It’s not that FX tends to think small, but they do think grounded. Some recent shows include Reservation Dogs, about Indigenous teens in Oklahoma; The Bear, about Chicago restauranteurs; Justified: City Primeval, where U.S. Marshal Rylan Givens bounces around Detroit. With Shōgun, though, they’re going epic. It’s the latest small screen take on James Clavell’s 1975 doorstop, previously adapted for a much-watched 1980 miniseries (back when they called them that). It has the size and maybe also close to the violence of an HBO blockbuster, like Game of Thrones (to which it’s already been compared).
But when can one watch this fool thing?
The answer is: starting Tuesday, February 27. That’s when FX will drop its first two episodes. There are 10 in all, meaning the show will conclude by April 23.
Here’s how Uproxx previously described Shōgun’s plot:
The expansive story follows the outbreak of a 1600s civil war and also revolves around the accounts of an English ship captain, John Blackthorne (Cosmo Jarvis), whose shop becomes marooned, which is the first step in him becoming pivotal in the conflict, particularly on the side of Lord Yoshii Toranaga (Hiroyuki Sanada), whose rule has been dragged into chaos by an opposing Council of Regents (i.e., “vultures”). However, Blackthorne and Toranaga must rely upon a translator, Toda Mariko (Anna Sawai), who is no mere impartial party.
The first time American TV adapted Shōgun, it turned Richard Chamberlain — already a fixture of TV films, to say nothing of his beloved ‘60s show Dr. Kildare — into the king of miniseries. Three years later he’d star in the far trashier The Thorn Birds, playing a horny priest who struggles to love God more than the young woman he once hooked up with.
Will the same happen to Cosmo Jarvis? Or what about Hiroyuki Sanada, a regular of Hollywood blockbusters — in the last two years alone he was in Bullet Train and John Wick: Chapter 4 — finally getting a splashy co-lead role? You can start finding out very soon, when the show airs on FX and streams on both Hulu and Disney+.
In the meantime, you can watch the trailer for Shōgun below.
