FX’s historical series Shōgun, starring Hiroyuki Sanada, has taken the streaming world by storm, amassing 9 million views in just six days across Hulu, Disney+, and Star+. Despite surpassing FX’s previous streaming hit The Bear Season 2 and receiving critical acclaim for its portrayal of feudal Japan, the series’ creators, Justin Marks and Rachel Kondo, have clarified that a second season is unlikely.
Adapting James Clavell’s 1152-page novel, Shōgun, was no small feat. Marks and Kondo embarked on this epic journey in 2018, dedicating nearly a decade to meticulously crafting a world that honours Clavell’s work while also setting a new standard for historical accuracy on screen. Their commitment to detail and authenticity paid off, culminating in a ten-episode series that has captured audiences worldwide.
“We took the story to the end of the book and put a period at the end of that sentence. We love how the book ends; it was one of the reasons why we both knew we wanted to do it — and we ended in exactly that place. And I’ve been party to this in the past with shows like this, where you build a whole factory, and it only pumps out 10 cars and closes up shop. It’s a bummer. You know, one of our producers wrote a nearly 900-page instruction manual for how we do this show — almost as long as the book Shogun itself. All of this infrastructural knowledge went into it. I just hope someone else — maybe a friend — needs a production primer on feudal Japan at some point, so I can be like, ‘Here you go, use this book. That will save you 11 months.'”
Despite its success, Marks and Kondo have decided to conclude the story where the novel ends. In a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, they expressed satisfaction with the series’ natural conclusion, suggesting that extending Shōgun beyond its intended finale might not serve the story or its characters well.
“Oh, that’s just our bodies talking. Like, do you want to have another kid right now? You know, we also made this show so long ago, because of the long tail of post-production on it. It’s not like a normal TV series, where if we were in a situation like this promoting it, we wouldn’t just be in the writers room already, we’d be on set shooting season two by now.”
However, there is a catch to the finality of Shōgun. James Clavell wrote six books in his Asian Saga from 1962 to 1993, covering different time periods and locations in Asia. The next book, Tai-Pan, set in 1841 Hong Kong, represents a completely different production challenge and narrative focus. Given the immense preparation and dedication that went into Shōgun, Marks and Kondo indicated that embarking on a new Clavell adaptation would be a significant undertaking, suggesting that if it were to happen, it wouldn’t be a continuation of Shōgun but rather a new series altogether, and not any time soon.
As the series continues to air, with new episodes released every Tuesday on FX and available for streaming on Hulu and Disney+, viewers can appreciate Shōgun for what it is — a meticulously crafted narrative that honours its origins while carving out its own place in television history.
Natalie is a big fan of anything related to movies, TV shows, games, and comics — you name it. When she’s not reading or geeking out about the latest shows on Netflix, she’s probably playing Honkai: Star Rail, cosplaying, or daydreaming of meeting her idols.
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