SHOŌ-IN

SHŌGUN
NBC 1980

SHOŌ-IN
Crazy #72, March 1981
w: Murad Gumen
a: Kent Gamble

This was a TV mini-series about John Blackthorne (Richard Chamberlain) a British sailor who lands in Japan in the 1600s and is captured by samurai warriors, then released and rises through the ranks in Japan. The parody gives them the opportunity to use several dated Asian cliches that wouldn't fly today, and especially weird that since were written by a Thai man and approved by a Japanese editor.

After his Dutch trading ship Erasmus and its surviving crew is blown ashore by a violent storm at Anjiro on the east coast of Japan, Pilot-Major John Blackthorne is taken prisoner by samurai warriors.

Being an Englishman, Blackthorne is at both religious and political odds with his enemy, Portuguese traders such as Father Dell'Aqua (Alan Badel) and Captain Ferreira (Vladek Sheybal), and the Catholic Church's Jesuit order which includes Father Sebastio (Leon Lissek) and Vasco Rodrigues (John Rhys-Davies). The Catholic foothold in Japan puts Blackthorne, a Protestant and therefore a heretic, at a political disadvantage. This same situation, however, also brings him under the scrutiny of the influential Lord Toranaga (Toshiro Mifune) , who mistrusts this foreign religion now spreading throughout Japan. He is competing with other samurai warlords of similar high-born rank, among them Catholic converts, for the very powerful position of shōgun, the military governor of Japan. Through interpreter Father Alvito (Damien Thomas), Blackthorne later reveals certain surprising details about the Portuguese traders and their Jesuit overlords. He explains to Lord Toranaga about the terms of the Treaty of Tordesillas which was signed between Portugal and Spain in 1494, forcing Toranaga to trust him; they forge a tenuous alliance, much to the chagrin of the Jesuits. To help the Englishman learn their language and to assimilate to Japanese culture, Toranaga assigns a teacher and interpreter to him, the beautiful Lady Mariko (Yoko Shimada), a Catholic convert and one of Toranaga's most trusted retainers.

Blackthorne saves Toranaga's life by audaciously helping him escape from Osaka Castle and the clutches of his longtime enemy, Lord Ishido. To reward the Englishman, and to forever bind him to his service, Toranaga makes Blackthorne hatamoto, a personal retainer, and gifts him with a European flintlock pistol. Later, Blackthorne again saves Toranaga's life during an earthquake by pulling him from a fissure that opened and swallowed the warlord, nearly killing him.

Having proved his worth and loyalty to the warlord, during a night ceremony held before a host of his assembled vassals and samurai, Lord Toranaga makes Blackthorne a samurai; he awards him the two swords, 20 kimono, 200 of his own samurai, and an income-producing fief, the fishing village Anjiro, where Blackthorne was first blown ashore with his ship and crew. Blackthorne's repaired ship Erasmus, under guard by Toranaga's samurai and anchored near Kyoto, is lost to a fire, which quickly spread when the ships' night lamps are knocked over by a storm tidal surge. During a later attack on Osaka Castle by the secretive Amida Tong (ninja assassins), secretly paid for by Lord Ishido, Mariko is killed while saving Blackthorne's life, who is temporarily blinded by the black powder explosion that kills her. Lord Yabu is forced to commit seppuku for his involvement with the ninja attack, into which he was coerced by Ishido. Right before he dies, Yabu gives Blackthorne his katana, and Yabu's nephew, Omi, becomes the daimyō of Izu. Blackthorne supervises the construction of a new ship, The Lady, using funds Mariko left to him in her will for this very purpose.

It was Toranaga who ordered the Erasmus destroyed by fire to keep Blackthorne safe from his Portuguese enemies, who feared his hostile actions with the ship (and, if need be, the warlord will also destroy the new ship Blackthorne is currently building). He also discloses Mariko's secret but vital role in the grand deception of his enemies, and, as a result, how she was destined to die, helping to assure his coming final victory. The warlord knows that Blackthorne's karma brought him to Japan and that the Englishman, now his trusted retainer and samurai, is destined never to leave. Toranaga also knows it is his karma to become shōgun.