Chernobyl series premiere live stream: Watch online

It was one of the worst man-made disasters in human history. 33 years later, the Chernobyl disaster is about to become the subject of an HBO miniseries.

On April 26 1986, an explosion at the nuclear reactor of the Chernobyl energy plant in northern Ukraine released a cloud of radioactive material comparable to 500 Hiroshima bombs. Starring Jared Harris, Stellan Skarsgård  and Emily Watson, this five-part series is directed by Johan Renck of Breaking Bad and will dramatize the explosion at the Chernobyl Power Plant which has become synonymous with nuclear catastrophe in the modern era.

"“We are dealing with something which has never occurred on this planet before.”"

Check out the trailer here:

The miniseries looks likely to be as terrifying as it is heartbreaking. From the attempted government cover-up to the evacuation of Prypiat, the show has no shortage of dramatic historical detail to draw from. The question, then, becomes one of sensitivity.

Historical fiction always presents its own problems, and even more so when the “history” is barely history at all: Chernobyl happened within living memory, and the relatives of the victims are still alive today. As the trailer points out, not only are the effects of the disaster still felt, but they will last for millennia. On top of that, nuclear power itself is still a highly topical issue.

There’s a difference between the suffering of fictional characters (which can be pretty dang satisfying to watch) and the suffering of real people. And there is going to be a lot of suffering over the course of Chernobyl’s five episode run. The show looks amazing, but the question of how it will handle its subject matter remains to be seen.

Here are all the details you need to watch Chernobyl tonight:

"Date: Monday, May 6Start Time: 9 p.m. ETEpisode: 1:23:45TV Channel: HBOLive Stream: Watch on HBO and HBO Go, as well as Hulu and Amazon Prime."

Chernobyl airs Mondays at 9 p.m. ET on HBO.

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