Chernobyl review
9.3 / 10 — CineScope score
Overview
Five episodes covering the 1986 reactor disaster and the people who told the truth about it — a drama about institutional lying as much as about radiation.
The short verdict
A five-hour procedural about the price of a lie. Unbearably tense, and one of the best miniseries ever made.
Story
Each episode moves the camera outward — plant, city, country, continent — so the disaster keeps getting larger while the excuses keep getting smaller.
Direction
Johan Renck makes bureaucracy terrifying. Scenes of men arguing in rooms carry more dread than any explosion.
Performance
Jared Harris holds the moral centre, Stellan Skarsgård supplies the political pragmatism, and Emily Watson supplies the science.
Cinematography
Jakob Ihre shoots in grey greens and concrete, with the famous rooftop sequence lit like a nightmare.
Music
Hildur Guðnadóttir's score is built from recorded sounds from an actual power plant — industrial hum as requiem.
Pros and cons
What works
- Five tight, purposeful episodes
- Extraordinary sound design
- A political point without shouting
What does not
- Some events are compressed or composited
- Not a documentary and shouldn't be treated as one
Final verdict
A masterpiece of dread. Watch it once, then read about what was dramatised.
9.3/ 10