See how the pilot of Shōgun, winner of 18 Emmy® Awards, hits the Save the Cat! story beats.
Written by: Rachel Condo & Justin Marks, based on the 1975 novel by James Clavell
Directed by: Jonathan van Tulleken
S1 E1: “Anjin”
The World: Japan in the year 1600 during Sengoku Jidai, “The Warring States Era”
Franchise Type: (Wo)Man with a Plan (with a touch of Mad, Mad World)
Pilot Episode Genre: Golden Fleece
Platform: FX on Hulu
TV Genre: Historical Fiction Drama Series
Story DNA:
Heroes: Lord Yoshii Toranaga, one of the five powerful regents ruling Japan on behalf of the late Taikō‘s heir; the “Anjin,” John Blackthorne, a Protestant English maritime pilot who is taken captive by Toranaga; and Toda Mariko, a Catholic convert who serves as translator between Blackthorne and Toranaga.
Goal(s): For Toranaga, to keep the Heir safe and prevent an all-out war; for Blackthorne, to plunder all Portuguese Catholic territories in Japan and open trade with this new world; for Mariko, to find a new purpose for her life and heal her broken heart from the death of her father.
Obstacle(s): An abundance of enemies, both external and internal
Stakes: Their lives and the future of their countries
Opening Image: A massive vessel drifts through dense fog in the darkness, looking like a ghost ship with its tattered sails and broken masts; a single light glows from within, a testament to life… but just barely.
Set-Up: Against flickering images of destruction below deck, a Super on screen informs us that it’s the year 1600, the reigning Taikō has died, leaving the rule of Japan in the hands of five warrior regents until a child Heir is old enough to become Emperor, and Portuguese Catholics dominate trade in Japan, keeping the country’s whereabouts secret from their enemies, European Protestants.
We meet one of those Protestants in his thesis world, our anti-Hero, Pilot Major John Blackthorne (Cosmo Jarvis), riddled with scurvy and near death from starvation, trying to convince the Captain (Ned Dennehy) of the Dutch Erasmus that they are nearing their long-awaited destination, the Japans. Down to a single ship and 12 men from a fleet of five and 500 souls, the Captain declares that their voyage has been nothing but futility and commits suicide. Blackthorne is left to contemplate whether he will also end his own life or try to survive long enough to be the first European to set foot in a foreign land he’s not even sure really exists.
Theme Stated: Lord Yoshii Toranaga (the Emmy-winning Hiroyuki Sanada) admires a falcon, saying she “conceals herself against the sun, conserving energy, waiting for her moment.” This powerful and brilliant warlord knows, as do Blackthorne and Toda Mariko (the Emmy-winning Anna Sawai), that their survival in this unforgiving world will depend on being shrewd, strategic, and ruthless—all the while trying to maintain their humanity as they battle with the eternal question: is life ruled by shukumei (a fixed destiny) or do we have true agency?
Catalyst: Tonomoto Akinao (Yasunari Takeshima), an elderly fisherman, wanders down to the ocean, humming a song. As he grasps his cross necklace, presumably to pray, his Catholic god delivers the unexpected: the Erasmus emerges from the fog, stunning Akinao and setting in motion a cataclysmic series of events that will reverberate throughout the known world.
Debate: While samurai try to take the few remaining crewmen of the Erasmus captive and Blackthorne fights back, one samurai notices some strange weaponry aboard the ship: cannonballs. We get the sense that this find may be valuable in some way to Toranaga, Lord of Kantō, as he approaches Osaka Castle to face his nemesis, Ishido Kazunari (Takehiro Hira).
Accompanied by his most trusted confidant, “Iron Fist” Hiromatsu (Tokuma Nishioka), Toranaga faces the council of the other four regents who are determined to find evidence that he is a traitor bent on power; they accuse him of kidnapping the Heir’s mother and demand her return within seven days, under threat of Toranaga’s impeachment (which is actually a death sentence for Toranaga and his whole line). They fear Toranaga because he is a descendant of the Minowara clan who once ruled Japan as shōguns.
Meanwhile, we meet the tortured but resilient Mariko as she deftly and compassionately prevents Usami Fuji’s (Moeka Hoshi) suicide, and bear witness to Blackthorne’s plan to save the lives of his men by claiming the Erasmus is a ship of innocent merchants lost at sea and not the “shit-smelling Protestant scoundrels” they really are.
Break into Two: The crafty ruler of Ajiro, Yabushige (Todanobu Asano), rides into his modest fief like a returning hero, ready to go toe to toe with the mysterious “barbarian.”
Fun and Games: Blackthorne tries to use his wiles to charm his captors in this upside-down antithesis world, and is rewarded with getting pissed on by a samurai. A Portuguese priest purports to translate for Blackthorne and Yabushige, but things go south when the Protestant Blackthorne calls him a “papist prick” and the priest declares that the barbarian is actually a pirate and should be executed. Yabushige, obviously not a fan of religion of any type, stops just short of rolling his eyes as he commands Blackthorne to be bathed and housed. The barbarian sneers at the priest, declaring that Protestants will soon be swarming throughout Japan and cutting in on the monopoly the Portugese have on its riches.
We also see Toranaga’s warm and fatherly relationship with the Taikō’s young Heir, Nakamura Yaechiyo (Sen Mars), and his affection for his supportive wife Kiri no Kata (Yoriko Dōguchi); they lament the bloodshed that is certain to come and Kiri no Kata tells her husband that while she knows he is a good man, “now is not the time for good men.” She begs him to draw on his shōgun blood and save their lives, but Toranaga feels helpless and hopeless.
B Story: There are a number of tangled B Story relationships in Shōgun, but the love affair between Blackthorne and Mariko, only hinted at in the pilot episode, will bridge the gap between east and west and provide the emotional underpinning of the action.
Midpoint: In a false defeat for the Protestants, one of Blackthorne’s men is boiled alive by Yabushige, who has a morbid curiosity with violent death (and weird sex, too, apparently, as he enthusiastically slurps his soup while watching his courtesan seduce one of his men).
Bad Guys Close In: Yabushige, outwardly loyal to Toranaga but always looking for a loophole, plots with his nephew, Kashigi Omi (Hiroto Kanai) to use the weapons on the Erasmus to gain favor with Ishido once Toranaga has been executed. This plan is quickly shut down by Hiromatsu, but the simmering (and smiling) Yabushige appears to be a wild card in this battle of wills.
Blackthorne is taken to Osaka by the cynically amusing Rodrigues (the Emmy-winning Néstor Carbonell), who says Blackthorne will certainly die in Japan because these people live by shukumei, a.k.a., “karma,” an implacable destiny that Blackthorne should just accept—which, of course, he does not.
All Is Lost: The ship headed for Osaka hits a terrible storm and it looks like curtains for the whole crew.
Dark Night of the Soul: The skilled anjin Blackthorne saves their lives, but just as he’s about to put another notch on his western civilization superiority belt, he witnesses Yabushige performing a singular act of bravery that stuns and confuses him—has he been wrong about these “godless savages”?
Break into Three: Toranaga reasserts his leadership by summoning Mariko; perhaps he is not so resigned to shukumei after all.
Finale: Toranaga gathers the team and sets up a way to execute the plan: Mariko will translate for him and Blackthorne, the barbarian who could possibly turn the tide in this coming apocalypse. We feel the pull of his hope, even when in a bit of a high-tower surprise, Rodrigues discovers the manifest from the Erasmus, making abundantly clear that Blackthorne’s intentions for Japan are brutal and self-serving. But fear not, we sense that the wise and clear-eyed Toranaga will have an arsenal of contingency plans for the upcoming episodes.
Final Image: In a visual hint of the synthesis world to come, Toranaga, Mariko, and Blackthorne have their first meeting; as Blackthorne bows respectfully, we cut to an over-the-shoulder shot of Toranaga looming over the anjin, assuring us that while this falcon may be waiting for his moment, he will most certainly prevail.
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