Spoilers

“A Dream of a Dream”

That last moment of the penultimate ninth episode was the most shocking, unexpected scene I have seen on a TV show in a long time. The death of Lady Mariko shook the series dramatically, and the repercussions were felt of that death throughout a beautiful finale of Shogun.

In fact, the death of Mariko was the point of Crimson Sky, the main concept behind the plan of Toranaga in his attempt to regain power and bring a lasting peace to Japan.

We see John Blackthorne in a distant future, old and most likely on his deathbed, showing that he would survive the situation in Japan.

I thought the death of Mariko would trigger some serious violence and I was wrong. Her death actually triggered the change of alliances in the potential war. She negotiated for the life of John. Mariko’s ghost was all over this episode.

Her death also brought the guilt out of Yabushige and led to his committing seppuku with Toranaga acting as his second. The scene between these two on a cliff overlooking the sea was strong as Toranaga confessed his entire plan to Yabushige before his death.

There was a beautiful scene with Blackthorne and Fuji scattering her husband and baby’s ashes in the water before she would depart to become a nun.

Of course, the scene where Blackthorne threatened to kill himself was undercut by the fact that we saw old man Blackthorne at the beginning of the episode, but the acting was so good in this scene that you could excuse the structure.

I expect that this is the end of Shogun. It was ten fantastic episodes. If they decided to extend this to a second season, I would watch, but without Mariko, I am not sure it would have the same power. The acting was tremendous and the shocks were plentiful.