Side-by-Side Comparison of HBO’s ‘Chernobyl’ With Actual Documentary Footage From the 1986 Disaster

Video essayist Thomas Flight (previously) juxtaposed the footage from the HBO series Chernobyl with actual documentary footage taken from the horrific disaster that occurred at Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant on April 26, 1986 in order to show how closely fiction followed fact. While the timeline in the series was sped up and at least one character (Ulana Khomyuk played by Emily Watson) was a composite of many real people, to their credit, series creator Craig Mazin and show crew wanted to ensure that the viewer’s experience was as close to real as they could get.

It’s an interesting acknowledgment by the creators of the show of the way the meta-discussion and the experience of watching a show about true events is important to the story. And being transparent and talking about these things and the process of adapting reality to the narrative is commendable. it sets an interesting new standard for films and TV of this genre.