Stalin wants a bomb yesterday. These scientists have... questions. And maybe a death wish.
8.044 minSeason 1 • Episode 8
LatestThe year is 1942. Beria instructs his deputy Vsevolod Zamyatin to assemble a team of scientists to design the first Soviet atomic bomb. To do this in the midst of a war and on short notice is an almost impossible task.
Acting
Guskov's Zamyatin: terror wearing a bureaucrat's mask
Production
Claustrophobic period detail that suffocates
Writing
Dialogue so tense you forget to breathe
Aleksey Guskov
Замятин
Yuriy Chursin
Курчатов
Ilya Malakov
Фролов
Olga Sutulova
Карпова
Anna Chipovskaya
Екатерина Лазарева
Aleksey Kirsanov
Беляев
Guram Bablishvili
Берия
Ekaterina Klimova
Замятина
Dmitriy Mulyar
Фитин
Natalya Batrak
мать Карповой
Rodion Galyuchenko
Найденов
Sergey Pogosyan
Аниханов
Oleg Kamenshchikov
Мешик
Alen Saltykov
Мухин
Maria Chernolikhova
Ксения
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
The real Zamyatin was a physicist who survived Stalin's purges; most of his colleagues didn't. The series filmed in Kazakhstan, standing in for secret Soviet labs.
Released as Russia's nuclear rhetoric escalated globally, making its portrait of atomic origin feel uncomfortably timely. The show was state-funded but somehow critical — a tightrope walk Zamyatin himself would recognize.
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