James Delingpole James Delingpole

Lavish, graphically violent swashbuckling: Disney+’s Shogun reviewed

Ruthless warlords, sundry bandits, scheming priests, lubricious geishas and outrageously deft assassins – what's not to like?

Key Japanese player Lord Yoshii Toranaga (Hiroyuki Sanada) in Shogun 
issue 16 March 2024

Here’s a frightening thought for those of you who remember the original Shogun (1980), starring Richard Chamberlain as the Elizabethan navigator who ends up playing kingmaker amid the power struggles in the Japan of 1600. We are now further away in time from that series than that series was from the beginning of the second world war.

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