no need for spoiler blocks. the episode aired.
which is funny because the real person the character is based on died at age 55 or so. so would never have been that old.
and definitely was a dream sequence Episode title was "A Dream of a Dream".
Shogun 10-episode miniseries coming to FX
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no need for spoiler blocks. the episode aired.
which is funny because the real person the character is based on died at age 55 or so. so would never have been that old.
and definitely was a dream sequence Episode title was "A Dream of a Dream".
Shogun 2: Ninja Boogaloo, coming in 2026.aggiepaintrain said:
I assume it's over ?
but yes. 1 and done,
I failed to appreciate the flash forward. I guess I now know Anjin makes it until he's old and is back in merry old England telling tales of his encounters with the savages.
That part of the finale just felt completely out of place and added nothing to the story.
That part of the finale just felt completely out of place and added nothing to the story.
It was a dream. In the dream, he was holding Mariko's rosary but in the scene when he was in the boat with Fuji, he tossed the rosary into the water.torrid said:
My thoughts.
In the flash forward or dream sequence (I'm leaning towards the latter) of Blackthorne as an old man back in England, the makeup was horrible. It would have been an interesting tip of the hat to have had Richard Chamberlain, were he able at age 90, to play the elderly Blackthorne.
Did the real guy ever name it back to England?
Also, shortly after this, Japan banned Christianity and went on a Romanesq killing spree. Was that by the real life Toranaga? Or the Heir?
Also, shortly after this, Japan banned Christianity and went on a Romanesq killing spree. Was that by the real life Toranaga? Or the Heir?
Unemployed said:It was a dream. In the dream, he was holding Mariko's rosary but in the scene when he was in the boat with Fuji, he tossed the rosary into the water.torrid said:
My thoughts.
In the flash forward or dream sequence (I'm leaning towards the latter) of Blackthorne as an old man back in England, the makeup was horrible. It would have been an interesting tip of the hat to have had Richard Chamberlain, were he able at age 90, to play the elderly Blackthorne.
Well that makes more sense.
Toronaga's cruelty in service of his scheming was brutally displayed with the dead villagers with heads on spikes.
HE burned the ship. No investigation needed.
Yet he's willing to murder villagers to keep Blackthorne in check.
Btw yes, the real life version of Toronaga made Japan inhospitable to Christians.
HE burned the ship. No investigation needed.
Yet he's willing to murder villagers to keep Blackthorne in check.
Btw yes, the real life version of Toronaga made Japan inhospitable to Christians.
Spoiler tags are unnecessary
So this is a Japanese GOT. Episode 9 is better than 10.
So why did Mariko's death influence Ochiba in switching sides? Was it simply she aligned with a more devious and smarter leader.
So why did Mariko's death influence Ochiba in switching sides? Was it simply she aligned with a more devious and smarter leader.
More a Japanese The Usual Suspects.LB12Diamond said:
So this is a Japanese GOT. Episode 9 is better than 10.
Good stuff. Will definitely be reading the book again someday.
For those interested, the book "Taiko" is also very good.
For those interested, the book "Taiko" is also very good.
C@LAg said:BQRyno said:
Good show. I'll keep it spoiler free and just say that wasn't what I was expecting in the finale.
Music was a HUGE disappointment all season long. It was just ... there. Nothing really stood out, and the lack of some recurring things was disappointing. At least in this episode the music was notably more impactful and present.
I liked it. Listen to the entire Atticus Ross soundtrack with a good pair of headphones and you'll alternate between wanting to meditate and wanting to do some samurai ****.
Reading more about it, the real life Toranaga later forced the heir to commit suicide during a siege of Osaka castle.
He also banned Christianity and went on a murder spree. If you watch the Martin Scorsese movie Silence (which is a huge bummer of a movie), you end up hating the Japanese.
Another interesting tidbit was how the heir became the heir. To ensure his son would rule, his dad forced his nephew and his entire family to commit suicide. And then had all the family, who refused, killed including 31 women and children. He even had a concubine killed who hadn't even met the nephew yet.
Japan was a F-ed up place.
He also banned Christianity and went on a murder spree. If you watch the Martin Scorsese movie Silence (which is a huge bummer of a movie), you end up hating the Japanese.
Another interesting tidbit was how the heir became the heir. To ensure his son would rule, his dad forced his nephew and his entire family to commit suicide. And then had all the family, who refused, killed including 31 women and children. He even had a concubine killed who hadn't even met the nephew yet.
Japan was a F-ed up place.
aTmAg said:
Reading more about it, the real life Toranaga later forced the heir to commit suicide during a siege of Osaka castle.
He also banned Christianity and went on a murder spree. If you watch the Martin Scorsese movie Silence (which is a huge bummer of a movie), you end up hating the Japanese.
Another interesting tidbit was how the heir became the heir. To ensure his son would rule, his dad forced his nephew and his entire family to commit suicide. And then had all the family, who refused, killed including 31 women and children. He even had a concubine killed who hadn't even met the nephew yet.
Japan was a F-ed up place.
As was stated earlier in the thread…and by Dan Carlin over and over….
"The Japanese are like everyone else, only more so…"
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"Why tell a dead man the future?" is what the kids these days call a ****ing bar. Whew.
I know this is only because I watched Gone with the Wind recently, but I can't help being reminded of Scarlett O'Hara when I see how everything played out with Toranaga. You can argue that his goals/ambitions were for the greater good, but it's undeniable that he was single focused and would sacrifice anything or anyone to achieve them. Hiromatsu, Mariko, the villagers - just to name a few impactful ones from the last couple of episodes - barely made him flinch in pursuit of his goals.
In Gone with the Wind, Scarlett will do anything to accomplish whatever is most important to her in the moment. She lied to and married the man her sister was in love with just to get money to stay afloat. She intentionally got that same husband killed later by shaming him into revenge.
Toranaga's game had higher stakes, but sheesh. It's hard to actually like characters who are so Machiavellian.
In Gone with the Wind, Scarlett will do anything to accomplish whatever is most important to her in the moment. She lied to and married the man her sister was in love with just to get money to stay afloat. She intentionally got that same husband killed later by shaming him into revenge.
Toranaga's game had higher stakes, but sheesh. It's hard to actually like characters who are so Machiavellian.
His son and Yabu as well.
I don't think we're supposed to like them.
Mariko said it in her lines about not being fooled by the politeness of the culture. It's a brutal, cynical culture hiding under the veneer of the good manners.
Mariko said it in her lines about not being fooled by the politeness of the culture. It's a brutal, cynical culture hiding under the veneer of the good manners.
I loved this show up until the last episode. The dream segment and the explanation of how things would play out was just a little bit of a letdown after how good the rest of the show was. That said, the series was so good that, even with the disappointment at the end, it was still pretty much a masterpiece.
I think watching the leader she was allied with be completely out-maneuvered by a man who was at least three steps ahead was part of it. I think reconnecting with Mariko and seeing her loyalty to the same man was part of it. I also think she lost respect for a man she could sort of lead around, too.LB12Diamond said:
So this is a Japanese GOT. Episode 9 is better than 10.
So why did Mariko's death influence Ochiba in switching sides? Was it simply she aligned with a more devious and smarter leader.
I'd say this isn't too different than other cultures though. Succession issues, especially where a king or emperor can't seem to sire a son, then finally dies and finds some way to dispose of the previous heir. It's some real
House of the Dragon ****.
After Sekigahara, Tokugawa/Toranaga put a lot of his allies in positions of power and demoted a bunch of those who stood against him. But that's not too out of the ordinary either. He made deals and promises and wanted to put an end to the fighting, which had raged for decades without stop.
House of the Dragon ****.
After Sekigahara, Tokugawa/Toranaga put a lot of his allies in positions of power and demoted a bunch of those who stood against him. But that's not too out of the ordinary either. He made deals and promises and wanted to put an end to the fighting, which had raged for decades without stop.
Battle Royale and Pearl Harbor movies don't paint them in a good light either.aTmAg said:
Reading more about it, the real life Toranaga later forced the heir to commit suicide during a siege of Osaka castle.
He also banned Christianity and went on a murder spree. If you watch the Martin Scorsese movie Silence (which is a huge bummer of a movie), you end up hating the Japanese.
. . .
You get over it.
I also read that Tokugawa changed the way people sat in court.
In the show, most people sat cross legged, but after taking power, he changed it to the kneeling position. This would make legs go to sleep and therefore render people unable to attack.
I haven't fact checked that, but I really want it to be true
In the show, most people sat cross legged, but after taking power, he changed it to the kneeling position. This would make legs go to sleep and therefore render people unable to attack.
I haven't fact checked that, but I really want it to be true
I dunno... Other than these shows, I know very little about ancient Japanese culture. And it seems that the one random link I clicked on had an example of a case that would be probably the worst I'd ever hear of in Europe. Sure, Henry VIII had 6 wives, 2 of which he beheaded, but he didn't go kill their entire extended family afterwards. I can't think of a case where somebody had that many of his own family killed.rhutton125 said:
I'd say this isn't too different than other cultures though. Succession issues, especially where a king or emperor can't seem to sire a son, then finally dies and finds some way to dispose of the previous heir. It's some real
House of the Dragon ****.
After Sekigahara, Tokugawa/Toranaga put a lot of his allies in positions of power and demoted a bunch of those who stood against him. But that's not too out of the ordinary either. He made deals and promises and wanted to put an end to the fighting, which had raged for decades without stop.
Never seen Battle Royale (looks to be fiction anyway) and Pearl Harbor makes the Japanese look like honorable combatants compared to Silence. In that movie, they tortured innocent civilians just to get priests to denounce their own Christianity. Seems pretty F-ed up to me.Faustus said:Battle Royale and Pearl Harbor movies don't paint them in a good light either.aTmAg said:
Reading more about it, the real life Toranaga later forced the heir to commit suicide during a siege of Osaka castle.
He also banned Christianity and went on a murder spree. If you watch the Martin Scorsese movie Silence (which is a huge bummer of a movie), you end up hating the Japanese.
. . .
You get over it.
Definitely. And I don't know enough about European history, to be honest, to say definitively whether comparable atrocities were committed... but I definitely assume so, between the inquisition and crusades and Roman conquest and so on. Killing entire extended families is harsh but I know of examples in Chinese history, for example, where it happened as well.
It's all very Game of Thrones. A surviving heir complicates things. Think about the Starks getting betrayed in GoT and House Bolton coming for all the children and Stark loyalists. Otherwise you have a situation where, years later, the North rises up under the surviving Snow/Starks. Or shoot, any surviving Targ or Targ ******* - that's half the show.
Even after Sekigahara (1600), when Tokugawa Ieyasu (or "Toranaga" from the show) becomes shogun, he lets the Taiko's heir survive until 1614 when the relationship deteriorates and the heir starts gathering ronin in Osaka. Ieyasu wasn't about to let the country fall into civil war again so he comes down hard on them and anyone who supports them.
It's brutal and fascinating and tragic and has led to all kinds of great stories, plays, books, video games, etc.
A few miscellaneous tidbits from the era:
- When Oda Nobunaga (1st great unifier) is betrayed by Akechi Mitsuhide (Mariko's father), he comes for "Toranaga" as well, but he escapes when one of his vassals, Hattori Hanzo, leads him through the mountains to safety. Hattori Hanzo is usually depicted as the ultimate ninja in movies and film, but he was also a real life Tokugawa retainer.
- Many of the castles from this era, including Osaka castle, still exist in Japan today. I really hope to visit Osaka castle in particular someday.
- There's a well-known idiom in Japan, something along the lines of "what do you do if the bird won't sing?" The first great unifier, Nobunaga (known for his brutality) says "kill it." The second great unifier, Hideyoshi (the Taiko, known for his cunning) says "convince it to sing." The third great unifier, Ieyasu ("Toranaga" from the show) says "wait." I think this show did a great job showing a guy with the patience to wait and navigate 60 years of war and politics until it was finally his turn to rise to the top.
- A samurai from this era, Ukon Takayama, became a catholic saint in recent years. He was eventually exiled for his faith. The show/book make a way bigger deal out of Christianity in this period than it was (it wasn't 2/5ths of the council, for example) but it definitely played a role.
It's all very Game of Thrones. A surviving heir complicates things. Think about the Starks getting betrayed in GoT and House Bolton coming for all the children and Stark loyalists. Otherwise you have a situation where, years later, the North rises up under the surviving Snow/Starks. Or shoot, any surviving Targ or Targ ******* - that's half the show.
Even after Sekigahara (1600), when Tokugawa Ieyasu (or "Toranaga" from the show) becomes shogun, he lets the Taiko's heir survive until 1614 when the relationship deteriorates and the heir starts gathering ronin in Osaka. Ieyasu wasn't about to let the country fall into civil war again so he comes down hard on them and anyone who supports them.
It's brutal and fascinating and tragic and has led to all kinds of great stories, plays, books, video games, etc.
A few miscellaneous tidbits from the era:
- When Oda Nobunaga (1st great unifier) is betrayed by Akechi Mitsuhide (Mariko's father), he comes for "Toranaga" as well, but he escapes when one of his vassals, Hattori Hanzo, leads him through the mountains to safety. Hattori Hanzo is usually depicted as the ultimate ninja in movies and film, but he was also a real life Tokugawa retainer.
- Many of the castles from this era, including Osaka castle, still exist in Japan today. I really hope to visit Osaka castle in particular someday.
- There's a well-known idiom in Japan, something along the lines of "what do you do if the bird won't sing?" The first great unifier, Nobunaga (known for his brutality) says "kill it." The second great unifier, Hideyoshi (the Taiko, known for his cunning) says "convince it to sing." The third great unifier, Ieyasu ("Toranaga" from the show) says "wait." I think this show did a great job showing a guy with the patience to wait and navigate 60 years of war and politics until it was finally his turn to rise to the top.
- A samurai from this era, Ukon Takayama, became a catholic saint in recent years. He was eventually exiled for his faith. The show/book make a way bigger deal out of Christianity in this period than it was (it wasn't 2/5ths of the council, for example) but it definitely played a role.
I wasn't talking about atrocities in a general sense. Obviously, the Nazis killed entire families in death camps and plenty of ancient civilizations killed entire enemy towns/cities. I'm sure that is a common thing throughout history.
The part I am talking about is how a king kills a crap ton of people IN HIS OWN FAMILY to ensure that his kid is the sole heir. I've heard of a brother killing a brother, or a son killing his father, but an entire extended family? I can't think of that happening in Europe.
The part I am talking about is how a king kills a crap ton of people IN HIS OWN FAMILY to ensure that his kid is the sole heir. I've heard of a brother killing a brother, or a son killing his father, but an entire extended family? I can't think of that happening in Europe.
So many great comments.
The Japanese culture of the time was simultaneously beautiful, sophisticated, honorable, brutal, deceptive and unquestionably EVIL.
It's good to be fascinated with Japan. Not good to emulate Japan.
The line we laughed at most from the final episode is when Toronaga told Yubushige, "Yes, that's interesting, but please commit seppuku by tomorrow."
This culture poured over into WW2. Japanese atrocities were legend.
The Japanese culture of the time was simultaneously beautiful, sophisticated, honorable, brutal, deceptive and unquestionably EVIL.
It's good to be fascinated with Japan. Not good to emulate Japan.
The line we laughed at most from the final episode is when Toronaga told Yubushige, "Yes, that's interesting, but please commit seppuku by tomorrow."
This culture poured over into WW2. Japanese atrocities were legend.
The two examples I can think of (from Asian culture) involve adopted heirs. I wonder if that's the differentiating factor at all.
Side note: some believe the Taiko to have been losing his mental faculties toward the end of his reign. I'm not sure if it's just a convenient excuse, or if it's perhaps an example of absolute power corrupting (especially since he rose from peasant foot soldier to single leader of Japan) but it is a decent theory to explain how someone so talented, intelligent and cunning... would then murder his own heir's family in favor of a 'trueblood' son, invaded Korea twice, tortured and killed Christians, etc etc. It's a stark contrast from the first 80% of his life, from what I know (500 years later and a world away).
Side note: some believe the Taiko to have been losing his mental faculties toward the end of his reign. I'm not sure if it's just a convenient excuse, or if it's perhaps an example of absolute power corrupting (especially since he rose from peasant foot soldier to single leader of Japan) but it is a decent theory to explain how someone so talented, intelligent and cunning... would then murder his own heir's family in favor of a 'trueblood' son, invaded Korea twice, tortured and killed Christians, etc etc. It's a stark contrast from the first 80% of his life, from what I know (500 years later and a world away).
Richard III ??
rhutton125 said:
The two examples I can think of (from Asian culture) involve adopted heirs. I wonder if that's the differentiating factor at all.
Side note: some believe the Taiko to have been losing his mental faculties toward the end of his reign. I'm not sure if it's just a convenient excuse, or if it's perhaps an example of absolute power corrupting (especially since he rose from peasant foot soldier to single leader of Japan) but it is a decent theory to explain how someone so talented, intelligent and cunning... would then murder his own heir's family in favor of a 'trueblood' son, invaded Korea twice, tortured and killed Christians, etc etc. It's a stark contrast from the first 80% of his life, from what I know (500 years later and a world away).
Outside of listening to Dan Carlin, I'm not very familiar with Asian history (prior to like 1900). So if stuff like this happened there, it's pretty likely I wouldn't know about it. I'm more familiar with Roman and English history myself.
Did the families of his brothers get killed too? Like several dozen people people?Quad Dog said:
Richard III ??
Europe also had a longtime, deep-seated Christian belief in not executing innocents. Executing your enemies is standard for all cultures; murdering their entire line is anathema for a Christian culture. But the Japanese had no faith tradition of mercy, and were pragmatic about death living on an island where earthquakes and tsunamis and typhoons regularly killed thousands at a time and believed that as Buddhists, death is not the end but just another door you walk through into another life on the way to nirvana. I'm not defending the feudal Japanese samurai culture any more than I would defend the Vikings or the Mongols. (Or the Inquisition, for that matter). But they did things according to their own values and beliefs, which they came by honestly.
Tongue in cheek because I'm one of the last people that should quote scripture.jenn96 said:
Europe also had a longtime, deep-seated Christian belief in not executing innocents. Executing your enemies is standard for all cultures; murdering their entire line is anathema for a Christian culture. But the Japanese had no faith tradition of mercy, and were pragmatic about death living on an island where earthquakes and tsunamis and typhoons regularly killed thousands at a time and believed that as Buddhists, death is not the end but just another door you walk through into another life on the way to nirvana. I'm not defending the feudal Japanese samurai culture any more than I would defend the Vikings or the Mongols. (Or the Inquisition, for that matter). But they did things according to their own values and beliefs, which they came by honestly.
Deuteronomy 20:16-17
"In the cities of the nations the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes. Completely destroy them--the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites--as the LORD your God has commanded you".
Leviticus 26:7-26
"You will hunt down your enemies. You will kill them with your swords. Five of you will chase 100. And 100 of you will chase 10,000. You will kill your enemies with your swords.
2 Chronicles 15:12-13
"And they entered into a covenant to seek the Lord, the God of their fathers, with all their heart and with all their soul, but that whoever would not seek the Lord, the God of Israel, should be put to death, whether young or old, man or woman."
The Old Testament is indeed hardcore and would probably be Samurai-approved. But Christ preached mercy, and western militaries generally honor the ideals of Christian chivalric warfare regarding prisoners, non-combatants, and children, at least in principle if not always in practice.
Anyway, I'm not here to argue that Christian cultures are superior, just that the Japanese of the 1600s evolved in a universe where none of those principles had ever been seeded.
Anyway, I'm not here to argue that Christian cultures are superior, just that the Japanese of the 1600s evolved in a universe where none of those principles had ever been seeded.
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