Stream It Or Skip It: ‘The Railway Men’ on Netflix, A ‘Chernobyl’-esque Disaster Series About The 1984 Bhopal, India Gas Leak

YRF Entertainment, a spinoff of the esteemed Hindi cinema production house Yash Raj Films, has released its first foray into streaming television with a story about the 1984 Bhopal, India gas leak disaster that left over 15,000 dead following the incident. Head of YRF Aditya Chopra reportedly “handpicked” the story as the company’s first streaming production under their partnership with Netflix, and the four-part limited series is now available on the platform.

THE RAILWAY MEN: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: After title cards that level-set the impending disaster, we see snapshots of newspaper headlines and reenactments of historical footage about the immediate aftermath of the incident. The images are accompanied by a voiceover explaining the circumstances of Indian society at the time that helped lead to this disaster.

The Gist: In 1984, young Carbide chemical factory workers in Bhopal, India discovered that some of the equipment they were working with was faulty. Gas pressure detectors, pipes, and even their own training wasn’t adequate enough to stop a lethal gas leak from occurring, exposing an estimated half a million people to methyl isocyanate. Simultaneously, communication lines in Bhopal were down as the leak permeated, rendering the city at high risk while cut off from civilization.

A Bhopal station manager, a bandit, and a green railway engineer team up to save the thousands of people at the Bhopal railway station before it’s too late in The Railway Men, which is based on a true story.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? The most obvious comp is HBO’s Chernobyl, which examined every aspect of the Eastern European nuclear disaster in a similar fashion.

Our Take: The Railway Men is a striking story about the human spirit in the face of adversity, as is usually the case with these real life disaster stories. Here, the adversity is a man-made gas leak of epic proportions that could have and should have been caught and contained before reaching the height of destruction that it did. The story takes cues from HBO’s Chernobyl, as it investigates what caused the disaster (largely an improperly prepared staff and American cost-cutting policies at the Bhopal-based Carbide factory) and retraces the steps of everyone involved with that fateful day.

The Netflix show handles the delicate nature of the disaster without the melodrama that is normally second-nature in Indian dramas, focusing more on unfolding the story in a level-headed way. In this, it gives a degree of gravity to the story that’s necessary to convey the horrors of the incident, though it loses its thread and steadiness slightly at the end of the series.

The series is anchored by great performances from Kay Kay Menon, Babil Khan, Divyenndu, and R. Madhavan, but suffers from too many more characters beyond theirs. There are tangential storylines that don’t amount to much — the first episode opens with a voiceover from a journalist who doesn’t play much of a role beyond this scene; there are multiple attempts to show the real-life consequences of the leak, like its interference in a wedding procession or a young soccer player trapped at the station who must choose between their humanity and their survival in a crucial moment — and it distracts from the central story a few too many times.

While it’s also important to ground the series in the country’s political atmosphere, a side plot revolving around rioters hunting Sikhs on a train headed to Bhopal feels unnecessary to the central plot of the series. (For context, 1984 also saw a Sikh genocide in India following the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, who was killed by her Sikh guards). The Sikh genocide deserves more screen time to properly relay the horrors of that time, and it doesn’t work as a side dramatic plot with little connection to the main gas leak story, even if it does take place on a train.

Even with some missteps in execution, there’s a lot to applaud in The Railway Men. Its historical accuracy packs a punch about organized systems and governmental care for citizens, and the performances are truly excellent. For a filmmaker whose previous forays include assisting on Hindi films Dhoom 3 and Befikre, director Shiv Rawail steps up to make a very measured and impactful series that celebrates the resiliency and pure heart of humankind.

Sex and Skin: In this story about tragedy, there isn’t room for sex, skin, or romance.

Parting Shot: A Carbide factory worker realizes something wrong and sacrifices himself to try to reverse the damage, but is too late. The pressure from the pipes filled with the lethal gas causes it to burst, throwing him to the ground as he foams at the mouth. The scene shifts to some of the everyday people we’ve met throughout the first episode — including our future heroes — who have no idea what’s about to happen.

Sleeper Star: Babil Khan stars as a young railway worker with a mind for engineering, and winds up being a crucial part of the team that devises a rescue operation for those stranded at Bhopal Station. Khan’s portrayal of Imad Riaz is full of humanity, his eyes doing most of the work to convey his love for his family and his hopes of surviving the disaster.

Most Pilot-y Line: “The truth is that in this country, if there’s something cheaper than sea salt or homespun cloth, it’s the life of the common man,” a voiceover at the beginning of the series states. It’s a common thesis for these types of series that shine a light on corruption: everyday people are disposable.

Our Call: STREAM IT. While the series occasionally feels overstuffed by characters, its storytelling heart remains true to honoring the men that saved thousands in Bhopal in 1984.

Radhika Menon (@menonrad) is a TV-obsessed writer based in Los Angeles. Her work has appeared on Paste Magazine, Teen Vogue, Vulture and more. At any given moment, she can ruminate at length over Friday Night Lights, the University of Michigan, and the perfect slice of pizza. You may call her Rad.