Speaker 1: Hello, it's me Rosie Night. Last night that Emmy's happened
Speaker 1: in a historic fashion with unbelievable wins for Shogun, including
Speaker 1: historical wins for Hirooki, Sonata, my all time Faith, and
Speaker 1: the incredible Anna So why from Monarch and of course
Speaker 1: who leads Shogun? So we are delaying the release of
Speaker 1: our Netflix animation episode so that we can bring you
Speaker 1: our Shogun Time Capsules special just in time to celebrate
Speaker 1: the eighteen wins that Shogun took home from the Emmys.
Speaker 2: Hello.
Speaker 3: My name is Jasonceps and I'm Rosie Knight, and welcome
Speaker 3: to x Ravision, the podcast where we dive deep into
Speaker 3: your favorite shows, movies, comics and pop culture. Coming to
Speaker 3: you now Heart Radio, where we're bringing you two episodes
Speaker 3: a week every Thursday. Today, jumping into the time Capsule
Speaker 3: to catch up on the incredible, the majestic, the action
Speaker 3: packed Showgun on FX. Here is the recap, folks. Now,
Speaker 3: before we dive into the lightning as lightning as you
Speaker 3: can possibly make a recap of an adaptation of a
Speaker 3: book that was eleven hundred pages long and features a
Speaker 3: lot of characters, just understand that we're we're gonna move
Speaker 3: as fast as we can, but it is complicated. We
Speaker 3: open in sixteen hundred. John Blackthorne, English pilot of a
Speaker 3: Dutch trading vessel, the Erasmus, along with his crew are
Speaker 3: taken prisoner off the coast of Japan. And believe me, folks,
Speaker 3: Blackthorn is going to complain about this for the rest
Speaker 3: of the series. He will not.
Speaker 1: Shot up a crew. And also, can I just say
Speaker 1: they were also saved.
Speaker 3: Get me a back to my crew.
Speaker 1: Like this man, they was death.
Speaker 3: This is going well for the very poor.
Speaker 1: This should be like at least slightly grateful.
Speaker 3: So the issue the landscape in Japan right now, it's
Speaker 3: very fragmented. There is no overall leader, the tycho, the showgun.
Speaker 3: Not there. There is a boy heir to the throne,
Speaker 3: who is being steered by five high lords, five regents.
Speaker 3: This is called the Regency Council. Meanwhile, Portuguese Catholic traders
Speaker 3: are all over the country attempting to exploiting. They are
Speaker 3: everywhere trying to exploit the country's isolation and it's disunity
Speaker 3: in order to enrich themselves. And Blackthorn is a problem
Speaker 3: for them because the Japanese don't really have all the
Speaker 3: information about what's going on in the wider world and
Speaker 3: the kind of goals that the Portuguese have. Blackthorne knows
Speaker 3: about it, so they would like him dead. Blackthorn is
Speaker 3: taken to Osaka Castle, where he meets Lord Taranaga, who
Speaker 3: is our primary protagonist and his vassal and translator, Lady Marico.
Speaker 3: Toronaga is one of those five aforementioned regents chosen to
Speaker 3: rule in place of the Air and Future Tycho because
Speaker 3: he's just a kid stone.
Speaker 1: And we got to say, as we'll find out, Toronaga
Speaker 1: actually turned down the chance to be the sole regent.
Speaker 1: He was like, I don't want it. I don't want
Speaker 1: a wall. We've got to protect your son, We've got
Speaker 1: to protect the future, you know, Ruler. So he's a
Speaker 1: very interesting figure played by legendary Japanese actor.
Speaker 3: Harry one of the most handsome men of all time,
Speaker 3: all the time his life, yes, throughout his life. And
Speaker 3: by the way, one more thing about Tornanga. Very smart,
Speaker 3: very wily, very strategically brilliant man who turned down the
Speaker 3: big chair because he knew it would make him the
Speaker 3: big target. So he's a very very smart guy. Now,
Speaker 3: the other four regents led by Lord Ashido. They all
Speaker 3: want Tornaga out of the way because he's very very smart,
Speaker 3: very very dangerous, and very very popular. Tornaga is a
Speaker 3: captive at Osaka Castle and all but name, and he
Speaker 3: sees Blackthorne as kind of like a useful lever to
Speaker 3: separate his enemies because they all have their own competing interest.
Speaker 3: Ishido wants to be the guy. He wants to be
Speaker 3: the emperor, the tycho, wants all the power in his hands.
Speaker 3: Sad Naga recently converted to Christianity for the purposes of
Speaker 3: getting rich baby, getting them money baby. Sugiyama just kind
Speaker 3: of like doesn't like Tornaga and is basically supportive of
Speaker 3: any efforts that would bring him down. And then there's Haronobu,
Speaker 3: who is a leper and he seems he's also a
Speaker 3: Christian and it seems more sincerely dedicated to Christianity and
Speaker 3: certainly in increasing its influence throughout the country. Yeah, Ishido
Speaker 3: initiates a vote to throw Tornaga out of the regents,
Speaker 3: after which they can do whatever they want to. But
Speaker 3: as Tornoga planned get used to hearing that phrase, the
Speaker 3: Christian regions are so focused on getting Blackthorn out of
Speaker 3: the way that they say, we're not voting until you
Speaker 3: kill the pilot. Tornaga saves Blackthorn from being assassinated by
Speaker 3: Ninja's incredible seed, yeah.
Speaker 1: Which is ironic because Blackthorne sees it as a way
Speaker 1: to get in Toronaga's good books, so he saves Toronaga.
Speaker 1: But Toronaga is also saving Blackthorn because the assassins were
Speaker 1: really there for Blackthorn and not that's our Naga. And
Speaker 1: it's just worth mentioning here, like the action in this
Speaker 1: show is so unbelievable when it happens. We're talking about
Speaker 1: the political machinations because this is a show about historical
Speaker 1: fiction about political machinations in Japan, but it's also appressed
Speaker 1: these TV show with incredible action, stunning costume design, and
Speaker 1: unbelievable production design, and it's so immersive and it is just, yeah,
Speaker 1: just what a show.
Speaker 3: The cinematography is as good as anything you'll see. They do.
Speaker 3: They use different lenses for these different foregrounding effects where
Speaker 3: stuff in the background has kind of blurred out. They
Speaker 3: use they put in this like vignette effect, so it
Speaker 3: looks like you're looking at like an old photograph. It's
Speaker 3: just wonderful. So Tornaga sends Blackthorn to the village of
Speaker 3: a Duro, which he controls along with his wife Kiri,
Speaker 3: in order that he will be safe. But again, Lord
Speaker 3: Tornaga very crafty. He switches places secretly with his wife
Speaker 3: and they all manage to escape by Osaka by ship,
Speaker 3: although it's a little dicey at times. Tornaga tries to
Speaker 3: leave Blackthorn behind for the Portuguese as kind of like
Speaker 3: his the price offering escaping the blockade, but Blackthorn is
Speaker 3: very stubborn. He refuses to just go away. He takes
Speaker 3: the ship that he's been loaded on and erases it
Speaker 3: through the blockade and catches up to Tornaga, who's like, okay,
Speaker 3: you're my new you're my new military consultant, basically a hatamoto.
Speaker 3: You can you can have swords and stuff, and you
Speaker 3: can be a military man.
Speaker 1: And he wants them to teach him the ways of
Speaker 1: the English and Portuguese and European military. But hilariously, Blackthorn
Speaker 1: doesn't know shit about that because he's just been He's
Speaker 1: just a sailor, like he has to blag it. And
Speaker 1: and the pair of them are kind of this wily
Speaker 1: little duo who are abusing each other for their own games,
Speaker 1: but kind of become this unexpected power pairing. And at
Speaker 1: the same time we have Anna Sauai, who I just
Speaker 1: love from Monarch, as as Marico Lady Rico, who has
Speaker 1: this incredibly powerful role in the story because she is
Speaker 1: the translator. So there's been lots of really fantastic meanings
Speaker 1: about how you know, John Blackthorn, he'll be like doing
Speaker 1: some long.
Speaker 4: I tost you down, I shit on your face, I
Speaker 4: piss on you, I piss on your leg, I piss
Speaker 4: on your entire root and branch.
Speaker 3: Is like.
Speaker 1: He says, yes, he'll do it, like she is just
Speaker 1: getting like he's always getting destroyed, like people have been
Speaker 1: doing really good ones where he's like, you know, you
Speaker 1: just don't understand, Like I had to walk.
Speaker 3: All the way here, I came a long way.
Speaker 1: I worked all my life to get to this place.
Speaker 1: And she's gonna be like, uh, the engine said that
Speaker 1: he made his way here easily, Like she's always.
Speaker 3: Just playing him and like limiting well.
Speaker 1: His true messages, which honestly she is saving his life
Speaker 1: by doing that.
Speaker 3: That's what I was about to say. It's increasingly protective
Speaker 3: as kind of against both of their better judgments. A
Speaker 3: warmth grows between them, because, as we will see, Marico
Speaker 3: is as much an outsider in this political faction, almost
Speaker 3: as Blackthorn is in a gyro.
Speaker 4: Guess what Blackthorn wants to get back to his ship?
Speaker 4: My crew, my ship, and my crew sent me back
Speaker 4: to them.
Speaker 3: No luck there, but he does get a handsome wage.
Speaker 3: He gets a beautiful apartment and a consort. Usami the
Speaker 3: granddaughter of Hiramatsu, who is Tornaga's most dedicated and most
Speaker 3: hard line general. He's older than Tornaga, has known him
Speaker 3: since he was a little kid. Usami is a deeply, deeply,
Speaker 3: deeply tragic figure. Her her husband spoke up at an
Speaker 3: earlier Council of Regents meeting, spoke out of turn. That
Speaker 3: was very shameful for him. The only way he could
Speaker 3: expunge that shame was by committing ritual suicide and also
Speaker 3: uh killing his own infant son. So Uhuzami has lost
Speaker 3: her husband, lost her son, and is now bears the
Speaker 3: burden of this shame. Meanwhile, Yabashiga Tornaga's death obsessed constantly
Speaker 3: scheming but unfortunately not very smart, general keeps wondering when,
Speaker 3: how or if at all he can turn all of
Speaker 3: this political tumult to his advantage.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's Tadanobusano, who's like another icon Itchi ta Kila.
Speaker 1: He's Hogan from Thor's he was a punk rocker in
Speaker 1: Japan years ago. He's had such an unlook.
Speaker 3: Yeah. True, he's had such.
Speaker 1: An unbelievable career. He's now doing a lot of art
Speaker 1: and I love that Yabashige essentially becomes like the fan
Speaker 1: fave of char in this show because he's so self serving.
Speaker 1: He's like this warlord who has bigger dreams and he
Speaker 1: will turn on a dime, and he's always doing a
Speaker 1: heel turn and betraying people. But Tadanobu brings this warmth
Speaker 1: and this charm and this sort of irreverence to him because.
Speaker 3: He's a lateness.
Speaker 1: He wants he does want the power. He does want
Speaker 1: to know how things can turn in his kind of favor.
Speaker 1: But he's also seen so much that he sort of
Speaker 1: laughs at the inner workings and the war games of
Speaker 1: the shogun wannabes, like he just feels like it's all ridiculous.
Speaker 1: He's kind of a nihilist in that way, but he
Speaker 1: has this this warmth and comedy to him. That makes
Speaker 1: him so appealing.
Speaker 3: I completely agree. Ishidoh. Lord Ashido, through a messenger, tells
Speaker 3: Yabashiga to return to Osaka for a big meeting in
Speaker 3: which he will swear his continuing allegiance to the Regency
Speaker 3: Council and to the Air. But Yeahbashiga knows, like Tommy
Speaker 3: and Goodfellas, he will be killed if he goes back
Speaker 3: to Kasaka. It'll be the end instead. Uh Nagakado Tornaga's
Speaker 3: boneheaded but dedicated sons. Yeah, like he's stupid, He's try
Speaker 3: something really hard. Yeah, he loves his dad, he wants
Speaker 3: to impress him, but he's not as smart as his father.
Speaker 3: To be fair, no one is. Yeah, murders the Shidos
Speaker 3: messengers during display of Lord Tarnaga's cannons, and this makes
Speaker 3: Dad really really unhappy.
Speaker 1: And it's really just this is the scene where I
Speaker 1: feel like they knew people were gonna be like, Okay,
Speaker 1: so this is the new Game of Thrones, vibe, this
Speaker 1: is the new Prestige TV. Where's the gore? And they
Speaker 1: were like, well, we're gonna take We're gonna take the
Speaker 1: cannons off the Erasmus and we're gonna take them, and
Speaker 1: you know, Black Phone's gonna teach them how to use
Speaker 1: the cannons, and then we're gonna have this huge moment
Speaker 1: where Shido's men show up and these are like high lords,
Speaker 1: like he doesn't send nobody's you know, and uh and
Speaker 1: Toronaga's son decides, well, we're going to shoot them with
Speaker 1: these cannons to kind of show what happens.
Speaker 5: And they blowing off arms, exploding bodies and courses and
Speaker 5: they were laying on the ground and he's saying, this
Speaker 5: isn't how a samurai fights, and he's like, you know,
Speaker 5: arms hanging off. That was such a gruesome ending to
Speaker 5: episode four, but I feel like it was really well utilized.
Speaker 5: Like when they use horrific violence in this show, it's
Speaker 5: very impactful. And this is a great moment too, because
Speaker 5: it kind of shows that impact that Western weaponry had
Speaker 5: and this on this totally different landscape and uh yeah,
Speaker 5: Taranaga smart Tornaga decides he's going to pretend that this
Speaker 5: was always the past as always.
Speaker 3: Meanwhile, Marico and Blackthorn have begun pillowing sleeping. This gets
Speaker 3: complicated when her fierce and everybody. A lot of people
Speaker 3: are very sad in the show, It's sad time. One
Speaker 3: of them is her husband, Bintaro, who is eaten from
Speaker 3: the inside out by sadness and anger. He gets super
Speaker 3: drunk and we get some of Marico's backstory. We're learned
Speaker 3: that she is the lone survivor of a family that
Speaker 3: turned on the previous ruler and then to expunge that shame,
Speaker 3: the leader of that family, her father had to basically
Speaker 3: kill at his hand everyone in the family and then
Speaker 3: commit ritual suicide. And she is the only survivor and
Speaker 3: she's been married to Bintaro to atone for that.
Speaker 1: And the only reason that she was not killed is
Speaker 1: because she was going to be married to Bintara and
Speaker 1: she or she was Bintara's wife. And he just like
Speaker 1: hates life. He's quite horrible to her. Hate he's mean
Speaker 1: to that kid, like he's just not a viby guy.
Speaker 1: But you do, you do learn as it goes on
Speaker 1: that he is on his own journey and he loves
Speaker 1: her so much, he just doesn't really know how to
Speaker 1: show it.
Speaker 3: Meanwhile, Blackthorn is up to letting animals rot.
Speaker 2: He's like, oh, I'm going to I'm going to show
Speaker 2: you the one that was of English stew He's got
Speaker 2: this squirrel here and I'm going to let it ratful
Speaker 2: nigh on three weeks and with the insides have turned
Speaker 2: to a liquid, wonderful and juicy to cook.
Speaker 3: And his his servants and the people around him are
Speaker 3: disgusted at this, and also of course black live.
Speaker 4: I need to get back to my ship, my crew,
Speaker 4: where are they? He needs to get back to his ship.
Speaker 3: In Osaka, word a Hido's plan are getting even more
Speaker 3: tangled when Ochiba, the mother of the air and a
Speaker 3: power player in her own right, arrives and says, okay,
Speaker 3: Regency Council, guess what now, you're gonna listen to me
Speaker 3: because everything's going sideways. It's all getting fucked up. You're
Speaker 3: fucking it up, and I will now have a voice
Speaker 3: in these affairs.
Speaker 1: Such a good that's such a good moment. That she's
Speaker 1: kind of the puppet masta behind Taranaga's full well that
Speaker 1: hoped full of Tara.
Speaker 3: That hoped for fall. And in the flashback we learned
Speaker 3: that Marico in Achiba were childhood friends before all the
Speaker 3: bad shit happened. A Chiba and Ashido now take the
Speaker 3: other regents prisoner, though They go through great prains at
Speaker 3: times to pretend that people aren't prisoners when they actually
Speaker 3: are guests. But you can, but don't go anywhere. Yeah,
Speaker 3: Hiu Matsu, the hardline general escapes. Excuse me, hear Maatsi,
Speaker 3: one of the regions, escapes and tells Tornago what's going on.
Speaker 3: Tornaga rudgingly begins putting his secret war planned Crimson Sky
Speaker 3: into motion. We get a flashback. We were learning that
Speaker 3: when Tarnaga was a kid, he was like Lebron James
Speaker 3: was like, he was like a child prodigy. He won
Speaker 3: like an incredible crushing victory when he was like thirteen
Speaker 3: years old, and Hiramatsu's been with him that whole time.
Speaker 3: In the present, he needs to get stronger. He tries
Speaker 3: to mend fences with his half brother Ssayiki so they
Speaker 3: can unite against Hido. But Seika says, you know what,
Speaker 3: maybe I'd do that, but I've just been offered a
Speaker 3: job on the Regency Council and sorry about it, and
Speaker 3: I'm taking a prisoner, and you have to surrender to
Speaker 3: Lord Ashida. Tornaga says, okay I will surrender his vassals,
Speaker 3: his son, his generals. They are shocked They can't believe
Speaker 3: that that Lord Turnaga would even consider this. It must
Speaker 3: be a trick, right, It's gotta be a trick. No,
Speaker 3: Lord Turtuck is like, I'm doing it. I'm surrendering his son,
Speaker 3: the beautifully thick headed Nagadaka. Nagadaco says well, I'm not
Speaker 3: gonna let that happen, and so he attacks Psyik. He
Speaker 3: tries to kill him, but it said he slips on
Speaker 3: a rock in a pond and he dies.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this was such a brutal, unexpected ad too. It's
Speaker 1: one of those horrible like wow, did that just happen?
Speaker 1: It's like, okay, that's ripizza.
Speaker 3: That son Psyche survives, joins the regency council. Tornaga says, okay,
Speaker 3: I'm still gonna surrender, but after the forty nine day
Speaker 3: morning period for my son, of course, and again his
Speaker 3: generals are like, don't do it. Don't what you can't
Speaker 3: do it. Hiramatsu now is like I'm begging you not
Speaker 3: to do it, and Tornaka is like, well, I'm doing it,
Speaker 3: and then he says, well, I'm gonna kill myself if
Speaker 3: you do it. Ritually cut my belly open. And I
Speaker 3: was like, well, I don't want you to do that,
Speaker 3: but I'm still gonna go surrender, And Hiramatsu doesn't. He
Speaker 3: he kills himself. But shockingly, Lord Tornaga has kind of
Speaker 3: set these pieces in motion, the death of his son,
Speaker 3: the suicide of his most cherished and loyal general, so
Speaker 3: that Lord Ashida's defenses will be all the way down
Speaker 3: because he will believe that I get that Lord here.
Speaker 3: Of course he's gonna do.
Speaker 1: So.
Speaker 3: He sends Marico as Osaka to be his messenger and
Speaker 3: deliver the messages that he wants to deliver to the
Speaker 3: Regency Council, telling them, yeah, I'm gonna surrender, but listen,
Speaker 3: there's some things I have to do for us. First,
Speaker 3: Blackthorne goes with her, still complaining about his fucking dims ship.
Speaker 3: But also, I will.
Speaker 1: Say in Blackthorn's defense in this case, which I would
Speaker 1: rarely say, but he rarely doesn't want Marico to go
Speaker 1: to Osaka. He knows this is a bad idea. He's like,
Speaker 1: just don't go. Like he's like, just like, don't do it, man,
Speaker 1: this is like a bad, bad idea. You do not
Speaker 1: need to go and be the messenger. But Marico is
Speaker 1: She is dedicated. To this plan, and as we kind
Speaker 1: of learned earlier, she is in a similar situation to
Speaker 1: Asami West. She really wants to join her family and death.
Speaker 1: She doesn't have a lot to live for she you know,
Speaker 1: she does love. She has this burgeoning love for black Don.
Speaker 1: She loves her family, but really she wants to join
Speaker 1: those who were killed many years before.
Speaker 3: That's right. Meanwhile, Yebshi tries to switch sides, but he
Speaker 3: is denied. Adding to what you said, Rosie, I think
Speaker 3: another really fun motivation for Yebishiga is he he just
Speaker 3: wants to know what's going on. Yeah, he just wants
Speaker 3: to be He just wants to be a part of it.
Speaker 3: He doesn't really want to make moves.
Speaker 1: No, he wants to be in the room where it happened.
Speaker 3: He yeah, that's it. He's just like, whoever's gonna let
Speaker 3: him do that? Lord Ashido, is it you? Or are
Speaker 3: you gonna tell me what's going on? And he keeps
Speaker 3: He's constantly begging Tornaga tell him what what is? What
Speaker 3: is your plan? Tells you what your plan? What is it?
Speaker 3: Rico eventually tries to leave after fulfilling some of her
Speaker 3: duties there in Osaka, saying my lord, you know, just
Speaker 3: sent me here to deliver some messages, and now he
Speaker 3: requires me that I come back. But Ashido and Ochiba
Speaker 3: are like, no, you are a guest, but actually you
Speaker 3: can't leave. And there's a big fight at the gate
Speaker 3: where her retinue or slaughtered, and she tries to fight,
Speaker 3: but she's absolutely cance.
Speaker 1: But it's such a cool scene. It's amazing, and she
Speaker 1: knows that by doing this she is gonna allah the prisoners.
Speaker 1: She's basically calling his bluff on politeness because she's saying, well,
Speaker 1: you said we can leave at any time, and we're
Speaker 1: not prisoners, so I'm gonna try and leave. And you
Speaker 1: see that they just keep fighting and killing her, because really,
Speaker 1: if she leaves, then everyone else can.
Speaker 3: Leave, right the other notables, the other regions, especially who
Speaker 3: are secretly hostages there. Though again Ishidas, pretending they're not hostages,
Speaker 3: would they would flee, but they because of this now
Speaker 3: kind of realize these other people, these other notable people
Speaker 3: hostage at the castle, are like, wait a second, are
Speaker 3: we prisoners? Also, Marico announces that she will kill herself
Speaker 3: at the end of the day, which is Shido, for
Speaker 3: various political reasons, cannot allow. He can't let that happen, so.
Speaker 1: So he goes and he stops her, and he says,
Speaker 1: he's starter, you don't have to do this. She's to
Speaker 1: kill herself because she couldn't fulfill Toro Naga's you know,
Speaker 1: wishes to leave and as she's his vassal, that's shameful.
Speaker 1: And then he's like, no, I don't leave. Everything's okay,
Speaker 1: you can just leave tomorrow.
Speaker 3: Here's a podon like, yeah, we got you apart. You
Speaker 3: just needed the.
Speaker 1: Papers, you just needed the leaving papers that.
Speaker 3: We miss what I went down to the office. I
Speaker 3: got you the exit papers.
Speaker 1: Boom.
Speaker 3: You can leave in the more. But of course she's
Speaker 3: not gonna let that happen, so he sends in ninja's
Speaker 3: to kidnap her, and in the end, Marico and Blackthorn
Speaker 3: they fight off the ninjas. They end up pulled out
Speaker 3: in like a storage room.
Speaker 1: With her with her ladies in waiting and her retinue.
Speaker 3: The ninja's blow open the door with gunpowder. Marico takes
Speaker 3: the full blast. She stands in front of the door.
Speaker 1: She knows, she knows it's gonna happen. She wants to
Speaker 1: protect the other people and she does. She saves black
Speaker 1: Thorn's life, she saves the other people, and I think
Speaker 1: it's a very interesting moment because obviously we're all rooting
Speaker 1: for Mariko. She becomes like she's one of the main
Speaker 1: core cast in the show. But even in that moment,
Speaker 1: she actually gets to die with agency, like she chooses it,
Speaker 1: She chooses to save these people. She cares about it.
Speaker 1: I remember the end of that episode, like everyone was
Speaker 1: hitting me up, going do you have screeners?
Speaker 3: Is she still alive? Like did she really die?
Speaker 1: And it was like a huge that was just such
Speaker 1: a huge talking point. I think people were really shocked,
Speaker 1: which is funny because the book exists and the other
Speaker 1: TV show exists, so this has already been established. But
Speaker 1: people were so invested in the show that they were
Speaker 1: not getting spoiled even though it had existed for so long,
Speaker 1: except for a certain Jason and who did guess.
Speaker 3: So let's talk about I let's briefly talk about that.
Speaker 3: My mom talking to about the show and texting about
Speaker 3: the show. She was a fan. She didn't like the
Speaker 3: nineteen eighty mini series as much, but she likes this
Speaker 3: one quite a bit. She texted me before I had
Speaker 3: watched this episode. I can't believe she dies. It was
Speaker 3: so fucking mad.
Speaker 1: Legendary. That's like the ultimate mom interaction. I love it.
Speaker 1: But yeah, rip Marico.
Speaker 3: A'm so sad she's free.
Speaker 1: And you know what, Blackthorn and her was never gonna
Speaker 1: work out anyway, and they got to tell each other
Speaker 1: they loved each other. So he must have stunk, like
Speaker 1: he looks stinky as hell, and I I do love
Speaker 1: I love the joke where he goes, he goes, I
Speaker 1: had a bath this week already, and they're like, they're like,
Speaker 1: don't you have another one?
Speaker 3: And he's like no again.
Speaker 1: It's like, no, you're going to have a bath based.
Speaker 3: Last month, I based last Easter again. Okay, So with
Speaker 3: Osaka Castle in chaos, the Council finally declares war on Tornagus.
Speaker 3: Let's just put an And.
Speaker 1: The reason they think they're going to be able to
Speaker 1: do it is because Lady Achiaber is on their side,
Speaker 1: meaning they can fly the banners of the Child Air
Speaker 1: and that gives them a legitimacy. And Ishido's like he's
Speaker 1: on it. He's like, I'm going to war baby. They're
Speaker 1: playing the war drums like he's ready. Everyone's like super
Speaker 1: hyped up, but Burro, it's not going to happen for you.
Speaker 3: So uh, Lord of Shido basically lets Blackthorn go, puts
Speaker 3: him in the hands of the church because this guy's
Speaker 3: been more trouble than he's been worth it fucked up
Speaker 3: all their plans, and the church and lets him go essentially,
Speaker 3: so he goes back to a gyro.
Speaker 1: And that's actually again thanks to Marico, because she was
Speaker 1: she was very close with the one Catholic representative who
Speaker 1: seems to be actually like interested in and not corruption.
Speaker 1: And and and he says to Blackthorn, you know, she
Speaker 1: asked me to let you go, so I'm gonna I'm
Speaker 1: gonna let you go now, I will say by the
Speaker 1: end of the episode, do I believe it was her
Speaker 1: who asked him? No, somebody else's scheme in But in
Speaker 1: that moment we get to see once again, like Marico's
Speaker 1: power in this society where she is undervalued and seen
Speaker 1: his property, she still gets to make these power plays
Speaker 1: that change people's lives and save people's lives, which I
Speaker 1: think is the same with Lady Atchiba. With the Sami.
Speaker 1: There's a very interesting undercurrent hair of the ways that
Speaker 1: women can find power in this space that doesn't give
Speaker 1: it to them willingly.
Speaker 3: Uh in it added Jiro. Blackthorn finds uh sadly, sadly
Speaker 3: that his ship, the Erasmus, has been something. Face.
Speaker 1: It's just my way in to get back to his
Speaker 1: ship this time, sad face, EMERGI, you.
Speaker 3: Piss drinking rats, you vermin.
Speaker 4: I'll rip your cuts out at ile, I'll barbecue them
Speaker 4: on a spin and I'll eat them.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 3: The engine says that he is displeased, forces his generally
Speaker 3: Abashi gat to commit suicide for betraying him, and we
Speaker 3: discover guess what The Erasmus was sunk by Toronaga because
Speaker 3: he wants to keep you know, like Blackthorn has been
Speaker 3: very useful to him.
Speaker 1: One will stup him around, as he says to Abi.
Speaker 1: Because this is a great moment, we get Tadanobu, we
Speaker 1: get Hiroyuki, and in a change from the book where
Speaker 1: we kind of learn all of this in a like
Speaker 1: a voice over almost like a kind of just a
Speaker 1: first person like, WHOA, I was doing this all along? Instead,
Speaker 1: they have Toronaga confess to Yabashiga, and it's so great
Speaker 1: to see Yabashige finally get let in on what's going on, and.
Speaker 3: He's so happy. He's happy, but he's also like horrified.
Speaker 1: He's like, yeah, this is terrible. He's like what I
Speaker 1: actually interviewed Tadanobu for IGN and he said he feels
Speaker 1: like in that moment, like he's less interested, and I
Speaker 1: think this is kind of what you touched on. He's
Speaker 1: less interested in like the greater plans for Japan or
Speaker 1: the world, or this change is of society. He just
Speaker 1: wants to understand the man in front of him, and
Speaker 1: and in that moment he's kind of disappointed because he
Speaker 1: feels like this was a man who, well, Yabashige is
Speaker 1: like the self serving, like foolish, like kind of rogue.
Speaker 1: He put Toronaga on like a pedestal, as like this
Speaker 1: great man. But as we find out as he does
Speaker 1: this confession, Toronaga has been playing all of them all along, and.
Speaker 3: The final chess move of Lord Tornaga's occurs. In a
Speaker 3: kind of flash forward, we go to the big battle
Speaker 3: where all the regency armies have gathered to crush Toronaga
Speaker 3: and his armies, and on the battlefield, Lady Uchiba's forces
Speaker 3: change sides. They turn on Lord Ashido, who is cast
Speaker 3: down and we should assume is killed and his forces
Speaker 3: put out of power. An amazing an amazing run, A
Speaker 3: very complicated show, just with so much drama and emotion.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think like that final reveal that it
Speaker 1: was Tornaga that really took a lot of people by surprise,
Speaker 1: because it's even implied like did he send the ninjas?
Speaker 1: Was he part of that plan? Did he need because
Speaker 1: he needed Riko to die for a Cheeba to turn
Speaker 1: on Ishido because she blamed a Shido from Rico's death
Speaker 1: and they were friends. And I just the whole thing
Speaker 1: is so complex, and I'd seen a lot of kind
Speaker 1: of people being like how cool that Hiroki Hirouki Sinada had.
Speaker 1: You know, this has been a passion project for him
Speaker 1: for twelve years and he cast himself in this role
Speaker 1: where you think he's the main character but then actually
Speaker 1: he's a side character. But really the funny thing to
Speaker 1: see people talk about that and then you get to
Speaker 1: the final episode and you're like, oh no, this he
Speaker 1: is going to be the shogun. There's this great line
Speaker 1: where he says to he says to Yabashiga, he says,
Speaker 1: remember what the anjin said when we first met, and
Speaker 1: he said, you know, it's impossible, and then he says,
Speaker 1: unless I win, and then anything is possible. And Yabashiga
Speaker 1: looks up at him and he says, even shogun, And
Speaker 1: he has that realization that Toronaga has always wanted to
Speaker 1: be shogun, and in fact, all his humility, all his
Speaker 1: plans were leading to this moment where he could become
Speaker 1: the true leader of of Japan. And you mentioned something
Speaker 1: really interesting here about the flash forward. I think I
Speaker 1: read some I didn't agree with them, but I read
Speaker 1: some really interesting, well written thoughts about how a lot
Speaker 1: of people were kind of shocked by the finale because
Speaker 1: it promised this great battle, but it doesn't have one.
Speaker 3: It proms two huge battles that happened off screen.
Speaker 1: And I love that because I think that's like very
Speaker 1: much in line with the intellectual wars that kind of
Speaker 1: fuel the show. But I understand how if we're used
Speaker 1: to like a Battle of the Bastards esque episode to
Speaker 1: a lot of people that were expecting that final violent moment.
Speaker 1: But I mean, what a show, and it's so fantastic,
Speaker 1: and the thing that blows my mind that's so great
Speaker 1: about it is like this book is like a eleven
Speaker 1: hundred and five pages long or something. Yeah, and that
Speaker 1: it's huge and in the world of the MCU and
Speaker 1: the kind of shared universes and all that kind of storytelling.
Speaker 1: There is a version of this where they just adapt
Speaker 1: it for like five seasons. But I love that they
Speaker 1: streamlined it and they changed the perspective. They were like,
Speaker 1: what is this like if you actually live in Japan
Speaker 1: and it's focused on the Japanese cast and Black THRM
Speaker 1: is essentially a distraction, which they have a lot of
Speaker 1: fun at the end with Toronaga basically saying that he's like,
Speaker 1: he distracts the Portuguese and he makes me laugh, So
Speaker 1: that's why he's here, you know. And I think that
Speaker 1: it's incredibly brave in a way and savvy to just
Speaker 1: adapt it in ten episodes when you could have longed
Speaker 1: it out and tried to do multiple seasons. But now
Speaker 1: we have a fully complete season of television that I
Speaker 1: think it probably stands up there with the best one
Speaker 1: season series.
Speaker 3: For sure, for sure. Next up, we go to the
Speaker 3: end of US. Yeah, welcome to another continuing chapter in
Speaker 3: the Omnibus, where law, analysis and understanding come together. This week,
Speaker 3: talking about the life of the author of Shogun, James Clavel.
Speaker 3: James Colvell, born in nineteen twenty four and Ciney, Australia,
Speaker 3: lived a incredibly fascinating and interesting life. Clavel's father and
Speaker 3: grandfather were both in the Royal Navy, but like Blackthorn,
Speaker 3: Clovel's fate would largely be decided on land. He joined
Speaker 3: Her Majesty's Royal Artillery in nineteen forty was sent to
Speaker 3: Malaysia the Second World War broke out. He was shot
Speaker 3: in the face, eventually taken prisoner by the Japanese and
Speaker 3: he spent three and a half years in two prison camps,
Speaker 3: the second of which Changi in Singapore, was noted for
Speaker 3: its brutality and starvation conditions. You see a lot of
Speaker 3: competing numbers for the amount of people died in this
Speaker 3: prison camp. But whatever the case may be, it's clear
Speaker 3: that Clavell needed some luck to survive that. He did
Speaker 3: not talk about those experiences, and by nineteen fifty three
Speaker 3: he was in la trying to make a go as
Speaker 3: a screenwriter. His first paid screenwriting gig was adapting a
Speaker 3: short story which appeared in the pages of Playboy magazine,
Speaker 3: which also started in nineteen fifty three, by the way,
Speaker 3: written by George Langlan, the story was called The Fly,
Speaker 3: about a scientist who accidentally merges his DNA with that
Speaker 3: of a fly. And guess what. The movie The Fly
Speaker 3: would go on to become an absolute bonafide horror classic.
Speaker 3: That even the type of movie where, even if you
Speaker 3: haven't seen the original, you've seen references to it.
Speaker 1: Yes, and you've seen the remake.
Speaker 3: Yes, Clavel that went maiden stream. You know, The Fly
Speaker 3: was kind of a B movie, despite its current modern
Speaker 3: status as a landmark horror film. He then went mainstream
Speaker 3: with nineteen sixty threes Air Force action film six point
Speaker 3: thirty three Squadron, and then nineteen sixty six epic Second
Speaker 3: World War drama The Great Escape, which he co wrote,
Speaker 3: starred Steve McQueen and a bunch of other notable legendary
Speaker 3: film Clavel then transitioned to directing, both on screen and
Speaker 3: for television. His most notable film is an adaptation of
Speaker 3: To Stir with Love, the biography autobiography of the Guyanese
Speaker 3: author Er Braithwait, starring Sidney Poitier. Braithwait was not really
Speaker 3: that much of a fan of the adaptation, but it
Speaker 3: was a landmark film and a big cultural hit. Clavel
Speaker 3: also wrote the script, and then Hollywood screenwriters and actors
Speaker 3: went on strike together at the same time for the
Speaker 3: first time. The issues at that time were residuals coming
Speaker 3: from reruns and also with the studio's fund healthcare and
Speaker 3: pensions for actors and writers. So no work right, Clovell
Speaker 3: pivots to novels. He expungent your minds all this trauma
Speaker 3: that he had from his experiences at Chaney to write
Speaker 3: King Rat, which was published in nineteen sixty two, and
Speaker 3: the book immediately established Clavel as a brand unto himself,
Speaker 3: and the covel brand was as follows. He would write
Speaker 3: long books featuring numerous characters, usually set in the East
Speaker 3: and richly researched, and the book was a best selling smash,
Speaker 3: and then he would continue writing novels, eventually pivoting away
Speaker 3: from directing, which all his kind of like Hollywood friends
Speaker 3: would be like, why do you you've got a good
Speaker 3: thing going here. You're a writer director, multi hyphen it
Speaker 3: when that doesn't mean we don't even have that phrase yet.
Speaker 3: For fifty sixteen years, keep doing that, He's like, no,
Speaker 3: you know what, I'm gonna keep writing books. I think
Speaker 3: I like this better because I have full control. His
Speaker 3: next book, Taipan in nineteen sixty six, tells the story
Speaker 3: of Western traders working out of nineteenth century Hong Kong.
Speaker 3: And then in nineteen seventy five, now a full fledged
Speaker 3: just an author, came Shogun. The novel, as Rosie said,
Speaker 3: ran over eleven hundred pages, sold six million copies worldwide,
Speaker 3: and established Cavell as a major, major literary star. It
Speaker 3: made me, Clavell once said, I became a brand name
Speaker 3: like Heinz Baked Beans. In nineteen eighty, NBC aired its
Speaker 3: adaptation of Shogun on five consecutive nights in September. This
Speaker 3: was part of a of a trend towards mini series
Speaker 3: which began in the seventies and we continue through the
Speaker 3: mid eighties, starring Richard Chamberlin as Blackthorn, the legendary Tishira
Speaker 3: Mufuni as Tornaga, and Yoka shimades Marico. Shogun was a
Speaker 3: gigantic hit, huge television hit had a Nielsen rating of
Speaker 3: twenty six point three, which means twenty six point three
Speaker 3: million viewers per episode. That was the largest in NBC's history,
Speaker 3: and honestly, it's like up there with like stuff like
Speaker 3: super Bowls. Like it's basically like super Bowls happening every
Speaker 3: single night of the week. The show is credited with
Speaker 3: kicking off a general interest in Japanese culture that continued
Speaker 3: through the throughout the nineteen eighties, and you see it
Speaker 3: a lot in pop culture, although the context was usually
Speaker 3: pretty negative. Some interesting notes about the nineteen eighty Showgun
Speaker 3: and Well, in particular, like the FX adaptation, most of
Speaker 3: the dialogue of the nineteen eighty Showgun was in Japanese. However,
Speaker 3: Blackthorne was most decidedly the protagonist. It was all through
Speaker 3: his eyes and there was a lot more sex and
Speaker 3: romance with Marico and NBC therefore, since Richard Chamberlain as Blackthorn,
Speaker 3: is gonna be the star, they made the decision, a
Speaker 3: baffling decision in retrospect, to just not have any subtitles.
Speaker 3: You just know what seventy five percent of the actors
Speaker 3: you're saying at any given time. The thinking was since
Speaker 3: Blackthorne was confused about what was being said around him,
Speaker 3: and he is the avatar for the audience, Therefore their
Speaker 3: confusion would help the story, okay whatever. Showgun, the nineteen
Speaker 3: eighty Showgun was the first show to have a character
Speaker 3: say the word piss and to show a character pissing,
Speaker 3: you know, when Blackthorn is pissed on after his capture
Speaker 3: by the Japanese. The mini series, as I mentioned, was
Speaker 3: part of a wave of successful television events that began
Speaker 3: with ABC's adaptation of Alex Haley's Roots, which was the
Speaker 3: biggest television event to that time, and the European Smashed
Speaker 3: Jesus of Nazareth. Clavel himself was an ardent right wing psychopath.
Speaker 3: His nineteen eighty one book eight nineteen eighty one book,
Speaker 3: The Children's Story, a novella, is eighty five pages of
Speaker 3: hysterical dystopian paranoia, set in a future where kids have
Speaker 3: lost their connection to the meaning of the Pledge of Allegiance.
Speaker 3: That's literally what the story is about. And therefore he
Speaker 3: was like very close with the Reagan administry. Loved Reagan,
Speaker 3: He's very close with him. Was invited to a White
Speaker 3: House event honoring Japan. He was, he said of The
Speaker 3: Children's Story Clevell in a nineteen eighty one New York
Speaker 3: Times magazine story quote the Wonderful thing about the book
Speaker 3: is that it's just a It's just at the right
Speaker 3: time with Reagan, the right wing approach America first, the
Speaker 3: awareness of an enemy called communism. We are in a
Speaker 3: sweep away from the left wing attitudes that have been
Speaker 3: creeping in against our constitution. He's Australian.
Speaker 4: This is democracy, isn't it.
Speaker 3: It's not a socialist state end quote. James Killel. Javits.
Speaker 3: Critics reacted to the nineteen eighty eighty Minui series with
Speaker 3: kind of like bemusement. They they it would be too
Speaker 3: strong to say they were disappointed. They have, of course
Speaker 3: their own historical dramas, so what do they need this one?
Speaker 3: For The New York Time. That same nineteen eighty one
Speaker 3: New York Times story quotes Asahi Television's New York bureau
Speaker 3: chief Yasushi Miyakawa as saying, quote, it had some funny points,
Speaker 3: some curious points, some inadequate points. Showgun was of course
Speaker 3: a huge hit, both in novel and television forms. So
Speaker 3: there's like a lot of wild, possibly apocryphal like propaganda
Speaker 3: about like what a big hit it was. Like one
Speaker 3: of the stories you will read that's impossible to verify
Speaker 3: is that like restaurants noticed a dip in people going
Speaker 3: out to eat because they couldn't miss Showgun, of course,
Speaker 3: this being the era before VCRs were really popular. Another
Speaker 3: one that is really fun and jibs with Clovell's right
Speaker 3: wing tendencies that I can't find proof for is a
Speaker 3: story reported in The New York Times that was supposedly
Speaker 3: relayed by Shogun's publisher that said that Henry Kissinger, Nixon's
Speaker 3: former Secretary of State, was such a Showgun fan that
Speaker 3: he referred to his wife as woman like various characters
Speaker 3: and Showgun do anyway, did Shogun spark a general interest
Speaker 3: in amri in Japanese cuisine, most notably sushi. This another
Speaker 3: possibly apocryphal story about the popularity of Shogun we don't know,
Speaker 3: but clearly an incredibly influential work. James Clovell would pass
Speaker 3: away in nineteen ninety four, was working up until his death,
Speaker 3: only a year after the sixth and final book in
Speaker 3: his Asian saga Guy Jin was published. James Clavell super weirdo.
Speaker 1: Every episode we like to end the show with a
Speaker 1: fast moving segment. This time we're doing like that. Watch
Speaker 1: this with our favorite samurai movies inspired by Shogun. I
Speaker 1: love samurai movies. I'm a Shakira kurrasur fat and I
Speaker 1: think like one of the coolest things about Shogun and
Speaker 1: this version of Shogun kind of that you touch on
Speaker 1: this in the omnibus about Clavel's right wing leanings and
Speaker 1: the way that he positioned himself in the world. So
Speaker 1: as you can imagine, the book is very much of that,
Speaker 1: like a white savior who goes there, who understands things better,
Speaker 1: who can do things better, who kind of has to
Speaker 1: navigate this landscape. Obviously, the FX version of Shogun, the
Speaker 1: creative team crafted something entirely different that totally repositions the
Speaker 1: story and the importance of Blackthorn, and I think like
Speaker 1: going back to classic Japanese samurai movies, you get to
Speaker 1: be in a situation cuation where you get to see
Speaker 1: the films that inspired this stuff. I would say if
Speaker 1: you loved this my basically, any Currosaur movie is like
Speaker 1: a dream place to begin your exploration. Curricur is like
Speaker 1: a legend. My favorite Curaca movie is The Hidden Fortress,
Speaker 1: but that is that's if you watch Star Wars, so
Speaker 1: that's more of a comedic twist I'm going to say
Speaker 1: for this one because of how much I loved the
Speaker 1: women in this film, I'm gonna I'm actually gonna go
Speaker 1: away from Kurosawa and I'm gonna say Lady Snowblood. Yeah.
Speaker 1: T Shoya Fujita directed it, and it is if you
Speaker 1: are so good, Yeah, because it was recently they did
Speaker 1: a Lady Snowbug collection for Criterion. A lot of the
Speaker 1: Criterion stuff is on Max and it stars Mako Kaje
Speaker 1: as like a woman seeking revenge on the people who
Speaker 1: murdered her family. Huge influence of on Kill Bill. It's
Speaker 1: this totally nonlinear narrative that makes it feel super modern
Speaker 1: and contemporary. It's just such a joyous film. It's so beautiful,
Speaker 1: like joyous if you love bloody Revenge, but like it
Speaker 1: makes me feel so happy every time I see it
Speaker 1: because it's so beautiful. There's so many fantastic shots and spaces,
Speaker 1: and I think it very much is in that space
Speaker 1: of Shogun. So yeah, that's that's that's my pick. If
Speaker 1: you loved Shogun.
Speaker 3: My pick is Akua Kosauer's nineteen five classic Throne of Bloody,
Speaker 3: his take on Macbeth starting to Shiro Mufude it's awesome betrayal, madness,
Speaker 3: the hunger for power, and how it's corrosive and of
Speaker 3: course just like beautiful, unbelievably beautiful in camera effects and visuals,
Speaker 3: ending with an iconic action scene involving so many arrows
Speaker 3: that even to this I mean, to this day, it
Speaker 3: holds up incredible throne of blood.
Speaker 1: So good. And that's it for the episode. So I'll
Speaker 1: see you next time.
Speaker 3: Jason, see you, next time, I see you next time.
Speaker 3: Check x ray Vision is hosted by Jason Kisepsion and
Speaker 3: Rosie Knight and is a production of iHeart Podcasts. Our
Speaker 3: executive producers are Joelle Smith and Aaron Kaufman. Our supervising
Speaker 3: producer is a Boo Zafar. Our producers are Carmen Laurent
Speaker 3: and Mia Taylor. Our theme song is by Brian Basquez.
Speaker 1: Special thanks to Soul Rubin and Chris Lord, Kenny Goodman
Speaker 1: and Heidi our discoord moderator.