The Communists of Russia, a Russian Marxist-Leninist political party, is calling on Russia’s TV regulator, Roskomnadzor, to ban HBO’s “Chernobyl” miniseries in the country, saying it is “an ideological tool designed to defame and demonize the image of the Soviet government and Soviet people.”
The political party, which is different from the larger Communist Party of the Russian Federation, is also calling for libel cases to be brought against the writer, director and producers of the Jared Harris-led show under Article 129 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
“In the Chernobyl series, genuine tragedy became the object of ideological manipulation on the part of HBO,” Communists of Russia party member Sergey Malinkovich said in a statement Thursday. “The TV series about the dramatic events of April 1986 is an ideological tool designed to defame and demonize the image of the Soviet government and Soviet people. Although the chronology of the series’s events and key moments most of them correspond to reality, motivation, the actions of the heroes themselves, the order of relationships in institutions and collectives, and finally, the moral climate in Soviet society itself is the first example of an absolute lie.”
Harris, Stellan Skarsgård, Emily Watson, Paul Ritter, Jessie Buckley, Adrian Rawlins and Con O’Neill star on “Chernobyl,” which dramatizes the story of the titular 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster. The miniseries aired its finale in the U.S. on June 3.
The show has been widely praised by critics and is the highest-rated TV series of all time on IMDB.
Roskomnadzor and HBO did not immediately respond to TheWrap’s request for comment.