Shogun Takes The 'Limited' Out of Limited Series

 

Considering that I am about to discuss a  mini-series that gives great detail to  history, we must begin this review with a history of the mini-series.

In the 1970s when television was the sole property of the three major networks, the networks would sometimes be willing to interrupt their schedules for days, extending into weeks with adaptations of novels that were considered unfilmable because of their sheer size but that television might be able to handle. They called in the mini-series.

During this period bestseller would be adapted into eight and nine-part series that featured actors and actress who often did not appear on TV but were willing to make an exception for these projects. Some of the most glorious work of the era came from these daring adaptations from the groundbreaking Roots to the masterful The Thorn Birds to Rich Man, Poor Man and North & South, these programs had the kind of budgets that some of the filmmakers of that era were not able to get. And the audiences they could attract, even by the standards of only three networks, were similarly huge. Roots averaged 70 million viewers an episode, all the more impressive for ABC who had no faith in the property at first. Other series were able to embrace the works of the biggest writers from Larry McMurtry Lonesome Dove and James Michener’s Centennial.

PBS also contributed massively to the trend with British imports from Elizabeth R. to I, Claudius, Brideshead Revisited and their greatest success The Jewel in the Crown. The BBC could often be ambitious on its own, particularly with the brilliant Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Smiley’s People.

Eventually the mini-series got literally too big for TV to handle. The thirty hours that ABC spent on War & Remembrance cost so much and took too much time that it started to hasten the decline of the long-form network series. By the mid-1990s, mini-series were being reduced to four two hours blocs at most, such as with ABC’s adaptation of The Stand.

Pay and basic cable would take up the gauntlet to an extent, particularly HBO. Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks would collaborate on several ambitious projects starting with From the Earth to the Moon and ending with The Pacific. But these series were not only spread over a weekly basis but were never as long as the blockbusters of the past: at most an episode would be an hour plus ten minutes. The last miniseries of that kind by HBO was Olive Kitteridge in 2015. The idea of elaborate blockbuster miniseries was essentially dead by the mid-2000s – the last major project of its time I recall was the Sci-Fi’s channel’s Taken which they aired over ten consecutive weeknights in two hour installments. While it did win the Emmy for Best Mini Series that year, it was likely more due to its ambition then its quality –  for all the attempt to tell an epic, multigenerational story in the way the bets mini-series, at the center there was practically nothing there.

The mini-series puttered around for the next decade until 2014 when fresh life was breathed into it. Ryan Murphy had given some momentum to in American Horror Story but it was the one-two punch of True Detective and Fargo in the winter and early spring of that year that gave it life. Within just two years it had been rebranded ‘the limited series’ and the genre has never looked back. Whatever one might say about whether Peak TV is over, few would argue we are not still living in the Golden Age of the Limited Series.

But more than the name has changed about the genre. While few would argue about the incredible quality of almost every major winner and contender for Best Limited Series in the past ten years, one could hardly mistake them for the kind of projects we would get more than half a century ago. Literary adaptations are still being done to be sure, but projects such as Little Fires Everywhere, Sharp Objects and last year’s Fleishman is in Trouble are hardly the kind of epics that would have gotten this kind of treatment. I’m not saying that’s a drawback; on the contrary, this has led to  a greater focus on character and detail that could often be missed in so many of these bigger projects. But the idea of ‘the event series’  doesn’t have the same oomph it was did; you do not get the sense of spectacle that so many of the great mini-series did. There have been exceptions of course – HBO’s adaptation of Watchmen and its version of Chernobyl are both major examples of how immense scope does not necessarily lead to diminish in either writer or performance. But mostly the smaller ‘more intimate’ limited series has become par for the course. Well, until the first few months of 2024 and in this case, it is fitting that we are also going back to one of the greatest.

In 1980, Americans were enthralled by the adaptation of James Clavell’s Shogun. Clavell was in the midst of writing was would become known as the Asian Saga, a series of six epic novels that told the story of Asia being ‘discovered’ by Europeans that would span over four hundred years. Shogun was the second book, set in 1600 and dealt with the fictionalized story of the first English navigator to reach Japan and helps a formidable Japanese warlord deal with a board of Regents who scheme against him. The first American TV series filmed entirely in Japan, and with much of the native Japanese cast speaking Japanese – often without subtitles to depict the disorientation of the shipwrecked John Blackthorne (played by Richard Chamberlain in that version). The series ran twelve hours, achieved huge ratings, won the Emmy for Best Mini Series and the Golden Globe for Best Drama in 1981.

You would have to be either very brave or a lunatic to want to try and remake one of the greatest limited series of all time, particularly in an era where any remake of a beloved project is considered a crime against nature.  It is hard to argue that Hiroyuki Sanada is the latter. Sanada is one of the greatest of all Japanese actors, starring in some of the greatest projects of the era, including The Twilight Samurai, a film beloved by Rogert Ebert that won twelve of the Japanese equivalent to the Oscars. Sanada had had his share of crossover success, some in projects worthy of him (The Last Samurai) but much of his best work has come on TV. Genre fans remember him from his brief stint as Dogen in the final season of Lost (at one point Hurley actually said “I just lied to a samurai) He had recurring roles on Extant, Helix and Westworld. He has taken the lead role as Toranaga in the version that FX has created. He has served as producer on it, and carried his own dog-eared copy with him everywhere, making sure the production was an accurate. It has taken five years to get the project done, through a pandemic and two strikes in Hollywood. Now it has finally debuted on FX and the only word to describe is epic. Also magnificent.

I had neither read the Clavell book nor seen the original miniseries so I had no bias going in. But if there is one thing I have learned about television in the past decade it’s that when it comes to the limited series FX has rarely let me down. For six years HBO and them exchanged the Emmy for Best Limited Series before HBO took two in a row with the back-to-back wins of Chernobyl and Watchmen, FX has not won in that category since but it has nothing to do with a drop in quality: I could not comprehend why the fourth season of Fargo or Impeachment were ignored by the Emmys. They’ve already produced two major contenders for awards in the 2023-2024 lot: the fifth season of Fargo and Capote Vs. The Swans. Both of those shows are exceptional but far more in the wheelhouse than anything like Shogun.

Unlike the original, all of the Japanese is subtitled. Blackthorne is the only character who speaks English naturally but he understands Portuguese so, for the benefit of the viewer, we hear all of the Portuguese in English. Blackthorne’s ship is the last of five vessels that have managed to make it to Japan and almost all of the crew had died on the trip. The rest of them are suffering from malnutrition and scurvy when they reach land but are intercepted by samurai  who defer to Toranaga (Sanada). Toranaga is currently in Osaka, facing a crisis. He is one of five regents who has been appointed guardianship of the young emperor and the other four have begun to turn against him. On a pretense that all, including Toranaga, is an excuse to hold him prisoner and then execute him, he learns of the barbarian ship and orders it to be monitored. He knows how tenuous his position is and he is gambling that there might be something in it that can help.

Blackthorne is played by Cosmo Jarvis. I don’t know how Chamberlain played him in the original but Jarvis’ version reminds me of Ian McShane in Deadwood. I mean this as a compliment by the way, Jarvis has no use for God, believes that the Portuguese are the barbarians and has little use for the Japanese themselves. He clearly thinks, with his nod to survival and his certainty built in imperialism that he has the tools to get around the many obstacles he faces. And he’s in for a mess from the start; he barely survives execution the moment he is brought out of his prison,  manages to survive only with the arrival of a Spanish sailor (Nestor Carbonell looks both ragged and old, and is utterly brilliant) once he helps them survive a storm and manages to persuade them to rescue the Spaniard. The Spaniard repays him by revealing the logs that show his record of piracy, which give lie to the story he is telling that he is a merchant, and that he gives to the Portuguese when they reach Osaka. Blackthorne’s life is once again in immense peril, but he stubbornly refuses to accept that he is built to die here.

At this point Toranaga, who inspires immense loyalty and has a devoted following among his vassals, enlists in his aid Mariko (Anna Sawai) who because of her religious teachings understands Portuguese and can serve as a translator. Mariko is married to another samurai with whom she has a difficult relationship but who clearly cares for her.

The worlds collide in the second episode and it seems Blackthorne’s fate is sealed. The regents plan to execute Toranaga but Ishido, head of the council, is halted because two of the regents who are heavily Catholic, demand ‘the heretic’ be executed. Ishido plans to do so but he sees this as a way to outmaneuver them both and an ally of Toranaga promises to help and Blackthorne is saved when ‘bandits’ intervene and kill the guards leading Blackthorne to his death. Blackthorne has a second meeting which goes better because he is able to draw a map of the world as he knows it and tells Toranaga certain details that he and his lords are unaware of, including that Portugal and Spain have divided Asia between them and that there is a secret base of weapons in Macao. This appalls the samurai when they here it discussed (“Why not divide the earth and heavens?” one says.) but they soon realize there is more to it when that night an assassin comes and only narrowly stops Blackthorne from being killed.

In last night’s episode Toranaga, knowing his fate is sealed if he remains, plans to escape Ishido’s ‘custody’. The opening scene is a minor masterpiece of suspense as we see, but Ishido’s men do not, how Toranaga has managed to escape detection. When they reach the gates and another inspection takes place, Blackthorne improvises (so obviously one guard mutters: ‘This is the man we’re protecting) but it manages to get them out. It does not bring safety: that night, everything that Toranaga is expecting and more too goes wrong as they try to flee to the harbor.

As they escape on boats, they soon realize they may be trapped by Ishido when Blackthorne runs a gamble and has them sneak about a Portuguese vessel that needs to get out of Osaka. One of the conditions is Blackthorne be left behind – something Blackthorne refuses to accept. Yet again he manages to use his sailing skills to avoid death from behind and the elements, something that astonishes even the men who watch him. By this time Toranaga has decided to entrust Blackthorne in their alliance.

The acting and writing are more than up to the challenge of the usual standard of limited series these days, but what I find more remarkable about Shogun is that it manages to do this and yet add to the level of the kind of historical epics that I often love in film but I have rarely enjoyed when done on television. Perhaps the comparison to Deadwood I made with is not out of character; there is a foulness and filthiness to much of what we see Blackthorne and so many of the Portuguese (Blackthorne curses as much Al Swearengen does) and there is a kind of graphic violence that I am very familiar with; I’ve seen at least four beheadings and one man being boiled alive. But I suspect the more accurate model may be Rome which was hailed by many as an underrated masterpiece (I never saw it, so I’ll withhold my comparison). I do know that both series were ultimately cancelled because they became too expensive for HBO to justify their continued runs.

No expense was spared for Shogun and you can see all the money on the screen. It’s not just the brilliance of the scenery or the camera work; the three episodes I have seen have all of the epic scale of the epics of David Lean or John Huston. There is an attention to detail that we rarely see in so many limited series and the camera work and editing are at the kind of level of a great epic. The battles so often remind me of the kind of fighting I saw in so many of Edward Zwick’s war movies such as Glory and yes, The Last Samurai. You can see the blood and the dirt and the death up close as well as the gallantry in the fighting. I haven’t used words like ‘majesty’ in relation to a limited series, but I don’t think I’m understating it with Shogun.

All three episodes I’ve seen, I should mention, also run well over the hour limit of most limited series: each running anywhere from an hour and a quarter to an hour and a half. Most of the limited series I’ve seen that have these lengthy episodes (Under The Banner of Heaven is the most recent example) always seem bloated and overcooked. Not Shogun. In fact, this is the first limited series I remember. I wish the episodes were longer because I truly want to stay in this world more than I can imagine. The time seems to flow in a way I rarely see with many limited series that have these kinds of episode lengths and that’s the prime example of great storytelling.

Usually when something that is considered ‘sacred’ the way Shogun is, you see a huge amount of review bombing even before the series comes out. I saw it as recently as the prequel to Sexy Beast. Not here. It’s ranked at 9.2 on imdb.com and according to Variety when it premiered on Hulu, nine million people viewed it. The series dropped all at once on Hulu; I’m watching it on FX, mainly because I want to feel the experience the same way so many viewers once loved other series like this.

The sense of the epic has been returned to the limited series in 2024; earlier this year AppleTV released Masters of The Air, another historical miniseries that has a similar sense of spectacle that does not skimp on character. It is likely both series will be major contenders for Emmys during the next few months, adding to what will likely be an already crowded field. Based on the reception of both, it’s clear that there is as much a demand for spectacle and taking the limited aspect out of series.

I’m not saying I necessarily want this to lead to a diminishment of the kind of series that I have loved during the era of Peak Limited Series. But Shogun demonstrates that of the idea of the spectacle is worth doing if it can be done well and that there is clearly the same kind of audience for it that there is for Night Country and Lessons in Chemistry. I hope we get more of this kind of limited series. Hell Clavell did write five other books.

My score: 4.75 stars.