SHOGUN, people. SHOGUN!

 

Oh my god. Oh Portugese God. Oh friggin' god of all falcons, short and long winged.

I repeat: SHOGUN!

This show, in this era, in the last decade of the most decadent and beautiful and tragic and incredibly crafted and stacked with acting talent and imagination television. In and out of all of it, this show has risen, I believe, to claim the crown of best TV show ever.

And look, I'm not trying to dance around like a fool waving war fans made out of hot take clickbait (to my single digit readership) when I say this. It is not said lightly. Also, I recognize that I am caught in the afterglow of pillowing, having just finished the series last night - and maybe I'm about to be descended upon by shinobi wearing such flags as the Sopranos or Mad Men (in my mind they are probably wearing the Americans logo). But there is nothing, there is absolutely nothing about this show that does not rate below 10/10.

Here is a non-exhaustive list of things it 10s out of 10:

• Production values including costumes, sets, props etc
• All technical visual and audio stuff - it's beautifully presented, and the score is wonderfully contributory without being ostentatious
• The acting is off the charts
• The writing (dialog) is even further off the charts - which in and of itself is amazing, but when you consider that it was written in English, then Japanese, then C17 Japanese, then back to English for subtitles ... it blows my mind
• The writing (story) is intricate, so well thought out, it's tragic (like tears, man, prepare to shed some tears), it's at times funny, and in a nod to music, maybe (in particular jazz, Ryan Gosling), it's the words left unsaid that really throw the whole pile hurdling off a cliff to be battered by waves against jagged rocks until only the option of seppuku remains. I like this. I love shows that respect the audience to figure some shit out for themselves, because the echo of realization makes the impact earned and deeply resonant
• The actors are all amazing - yes Hiro Sanada, obviously, Anna Sawai (moment!!) and Cosmo Jarvis are all tremendous, like these are all Emmy performances; but then you get to the second level: Tadanobu Asano who plays Yabushinge, Takehiro Hira who plays Ishido are just two of multiple; and then you get to the third level: Moeka Hoshi who plays Fuji, and Hiroto Kanai who plays Omi, and the list goes on ... the height of skill and the depth that the talent reaches is amazing. And then when you consider all of these folks are native Japanese speakers (or if they're not, then holy moly extra kudos) and certainly not of the regular Hollywood circuit, well then ... simply, wow (incidentally, as we have moved into the Representation Era of Hollywood, we have seen the unearthing of some seriously amazing Asian talents)
• The little details such as letting Japanese people speak Japanese (I think this is the way it should be), or the slight deviations in translation from party to party (Mariko, you are the slyest of devils) - something that each speaker at one point or another worries about and sometimes directly confronts the translator over - all these details equal crazy levels of realism that enrich the show, like a 48 hour tonkotsu stock

Anyway, maybe I'll write a separate spoiler-y discussion post but for now I'm still reeling in the whole aftermath of it all (I watched episodes 9 and 10 last night) and my heart hurts. But, it is also overjoyed to have watched this series, and I had to say something. So if you haven't started it yet, friggin' go press play on Shogun already. And get ready, you shitbag barbarian, get ready for a journey for which you could never have prepared anyway.