|
Scoss posted:Slightly confused by some of the background politics in EP3 Toranaga was effectively being held as a hostage under threat of impending impeachment. I don't think pirating/privateering is a distinction Japan would accept, particularly as they have no contact with the Protestant rulers and no reason to respect their behaviour. I read Blackthorne differently there - I think he was genuinely trying to explain that he doesn't know how to train and drill troops or to teach battle tactics (which is not the same as blasting cannon from your ship, after all), but quickly realised that this would be a death sentence.
|
#
¿
Mar 5, 2024 23:30
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 12, 2024 04:51 |
|
|
Arglebargle III posted:They cast a guy with brown eyes who's English but doing a weird English guy voice. Everything about this is good except for the lead. Counterpoint: the IT'S NOT PROPER!! WORSE THAN THAT, IT'S VULGAAR!! scene was fantastic and very funny, and it relies on him having a bellowing baritone. I will admit that they've gone to the well of "intense close-up reaction shot of Cosmo Jarvis' wide-eyed and trembling face" maybe 2 or 3 times too many.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 7, 2024 09:47
|
|
|
For all the Game of Thrones comparisons, Shogun is really much closer to The Wire - it's got the constant narcing from all sides, scheming scoundrels who just aren't quite smart enough to come out on top, the intricate social expectations and suffocating codes of conduct within a system that will ultimately devour us all, the focus on translation and communication, the short and dispassionate bursts of violence, the wealthy criminal shipping syndicate led by devious foreigners, and the lead is a drunk-sounding Englishman who thinks the rules shouldn't apply to him and keeps pissing everyone off. It rocks.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 16, 2024 13:34
|
|
|
Nice Tuckpointing! posted:Which makes me wonder if the show writers had an idea when deconstructing a lot of Clavell's cultural assumptions from the novel: "Guys, is Toranaga the baddie?" Sanada, at least, has been quite vocal on the press tour saying that he sees Toranaga as a heroic figure and an exemplar, so it'll be interesting to see how the rest of the character arc plays out.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 22, 2024 10:10
|
|
|
On one level I can understand the impatience to be getting on with things - we've had a couple of successive episodes where characters have signalled the end credits by very dramatically declaring "It's war / the time for politics is over", and then the show's focus has gone right back to hanging out in Yabu's village / the decidedly political business of conducting job interviews in Osaka, with only smaller glimpses given to the audience of the forward momentum that's occurring elsewhere. It hasn't been cheap or unjustified, but I can get that it might be starting to remind viewers unfavourably of blockbuster shows like GoT that tended to stall for time mid-season by having its characters make portentous declarations of intent to a big swell of music before the end credits...and then go right back to bickering in tents, because after all there are another four episodes to go before it's time for the actual big battle sequence or betrayal. On the other hand, Shogun is proving its skill with small and understated character moments so well, and using these moments to play into the wider themes of the story so effectively, that I almost don't want them to get to the fireworks factory. (That tender but unreciprocated finger caress. Buntaru's isolated cheek twitch when he sees his wife. The unstated parallel between Blackthorne's gardener and Mariko's dad. It's all great.) grobbo fucked around with this message at 08:34 on Mar 27, 2024 |
|
#
¿
Mar 27, 2024 08:31
|
|
|
It's been said, but it feels like they've worked themselves into a baffling narrative corner this episode. If Saeki was privy to a clever plot and only pretending to publicly 'arrest' Toranaga in order to march him up to the gates of Osaka, it'd be much more fun and satisfying to watch that twist play out rather than revealing it in the messy aftermath that will presumably open Episode 8 (and the reveal of Toranaga's brilliance massively undercut by the obvious audience question of 'could you really not have predicted your idiot son flying off the handle and accounted for that in some way?'.) If the reveal is going to be that Toranaga has secretly summoned another army offscreen, that's going to be weightless and unsatisfying, a la late-era Game of Thrones. If Blackthorne's strop over Toranaga's surrender was genuine, it's a tiresome character regression after he literally just pledged undying allegiance. If it was a fake strop to cover Blackthorne's exit as part of some cunning plan to sneak back onto the Erasmus (as Reddit seems to think) then to what purpose? He's only drawing attention to himself. If Nagakado's death makes Saeki change his mind and align with his brother, that's going to feel like the entirety of Episode 7 was narrative foot-dragging - we don't have any reason to care about Saeki's inner state or emotional allegiance, we've only just met him.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 5, 2024 10:32
|
|
|
I think by now it's fair to admit the show could probably have benefitted from a couple of extra episodes and bit of a structural rearrangement to help us through the political intrigue in this second half. Toranaga's plan is only reasonable to the viewer if we accept the fact that Osaka's spies are observing him so closely and competently that he needs to go to extreme, even self-destructive lengths of secrecy: fake-coughing as soon as he wakes up in case someone's listening through the walls, alienating his own men and repeatedly leading to the deaths of loved ones (as well as fuelling his top lieutenants' open speculation that he must be up to something, which is surely not helpful!) by refusing to even privately confide in a few key allies. However, it seems increasingly as if for the plot to work out, we're also going to have to accept the fact that these same spies simply aren't listening in - and Toranaga is somehow fully confident in that - when he tells Mariko in his chambers that he's manoeuvring the Edo Bros to his advantage, or when she goes to join up with them and tells everyone Toranaga sent her (on a dock! In front of Omi and a whole bunch of other random people!), or when Father Martin comes to visit. Because otherwise it's going to be: "Lord Ishido, good news - the Portuguese report that Toranaga is coughing feebly and only wants a peaceful death. That said, they spent their audience openly trying to recruit him to overthrow you, then he gave them a reward and explicitly asked them to feed back how frail and defeated he is, which was an odd thing to say, so maybe take that with a pinch of salt." This would be easier to handwave past if we could see what information is being fed back to Ishido or how it's happening (it feels partly like a pacing issue that they haven't, but I also get the impression they're holding off on a big reveal about the spy's identity that is not actually going to be all that surprising...?) but currently Toranaga is coming across less as a masterful strategist, more as a wildly erratic overthinker. grobbo fucked around with this message at 18:27 on Apr 10, 2024 |
|
#
¿
Apr 10, 2024 18:13
|
|
|
Aurubin posted:While in line for the "what a twist!" thing, I just think a Toranaga false flag has too much potential for failure. But who knows, maybe they'll sell it well if it's that. It's a fun idea, but if Toranaga has access to an untraceable shinobi group in the heart of Osaka, including one guy who is able to successfully disguise himself as one of Ishido's retainers, surely there's other, less convoluted, uses he could have put them to. Anyway, brilliant episode. The final image will stay with me for a long time, heartbreaking, horrible, and weirdly beautiful.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 17, 2024 07:37
|
|
|
Rabelais D posted:Blackthorne just kind of appears heavily constipated in every scene he's in, I think it's the combined effect of the stiff acting and the weird voice Cosmo is doing, he's absolutely the weak link in the cast. Not an easy role though. I do still think this is a deliberate choice, and Jarvis is entertainingly and mostly very effectively playing up certain aspects in order to demonstrate how Blackthorne must come across to the rest of the characters, in constant violation of social etiquette: graceless and unable to remain still, blurting out his innermost emotions or leaving them instantly readable upon his shocked or sorrowful face, bellowing unnecessarily loudly or emphatically to make a point (while, say, Mariko can make the same point with a gentle 'So sorry, but...') I'm not sure I'm willing to stand up and wholeheartedly defend what appears to be his Ep 10 line reading of "Don't you understand? I came here to YOOOSE YOOOOOOOOU", though.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 18, 2024 07:56
|
|
|
Perestroika posted:That reminds me of one of my favourite moments this episode that got kinda overshadowed by the finale: Mariko telling Blackthorne that they should leave, her having a tearful final goodbye with Oshiba, and him just absolutely gracelessly STOMP STOMP STOMPing away. That was so good and somehow a perfect visual representation of 'I'm ready to leave the party but my wife keeps stopping to say goodbye to people'
|
|
#
¿
Apr 18, 2024 08:52
|
|
|
Sentinel Red posted:I hope not, the scene in the 80s series where Yabu gives Blackthorne his sword and tells him this is how a true samurai dies, while cussing everyone else out before he guts himself is one of my favourites. The trailer shows Toranaga hefting his katana in a very second-y way, although I wondered if that was going to be Blackthorne trying to commit seppuku as the climax of his character arc and then getting forgiven. With only an hour to fit in so much storytelling, it'll be interesting if they're going to use Ishido's fate from the novel. It might come across as a bit deranged on Toranaga's part to have Yabushige being ordered to die with honour for his many acts of betrayal followed immediately by "and as for you, who largely attempted to thwart me via the rule of law, get in the hole and starve to death"
|
|
#
¿
Apr 20, 2024 13:24
|
|
|
Thinking back over the show, I'm probably a 'it-would-have-been-better-with-Sekigahara-included-to-some-extent' truther. That's not about needing flashy action sequences. It's just coming away from the series lacking the satisfaction of explicit payoff for story elements that were built up very well but ultimately never came to climax (like the regents' increasing unhappiness with Ichido) but also with lingering dissatisfaction over story elements that I think were honestly handled pretty badly (like Saeki - unless I missed it, I don't think the show ever established exactly when his huge army ceased to be a threat to big T, but presumably it either left some time during the mourning period, or the idea is that Saeki has implicitly switched sides by the time of the final council?) A lot of narrative information that the show spent a good deal of time investing the audience in - the threat of Saeki's massive encircling army and the question of Saeki's loyalty, the diminished size of Toranaga's forces, who has ownership of the cannons, the Christian bloc in Osaka - proved to be basically irrelevant to the final episode in favour of Ochiba's shifting allegiance and the fallout of the hostages being freed (and I don't think we really got enough time with either of these to feel the weight of them). There's a bit of 'ho ho, I suppose you Michael Bay-loving nerds wanted a big battle scene with katanas? You simply cannot appreciate the elegance and refinement of a quiet character-focused final episode which leaves you to infer much of what happens next' talk going on online, and I don't think that's necessarily fair to the audience. For all of its excellent character work, this was also an extremely plotty show which I don't think always managed its plot effectively, and by having a penultimate episode that explicitly shows Toranaga's former enemies coming around to his side - even if that means a more traditional climax than what appears in the novel - I think it could have swept away a lot of those issues, paid off its occasionally faltering narrative momentum, and given more weight to the final episode we actually got. Ultimately, it is narratively dissatisfying to end with Toranaga still hanging around on the beach in Izu waiting to accomplish his goals when we spent a sluggish mid-section of episodes waiting for him to get out of Izu and accomplish his goals, and I don't think that's evidence of superior storytelling so much as evidence of structural and budgetary issues which the show could never quite manage to resolve. grobbo fucked around with this message at 08:33 on Apr 24, 2024 |
|
#
¿
Apr 24, 2024 08:27
|
|
|
snoremac posted:Based on that dream sequence showing the armies gathered I wonder if they had the budget left to make a good looking battle anyway. TV really needs to take a step back from the absurd expectations set by Game of Thrones and return to the production standards of the 90s Sharpe TV series, where all you need to simulate the Battle of Talavera is 40 uncomprehending Crimean extras and a smoke machine.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 24, 2024 14:00
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 12, 2024 04:51 |
|
|
Hero is a fascinating one because unlike most uncomfortably sympathetic depictions of Great Men Who Do What Must Be Done, it doesn't really make the effort to humanise its king or develop his psychology. Instead it has the courageous assassin stop dead in his tracks and declare that the tyrant who may or may not have massacred a bunch of innocent scribes earlier in the movie is in fact the great unifier the nation needs. The king nods approvingly from his throne and says he's glad someone understands what he's trying to achieve, and then has him killed anyway.
|
|
#
¿
May 6, 2024 13:17
|
|