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Netflix series nuclear time travel7/22/2023 ![]() We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. For more information see our Privacy Policy. Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. He is trapped in a steadily deteriorating nightmare, but the nature of it – more or less the same thing goes wrong, over and over and over, a little bit worse each time – kills The Days as a drama. Yakusho is excellent as a man who morphs slowly from a happily pottering pen-pusher, triple-checking everything with calm dedication, to a stubbly firebrand kicking over waste bins and disregarding direct orders because he can see what needs to be done, hasn’t slept for 80 hours and no longer has time for anyone’s bullshit. As quickly as he and his team conjure a clever scheme to avert an explosion here, the readings are hitting the red zone there. ![]() He has several reactors that require ventilation, the pumping in of water, or both. Once the tsunami has arrived – the awesome destructive power of the sea crashing incongruously through dry-land structures is superbly rendered, and prompts a haunting miniature disaster movie featuring men stuck in a rapidly filling basement – the plant manager, Yoshida (Koji Yakusho), has to perform a terrible plate-spinning feat. ![]() Instead, many lengthy sequences recall the moments in Chornobyl when men volunteered to complete essential tasks, knowing that doing so would expose them to potentially fatal levels of radiation. Yes, there are scenes where senior managers and politicians give bad instructions because they are afraid of political blowback, concerned with their public image or too wedded to normal protocol, but they are few in number and don’t offer any surprising insights. The Days, unfortunately, only really has the “stunning re-creation of specific events” part. Now completely without power, the plant’s reactors could no longer be cooled – only an improvised damage limitation exercise would avoid a total meltdown. When a subsequent tsunami flooded the station – situated only 10 metres above sea level – it nullified the site’s emergency diesel generators. One of the most powerful earthquakes in recorded history took place under the sea off Japan’s east coast on 11 March 2011, rupturing the mains electricity supply to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. But as a drama, The Days is too respectful: its desire not to leave anything out might result in tired viewers abandoning their posts. ![]() The resourcefulness and courage of the men on duty at the power station at the hideous moment when calamity struck, who stayed for a week afterwards working to avoid a much worse catastrophe, deserves our deep respect. I t feels borderline immoral to criticise The Days, a serenely measured and thorough dramatisation of the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster and its aftermath. ![]()
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