With 'Shogun,' FX Lays a Claim for Best Show of the Year
The dawn of the 1600s was a pivotal historical moment for Japan and the European powers vying for a slice of its power. Portugal and their Jesuit priests were the only nations engaged in trade with Japan, having first made contact some 60 years previously; however, tensions across Europe pushed countries like Spain, Holland, and England to challenge their autonomy on trade. Japan was about to enter its Edo Period, where for over 250 years, the country was ruled by the Tokugawa shogunate (a hereditary military dictatorship that, in effect, extended over the entire country) and was caught in a chaotic state of flux.
This defining chapter of Japanese history is what pushed Australian-British author James Clavell to write Shōgun, a 1975 novel about following Englishman John Blackthorne after he is taken prisoner on Japanese shores and his increasing diplomatic value to the warring daimyō Toronaga as he ascends towards dictatorship of Japan. Toranaga and Blackthorne are inspired by real-life figures from the first Edo Period shōgun Tokugawa Ieyasu and William Adams, the first Englishman to reach Japan – but both Clavell’s novel and the new FX miniseries adaptation take full advantage of being historical fiction.
Get ready to have your appetite for feuding clans and scheming bureaucrats completely satiated; Shōgun is pacy, stunningly crafted stuff. The series is packed with compelling drama and brilliantly performed characters, joining the annals of exemplary period dramas by deftly demonstrating how to make feudal politics exciting. Over the first eight episodes (there are ten in total, the climactic two not being available to review), Shōgun rousingly stakes a claim for the best show of the year thus far.
