over the reactor or else he will get a bullet to the head, Legasov tells the pilot that if he flies directly over the reactor, in a few days he will be begging for a bullet.

And when Ulana visits Anatoly Dyatlov, he refuses to give her information that could prevent future meltdowns at other reactors because it would guarantee that he would "get a bullet," which implies that his initial suffering with radiation sickness did not humble him or make him heroic—but then humans rarely change. He died of heart failure in 1995 in his 60s, after writing a book about the flaws in the design of the reactor (wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatoly_Dyatlov).

[Quilt Fairy]

9 hours ago, ombelico said:

I was thinking about this contrast as well - the humans had to suffer an unimaginable horror because of the lack of euthanasia, but the animals are given the mercy of a quick death. I understand the hospital may have been uninformed about what the firefighters were going to go through but seeing the shape those men were in, truly a bullet to the head and a quick end would have been far more humane and compassionate.

It was not shown or discussed, but for many/most of the hospitalized men, they contacted relatives and attempted bone marrow transplants.  And a few of them inexplicably made almost a full recovery. 

[Grammaeryn]

Every episode I say, "Welp, yet another reason I would never survive an authoritarian regime." 

I was a little kid when Chernobyl happened and had family still in Hungary. Maybe my childhood was different that way but my whole life I absolutely knew what nuclear fallout could do. Can I blame those GI Joe PSAs? Because knowing is not half the battle. Knowing is the road to lifelong anxiety! Two other good sources are the movie "Fat Man and Little Boy" and the book "Hiroshima". Some of the bonuses of an open democratic society - a 10 year old has access to those.

I have to admit, this show is giving me a better appreciation for Russian fatalism and black humor.

[DrSparkles]

On 5/26/2019 at 4:51 PM, One Imaginary Girl said:

The tweets of @SlavaMalamud are a good accompaniment to watching Chernobyl. He grew up in the USSR in the '80s and is astounded about the details that the series gets right.

YES! Fascinating!!

[tljgator]

During the walk-and-talk speech about what happens to those who get sick, didn't he say that they can't even administer morphine, though? I thought that a large part of why euthanizing those who were worst off/near death wasn't possible? I could definitely be wrong, though.

As a side note, I did okay (for the most part) through most of this as I thought they did do a good job of not showing things that were explicit, and then...adorable little puppies. *sigh*

[Quilt Fairy]

24 minutes ago, tljgator said:

During the walk-and-talk speech about what happens to those who get sick, didn't he say that they can't even administer morphine, though? I thought that a large part of why euthanizing those who were worst off/near death wasn't possible? I could definitely be wrong, though.

I believe the veins rupture and collapse, so yeah, eventually no IVs or injections.  It would have to literally be "the bullet". 

[ch1]

12 hours ago, lidarose9 said:

As difficult as it must have been, this was also the only humane answer. Not knowing what prolonged agony awaited every one of those animals, a quick death was far preferable. (Full disclosure: I haven't watched the episode yet cuz I am such a huge baby about animals dying.)

But watching those poor firefighter guys melting alive in the hospital, I kept wishing someone would just do the humane thing. I can't imagine having to stand by and let them die so painfully, so slowly. Those poor nurses and doctors. I bet they all had PTSD so bad afterwards.

I thought the same thing.  I can’t help thinking in that horrible situation that those animals were the lucky ones.

[proserpina65]

On ‎05‎/‎28‎/‎2019 at 11:57 AM, marinw said:

Speaking of the animals:

https://www.treehugger.com/animals/chernobyls-accidental-wildlife-sanctuary-thriving-life.html

That is wild.

55 minutes ago, tljgator said:

As a side note, I did okay (for the most part) through most of this as I thought they did do a good job of not showing things that were explicit, and then...adorable little puppies. *sigh*

I couldn't actually look at any of the scenes with dogs.  I didn't want to see the puppies, it was that disturbing to me.

[meep.meep]

Pretty much any place that you keep people out of for a long period of time will become a wildlife sanctuary.  The DMZ between the two Koreas is one.

[shapeshifter]

59 minutes ago, Quilt Fairy said:

I believe the veins rupture and collapse, so yeah, eventually no IVs or injections.  It would have to literally be "the bullet". 

Or "the pillow."

[MadameKillerB]

3 hours ago, Grammaeryn said:

I have to admit, this show is giving me a better appreciation for Russian fatalism and black humor.

I'm glad someone mentioned this. I have been trying to describe fatalism to my husband and how that affects worldviews/humor/daily choices. I lived in Czech Republic for a bit over 8 years and Czechs also subscribe to this fatalist perspective.

[icedsly]

I haven't watched the episode with the culling yet (just finished Episode 3 last night and kind of dreading the next). 

There is a charity that works to spay/neuter/vaccinate the stray dog population in the exclusion zone: https://cleanfutures.org/projects/dogs-of-chernobyl/. There is a large number in the area, and it seems like they flock towards the power plant because they are chased out of the forests by the wolves.

So if it makes anyone feel better, some of the dogs survived the extermination - not that living in the wild is a great life either for these animals....

Edited May 29, 2019 by icedsly
Link

[Melina22]

3 hours ago, tljgator said:

During the walk-and-talk speech about what happens to those who get sick, didn't he say that they can't even administer morphine, though? I thought that a large part of why euthanizing those who were worst off/near death wasn't possible? I could definitely be wrong, though.

This detail stuck in my mind and upset me a lot. I found myself trying to think of other ways they could stop their pain in this scenario (other than shooting them). It's like a real life horror movie.

I didn't like the animal scenes (I lived in eastern Europe for a few years and they were always poisoning the packs of stray dogs. Horrible) but those early scenes of the workers in the hospital were by far most horrifying to me, and brought back awful flashbacks of when I was young, being totally traumatized by reading about Hiroshima. 

If I were smart I'd quit watching the show now, but of course I won't. 

[akr]

On 5/26/2019 at 1:51 PM, One Imaginary Girl said:

The tweets of @SlavaMalamud are a good accompaniment to watching Chernobyl. He grew up in the USSR in the '80s and is astounded about the details that the series gets right.

Thank you for the tip-off to these. The one for the latest episode is especially powerful as it turns out his father-in-law stepfather didn't want to watch because he had been there.  The thread starts a tweet or two above this & it's all worth a read. 

Edited May 30, 2019 by akr
His stepfather, not his father-in-law.

[DrSparkles]

The FUCK!! That scene on the roof.

[tennisgurl]

I just went through the first three episode, and I needed to poke my head up and take a breather. Such an intense and relentlessly depressing show, but also fantastically well made, I kind of cant believe that it took me a second to catch up with it. Ever since The Americans ended, I have really been missing my 80s era USSR drama fix! Plus I always love Jared Harris in everything, this reminds me of his role in The Terror, another period piece where he played the guy trying to keep a desperate situation under control despite the actions of the people around him making everything worse, and sometimes making bad choices but really meaning well. 

Speaking of, between this show and The Americans, I am now convinced that the USSR in the 80s was entirely lit with pale blue light. 

God those poor people in the hospital...

I admit to not knowing much about the Chernobyl disaster, but the complete lack of preparedness for something going wrong and the lack of safety going on in such a dangerous place actually kind of reminds of the Titanic. Not the movie, like the actual event. Both Titanic and Chernobyl were these massive monuments to the success of their respective societies and time periods, and were considered so amazing and perfectly manufactured that no one even bothered to come up with any precautions if something went wrong, and when things went sideways, no one knew what to do so everyone just ran around like a bunch of chickens with their heads cut off because no one actually knew what to do, and then tons of people died available deaths. The thing that really connected the events for me was the first episode when people are being told to just go about their days like nothing is wrong and are dancing around in the ash clouds, it reminded me of how the first few lifeboats on the Titanic went out with less than half the people on board, and reports of people just playing around on deck with chipped blocks of ice, because no one understood what danger they were in, they just couldn't conceive of it, and even the people working there didnt really impress upon people the importance of getting the fuck out of dodge until it was too late. Of course the situations were different, as Titanic was just people following horribly out of date maritime law even after they stopped making sense and some tragic lack of communication, while Chernobyl was negligence mixed with people more interested in political ass covering than saving lives and a state obsessed with secret keeping and refusing to acknowledge their own faults, but I do see some similarities. The more thing change I guess. 

This is only five episodes?!?

[AgentRXS]

7 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

This is only five episodes?!? 

I was surprised at this too. I'd thought we'd get at least an even 6.

Yeah, I was ok until the mother dog and puppies too. That was just verging on torture porn and it sort of pissed me off. The show is better than that. We got the point with adult dogs, adding puppies in the mix was a deliberate tug at viewer's heartstrings. It's almost a relief to be getting back to politics of it all next week.