A Geek History of Time - Episode 298 - Shogun Way Back Then, Then, and Now Part I

Episode Date: January 10, 2025

Okay, so there's there there are two possibilities going on here. One you're bringing up a term that I have never heard before. The other possibility is that this is a term I've heard before but it involves a language that uses pronunciation That's different from Latin it and so you have no idea how to say it properly an intensely 80s post-apocalyptic Schlock film and schlong film, you know, it's been over 20 years, but spoilers Okay, so so the Resident Catholic thinking about that. We're going for low Earth orbit. There is no rational. Blame it on me after.

And you know I will. They mean it is two o'clock in the fucking morning. Where I am. I don't think you can get very much more homosexual panic than that. No. Which I don't know if that's better. I mean you guys are Catholics. You tell me. I'm just kind of excited that like you and producer George will have something to talk about

That basically just means that I can show up and get fed This is a geekek History of Time. Where we connect nerdery to the real world. My name is Ed Blaylock. I'm a world history teacher here in Northern California. And earlier today, my son had a soccer game. And I'm very, very proud of him. He played like hell.

He ran, ran his heart out, was, was always going after the ball, always doing his best. And it was hard for me to watch because his team was pretty seriously overmatched today. And they wound up losing in a in a pretty dramatic blowout So like I'm really really proud of him and I felt really really bad For him because I remember that experience Not not having been very athletic myself and and yeah, it was my inner child Had a very hard time watching his game today but he he had a whole lot of fun he was really amped he came within inches of scoring a goal so yeah and and again I'm proud as heck of him because

he you know he was playing his heart out so it was great and he had fun so that's at the end of the day That's what's really important It was it got tough points for me So how about you? Well? I'm Damian Harmony. I am a US history teacher up here in Northern, California And I have made the decision as you know that I'm running my kids through the West End Games Star Wars Yes, they have time traveled I made the decision, as you know, that I'm running my kids through the West End game Star Wars. Yes. They have time traveled by way of suspended animation.

And I've decided to... I was going to have them do all kinds of adventures. They've already fought some of the Knights of Ren and whittled them down from 12 to 6. So that that's what we see in the movies. Yeah. I like it. All right. Yeah, either I've overpowered my kids or they've just gotten really good at like tactical thinking But either way I've decided instead of keeping them Like around the first order while everything's going on. Yeah, they've already kind of seen enough

Like they they woke up on Starkiller base. They fought the Knights of Ren. They met the last surviving clones Who helped them fight off like the First Order I'm going to take them to I'm gonna hold this up, and you will see I'm doing this Okay, your your settings with the background are doing weird things there we go oh Damn all right. That's that's a campaign right there. They are going to do dark Strider I'm going to update it so that it's you know first yeah, yeah, but you know you basically got warlords So I'll just you know update. You know Imperial troops with first-order troops. It's not a deal

But yes, I'm going to have them go off on the far star and all kinds of stuff all right But yeah, so that's what I got going on. Yeah, right I Got nothing All right done a lot this is a good episode like all right there there. We go all right We'll call these roles oneys. I don't know yeah Keep rolling 20s, but in any event no It's only it's only fair that you know I pick up and do my best to try to shoulder the burden You know after after the last I don't know how many episodes in that series But yeah, you've you

Go go ahead and you know rest by the fire a while, and I think I will you I'll regale you with a tail sir So one of the one of the remarkable things about the era we are living through right now And and this is I promise this isn't anything depressing or awful Because there's there are a lot of things there's There's an awful lot of things in this era that are but this this is Positively remarkable I think is that the expansion of a subscription,

like streaming services and, and the entry of, you know, so many different, uh, essentially, uh, platforms, uh, coming, coming online and all of them, hunting for content hunting for We got to have something to you know hook people and get people to get people to sign up, right? means that the Episodic model of television drama That you and I grew up with

the very American idea that okay, well this is going to be a series. And ultimately, in order to make money off of it, we want to get into syndication, which means we need to have this, you know, certain, certain significantly large number of episodes. And each season has to be 26 episodes or what have you, you know know half a year, right? And There was a very significant Financial hurdle that created for anybody who wanted to try to create a series or you know Because you had to convince a network that it was worth paying for

That many episodes of something, right? Right, right. And pilot season and that's how they would pick things up. Yeah. They would almost always like there was pilot season and then there was mid season attempts. So basically, record a pilot, it would get shown. They would either say, okay, let's give it a shot for a whole season, or we're gonna release it in March. We want half a season from you.

We'll see how it does and we'll let you know. Yeah. And that was essentially, those were the two models for TV, at least in the 80s and 90s. Yeah, in the 80s and 90s here in the States, that was kind of the way that went and Like we talked about earlier in in the episodes about Latium games and rifts when I was talking about the development of the of the role-playing genre

and we talked about the fact that you know trying to reach a critical mass of We need this many people to get into this and start buying the books before we can, you know, so that we can print more, you know, we need, we need to have, and that, you know, created a, a, a hurdle for lack of a better word. So in Europe on the other hand, especially I'm thinking of the BBC, if you look at British television series for the longest time, British television series have historically had episodes that are like, or had seasons rather, and they refer to them as series. So it'll be like, you know, the midsummer murders series one is like eight episodes

Because they had the Automatic buy-in from the BBC Of being able to just go. All right. Well, you know, we'll do we'll do ten episodes of this And if people like the series, we'll do another series. And otherwise, you know, we'll, we'll, you know, come up with something else and we'll, you know, and, and so. Yeah. I mean, the British model is also interesting in that they

end shit. Like they don't think, oh, we're going to just keep milking this cow after it's a corpse. They're like, said we're gonna do three seasons we're done yeah like life on Mars yeah or I was thinking um like the true blood no not true blood being human the other being you the good vampire one um not as sexy but but like the British being human it went for like three seasons with that cast and then they were like okay those characters those with that cast and then they were like, okay Those characters those actors are done doing what they were doing So they're moving on but we are going to continue the series for another couple seasons

Yeah, they're like, I mean we've got we've got characters like Frazier who's been on TV longer than anyone through two series because there's money to be made. You've got, I mean, the old joke of MASH being like three times longer than the Korean War. The actual Korean War. You know, and I would say that like, you know, toward the latter third of the series, like they did start flagging, but like,

and no pun intended, but like and no pun intended but But like ER lasted for 15 years. Grey's Anatomy is still going. It's been starting its 21st season. Yes You know, so like you got stuff like that and you know, bonanza, gunsmoke all those kinds of well, maybe not gunsmoke Bonanza forever. Yeah All those kinds of well, maybe I don't smoke bonanza bonanza forever. Yeah So you had that and you know, like Star Trek would be seven series and out unless it was you know, 9-eleven Where where? Empire or

Enterprise only went for yeah four or five. Yeah, but you know They they tended to have a more British mindset, but the British were like no we're done This this was a new we finished the narrative and we're done. Yeah, yeah and So so that's been that's been a British model for forever mm-hmm and We think it's because they're an empire that ended Whereas we don't think ours will I think it has more Yeah, yeah, but I mean, you know, it's a legitimate question about why and I think the

the reasoning is All of the decisions on on any kind of television production here in the United States are based on a profit motive. And so, again, these are private corporations, whereas the BBC is not. And so there's the risk aversion as to what are we gonna pick up and Then there is the okay. We didn't realize we had lightning in a bottle But we've caught it and how are we going to keep it going?

Right and we're gonna we're just gonna keep milking this cow until it keels over dead sure And then we're gonna try to see if one of its calves will you know carry on right? You know Joni loves chachi try to see if one of its calves will, you know, carry on, right? You know, Joni loves Chachi, um, you know, just the tortellas, you know, um, but, but with the, uh, ascendance of Netflix and Hulu and Disney plus and Amazon and all of these streaming services. Now the, the profit motive is now leading to, okay,

we can spend the money to do a 10 episode series and get everybody and their uncle to watch it. Like it's a good one if it really if it really hits Yeah, we're gonna. We're gonna. You know catch people and and make money off of it, and it'll be awesome And so we're seeing more and different kinds of stuff showing up and You know to look at you know the model that's being used by Disney Plus right now for Star Wars series for example or the Marvel series in the Marvel universe Each season of those is I think

like and or And or was a long one was a long one, but even as a long one it was 10 episodes No, I think it was it was closer to like 18 or something. I mean, I can look that up pretty quickly, but more to the point, like most of the Marvel series are six episodes. Um, it gets long when they get to 12 or 13, which is half of what a usual season, which is, yeah, which is the, yeah, kind of the point that I was, that I was getting to is it's still's still You know half as much as what a standard season used to be right and

It was it it was You're absolutely right. It was 12 12 episodes. Okay, and it was and as you say it was a long one Yeah, cuz Kenobi I think was only eight. Yeah, you know so Cause Kenobi I think was only eight. Yeah. You know, so the, and, and when you and I were growing up, cause as much as you like to point out how old I am, we're not that far apart chronologically. Very true. Um, the mini series was a special event on TV. It's like, okay, we're doing this thing that we would normally do as a movie,

but we're going to, we're going to break gonna break it up into you know multiple nights, right? Yeah, and and that was kind of cool because it had variability for instance V I believe was a two or three episode miniseries go back to the yeah the six episodes we did Six episodes that we spent talking about a three part mini series. But, but you know, and, and the, they were, they were because they were shorter, there was a more movie like, uh, kind of production value attached to them. If that makes sense.

Yeah. Yeah. And they were, yeah. And, and they were, and they were hyped and they were this big deal and Hey, you know, this is really going to be this big event. Right. Right. And you know, famously Roots was a cultural phenomenon, a huge big deal. Kind of the first big mini series. It really was like it was proof of not just concept, but like perfection. Yeah. Yeah. It, it, yeah. It was, it was in many ways the codifier for,

for like what you aimed for enemy series, as well as being, you know, kind of the, the, the, uh, originator of many of the kind of, kind of goals and concepts that you would have. Yeah. And so, um, I'm bringing all of that up and I'm going into all of that because, um, I'm bringing all of that up and I'm going into all of that because one of the interesting things that has happened recently is one of the really big mini series events of literally the beginning of the eighties got remade,

reimagined even just this past year and That is Shogun See now this one missed me so when the original come out, okay So the mini series came out in 1980 Okay, so here. I'm out it was- Much as I tease you, this is the cutoff point of my consciousness. This is true. Like this is where we differ, you know? I do not remember TV from 1980.

I do remember TV from 1982. Okay. Just two years ago. My exposure, so here's the deal, my exposure to Shogun was actually in 1984, right? When it got rebroadcast. Yeah. We never saw it. Okay. Yeah. Okay. And it could be because my parents saw or, you know, whoever was in charge of the remote that night kind of thing. If we had,

yeah. But whoever was in charge that night, like, whoever was making the decisions out of the TV. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. See, if it was, you said reb out of the TV. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, see if it was you said we broadcast in 84. Yeah Probably you gotta We were probably watching Dallas or I was going to or I was being put to bed cuz again that that distinction in age At that age probably mattered for bed. Yes, too. Oh, yeah. Yeah, so Fucking watching mystery. Oh my god They watch that shit all the fucking time and I bet you now I would appreciate it. Yeah, but as a kid it was

Oh, yeah, well, yeah, I mean the woman and she's And she said yeah Yeah, the intro was amazing and then after that if you were under I don't know 12 13 Yeah, you know and even if you're 12 or 13 you're like this is all moving way too slowly. Yeah. Oh My god, I did see the fight at Rickenbach Falls. Oh there you go. I remembered that action and I remembered he came back and Took off his deer hunter cap and yeah and said, um, you know, do you mind if I smoke dr? Watson? Was that only remember those Jeremy Brett? Do you know do you know which actor? Yeah. All right. No idea the pasty british one

Yeah No idea. The pasty British one. I don't know. I barely stayed interested. Just know that. Yeah. All right. So, but yeah. So so Shogun was was 1980 and it was produced by Paramount. It was a five-part miniseries And the thing is part of the part of the lead-in to it was the novel that it was based on

Mm-hmm was published in 1975 James Clavel was the author and he he Is well known for a number of novels Shogun is the one that he's that he's well known for a number of novels. Shogun is the one that he's best known for. Shogun is the one that catapulted into literary super stardom, because the book was a huge runaway hit. It is a tome.

It is a 1,000 plus page novel. So is it like a Michener book page novel so is it like a mitchner book I've also never read mitchner yeah, yeah, why Texas and if yeah? Yeah, yeah, you could you could very easily make the make the comparison of mitchner so like if if the on a least were novelists if the on a least were novelists yes, and no because the on a least were novelists yes, and no because the Analysts are we're going to look at all of these minutiae over the span of a century Mm-hmm in in order to not really even come to a conclusion. We're just gonna say hey

This is this is what the tables and the charts say right? We somehow made chronicling less exciting Chronicling even more boring than it already was God have mercy on your souls. Yes Everyone everyone in the room has become more and more Number essentially what has become numbers. Yeah number You were awarded no points and and God have mercy on your souls. For, for anybody in our audience who, who is not, uh, following our inside baseball here, uh, the analysts are a, are a school of,

of, uh, historiographical thought. Yeah. Uh, we're, we're wherein, um, their, their whole raison tetra and I'm going to use that phrase cause they were French, uh, was, was very, very long-term recording. I'm not even going to say it now. It's just very, very long-term, uh, recording and reporting of all kinds of statistics over the long term. So I will plumb the depths a little bit there

and push back. So people may well remember that in one of the bumpers it says, but also trade wins are a thing. It's not so much they were just recording, it's that their analysis was so overarching that you could not explain the election of Charles de Gaulle in 1968 without first understanding Phoenician broadships. Like, you gotta get it all. Yeah, yeah.

Like, you understand, you understand the picture. It needs to be sufficiently broad. Yes. Yeah Their analysis there. It's just like yes. Oh my god. I'm like fuck the opposite of Carlo Ginsburg. Yes. Yes Very much. Yeah, so anyway So it is shogun is the opposite of the analyst idea Because Shogun is a thousand pages long and it has this panoply of characters but It's actually it covers a very condensed span of time

It's it's a thousand pages All of which cover events taking place in the year of our Lord 1600, over the course of about maybe nine months. So it's like expanded Ulysses? Yes. Okay. Yeah, in a way, only more comprehensible. Sure. only more comprehensible sure and and a lot less prone to

Weird analysis by literature majors Well in fairness in fairness Ulysses was written by somebody who was living on an island whereas Shogun is about oh Yeah, never mind about Yeah, never mind So so show the novel and the miniseries is a historical drama

Based very loosely on the adventures of the first Englishmen in Japan Historically the band's name was William Adams Like I said, it's that it's the door stopper of a book and It it renames it it, you know gives gives fictitious names to a whole cast of luminaries from actual Japanese history From the end of the Sengoku Jidai the era of the country at war Okay Again, what year was it supposed to be? Okay, and again what year was it supposed to be? 1600 specifically the year 1600 okay, so I mean for Europeanists were the tail end of Elizabeth

Yes for the Stuart Kings, okay, yes, yes right before the Stuart's if I'm remembering the chronology there, right? It's right before the Stuart's and he became I want to say 1602 That sounds about right. Yes, oh two or three something like that. Yeah, okay, so so okay. We're talking Yeah, okay Yeah, we'd call it early modern period in Europe. Okay sure this is this is post Renaissance mm-hmm post northern Renaissance at this point this is post Renaissance mm-hmm post northern Renaissance at this point this is Religious warfare between Protestants and Catholics Trying to remember when 30 years with this is post 30 years war I think or no I'm wrong

I think it's pre 30 years war. It's pre 30 years war never mind But but that is that is winding up Well, all of the all of the all of the events that that are gonna lead to that or are fomenting in Europe Peter the great is kicking around doing his thing. Yes. He's he's no hundred years later, isn't it? Yeah, you know, he's early 18th century. Yeah, okay So but yeah, it's it's end of Elizabethan era The English and the Spanish and Portuguese hate each other Spanish Portuguese have

Beat up on the new world like yeah, they've Aztecs yeah, the the Spanish the Portuguese have gotten the Pope to divide the New World up between them mm-hmm Which is an important plot point everybody everybody put a pin in that okay? Because we're gonna come back to that in a while uh It might not be later in this episode, but it will be coming up, okay? So with this novel is is set on the other side of the planet from all of that. And Clevel in in the novel and by extension in the miniseries weaves his his fictionalized version of Adams.

He names his his character in in true really, really good role playing game character style, John Blackthorn. I mean, like that's, that's like way English and like, yeah. I mean, you named him after the stick that's used for chileles. Yeah. This guy's from the British Isles. Hi, how you doing? Yeah. Um, just, just so that we're clear I I yeah, you are by far the expert on this region of the world probably around this time Especially on our podcast. Yes, will you be telling us the good qualifier? Yeah

will you be telling us the the historical context leading up to the era that it set in. Oh Fuck yes Okay Because I know next I'd like my understanding is There's a whole bunch of really interesting stuff that I never studied and then the Meiji Emperor came like that's like I'm there then like that's it's I can get us from the Meiji Emperor forward Like I'm there then like that's

I can get us from the mage emperor forward. Oh man. Yeah Yeah, there's there's it's a lot. Yeah Okay, cool. I look forward to learning and having to rewind when this finally makes air Yeah, a bunch of times big wait who again what yeah I'm gonna I'm gonna do my best to when I go through that cuz cuz like yeah, I'm gonna do my best to try to focus on one Individual figure at a time sure in order to make the

individual figure at a time in order to make the Complexity of everything a little bit easier to follow We're following this individual's biography. Yeah, okay But all right. I look forward to it. Yeah, so so John Blackthorne uh-huh is our is our hero sure he's an English pilot which in the context of the 1600s means he is a very, very highly trained navigator and steersman of a ship. Right. Okay, so he is, he is by the standard of the day, he is going to be very highly educated, very knowledgeable and has to be somebody who is competent, cool under pressure, all of all

of these kinds of things. All right. So Clavel takes this historical figure of William Adams and in his fictional ization of the story he contrives things and moves figures around a little bit in history and changes timelines a bit in order to make Blackthorn part of events that he was not actually part of Okay, so of events that he was not actually part of. Okay. So, and this is all in the intrigue surrounding the collapse

of the Council of Five Elders, which I'm gonna get to explaining. And ultimately the Battle of Sekigahara, which is toward the end of 1600, which cemented Tokugawa Ieyasu's hegemony over Japan. That was the battle at which Tokugawa Ieyasu became the final unifier of what we would recognize today as modern Japan. And that is one of beginning and that is that is One of the dates that is considered the beginning of the Edo period

Okay, okay an Edo for for our listeners who don't know Edo is what we now call Tokyo Correct. Okay. Yes, so he's kind of like the the first chin Emperor, but of Japan Unifying yeah Yeah, he'd be a Little bit more like if Garibaldi had turned into a military dictator the chocolate guy One of the leaders of the unification of Italy as my third guess. Yeah, okay So yeah, the the chin Emperor yeah, actually yeah chin Emperor works although

the actual politics of it are more complicated because For sure he also had an Emperor that on paper He was supposed to be answering to right because all political legitimacy in Japan still and always has come from the person and figure of the emperor, which I can kind of get into and explain here in a little bit. But so, so there's, there's this, this period of really really intense intrigue politicking and all of these feudal lords playing maybe not three dimensional chess but definitely speed chess against each other and calculating you know who has the upper hand and you know and everybody's kind of walking on a knife edge until you know the one big moment where Tokugawa was a able to step in and go no

I I'm going to force a conflict and I'm going to you know I'm gonna I'm gonna force an open pitched battle and Solve the problem once and for all. Gotcha. Basically. So the novel lays very loosely with the details of who did what and when, again, mostly for the sake of drama and keeping our Western protagonist kind of at the middle of things. But Clavel researched the hell out of the book and he gets the detail of feudal Japanese culture and politics and like the Japanese the feudal Japanese mindset. So very right that the book has frequently been used as a signed reading in college level courses on Japanese history

because it gets at the culture like it's a historical fiction novel. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. The complexity of Lord Vassal relationships and the mentality of we live in a society where literally, um, the walls are made out of paper. And so you hear things, but you never heard things. Right. Like as it is a theme that he plays up repeatedly in the book, you know, and it's, yeah. So he gets, he gets so much, right. And, and the liberties that he takes The liberties that he takes are are again details of like timelines and who was where when right? They're not liberties in regard to anything about material culture. They're not liberties

You know in in regard to anything that historian would look at and go, well, okay, like this is just, this is wrong, right? Historians can read this book and go, okay, well, all right, that's not how that happened historically, but like it could have, you know? And so the book was a massive hit, especially for something that's a thousand pages long. It was huge, right? And so in 1980 Paramount produced a five-part miniseries that was an adaptation of the novel. It was five parts. It was a total of 12 hours long. Law And Famously to Shiromi Fune played Yoshi Toran aga who is the

novels version of Tokugawa Ieyasu, okay and John Blackthorne was I didn't write the actor's name down But anyway, it had a cast of very well known folks and It was it it was a cultural event You can look at the

number of ninja movies being made by Hollywood before Shogun and after That Shogun clearly had an impact on the American Zitgeist Because Shogun was 1980 and the explosion of American Ninja You know Shadow Warrior all these other you know schlocky Hollywood ninja movies started getting made in 1981 You know sushi restaurants Like sprung up in huge numbers right in the wake of of this because it

It added tinder To the spark that was already there because because we've talked in the past in other episodes and other contexts about the weird push-pull fear fascination that we in the United States had for Japan. Yeah, the fetishization and othering simultaneously. Yeah. Or, you know, in the in the the, you know, my God, they're going to they're going to eat our lunch economic. They're already eating our lunch economically.

Right. You know, and all of that that was going on. And I think that was there. And this catalyzed that. By the way, Richard Chamberlain is who you're looking for. Thank you. Yeah. Like his name was on the tip of my tongue and I was like, why didn't I write this? I didn't write this down because I was sure I would be able to remember it.

But yeah, Richard Chamberlain. By the way, looking at the cast, the first few people that are mentioned, they're all Japanese actors. And then you get to Richard Chamberlain, Ellen Bedell, Damien Thomas, John Rice Davies. Yes. Um, and then more Japanese actors. Like there, uh, there are a lot of specifically Japanese acts, which they're, yeah, that's its own interesting wrinkle. Cause it was not normal. No. Or Hollywood. No, not at all the the production of the miniseries in

1980 Was a co-production between Paramount and and the Japanese NH I want to say NHK in Japan and On for so it was this huge event on on this side of the Pacific on the in Japan They wound up cutting it down and turning it into a theatrical release film and it it bombed Because the novel had gotten a whole lot of things right

about Japanese culture and Had had there's there's all this depth and there's all this internal psychology of all of the characters and and particularly the Japanese characters, it's all it's it's written in Limited omniscient point of view. So you're inside characters' heads, right? And so their thinking and their viewpoint is there. Well, in the process of making it as a mini-series primarily for an American audience, it was like, okay, in order to make this easier for everybody to follow and to hold everybody's interest, we're going to focus really closely on Blackthorn. Right.

And then to the Japanese audience, it's like, no, no, we, we want to see the figures out of our history. Like we, we want to, we want to see the, the scheming between, you know, Ishido and Torinaga, we want to like, you know, that's why we following this white guy around like come on right and And you know there there were some things about the way the dot is like there were there were lots of criticisms and Like Japanese critics said you know everybody's performances in this are awesome, but the script sucks You know and it didn't it did not do well in Japan

You know, and it didn't, it did not do well in Japan. Over here though, it was like this runaway killer hit that was a big enough hit that four years later, I saw it on TV being rebroadcast in its entirety, you know. And so, so it was this, it was again, this massive huge cultural moment. Well in 2024, or starting in 2023, FX with with Hulu and Disney kind of being part of the production team, produced a new 10 episode series. Oh, wow. That was like, okay, the original mini series was awesome. That's great. But we're going to erase that. We're going to go right. We're going to go back to the novel.

So it's not a reboot. It's just a whole or is it is. Does that consider it? I'd call it a reboot. I would I would call it a reboot. And so there are there's obviously a lot of similarities I would I would call it a reboot and so There are there's obviously a lot of similarities because you're both based from them from the same source material but there's a whole lot of differences and The it won a whole bunch of Emmy Awards the the new one Like kind of kind of took away the Emmys

new one Like kind of kind of took away the Emmys One won a whole bunch of awards was hugely critically acclaimed hugely popular And and it was it it was a hit, but it was not nearly the same kind of Moment in our zitgeist. Well, I mean, there's more than three channels now. Yes, that's that's a that's a big factor. That is certainly a very big part of it. And what I'm ultimately going to do is I'm going to look at the two series to see what to point out,

what what the differences are between the two of them. OK, and and the answer is a lot and and why and Also You know look at okay. Well. We did this in 1980 Why why did FX look at this and go this is something we want to do again in 2024 Okay Possession movies, so I'm here for this again in 2024. OK. So that's session movies.

So I'm I'm here for this. Yes. And so first though, because it's what we do, I want to jump into the way back machine. And like you asked earlier, we're going

to we're going to delve into the real history behind the story. Awesome. And the cultural context of of where where this story comes from. Yeah. So like I said, this this focuses on a on a very, very, very specific span of time. Give or take from Blackthorn's arrival in Japan to the ending of the book, it's about six months. With the newer mini series, it's maybe a few more months beyond that, or maybe actually even less than a series. It's a point of this time in Japan is a point of political and military crisis, uh,

with, uh, multiple different factions jockeying with one another trying to see who's going to ally with whom, who's going to stab whom in the back. Right. Um, it's an inflection point. Yeah. And everybody, everybody is it's, it's, it's, there's kind of a Mexican standoff kind of situation of like okay We can work with you or we can wind up Shooting you and we don't know which we're gonna do yet. You know gotcha

Because everybody has competing agenda Everybody's playing a very complicated game of speed chess and a very delicate one, too And so I mean it's an amazingly compelling story and and because it's based on real events It's it's you know that much more compelling right so in in our story There are multiple feudal warlords in involved in their retainers the first one is Yoshi Torunaga who is based on the historical figures I've already mentioned of Tokugawa Ieyasu. And he is referred to in the book and in the mini series as the leader of the Eastern forces, because his base of operations is in the Kanto region, which is this, uh, historically it's,

it's kind of Culturally, it's been kind of like the the Wild West like warriors from the Kanto are You know seen as these bluff You know rough tough root and tootin kind of warrior types Compared to the you know more cultured courtly types from the East. And he's the commander of the Eastern forces in the novel. And in both of the mini series, he's treated as the underdog.

He starts out the story in a very, very precarious, vulnerable position. He's very powerful, but he's he's stuck in a very very dangerous political spot. Okay. So his so that we're clear the Kanto region is Main Island. Yes, like Western everything Western Center Honshu Honshu.

Okay, Eastern Eastern part of Honshu Eastern part of okay. Gotcha so like facing the Pacific yes, facing the Pacific and Modern Tokyo and Yato are located in the Kanto region so So if you know Kind of any if in your head you have a mental map of Japan and you kind of know where Tokyo is That's that's his region basically the point of the elbow

Yes, that's a good way of describing it. Yes or the or the One of my one of my professors used to describe the islands of Japan is forming a baby buggy Japan is forming a baby buggy Yeah, yeah, okay, I like it better as the elbow cuz I use Michigan as a hand and yeah Yeah, and Florida leave the rest told you that story haven't I Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, so then Tor Toranaga's main Antagonist and Kind of the mustache twirling villain of the series is Ishido Kazunari who is based on Ishida Mitsunari

Who is the leader of the Western forces, okay? Okay, so that'd be in the crook of the elbow. Yes. Correct. In the, in the Bay, seeing the sea of Japan, not facing the Pacific. Correct. Okay. Got it. And he's, he is a mustache twirling schemer, uh, Snidely whiplash who starts the story in a position of power because he holds the chairmanship for lack of a better word, of the Council of Elders.

Okay. And at the beginning of the story, he has managed to pull, because there's five of them, and Torinaga is one, Kazunari is another one, and Ishido, I'll use his last name because that's what they do in the book It or his family name Isshido has pulled the other three Lords of the council To his side and how many are on the council so I know how many are on the council a total of five Total five so he's pulled three others, so he's isolating out. He has isolated Torinaga Torinaga okay, yeah Okay, so Ishido has has isolated Torinaga and the three well and and

Yeah, two two of the lords on the council are Kiyama and Ono They're both based on other historical Daimyo. They're both Christians They're both based on other historical daimyo. They're both Christians who have a lie. Yes, because we'll get to one of the other factions involved. Okay. They're Christians and they have a lied with Isshido less out of loyalty to him than out of their belief that he's going to best serve the interests of the church to whom they actually have their highest loyalty. Okay. Now that brings us to one of the greatest historical weirdnesses of this time period in Japan. Because that brings us to the church and the Portuguese. I was gonna say, yeah, it's a Portuguese thing. Yes. So there's Father Del Vito and his superior father visitor del aqua okay who represent the Jesuits specifically sure specifically the the Iberian Jesuits okay okay um del aqua make sense they're Portuguese yeah you're pretty much on the Iberian Peninsula here. Yeah, so del aqua is

Based on the historical father visitor Alessandro Vignando Society of Jesus who was in charge of Jesuit missions throughout East Asia in the late 16th and early 17th centuries No, hold on Okay, all right the line of demarcation straight-up said anything to the east of the line Was Portuguese anything to the west of the line was Spanish Going from Europe toward the line of demarcation and beyond that means Spain should have had sway over Japan Okay, so here's the deal. They don't represent a secular government, they represent the church. They are Portuguese, but they are Jesuits. Gotcha.

Okay, so they're part of the NGO that is the Jesuits. Yes, they're more worldly companion is Ferreira, who is a Spaniard who is captain of the black ship? Okay, and His Spanish pilot or yeah Spanish pilot Rodriguez now. They're allied with the Jesuits But their interests don't hundred percent line up Ferreira in particular is motivated by his own short-term interests. He wants to Get his ship loaded up get his ship back headed toward Back home with all of these silver and trade goods and everything else

He's got a board right and all of this political shit. He doesn't care about Like right he wants to go to Alhambra right yeah sweet home back Alhambra. Yeah, and so He rankles like like gets into major Barking arguments with the father visitor who has to worry about long-term politics Okay, yeah, yeah, I could see this. Yeah. Sure.

And he's like, no, we're gonna miss our winds, we're gonna miss the tide. You're like, you know, the season is shifting, we need to get in the water, we need to get out to sea, or the whole expedition is fucked for the year. Right. He's like, the big winds keep on turning. Yeah. Yeah. And he's trying to carry himself home to see his kin. Yeah, nice. Very good. Yeah, and so and so father visitor del aqua and father del Vito who is the translator between

the the Europeans and the and the the Japanese They have to play political games with the figures of the council. And the one card that Torinaga has at the very beginning of the story is his role on the council is he is the foreign minister. And so he's the one who gets to say, yes, your foreigner ship can leave or not. OK, OK. And that's and that's and that's his job. And until the other members of the council figure out a way to actually impeach him. And and there's a whole lot of plotting about removing him, trying to get him off the council, and then they can all gang up on him andach him. And, and there's a whole lot of plotting about removing him, trying to get him off the council and then they can all gang up on him and destroy him. But, but, you know, he's a savvy enough operator that like, as well, you know, if you do that,

you're not going to have five members of the council and the whole agreement says there have to be members. So until you find somebody else to do the job like it's legal Like all the weapons at his disposal not just not just guns and spears, but you know the law right right and so black thorn Shows up in the middle of all this out of nowhere He's a Protestant Englishman Who who has an understanding of the wider world that the Portuguese and the Jesuits have been keeping secrets and

He becomes a pawn in the game that all of these sides are playing now He becomes he becomes this massive powder keg wild card so he's from England Yes, did it say what city I? Does it say what city? I would have to double to the miniseries. Okay, there's nobody controlling him from there No, well at this point No, uh, so you can't say that in birmingham. He has a governor Wow

I'm not even mad. That's that's really the thing that gets me about it at this point Yeah, no at this point he he does not love a governor In Birmingham or anywhere else right and and I I remember now It's an important distinction When we talk about the black ship They are Portuguese the pilot of the port of the of the black ship is a Spaniard right as you said which gives him a little bit of daylight between himself and the rest of that whole faction and That plus plus a pilot to pilot allows Rodriguez yeah to have a little bit of a, like, you know, I, I, I feel for you being in your position and like, you know, I understood your, your fucked six weeks to Sunday.

Lord, they piss me off so much. Nice. Nice. I, you know, I don't, I don't, maybe it's the cider that I'm drinking, like, you know, Picks me up when you're feeling blue. Yeah. cider that I'm drinking sure like you know picks me up when you're feeling blue yeah yeah so and and the thing is you are correct that the church had said you know the the western half is this and the eastern half is this because of the way they had drawn the lines on on the map essentially there there was a wrapar wrap around effect and Japan fell under the Portuguese so they were looking the other direction. Yeah. Oh wow. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Because because

they were looking from Rome westward or eastward. Yeah. Okay., you know, the line of demarcation is here. Right. We're, if we here in Europe are on the eastern side of it, we're continuing to look east and from here we're looking at Japan that way. Okay. So the Spaniards, you guys can go off the map. Yeah. Because you're venture capitalists, but Portuguese, you've already invaded parts of Africa, so

we're going to let you keep doing that. Okay. Yeah. And so anything further east yeah yeah and because the way they were getting to Japan they weren't going from Portugal yeah there was no Panama Canal well they weren't going down around the southern tip of South America they were taking the the they were going around the Horn of of Africa they were right Cape Horn not Cape of Good Hope right right so anyway, so yeah the Portuguese are The Portuguese captain is like I want to get in the water his pilot is okay Swaziland yeah, oh yeah, Chi manny Craig bandit on fire

So Oh, yeah, Chi mani crit bandit on fire So To get an understanding of how this whole situation started We have to go back to We got to go back a ways farther, okay,. First we have to go up back a lot farther Because the title of the book is Shogun Right and in order to understand what the Shogun is We have to go 400 years back to 1180

Okay, 420 years Okay. All right. So we got to go all the way back to 1180 and in that year So so in this time period going going back to the 1100s The Emperor still held real meaningful political power in 1180 in 1180 okay at 1600 no no right no it was wheels behind wheels basically wheels behind wheels behind okay yeah

but in 1180 he had the power 1180 the Emperor is legit the ruler of Japan now all the islands or just the area that the Emperor called Japan all By that time Nearly all of the islands everything from the southernmost point up to most of Hokkaido, okay in 1180 there might have been parts of Hokkaido that weren't that were still In 1180, there might have been parts of Hokkaido that weren't, that were still controlled by aboriginal people. Right, the Ainu, if I recall correctly. Yeah. But the islands of Japan were under imperial control. Sure, they'd been turning Japanese. Yeah. Well, yeah, I mean, I mean, everybody does. I, I really think so. 90, 90% of guys do. And if they, if they say they don't, they're lying. But, um, so,

so the, the, the emperor was the, the actual political head of state at this point, like for real, you know, and the Imperial court held real meaningful power. Well, there, there had, there had come into being a very intricate and, uh, kind of, kind of-standing and complicated competition between two major clans of intermarrying into the Imperial family and trying to kind of get control of the Imperial family through marriage. Okay, yeah. And these two families were the Taira, who are also referred to as the Heike, and the Minamoto, who are also called the Genji.

And the reason why also called is because the Japanese written language is inherited from Chinese. Right. And so there are, there are, there are two different ways to pronounce most anything in classical Japanese is the shorter explanation to oversimplify. So the Tyra and the Minamoto had fought a conflict a decade or so before and the Tyra had won. They'd come out on top. Okay. And the Minamoto had been the leadership of the Minamoto clan had been

kind of forced into exile you know out in the out in the heir, the heirs, plural, of the Minamoto rose up in rebellion, and they started a war against the Taira. And the war lasted for five years. And at the end of it, Tyra were driven to extinction the Heike were were destroyed at the Battle of Danura Which is which is one of the most Depicted

battles in Japanese history and It's actually the the source of one of the greatest Ghost stories ever told oh cool So at the Battle of Danura The Tyra had had for the first couple of years of the war the Tyra had had the advantage of being Stronger in terms of having a fleet so they were able to move around. So this is a naval ship Yes, this is very much a naval battle at the straight of donno two big battles in Japan named after oranges

Okay, okay, yeah, well this is a rebellion yeah, yeah, and then this one yeah, yeah, so This is the one where there's the triptychs right like it's like the three panels oh yeah well yeah and like there's a winding river through it kind of thing and there's a bunch of red boats or something yeah there's well it's not a it's not a river it's actually the Strait of Danura okay the boats are the the fleets of the Minamoto and the Taira. Okay, and The legend says that the water in the strait ran red That the sand of the beaches on both sides of the strait were awash in crimson

okay, because of the red banners of the Taira falling from their ships and the blood of fallen samurai. Sure. Okay. So this was this massive naval engagement. Uh, the, the, the Minamoto had basically run the Tyre to ground and now the Tyre were trying to flee across the street to Shikoku, I think. So like regroup and to try it. Well, just to try to hold up and do something just to get away.

And in their entourage as part of their fleet, they had with them the child emperor who was the grandson of the head of the Tyra clan. Oh, okay. And, and so we're going to end your fucking line. We're going. Yes. Yeah. Okay. And and so we're gonna end your fucking line. We're going yes. Yeah, okay, and at the height of the battle

the Grandmother of the Emperor Or it might have been his mother. I'm trying to remember the details of the story, but either way either his mother his grandmother Seeing that the Minamoto had completely slaughtered their samurai and seeing that there was no escape, she grabbed the child emperor in her arms on Toku, told him, our empire lies beneath the waves. and and rather than be captured Dove with him in her arms off the ship either carrying a heavy chest of some kind or Tied to an anchor stone. Oh like so like maybe the family jewels kind of thing actually literally the family jewels because the

side note the Oh, well, because the side note the Legitimacy of the Emperor is tied to Three important relics. There's a sword a mirror and a jewel And if I remember correctly, they carried the mirror with them. Okay beneath the waves But then we get into issues of you know Authenticity in Shinto and anyway there's a whole there's a whole mystical Shinto kind of explanation for like well

yes that mirror went down beneath the waves but now we have now we have the this is the Imperial mirror and it's it's legitimate now and it's fine and it's it's Shinto okay. So his grandmother dove with him underneath the waves. Yes. And the head of the clan... Of the Tyro clan. Of the Tyro clan. The head of the clan, rather than be captured, took a... wrapped a ship's anchor around himself.

Oh, shit. Five times and jumped off. I was expecting Sepuku. I was expecting like The ritual of seppuku had not been formalized by this time yet. Gotcha. This is so early that something we we we associate seppuku with the samurai so So very tightly right and this like that hadn't been codified yet Yeah, the guy you just mentioned I you know, he might not have been a samurai. So, you know, but he was a sailor. So anchors away. Yeah. Yeah. Grim, but funny. Yeah. Um,

now these two, these are the, like from that picture that I'm remembering, there's the, the, the, the, was there blue involved? It was like white and red, right? This is where you get the yeah the the was there blue involved it was like white and red right this is well yeah it was white and red and there you know some of the some of the vassal families would have had other colors or whatever yeah yeah okay yeah but and there's there's an amazing that's war of the roses kind of shit it really is. Color wise and everything. Yeah.

Oh, I understand, I actually understand why, no. Here's the thing. Most fabrics you make are white. And if you're really rich, you're going to get rid of all the impurities. And one of the easiest colors to add to a fabric is red. So when you're mass producing either of these, you go one way or the other.

Okay. Yeah. All right. Yep. Unless you're Scottish, in which case you're like, no. Nope, fuck that. That's the wrong word to hold. I'm gonna go thread by thread, motherfucker.

It is. And blue, lots of blue. Lots of blue, yeah. And then when we develop synthetic dyes, y''all are oh, we're gonna get y'all I'm gonna I'm gonna give you the most intense greens you've ever seen Speaking as a Douglas I'm like, yes Alright so wraps the chain around himself

All right, so wraps the chain around himself five times anchor anchor around himself a bunch of times and I wish I could remember his last words But you know supposedly and so you can't fire me I quit. Yeah kind of yeah so now the Minamoto have now completely obliterated their rivals and in a single day's obliterated their rivals. In a single day's battle? Well, over the course of the war, but really, yeah, the final ultimate blow was Danura. And so the Minamoto marched into the capital and everybody expected them to install a new emperor or their their chosen Emperor

Who was going to be part of the Fujiwara clan who was going to be related to them and you know? Meet the meet the new boss same as the old boss But instead they said yes Here is the new Emperor and the new Emperor is now giving me the title of say tie Shogun roughly translating into English as barbarian suppressing general great barbarian suppressing general And they kept the imperial family intact and the role of the emperor as no no the emperor well, the emperor is divine and You know the emperor is is the ultimate source of political legitimacy

You know, the emperor is the ultimate source of political legitimacy, but we're not going to let him have any real power because that's how this problem all started in the first place. Now, we're going to be the ones with the power and we're going to rule as military dictators. So the emperor kind of becomes a person who is a relic, similar to your mirror, your sword and your... Yes, that's a really really good metaphor yes I mean no one shit without knowing shit to who I am dangerous all right so really what was the third thing though there's a mirror there's a sword and there was a sword and a jewel jewel okay and and now there's mirror sword jewel Emperor and the Emperor yeah right and the person of

the Emperor not not just the title But the person is the one the thing that is Relic ask correct. Yeah, the Emperor as human MacGuffin. Yes a phylactery Kind of legitimacy of political legitimacy. Yes, right now part of the part of the reason they were able to get away with this was in the toward the end As they had all the swords and they live Yeah, I mean but but the way that The

sideline of the Emperor was was Kind of as broadly accepted as it was was kind of as broadly accepted as it was, was because before the Genpei war, that conflict that we just talked about is referred to as the Genpei war. Okay. For the first syllable of Genji and Heike, Genhei, Genpei, because of the way Japanese pronunciation works. Right. Okay, so it's basically those are the...

The two families. The two families by a different name or the writing. Okay. Okay. So, so before the game pay war happened, what had developed was a system where, uh, for a couple of generations, at least five or six, probably, um, emperors would Be emperor and then they would retire and install their son nephew grandson

Whoever as Emperor and the retired Emperor would be the one Really making all the decisions and running things but not having to do all of the ritual right? You know religious stuff that the Emperor was expected to do a power behind so yeah yeah because there had been this situation where everybody understood that like it's really the retired Emperor who's the one you got to listen to sure and he's gonna tell the Emperor what to tell everyone now the situation was instead of a retired Emperor we have the Shogun. You know, and let me guess, eventually that Shogun would retire and he had

appointed another Shogun and then he'd be the Shogun behind the Shogun. Yes, but that, that took a couple of generations and a familial switch. But also that Shogun behind the Shogun did not have the legitimacy in his Personage that the Emperor would have because the Emperor's one of the four holy relics now Yes, and so when an Emperor would retire it would have to be at the permission of the shogun. I would yes and So the show and show that retired emperors Emperor. Yeah Yeah, and retired emperors would be sent off to a monastery Showman's showman is not going to be emperor's emperor. Yeah. What to do? Yeah. And retired emperors would be sent off

to a monastery that would be very heavily guarded for their protection. How nice for them. Yeah. OK. I mean, this has like, I mean, the things that we've seen in American cinema alone. This is Don Corleone This is you know. Oh, yeah. Well, I mean, yeah, you know

History history does not repeat itself, but it rhymes right? Well, and I'm referencing cinema not at all. Yeah, but but the tropes come from some sure sure Okay, so you've got an emperor behind the Emperor you've got a Shogun behind the Shogun eventually not yet eventually right now We're let's right now the Shogun is still the guy the Shogun the Shogun is is the dude now. There was a Protecting yeah the Emperor retired that he's protecting the Emperor emeritus Protecting yeah the Emperor retired that he's protecting the Emperor emeritus There is no more Emperor emeritus You don't you don't you don't really retire out of the out of the Emperor's role anymore that that you might you might say

I'm tired of doing this. I'm done. I need I you know Mission from the Shogun and he's gonna go yeah, you go off the sideloft to a monastery But like no the emperor is the one Is the only one on that side of the equation there is no It's no longer the retired Emperor because the Shogun has stepped in and taken the Shogun the Shogun has taken over the role of what Had been the role of the retired Emperor. Okay. Okay. I skipped a step there. Got it. Yeah. Okay. Yeah the Shogun which is of the Just up there. Got it. Okay. Yeah. So the Shogun which is of the

Motto thank you Minamoto clan and he is the The leader I guess of that clan Yes, okay. And so he installs himself as Shogun the Emperor still exists But it's not the little boy who went down to the bottom of the water. No, it's all somebody else his exist but it's not the little boy who went down to the bottom of the water. No, it's his half brother. Yeah, I would imagine. Because you have to have some sort of legitimacy because the Minamoto clan is still married into that. So now the personage of that emperor is the thing that he is guarding and I'm keeping it safe.

Yes. Okay, so it's the Praetorians putting Claudius in charge. Uh-huh. Okay, okay. I'm keeping it safe. Yes. And okay. So it's, it's the Praetorians putting Claudius in charge. Uh huh. Okay. Okay. I'm with you. All right. Only, only when the Praetorians put Claudius in charge, the Praetorians didn't, didn't, didn't realize what they had done. No, no. Yeah. You know, in this case, in this case, it's like if, if Odo Walker had, had, you know, it's been like, Odo Walker had had, you know Been like no, no the upper is still here. I'm just yeah keeping him safe, right? Right, right Okay, so so and so this Emperor is is he just a kid or is he like a young man who's married to somebody? I don't remember right off the bat

because because Cuz he's not as much as the show because studies as important as the show got it. So So yeah, the Imperial family is is then placed in the position that we would recognize them as being in now Really in in a lot of ways. Oh like similar to the Hirohito emperor after the war Okay, so the show got his MacArthur Like similar to the Hirohito Emperor after the war. Uh-huh. Okay. So the show gun is MacArthur. Kind of. And MacArthur would probably look at that and go, why, yes.

Sure I am. As a matter of fact, I am. I'll show you two guns. He'll show you two guns. Yeah. Okay. Take you to the gun show. Yeah.

Look at my high-waisted pants yeah So So the the Minamoto family Held held a position of say Taisho gun and and Established it that okay this this is now going to be a hereditary position within within within our lineage right or and So the se itai shogun is shortened to just to shogun

Okay in common parlance, and this is where the novel in the miniseries gets her title from okay now the minamoto Only held on to the shogunate for a short time. Well, cause all the energy goes into establishing not in the keep. Well, yeah. Historically, that's what happens. Yeah. And, and then there's the issue of, you know, having enough sons. And at the close of the Genpei war there was also a brief bit of Internist seen conflict within the Minamoto over who was really in charge

And so that led to the whole Joe family who were married into the Minamoto The whole Joe the Claudians and Julian's okay. Yeah, yes, yes Sorry to keep romanizing in your own. No, no, but that's Gotta use that works and really when you're talking about dynastic politics anywhere you're talking about dynastic politics and anywhere. Yeah When I tell you dynastic politics have always been this way So the Emperor is FK Fabrelic. He's the championship match or his championship. Yeah yes yes as a matter of fact. Okay so the Hojo took over the

position. Okay. They held it until the 1300s Okay, when a different family of the Minamoto gens the Ashikaga Overthrew them under the color of imperial support So so you were occasionally act them would occasionally get an emperor there'd be an Emperor who'd show up on the throne and be like Fuck this noise. I'm the Emperor. Uh-huh and and as whoever was holding the Shogunate you had to be able to keep the Emperor under control and if you failed

You kind of lost your mind. Yeah, you've lost your kind of your divine mandate. Yeah. You, you, you no longer hold the grail. The grail has decided you are not worthy. Right. I want this other guy. And what we see repeatedly, this, this is something, and I, this is a sidebar, but what you see repeatedly throughout the the the history leading up to the single Kujida is about every century or so there'd be an emperor who would get uppity and and either the family holding the shogunate would succeed in controlling them right or They would fail and some other faction within the family would wind up

Taking over shogunate, you know There there is one very, very beloved samurai hero who actually got a whole lot of ink during the Meiji Restoration. Um, was, uh, constantly fighting, uh, against the Oshkaga family on behalf of a, a deposed emperor. They wound up being a, a complicated system of, of inheritance. There was the Northern court and the Southern court, and they were supposed to take turns in terms of, you know, who was gonna be Emperor sure and The Southern Court at one point through the finger and said no. No, we're we're we're keeping it. Yeah, and Masashi gay was was the

constant champion of this of this Emperor who Like you kind of read the like Masashi is this is this aladin kind of figure the way he's portrayed and the Emperor he was doing this for isn't is like not really a figure that feels worthy of that but his loyalty to the office of the Emperor was something that made him a figure that was very important to the Meiji Their mythos their mythos Yeah, so anyway, and there's all kinds of stories of his heroism and the stuff he had to do when he was Out in the wilderness with a small number of retainers and all this kind of stuff and it's it's wonder

That's great reading. But anyway now real quick is Japan fully isolated at this time or is their interaction with the the cons and and the Manchu dynasty is not coming in for another for one of the things one of the things that led to the collapse of the hojo shogunate Was the Mongol intent attempted invasion of Japan this the one that the kamikaze is named for? Yes. Okay. So they showed up and they had an army that fought in a completely different way than

the Japanese were used to. Right. Just came from. Because Japanese, well yeah, the Chinese army showed up and and like Chinese armies have been throughout history. It was a gigantic mass of soldiers and You know Japan didn't have the population for that and warfare at that time Was a much more small force of elite warriors kind of conflict. Right, you send your best, we'll send our best.

Well yeah, and every samurai saw himself as the main character and every samurai was out to show his courage to his lord because that was the way you got promoted and got more land and more wealth and everything. And if you were in the Khans army, you were fighting not to get, you know, beaten up by your own officers. Right. So, right. Right.

So it's, it's this completely different paradigm of warfare and, um, you know, the Japanese managed to hold, uh, the invasion fleet, you know in in the southern part of Japan Into typhoon season at which point Massive storm showed up completely wrecked the fleet to round outlass Chinese warriors and basically made it so that they just didn't have the material or the Resources to continue fighting and they turn around and went back to they just didn't have the material or the or the resources to continue fighting

And they turn around and went back to China and didn't try again and the problem that created for the Shogun it was Every warrior who had done something Petitioned the Shogun going hey look at what I did Reward me going hey look at what I did reward me okay so it's gonna empty the the bank well no the trouble is you don't reward a samurai by giving him cash you're reward a samurai by giving him land well you can't do that on island well well you can't do that when you fought off an invasion you can do that when you're

suppressing somebody else right like if you have a rebellion it's like all right no I put down the rebellion okay well you know we can have territory right got it well so there's what are they gonna do right sure sure not only that this this is the part that I love so so temples all over the country also petitioned the Shogun because We we prayed for a miracle to drive the Chinese off The Buddha answered right we got the miracle

Are you going to let the Buddha go unrewarded? Right pony up like going to let the Buddha go unrewarded right pony up like So that led to the hojo having to figure out how they were gonna reward everybody which just pissed everybody off and this led to And that led to the the yeah, the okay, I should come out here saying alright You've you've lost the mandate right taking it okay So then they come in and and hey or they? Well, because so, so that, that led to a very short essentially civil war, you know, between the, between the families that, you know, uh,

supported the Hojo Shogunate and those that supported the Ashikaga Shogunate. So yeah, the Ashikaga took over and we're like, all right, so the families we beat, um, you're giving up half of your territory or more. Oh yeah. Problem solved. You know, and problem solved, right? like, all right, so the families we beat, um, you're giving up half of your territory or more. Problem solved. You know, and problem solved, right? Right. And so then you've got the, the, the, the North and the South and then this. Yeah.

And then, yeah. And, and that was a rare example of a conflict where essentially both halves of the Imperial family went, Oh yeah, I'm not touching this one. You all, you all figured out this, this does not, this one. You all y'all figured out this this does not this is your problem, right? Yeah, we await the arrival of our new overlords This is not something we want to get involved in because that could lead to us getting wiped out like no. Thank you Okay, so So the Ashikaga took over okay and they then held onto the office for several generations okay and it's during the ashikaga that you

start seeing the okay well the shogun is going to retire and now he's you know and we got to know that shogun behind the Shogun You start seeing that kind of beginning to develop and that leads to its own kind of weird conflict Are these the ones who are left holding the bag when Europeans come a-knocking? Are these the ones that said like you can only be on that island during this day of the year kind of thing? Not a different group that's later different group? That's later. That's later. So the Ashikaga Shogunate

for the purposes of this podcast collapsed in 1467 with a conflict referred to as the Onin War. Which without getting into too much detail, the Onin war was essentially a

feud fought between different families in the capital at Kyoto Now at this point the capital's Kyoto. It's not a dough because it no it's not it. Oh, it is it is Kyoto all right and so It's not a dough because it no it's not it. Oh, it is it is Kyoto all right and so The the collapse of the Ashikaga showing it it is kind of the Japanese history version of when did the Western Roman Empire fall? Okay

Because there there was still somebody holding the office of Shogun until for another 100 years, but the office of Shogun had been shown to be powerless because regional warlords by this time had become independent enough that essentially in 1467 the Ashikaga shogunate said you guys go punish that motherfucker And they looked at him and went uh No Thank you We we we appreciate your your vote of support, but no it's not gonna work for us. Yeah, not gonna work for us

Okay, we don't we don't love that for us So this is like the equivalent to the Chinese version of the warring states period very much as a matter of fact the name is borrowed from the Chinese convention as as so many things in Japanese literature are Adaptations of things from Chinese. Oh, they had their own warring states. Oh, yeah. Oh, okay Okay, and we we get into the single coo G die era of the country at war

Warring states. Yeah, yeah close enough. Yeah, so say that one again the single Single coo G die is this where we get our Knights errant and the Jedi Geki Perfect place and time for Basically, you know your your lone gunman walking around, you know, it feels very wild rusty. Yes Yes, and no, okay most Jedi Geki Okay. Most Jidageki stories, as we've mentioned before, tend to happen in the Yato period, which is after the Tokugawa Shogunate was established. Because then you've got the cult of good conduct and stuff like that to promote the idea of

honor and order and stability at a time where you want people believing that that's the goal. Got it. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And yeah, but this, this is a period of widespread conflict. And, and we're talking about for the next, so 1467. So we're talking about for the next so 1467 so we're talking about for the next 130 years Warfare this period yes, then gives way to the Edo period Yes, the Edo period rises out of the Sengoku Jidai. Okay, so that that was the the Edo period

You like we'd said earlier he unified So this is what unifying is from. OK. Yes. OK. Yes. It's coming out of. Yes. Coming out of the Sengoku Jidai. Yeah. So so this is a period of 130 years, give or take, depending on when

you want to say it started and which specific point in Tokugawa's rise to power, you want to call the end of it. started and which specific point in Tokugawa's rise to power you want to call the end of it. Regional warlords, daimyo, is the Japanese term and that's in Japanese literally means big names. So daimyo fought daimyo for land and political power. Sure. Like I said, there was still a Shogun in name. The Oshkaga family still had somebody there in the Capitol, but the office held no real power and the actual source of legitimacy. When you wanted to get something rubber stamped to give you a legitimate

reason to do something you didn't go to the Shogun during this time period you went to the Imperial Court Hmm and that's that's gonna come up later, okay? and so Eventually the office of Shogun got dissolved toward the end of this period by Oda Nobunaga Then we're gonna get to that I know that name yeah well yeah and during this time period

we have a phenomenon called Gekko Kujo which is low overcoming the high so rebellions? well sort of this is this becomes normalized during this period as previously minor houses, like people

who were not, you know, the main line descendants of major clans, rose to regional power through their ruthlessness, their military strength, and through absorbing absorbing defeating and absorbing sure older more established larger Families, okay And these noble houses gobbled each other up a larger daimyo taking on the followers of other daimyo that they defeated So, you know family a family B are in conflict. They have bannermen like to use a term from the thrones They have bannermen, right? So I defeat, you know use a term from Game of Thrones, they have Bannerman. So I defeat, you know, I'm family A, I defeat family B, and some portion of family B's retainers

are going to go, all right, well, you're the boss now. And then there's going to be some other factions that are going to turn to some other Lord, you know. So it's big fish swallowing little fish, and sometimes little fish surprise, you know, taking down sharks. So your bannermen that were so effective now turn to you and be like, you know what, we lost too many people, we're taking over now. Yes.

And you don't have enough. And I don't buy, yeah. Yeah. Is this, there was, I know I'm going to mispronounce it, but I swear to God they were called the ouchy like like you get an ouchy like They were like there they were they were like you were saying they were like a small clan That because I just remember because she probably I don't know they're spelled out like a specific specific

family you're thinking yeah, but like Because I remember the name the name sounds familiar And what what if if I look them up? I'm going to bet bet that their name started out o uchi and Probably when they and then well, but then when they Took over when they when they conquered somebody they wound up taking on a more recognizable older name Okay, because because one of the one of the names you're gonna hear later is hojo

And you've already heard the name hojo They were a family that held the shogunate right but the new hojo have nothing to do with the original hojo they're they're a more minor clan that took the name after gobbling up other families and taking power okay so it's possible that Oh Chi turned into something else right I just remember reading about them and being tickled by the name yeah beat people up and gave them an ouchie. Yeah. Well, that's, that's, that's your job as a samurai. Right. So, um, and a lot of the literature from the period, what's, what's interesting is when you look at stuff that was being written down and recorded during the

Sengoku Jidai, a lot of the literature focuses really heavily on loyalty and high concepts of honorable service and all of this Or and the modern idea we have of samurai loyalty to a master is Based in stuff that happened in this period Okay, and there were retainers who were no no I am a retainer of the Azuchi family I'm gonna be a retainer of the Azuchi family. I'm going to be a retainer of the Azuchi family, like ride or die,

literally for me and all of my children and my grandchildren forever. And when the Azuchi go down, we're all going down with them. Like that was a thing. Sure. But at the same time, what was also a thing was a much more pragmatic view of, yeah, okay, they're, they're doomed and I don't have to be doomed. Yeah, we don't have to be, you know, so there was, there was just as much, if not more cynical, uh, you know,

uh, dealing and shifting of loyalty for advantage that went on. So the time period was a terrible one for the common people. I mean, it's never a great, it's never a great time to be a peasant. I can't imagine living in the cities is much better either. If you're a tradesman, like people come in, oh, this is ours now and our soldiers need to eat, so we're looting your shit. Yeah. And then two weeks later, this is ours now, you're safe now, but you

need to give us your shit. Yeah. Oh yeah. You know, and then somebody three weeks later, this is ours now. You're safe now, but you need to give us your shit. Yeah. Oh yeah. You know, and then somebody three weeks later, this is ours now. And we heard you gave comfort to the enemy. So we're killing you. Yeah. Like, yeah. Yeah. Okay. It's, it's never in a feudal society. It's never great to be a commoner and especially not a peasant. Like, right. You know, it sucks, but what are you going to do? Right. But during this kind of period of, of warfare, land and people were treated as resources to be stolen or destroyed. Right. You know, this, this is the way it was in warfare in Europe. And this is the way it is in Japan during this time period. Sure. Now at the same time as that,

during this time period. Sure. Um, now at the same time as that, the Sengoku era did open up opportunity for advancement that hadn't really existed before and certainly didn't exist afterward. Well, yeah, you got all these people dying ahead of you. You can obviously take the rank. Well, number one, that's, that's, that. That's that's that's if you're that's if you're samurai But I'm talking about as a commoner Because warfare changed in Japan very dramatically over the course of this hundred and thirty years Remember at the time of the Mongol invasion. I mentioned that you know Japanese warfare operated under a paradigm of small relatively elite forces Fighting against each other and every single guy in that force being in his own head, the main character. Sure.

During the Sengoku Jidai, we see massed warfare between large groups of foot soldiers with spears, bows and guns. Became the norm. These are Ashigaru or light feet. They were given whatever, whatever armor could be scratched, scraped, scraped together, scratched together. And they were, they were just said, all right, you know, mass up and go get them.

Basically. Okay. And they wound it. And over time these Ashigaru forces became more, uh, disciplines that got more training, you know, dime, you know, started realizing, you know what, if I have a bunch of guys with 15 foot pikes, um, that, that allows me a lot of control of the battlefield. So I'm gonna, I'm going to equip them with better armor so I'm gonna I'm gonna equip them with better armor and I'm going to actually train them all right and this is you

know a fundamental paradigm departure from the way warfare had had earlier had been earlier and this meant that as a commoner if you picked up a spear mm-hmm you had the opportunity to improve your station. You could become samurai. You can go from being a peasant to being a member of the warrior class. Now like a low ranking, you know, bottom feeder member of the warrior class, but it was still an important step up. Yeah, and and if you survived acquitted yourself well

Your children would now have some sort of hereditary leg up and very notably an ashi garu Eventually became one of the three unifiers of Japan Toyotomi Hideyoshi Started out as an ashigaru, attracted the attention of his liege lord, became a general. And we're gonna get into more end of his story, Toyotomi Hideyoshi becomes the Taiko

who in Shogun, his death sets the stage for all of the events that we're following in the novel. So the three unifiers are going to I assume it's gonna have to include The guy who brought in the Edo period so Tokugawa Ieyasu. Okay, the the Toyotomi Hideyoshi Oh and Oda nobunaga. That's where I know that name from. Okay. He's the the demon prince or some shit like that, right? Depending on which anime you watch. Yeah or some shit like that, right? Depending on which anime you watch, yeah.

Right? Yeah. Okay. So the saying in Japan, and if I can remember it right, the rough translation into English is, Nobunaga piled the rice, Hideyoshi pounded the flour, and Ieyasu ate the cake.

Oh, man. That's my whole don't be the first penguin in the watershed. Yeah, pretty much. Yeah. Okay. Now, were these three guys like contemporaries, like pals, or? They were definitely contemporaries. We know that we know we know that

Ieyasu and nobunaga were very close allies Okay, their portrayal is that they were friends Okay, how much of that is romanticization? We don't know sure and hiti yoshi almost certainly met Ieyasu they Were they certainly had professional respect for one another whether they were pals We can't really know so is this another one of those like you have

You know Octavian Is this another one of those like you have, uh, you know, Octavian, uh, Mark Antony and Lepidus, like like Lepidus was the captain of the horse under Caesar. He was an important fucking guy, but let's be real. It was about the other two. Okay. No, all three of these guys for four different reasons like three Caesars all three of these guys are like I like Caesar. Yeah Yeah, and and we're gonna get into that if you're in a bit, okay So now the Portuguese we're we're back to talking about them

Because they introduced the foreigners who got to Japan first. Well because they introduced the foreigners who got to Japan first well right They're the Europeans who got to Japan first. I would have to Japan first dare say the cons The other Chinese yeah, they're a long time before So Matchlock firearms uh-huh showed up in Japan in 1543 brought by the Portuguese, okay Within 15 years Japan in 1543 brought by the Portuguese, okay Within 15 years Okay, so think think on a on a historical time scale sure think about

development and adoption of technology generally right mm-hmm within 15 years Matchlocks had become a central part of Daimyo strategy fighting against each other. There are matchlocks single fire and then their clubs or are they match? Well, they are, they are muzzle loaders and they are referred to as matchlocks because the way they work is there is a, a smoldering fuse right and it kicks into that you yeah that kicks into a into a powder pan which sets off the sets off the charge and so the introduction of these weapons accelerated the process of

moving toward massed armies sure of less elite soldiers because you can Anybody can point and shoot yeah training training somebody to use a spear You got to learn how to maneuver a spear you got a you know you're not your friends Yeah, it's been and and fighting with a spear is still a martial art right Fighting with a gun is much less an issue of especially during this this at this level of technology fighting with a gun is much less a matter of

individual skill as It is a matter of working in unison with everybody else in your unit Right to fire a volley and reload in the same amount of time, reloading rapidly, you know, there's there's deciding if you're going to fire in a a wave or all at once. Yeah. Yeah. So so again, this is another this is another paradigm

change that's taking place during this time period. OK. And so paradigm change that's taking place during this time period. Okay. And so, um, to understand now, now that we've kind of set that stage, we have this period where, uh, everybody's fighting against everybody else. We have this period where warfare is now shifting in its in its nature there is a qualitative change in the way fighting is happening and

Now I want to get into The specific character what right now first to focus on because I said we're gonna We're gonna kind of follow individual threads to make this easier to follow We're gonna kind of follow individual threads to make this easier to follow We need to focus on on kind of toward the end of this period and we're gonna do that through the lens of one specific daimyo So in the same year that matchlock weapons are introduced by the by the Portuguese 1543 70 that's been 76 years that that this warfare has been going on. Okay.

Matsudaira Takechi yo is born in Okazaki castle in Mikawa province. Okay. So I'm saying all these names slowly because you're going to them again and they're gonna be they're gonna be important His family was Matsudaira Takechi yo, okay Now his family was of middling rank they had they had retainers they had families who were their vassals but in Takechi's childhood

But in Takechi U's childhood, his father was caught in a difficult situation and he had to turn to a more powerful neighbor for support. Okay. And Takechi U was sent at age five to be a hostage of the Imagawa clan in order to guarantee his father's loyalty as part of his okay. I need your support Okay, you need our support to make sure you don't turn on us. We're gonna hold your son as a hostage sure And so on his way to Emigawa territory five-year-old Takichi Oh Is is traveling and his party was ambushed by samurai of the Oda clan? And his party was ambushed by samurai of the Oda clan.

Oda, which is there, which is the family of Nobunaga, Nobunaga. Right now, Oda Nobuhide. Was was the big enemy that Takechi, his father was trying to get help against okay, and immediately Nobuhide sent word to Takechi his father. Hey cut your ties to Imigawa or I kill your heir Okay the

Takechi his father sent back a message saying you know what if you kill him message saying you know what if you kill him that's just going to show my level of dedication to Imigawa so if you're gonna do it do it. Wolf. Yeah. Now if he's a five-year-old son who's being sent to be a hostage there's plenty of other sons. No. No? No. Wow. Because like, wasn't it normal to have concubinage? Oh yeah. And have lots of kids? Yeah, but that hadn't happened for Takachiyo's dad yet. At this point, okay, Takachiyo is the number one only son. Okay. And what I love about this story is there's a remarkable rhyme to it in the story of William Marshall in England in the Plantagenet era in England, okay, so

We're going back a couple hundred years in time to the eleven hundreds during the time period known as the Anarchy when King Stephen was fighting against Matilda known as Empress Matilda who was the daughter of Hello No, no is this is nor this is all Norman but anyway, so so Stephen is on one side Matilda's on the other and

Williams William Marshall's father was defending a castle against King Stephen's forces the the Marshall at that time Was a loyalist to Matilda? Okay, and time was a loyalist to Matilda. Okay. And Stephen trotted young William, five years old, same age, five years old out in front of the castle, uh, trotted him out as a hostage and told John Marshall, surrender or a kill the boy. Um, he, he even, he even threatened to fling him with a, with a catapult into the castle From the ramparts of the castle John Marshall is said to have shouted down

I have yet the hammer and anvil upon which to forge more and better sons You're fucking five and you hear your dad say that? Yeah I know how like number one how how awful is that and like number two how fucking hard did you have to go with that man? Right like wow. My dick is iron. Yeah like yeah Steven had a lot of flaws, but Psychopathy was not one of them and he couldn't bring himself to harm William

He could he's a five-year-old kid he could write I'll threaten it, but I won't actually follow through In a similar vein Oh double-heated for whatever reason decided not to kill Takachiyo partly because it's a five-year-old kid and and partly because well shit actually he's right because Will galvanize people I will be the bad guy there is no other way Fucking lose and and like, you know the one the one consistent through line that you can point to in in in Japanese culture is They never ever ever do anything by half measures Yes

Yeah total 100 percent 110 percent commitment like So yeah, right Okay, fine. Okay, so that five-year-old safe Just like just like okay cool. Yeah, so yeah Boys like the the the high priest of a monastery in that guy's territory or some shit like that is Which one are you talking about? either of them because I

So William William Marshall. Yeah, William Marshall went on to be a Figure who is acknowledged as one of the greatest Knights in the history of knighthood. Oh wow okay? He was he was a tournament champion Okay, massive badass favorite of Eleanor of aqua tane like like well that makes sense because you heard your dad say Fucking yeah, my dick is bigger like okay. Yeah. Yeah, you're gonna play your dad. Okay. Yeah, and and yeah legendary badass So those five-year-old Japanese kids gonna grow up to be a badass samurai

Yeah, okay. Yeah, cool nice so talk to you He's the dude that grows up to use the ore and beat the shit out of that guy That's a that's way later. Oh sadly. I was a great story. I was not he's not Miyamoto Musashi, okay? So talk to you goes off to live as a hostage of clan Oda For the next three years wait, but he was originally gonna go be the host He was originally gonna go it was originally gonna be a hostage to Imigawa Okay, so did Oda stop that alliance then by saying I've got your kid. Oh, no Oh, oh no, no his dad his dad was ride or die with Imigawa

No matter what but but this meant that Like Oda Oda kind of had him in their back pocket and if it ever came down to it they could still be like Okay, you know what? This this specific thing you better not fucking do okay, so kind of so this is how Oda softens Yeah, Matsu Rida Matsudaira good. That's a guy He got really close for only having heard it a couple of times so far Yeah, I think you know what you because you said Right or die, so I think I flipped

Okay, so so okay, it's widely accepted that Takachiyo met Nobuhide's son who was eight years older, okay? Okay, so he's 14 When when when Takachiyo was six? So the following year after he got captured he met nobunaga Okay, and and wait wait. This is the first time they met Oda nobunaga Oda nobunaga the guy that was the the demon prince yes the deep demon demon lord First unifier of Japan so the first and so so now he's got oh cool

So he's got like a loyal servant guy who's gonna follow him through it You'll see Okay So Takechi was father dies in 1549 Okay, okay at that point Takechi Oh on paper was now the head of Matsudaira Okay, he's he's now on paper He's the head of his clan and he's pals he's got he's got uncles who are running things because he's a hostage But on paper he's he's the heir. He's the one he's head of the pen right it's no longer. We have your future air

It's we have The percentage of legitimacy. Yeah. Yeah, right. Okay So and he's friends with Oda no Banaga Well, he's he's the hostage of Oda no Oda no Banaga his father and okay. He and Oda no Banaga have met We don't know we did beyond that. We know we know not okay, so Imigawa Managed to maneuver Oda into a position where they were able to say hey You have this boy

Mm-hmm if you hand the boy over we won't burn this castle to the ground Okay, and so Oda when all right Fair and handed him over So he's no longer a well. He's no longer a hostage of Oda of Oda This poor fucking kid now so now he goes to the family He was originally supposed to be a hostage to right okay, Magawa sure so now he's nine years old uh-huh He goes to him ago his territory and by all accounts. He was treated pretty well. He was he was a vassal Yeah, well you're the head of a fucking family. You don't want to just shit on that kid well

Yeah, and and and you want him to be useful Right, so you're gonna give him shit. You're gonna right? So you're gonna give him shit You're gonna train him. You're gonna give him an education now You're gonna stop hold him a bit too Because you want him to be friendly to you because he is in charge of that other clan, right? Right, okay And in 1556

Takachiyo turns 14. Uh-huh Imagawa Yoshimoto who is the leader of the Imagawa family Confirms him as the ruler of Matsudaira's territory, okay which has the effect of Putting him in the position of being his overlord Yeah, cuz now I'm not merely an alliance to yeah yeah I'm giving you this position which means I have the power over it right but also fuck your uncle's you will there's a layer there too there's

there is a layer there yeah and so he also arranged Takachiyo's marriage to the daughter of One of his other major vassals keeping him within the family keeping him keeping him within the whole Imigawa orbit Right and the Oda family is like I mean obviously family is Oda family is now like a hundred hundred percent the enemy Okay, okay, but he did get treated nice by them. So he's gonna remember yeah, they treated him Okay, so like you know he doesn't it's not a level. It's not a personal animosity thing sure it's a Our families have been rivals and enemies for you know three generations, and now I'm now I'm in the political orbit of this other bigger feudal lord.

Yeah, if we fight and I beat you, then you're probably going to get favorableish terms for me because y'all weren't shitty to me. Yeah, as long as I'm given enough freedom by Imigawa to give you those terms. Right, right, right. You know, because the the thing is if we had a map Mikawa province which is which is matadira's territory is a buffer zone for Imigawa between His homeland and Oda territory this is given some serious Vlad imagery here You know

You know I haven't thought of that parallel, but yes the whole hostage story Vlad image here. There's, you know, Wallachia was a buffer zone. You know, I hadn't thought of that parallel, but yes, the whole hostage story. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot going on there. OK, so now you got to remember, um, just as a recap for anybody who's like, oh my god, all these fucking names, right? Could be worse. We could be doing Polish history. And it is. I know we We could be doing Polish history I know But like I had a professor say I Have a whole lecture, but it's essentially unpronounceable names from unpronounceable places. It's just like

That's a bit harsh, but I can understand there's six consonants in a row and Yeah, yeah But okay, okay, so yeah recap all right so so Let me try to let me try to recap okay, okay, okay? Matsudaira right okay, that's our boy Yeah, he the dad of of that five-year-old was sending him to the Any no, I forgot the name of that clan EMA EMA

You know Gawa. He McGowan was sending him to the McGowan clan gets intercepted by the Oda clan Right the Oda clan keeps him for four two or three years. Yeah, I'm like that. He meets Little boy Oda no no no no no one Aga who's actually like 14 right needs him at least And this is a Matsudaira talk to you talk to you then the Sound like a hot sauce it does then then Inuyaga clan.

Imigawa. Imigawa clan basically threatens a castle that the Oda clan has. Yeah. Says, hey, that's supposed to be our hostage. Give them to us and we won't burn your shit. And the Oda clan says, fine. They give him. We can't beat you in that location at this time. So are I trying?

meanwhile Takachiyo's dad Masuda era the elder. Yeah He has died. So now Takachiyo is the actual leader, but he it's kind of a regency thing Yeah, so whoever controls him has some sway over the Matsudaira clan Takechi is the actual leader, but it's kind of a regency thing. Yeah. So, whoever controls him has some sway over the Matsudaira clan, which is a buffer zone to another clan.

Correct. Okay. Between Imagawa and Oda. Oh, okay, okay, okay. So that's, okay, got it. So then the Imagawas now have Takechiyo and they're keeping a hold of him. And then they tell him when he's like 14, okay, now you're in charge of your own clan. Yeah.

Which is big dick energy and basically fuck you to his uncles who have been running it. Yeah. And so the kid is still a, he's 14 now. He's being raised by these folks taking care of because you want your your buffer zone to be your ally right who's also been cared for by the Oda clan at one point he's also been passed around a bunch like there's yes let's not make any bones about this yeah so he's now 14 right did we miss anything no cool okay he got he got made the one thing is his marriage

Oh, right to to effectively kind of a princess. Uh-huh. It needs to be said The his the woman the woman that he his marriage was arranged to was notable as a great beauty okay, she was from a a Family held a much higher formal rank sure like like Ceremonially speaking she was from the upper upper crust right the boobies. Yeah. Yeah, so this is a BFD right? right big fucking deal now also uh-huh uh And she's a she's from a family that's loyal to the Gowa, Imigawa. Yeah, yeah, right, okay, right, okay?

so Takachiyo also because this is age 14 and in traditional Japanese culture During this time in history as a young man when you reach the age of 14 you went through a ceremony called your gimpaku ceremony Okay Uh at which you took an adult name So he gives up his childhood name of uh, takechi. Oh and he becomes motoyasu Motoyasu, okay, okay, matsudaira

Motoyasu, okay. Cool. Okay Okay, Matsudaira Motoyasu, okay, cool. Okay So and and now things start so so he has spent his entire Childhood like right like except for his very earliest formative years, right? From kindergarten through his freshman year of high school sure they use modern Analogous age comparisons. He has been somebody's hostage Mm-hmm. He has never been in control of his own fate, right? and

So at this point he's now been given What what he was born to like what he was literally entitled to from birth has now been given to him by by Imagawa Yoshimoto, right and so When he turned 16 in 1558, okay Imagawa Yoshimoto gives him orders To lead an assault on a castle. He is sent into battle for the first time. Okay, I assume he's been training for this.

He's been, yes, he's been receiving the training that any young man of the Daimyo class would. And he's going to be protected by several retainers because you don't want to risk... His own samurai from Mikawa, from Matsudaira are going to be with him He's going to be commanding. Okay his own his own samurai now Much interaction he's had with them prior to being put in command sure is Uncertain Hey, you guys are going out on retainer and the guy who's leading is actually from our family Yeah, I could see that like leading to them like not again. This is this is this is a morale boost for sure right or and

Like I said before he's been given all this training. They want him to be useful. They want him to know what he's doing, right? So he's also received an education in military strategy Uh-huh, so he's also received an education in military strategy Focusing very heavily at this point on Chinese classics of the discipline, so he's read Sun Tzu specifically sure okay And and I think with with this big adventure in front of him. I think we're gonna. We're gonna pause here Okay, because I think this is a good This is a good place where we can where we can hit the pause button But we don't okay, you're you're you're kind of cliffhanger in me here with well intentionally. Oh, thank you. All right You haven't even named the castle. I'm sitting there going are they?

Can say that like to Robbie it's it's to Robbie castle. It's a castle in Oda territory. So they're going there They're going they. They're going They're going up against the enemy. This is not this is not okay. No border. Shit. This is not somebody else. This is yeah No, oh is he is no one. Oh, just tell me is no Banuga. No, it's not a super Naga. No, Banaga Is no Banaga? No, no, no, no No, Banaga in charge of that castle. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, happen cliffhanger which like Dude, well, then why wouldn't I do that right right? Yeah? Yeah Other than that what's your what's your takeaway?

At this point I'm wondering why who's the author of Shogun again James Clevel Why why compress anything this shits fascinating on its own. Like you could have, like there's no need. Yeah. You know? Um, and well, yeah, you didn't see me compress anything with Frank Gotch versus George Hackenschmidt. I didn't have to. Well, we're, we're kind of, we're kind of the king and crown prince of, you know, condensed or, or yeah, yeah, condense shit. Why? Yeah. What? What? Heresy. Yeah.

You know, so, I mean, that's not the way we operate. But I think for Clavel, so to actually give kind of an answer to that question for Clavel writing his novel. Blackthorn is the entry point character for him as the author and for his intended audience. Because he wrote the novel for Americans and Europeans. And so having Mighty Whitey in a, of centrality, and actually I shouldn't, I shouldn't denigrate it like that because blackthorn blackthorn is not

that trope. Um, blackthorn does not become a master of swordsmanship or anything like that. And he, and he fucks up like culturally, he makes so many mistakes. But it's that it's it's it's it's comical, but there are also points where he realizes that everybody expecting him to fuck up. He can use that to his advantage. He can, he can play the role of the stupid barbarian, right? Oopsie. Yeah. yeah and and like get away with shit or which which there's one really amazing point in the novel where where he

does it but anyway well again he's writing at the era that we haven't even gotten to yet like yeah like I think we're within the lifespan of the people and what you're talking about just by the data you've given me Yes, but like we haven't even gotten to to Clavel's main character getting on to Japan. Oh, no. No, we're not there. Yeah. No Yeah, so because because he was I I think His his interest came from, you know, oh, hey, there's this record of this Englishman showing up, you know, fortuitously at this, you know,

crux point of Japanese history. How cool would it be to write a story where he's, you know, where I can tell this specific story. Yeah, I can tell this specific story of all of the court intrigue and military stuff and backstabbing and everything using him as this viewpoint character. And so for that reason, it's like, no, no, I'm going to focus on this on this very short period of time. Everything that I've told you so far These these events are part of the backstory to the beginning of

The manga series that I've recommended as part of everybody's homework before Listening to this episode which is the path of the assassin And so if you want to see a treatment of this That is actually less historically accurate in many ways than Shogun, but is really entertaining Highly recommend path of the assassin It gets into all kinds of ninja Whoo-hoo stuff, but it's it's still a pretty good primer for, for these events. Sure. So yeah. Um, so I mean, that's, that's why Clavel condensed everything, but yeah, this, this is,

this period of Japanese history is, is catnip for me. And like it is my biggest frustration teaching middle school that you don't get there when I get to the well when I get to the Japan unit I get to go okay well so we have the establishment of the Shogunate and I have to tell the story of Don O'Rourke because like they're middle schoolers how can I not sure sure and then I have to jump to you know the Edo period and and all and so there was this long, the Edo period and all of this. It's like, and so there was this long period of civil war and like all of these amazing stories and all this detail just gets thrown out the wash.

Right. Because curriculum's a bitch and we only have a hundred and how many days in the year. Sure. God damn it. So, yeah. Okay. Sure. God damn it. So, yeah. Okay. Yeah, I still think I think Clavel missed missed.

I was going to say missed the boat, but I mean, literally he missed the boat. But like he I think he missed out on. I mean, just this this little thing that you are leaving me with. Yeah, that's right there enough for a mini series. Like are you fucking kidding me? It just means there's no white people involved. Yeah. That's and maybe that's why he missed it. Yeah. And in Japan, there have been so many television series movies made about this. You know, because is, this is a very important part of their national identity. Sure. You know, the, the, their, their, you know, uh,

development as a, as a nation is tied up in this and tied up in the personalities that are involved in all this. So yeah. Well, cool. Um, that are involved in all this so yeah Well cool, I look forward to seeing the payoff of this great battle and I assume Dude who just took an adult name Yeah, is is going to acquit himself well cuz you know I figured like he's like I said He's good. You already told me he's he's grown up to be a cool samurai, so yeah, yeah cool awesome Well, what are you recommending for people to? Take in as far as books go

I don't have a book recommendation at this time But I am going to strongly recommend if you haven't done it already Do take the time to watch the 2024 version of Shogun. Okay. Um, because it like, there's not, there's not a clinker in, in any of the performances, everybody just acts the shit out of it. Nice. Um, the script is really well done.

The script is really well done. It focuses much more heavily and centralizes the Japanese characters of the story much more than the 1980 mini series did. And in many ways, because of that, is truer to the book. And yeah, it's it's visually a feast for the I was just I could gush. It's amazing. Highly recommend it. Check it out.

So that's my recommendation. What about you? I'm going to actually recommend a graphic novel that just dropped. My daughter and I were talking about it today. I was hoping to get my son into it as well by Tony Weaver, Jr it's called weirdo and it's about a

Young kid who's about 11 or so who is trying to figure out himself and he's into anime comic books all kinds of nerd shit Right. It's written for young adults. So we're talking like 11 to 14 year olds But if you have one of those in your home, or if you know one of those, it's about coming of age and being geeky and dealing with mental health issues and self doubt. So absolutely something that you should take a look at. and Yeah, it's it's it's it's about like Being who you are and being comfortable with that regardless of who's pressuring you not to be and Bitch, yes. Yeah. All right. I like it. Cool. Well, uh, you don't ever want to be found. So where can we be found? We collectively can be found on our website at wubba wubba wubba dot geek history time dot com

where you can go through our archives and find any number of different topics to catch your interest and you know find anything that does catch your interest. You know if it's wrestling we get we definitely got you covered if it's Batman. There's a whole Whole chunk of our second season It's dedicated to that and anything anything in between anything and everything pop culture and geek related and Beyond that we can be found on the Apple podcast app on the Amazon podcast app on the Amazon podcast app on and on Spotify and

Where can you be found sir? Well as of this release you've probably missed the December 6th capital punishment show in Sacramento So I'm gonna recommend that you check out our January 3rd capital punishment show in Sacramento. So I'm gonna recommend that you check out our January 3rd capital punishment show in Sacramento at 9 p.m. at the Comedy Spot and go to comedyspot.com click on the link for the calendar and pull up our show get the tickets now. If you live in San Francisco area the odds are we're doing SketchFest as well. Otherwise wait until you see us on February 7th or March 7th. Both of those are dates as well. Get your tickets early because our October show sold out like weeks in advance and our November show

also sold out really well. So my strong recommendation is that you get those tickets well in advance. If you can't make it out to the show then bring the show Into you and get the digital version, you know get it streaming. So That's that's where you can find me. So first Friday of every month Honestly, just keep that in mind first Friday of every month capital punishment, Sacramento. So very cool Well for a geek history of time I'm Damian Harmony and I'm Ed Blaylock and until next time keep rolling 20s