70 Fun Facts About Shogun TV Series

The 2024 series Shōgun is based on a 1975 novel by which author?

The book had sold six million copies worldwide by 1980 and is part of his Asian Saga.

Who plays Lord Yoshii Toranaga in the 2024 Shōgun?

He also served as a producer and pushed hard for historical authenticity on set.

Which English actor plays the shipwrecked pilot John Blackthorne in Shōgun (2024)?

He was born in New Jersey to an Armenian-American mother but moved to Britain at three months old.

Which actress plays the translator Lady Toda Mariko?

She was born in Wellington, New Zealand, and once sang in the Japanese girl group Faky.

On which platform did Shōgun premiere in February 2024?

Internationally it streamed on Disney+ and Star+.

Who created the 2024 adaptation of Shōgun?

They took over in 2020 after original writer Ronan Bennett became unavailable and the project was rebooted.

Blackthorne is loosely based on which real English navigator who became a samurai?

Adams was known in Japan as Miura Anjin, "the pilot of Miura".

Which real Japanese ruler is the model for Lord Toranaga?

He became shōgun in 1603 and founded a dynasty that ruled Japan for over 250 years.

How many Emmy categories did the first season of Shōgun win in 2024, a record for a single season?

It was the first Japanese-language series to win Outstanding Drama Series.

Which series was the first non-English-language nominee for the Outstanding Drama Series Emmy, before Shōgun?

Shōgun then went one better and became the first to win.

Where was principal photography for Shōgun's first season based?

Sanada called it a perfect place for a samurai drama, with forest, river, beach and mountains half an hour from the studio.

Which Oscar-winning composer co-wrote the score for Shōgun (2024)?

He worked with Leopold Ross and Nick Chuba, while Taro Ishida arranged traditional gagaku music.

Which video game designer likened Shōgun to "a Game of Thrones set in 17th-century Japan"?

Japanese audiences and critics largely praised the show's authenticity, unlike the 1980 version.

Tadanobu Asano plays which scheming lord of Izu, who tries to play both sides?

His character is loosely based on Honda Masanobu.

Toranaga's chief rival, the ruler of Osaka Castle, is which former peasant turned regent?

He is based on Ishida Mitsunari, who lost to Ieyasu at Sekigahara.

What is the name of the Dutch ship that carries Blackthorne to Japan?

The real William Adams arrived aboard the Liefde, the only survivor of a five-ship fleet.

What name do the Japanese give Blackthorne, meaning "pilot"?

It is also the title of the series premiere.

In what year is the first season of Shōgun set?

It opens with the Taikō dead and five regents ruling on behalf of his young heir.

Ajiro, the fishing village where Blackthorne's ship makes landfall, lies in which province?

Yabushige is the lord of the province and Ajiro is his nephew Omi's fief.

Which Portuguese Jesuit priest, nicknamed "Tsuji", translates for Toranaga?

He is based on João Rodrigues Tçuzu, and Tommy Bastow plays him.

Who becomes Blackthorne's reluctant consort in Ajiro after her husband and infant son are put to death?

She is Hiromatsu's granddaughter and by the finale plans to become a nun.

In the episode "The Eightfold Fence", Toranaga's son Nagakado uses what to ambush Ishido's envoy Jozen?

The novel had Blackthorne teaching muskets; the writers switched to cannon chain shot because Japan already knew muskets.

Which dead bird causes the death of Blackthorne's gardener Uejiro in "Broken to the Fist"?

Blackthorne had jokingly told his servants they would die if they touched Toranaga's gift.

What natural disaster strikes Ajiro in "Broken to the Fist", letting Blackthorne save Toranaga's life?

Toranaga loses his swords in the landslide and Blackthorne offers his own.

Mariko's father, Akechi Jinsai, killed which former ruler of Japan, disgracing the family?

Jinsai is modelled on Akechi Mitsuhide, who betrayed Oda Nobunaga in 1582.

What is the name of Toranaga's secret plan for a decisive strike on Osaka Castle?

The finale reveals it was never an attack at all but Mariko's mission to Osaka.

Which childhood friend of Mariko becomes Ochiba no Kata, the mother of the Taikō's heir?

Fumi Nikaido plays her; the character is based on Yodo-dono.

Toranaga's half-brother Saeki Nobutatsu is offered which prize by the Council in "A Stick of Time"?

Nagakado dies trying to assassinate his uncle at the teahouse.

How does Toranaga's son Nagakado die?

The accident happens while he is trying to kill his uncle Saeki at the Ajiro teahouse.

Which of Toranaga's generals commits seppuku in the eighth episode to make Toranaga's surrender look real?

Buntaro, his son, reluctantly acts as his second.

How many days of mourning does Toranaga intend to observe for his son after taking the army to Edo?

He cannot bring himself to attend the funeral itself.

In the ninth episode, what weapon does Mariko fight Ishido's guards with when they block her exit?

She then announces she will take her own life at sunset, forcing Ishido's hand.

How does Mariko die at the end of the ninth episode?

She stands in front of the door and names herself an Akechi rather than a Toda.

On what date, coincidentally her own birthday, did the actress playing Mariko film her death scene?

The writers originally planned to hold the death for the next episode.

In the season finale, Toranaga confirms he had Blackthorne's ship burned. Why?

Blackthorne had believed Mariko arranged it with the Church to spare his life.

Which villager is revealed in the finale to be Toranaga's spy and a samurai in disguise?

He had translated for Blackthorne since the first episode as a humble Christian fisherman.

Whose seppuku ends the first season, with Toranaga acting as second before the body falls into the sea?

His last question is whether Toranaga always wanted to be shōgun, which Toranaga refuses to answer.

Which historical battle does the finale point toward as Toranaga's coming victory over Ishido?

The real battle in October 1600 secured Tokugawa Ieyasu's path to the shogunate.

What was the title of Shōgun's first-season finale?

It was written by Maegan Houang and Emily Yoshida and directed by Frederick E. O. Toye.

Which episode did the actor playing Toranaga submit for his Emmy-winning lead performance?

Critics singled out his grief-stricken Toranaga in that hour as the season's peak.

Néstor Carbonell won a guest actor Emmy for playing which Spanish sailor?

He submitted the series premiere "Anjin" for the award.

Which of Blackthorne's former shipmates confronts him in Edo and, unlike in the novel, is not mute?

Blackthorne beats him unconscious and realises his old life is over.

How many episodes made up the first season of Shōgun?

Two episodes premiered on the same day, then the rest weekly until April 23, 2024.

Before its Super Bowl LVIII ad aired, Shōgun was already the most expensive series in which network's history?

Adweek joked that another $7 million for a spot hardly mattered.

Which pop-art superstar said the first season of Shōgun influenced his 2024 Gagosian exhibition?

IGN named the show the best TV series of 2024.

The star who plays Mariko became the first Japanese performer to win which Emmy category?

She was also the first Asian actress to win it.

Before Shōgun, the actress who plays Mariko broke through internationally in which Apple TV+ drama?

She also starred in the MonsterVerse series Monarch: Legacy of Monsters.

Shōgun's Mariko actress landed her first acting role at age 11 in a Japanese production of which musical?

The stage production was simulcast on Nippon TV in 2004.

Shōgun's Toranaga actor was the childhood protégé of which Japanese action star?

He holds a black belt in Kyokushin karate and began acting at five.

Shōgun's lead actor played the swordsman Ujio opposite Tom Cruise in which 2003 film?

He later played Scorpion in Mortal Kombat and appeared in John Wick: Chapter 4.

What was the 2011 single by Shōgun's Blackthorne actor that made the Triple J Hottest 100?

He directed the song's video himself.

Which actor played Blackthorne in the 1980 NBC miniseries of Shōgun?

Clavell wanted Albert Finney but ended up calling Chamberlain "marvelous".

Which legendary Japanese actor played Toranaga in the 1980 miniseries?

He was Kurosawa's leading man in films like Seven Samurai and Yojimbo.

Which actor reportedly laughed off the 1980 Blackthorne role after hating filming You Only Live Twice?

Roger Moore and Albert Finney were also considered.

The 1980 miniseries famously did not subtitle its Japanese dialogue. Why?

The 2024 version instead subtitles everything and gives Japanese characters equal weight.

Which replica of Francis Drake's flagship played the European vessel in the 1980 miniseries?

It is now moored as an exhibit at St Mary Overie Dock in London.

The 1980 Shōgun's 26.3 average Nielsen rating was second in TV history only to which miniseries?

Restaurants and cinemas reportedly saw business drop during the broadcast week.

Over how many nights did NBC broadcast the original 1980 Shōgun miniseries?

It aired September 15 to 19, 1980.

The novel Shōgun is part of which series of books by its author?

It has the earliest setting of the six but was the third published.

The novel Shōgun chronicles the end of which period of Japanese history?

The Edo period that followed lasted from 1603 to 1868.

In which English county was the real-life Anjin born?

He described himself as "a Kentish-man, borne in a Towne called Gillingham".

The real navigator behind Blackthorne served under Francis Drake against which fleet in 1588?

He was master of a resupply ship carrying ammunition and food.

When did principal photography on Shōgun's second season begin?

Sanada, Jarvis, Bastow and Nikaido all return.

Justin Marks joked the network had greenlit a costly subtitled period piece climaxing in what?

Sanada himself had wondered whether a mostly Japanese-language series was a gamble.

How many Golden Globe Awards did the first season of Shōgun win, including Best Television Series – Drama?

Sanada, Sawai and Asano all won acting Globes, and the season also picked up a Peabody Award.

Who plays Ochiba no Kata, the mother of the Taikō's heir, in Shōgun?

The character is modelled on the historical Yodo-dono, the only consort of Toyotomi Hideyoshi to bear him an heir.

When did FX first announce a new adaptation of Shōgun with a straight-to-series order?

It took until September 2021 for cameras to roll in Vancouver, and filming overran by two months into mid-2022.

Roughly how many views did Shōgun draw across Hulu, Disney+ and Star+ in its first six days?

Samba TV called it the most-streamed programme on any platform in each of its first two weeks.

A Japanese white pine used on the Shōgun set was donated after filming to the city hall of which town?

Japanese extras on the British Columbia shoot were reportedly paid 50,000 yen a day, far above Japanese industry norms.

Which historical figure is the basis for Kashigi Omi, Yabushige's bright nephew and lord of Ajiro?

Hiroto Kanai plays Omi; the other names belong to the real models for Ishido, Buntaro and Nagakado.