Warning: Full spoilers for the Chernobyl miniseries finale below…
Breaking from the harrowing and haunting nature of the first four episodes, Chernobyl’s finale opted instead for an occasionally long-winded dive into “what went wrong?” on a relatively calm closer more focused on redemptive character moments than horror.
During some points of the trial – which Legasov, Khomyuk, and Shcherbina were called upon to testify against a trio of ambitious corner-cutters (including arrogant engineer Dyatlov) – things got a bit bogged down when it came to the nuts and bolts of the accident, and the actual human errors involved with overloading the power plant’s core. As a story device, it was a build – albeit, a lofty one – leading to Legasov’s turn. His decision to bring up the faulty failsafe button that could have saved everyone, in the end, had pennies (er, rubles) not been pinched. Still, a lot of time was spent explaining to the judge, jury, and us the intricacies of how everything went to hell. All of it is paired with flashbacks to the events themselves.