Shōgun episode 9’s major moment made the showrunners question everything they thought they knew
The penultimate episode of Shōgun is a big one, in the way only great TV can build to.It binds together everything the past eight hours of the show has built, then punctures the plotlines like daisy chains. And the result is explosive, even before the final moments blow up everything we understand about where this story might be headed. Episode 9, “Crimson Sky,” brings the whole conflict to a fiery head — so it’s no wonder it prominently features the plotline the show’s creators, by their own admission, struggled with the most.
[Ed. note: This post will now get into explicit spoiler territory for “Crimson Sky.”]
When trying to nail down all the details of Shōgun’s period world, showrunners Rachel Kondo and Justin Marks brought in producer Mako Kamitsuna as a cultural consultant. When seeking notes, they — like anyone undergoing an edit — were hopeful they had shot the moon.
“We thought, OK, she’s gonna be like, How did you guys do this? You captured the Japanese essence,” Kondo told Polygon. “And she very politely said, ‘I’m sorry, I’m not able to give you notes about this, because a Japanese person wouldn’t even have this thought.’”
As Marks and Kondo saw it, it was a classic case of not knowing what they didn’t know. “[It] really challenged us to break it down from the beginning and start over. At first you’re shocked, and then you’re challenged, and then you’re inspired — and I think that’s what happened at almost every level,” Kondo says.
One particular note stood out to them: “The meaning of seppuku and a true understanding of why it was used,” Marks says. “Even after the writers room with our Japanese producers and actors, there were a lot of conversations about us trying to reach for: What does seppuku mean?”
The answer to that question is weighed across “Crimson Sky,” particularly as various people try to talk or maneuver Mariko (Anna Sawai) out of her resolve to commit seppuku. Though, as we saw in last week’s episode, it is some sort of ploy on behalf
Read more on polygon.com
