Shōgun Premiere Recap: Does FX's Epic Samurai Tale Rule? Grade It!
FX's sweeping new adaptation of Shōgun takes us back to feudal Japan in the year 1600... when the arrival of an English sailor has the potential to change history.
Tuesday's premiere — which is now streaming on Hulu and airs tonight at 10/9c on FX — opens with a creaky ship emerging from the fog like a ghost, and one of its passengers is that English sailor John Blackthorne, played by Cosmo Jarvis. They have no food or water left, and one of Blackthorne's fellow sailors is so hopeless that he takes his own life, but Blackthorne is convinced they'll soon reach land and find riches in Japan, the land of feudal lords and samurai warriors. Sure enough, his ship soon crash-lands on a rocky shore in Japan, and when soldiers board the vessel, they find all the sailors starved and nearly unconscious. The soldiers imprison Blackthorne and his crew, who worry they'll be hanged, but Blackthorne rallies them with a stirring speech: "This is not where we die."
Meanwhile, we meet Lord Toranaga (Lost alum Hiroyuki Sanada), one of five lords sharing power after the reigning ruler died, leaving only an heir who's too young to rule. Toranaga meets with the other four lords, but he doesn't receive a friendly welcome: They're concerned he's consolidating power against them, and they accuse him of holding the heir's mother hostage when she's just staying at his castle for the imminent birth of a baby. They give Toranaga seven days to return the heir's mother, or they will vote to impeach him. One of Toranaga's loyal henchmen, Tadayoshi, stands up and objects to the "flimsy accusations" against his lord, but when Toranaga orders him to stand down, Tadayoshi apologizes — and asks for permission to commit seppuku, or ritual suicide, to end his family line.
Toranaga's friend Hiromatsu advises him that if they return the heir's mother, they'll all be killed, so Toranaga decides to stall for time, sending Hiromatsu back home to check in on the shipwreck. It's there that we learn the full scale of Tadayoshi's punishment: His infant son will be killed, too, and his wife Lady Fuji threatens to take her own life rather than hand over her baby. But a woman named Mariko (Monarch: Legacy of Monsters' Anna Sawai) intervenes, pulling a knife out of Lady Fuji's hand and convincing her that she still has something to live for.
The local lord Yabushige orders Blackthorne and his men out of the prison cell, but they don't speak each other's languages, leading to a struggle where they call each other "savages." Blackthorne does speak Portuguese, though, and since Portuguese traders have already landed in Japan, they find a Japanese serf to translate. Blackthorne claims they're just peaceful merchants and pleads to be released, but they refuse, and when Blackthorne protests, a guard holds him down while another guard... well, relieves himself on him.
Blackthorne is brought before Yabushige, with a Portuguese priest brought in to translate, but Blackthorne doesn't trust the priest, and indeed, the priest claims he's an evil pirate with murder on his mind. Blackthorne fights back, though, and Yabushige decides to spare him — although he condemns another of Blackthorne's men to die by being (oof) boiled to death. Japanese attendants trim Blackthorne's wild hair and beard, and Yabushige enjoys the company of a courtesan, watching as she gets intimate with one of his henchmen. Yabushige also has his men confiscate all the weapons and jewels on Blackthorne's ship, since he's convinced that Toranaga is a dead man walking and the weapons will be useful in the war that's sure to come.
Hiromatsu arrives and informs Yabushige that everything found on Blackthorne's ship belongs to Toranaga now. When Yabushige tries to say that this is his fief, Hiromatsu puts his hand on his samurai sword and says: "It was my understanding that you were loyal to my lord." Yabushige backs down with a smile, and Hiromatsu announces he plans to take Blackthorne back to Osaka to meet Toranaga. A Spanish sailor named Rodrigues (Nestor Carbonell) steps in to translate, telling Blackthorne he's about to meet a powerful lord. He also informs him his ship is theirs now, encouraging him to leave his future up to fate. On their way to Osaka, though, they hit a violent storm that sends Rodrigues overboard, and Blackthorne heroically helps steer the ship to safety. When they reach land, Blackthorne insists on going back to find Rodrigues: "Where I come from, we don't leave a man behind."
Blackthorne hikes up a cliff with Yabushige and his men, finding Rodrigues washed up on the rocks below. Blackthorne wants to scale down with a rope, but they won't let him, so he hands the rope to Yabushige, challenging him to retrieve Rodrigues. Yabushige takes the challenge, but when he's halfway down the cliff, the rope breaks, and he lands hard on the rocks, leaving him dazed and bloodied. He manages to save Rodrigues, but then he falls into the water himself and gets pulled under the tide. Yabushige draws his sword, prepared to end his life on his own terms — but a rope drops down just in time to pull him to safety.
An impressed Blackthorne bows before Yabushige, and they make their way to Osaka, where Toranaga enlists Mariko to serve as translator for the English sailor. Blackthorne calls this "a savage land," but Rodgrigues invites him to look at the city of Osaka and reconsider, and he is indeed awed when he sees the sprawling cityscape. Tadayoshi and his baby son are put to death while Blackthorne is brought before Toranaga and Mariko as we hear Rodrigues tell him: "Maybe fate brought you here for a reason. Maybe you'll live long enough to find out what it is."
Are you pledging your loyalty to FX's Shōgun after that premiere? Grade it in our poll, and then hit the comments and tell us if you'll keep watching.