PicoBlog

Spoiler alert. If you haven’t seen the series yet, you may want to avoid reading this article.

Readers of this Substack and the Facebook Samurai History and Culture Japan site often ask for my opinion on the series, and so with a few tweaks, this is a reprint of my initial reactions to having watched the series when it first came out in early 2021.

I don’t want to go into too much detail or this will become a novel, but here goes;

Finally got around to watching all six episodes of the Age of Samurai series, a basic rundown of the late Sengoku period covering the times of the Three Unifiers, Oda Nobunaga, Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Tokugawa Ieyasu from around 1551 to 1616.

While there are a number of glaring mistakes, mostly on the re-enactment side, on the whole it wasn’t as bad as expected. I had apologized to She Who Must Be Obeyed in advance of any possible swearing (She doesn’t speak English, but knows the bad words!) and any sudden outbursts that may emerge, but it turns out she was more vocal than I was in regards to the “problems” with the series.

The commentators gave a fair representation of the history. There was a lot to cover, and some very complicated dealings going on, so they had to keep it very simple. That being said, some of the details and comments were, in my humble opinion, out-dated in places, often stereotyped, occasionally exaggerated and a little too typical.  A few commentators seem to have missed the point, others made some blatant mistakes or made unsubstantiated claims which raised a few eyebrows.

What let the series down in my eyes were not so much content than visual mistakes.

The biggest problems were visual. The directors and producers could have, and should have researched Japanese period clothing, architectural styles, samurai fighting styles, weapons usage, customs and manners better. The clothing, the hairstyles, many of the sets and interior scenes were definitely NOT of Japanese origin. That is something Japanese friends also picked up on, and were most upset by. It was a mish mash of Korean and Chinese, with a touch of Japanese and modern “Hollywood” imagery thrown in. I’ve worked in the media long enough (36+ years now) to know there was a tight budget, and that costume rental, special wigs and make up, props and set design etc. is expensive. Still, to make a documentary requires a little more realism.

Scenes inside castles and palaces were dark and very un-Japanese. The architecture, the atmosphere and the furnishings were not correct. For example, the castle interiors, such as the depicted Iwakura and Fushimi Castles had walls and floors of stone. Wrong. Hideyoshi’s palace, shown towards his end when syphilis and drink had apparently consumed him,…it looked like he was living in a grubby mountain cabin, not the luxury and magnificence of Fushimi or Osaka Castles. We saw people sleeping on low beds, not futon, sitting in Chinese styled thrones not zafuton cushions on raised tatami. Some very un-Japanese interiors were shown throughout the series. Pity, because the simple aesthetics of Japanese interiors really could have added to the series.

There were numerous funeral scenes, those of Oda Nobuhide, Takeda Shingen, Toyotomi Hideyoshi etc, all shown outside in forest like settings, with the bodies laid out on a funeral pyre bed of logs, swords across their chests, surrounded by Buddhist statues.  Not correct.

Such figures were usually not cremated. While law stipulates that all be cremated in Japan, that is a modern law. Until the Edo period, most were buried in the fetal position, or seated upright and cross legged inside a simple wooden tub-like coffin.

The Battle of Okehazama was depicted as having been fought at night (it was fought during daylight hours), with Hideyoshi appearing to have taken Imagawa Yoshimoto. Hmm? Please check the history books again,…and again.

The depiction of Nobunaga as a ruthless, bloodthirsty, sake swilling paranoid thug went too far. Perhaps a more balanced view of the man would have been better. Yes, he was ruthless to his enemies, but he was an innovator, a creator, kind to his vassals and the people of his domains. He may have acted the fool as a youth, but this was to hide his keen and cunning mind. Many of the samurai depicted were shown to be grubby savages when in fact they were quite cultured. And clean.

Akechi Mitsuhide was shown as having been “horrified” by the massacre of those on Mt. Hiei. Recent findings prove that he was in compliance with the plans to attack and take down the Ikko Iki monks. Hideyoshi’s sword hunt and the disarming of the peasantry was shown as a forceful disarmament with bands of samurai tearing apart homes looking for weapons. Not so.

I’m an armor snob, so the following will be blunt. The series was for entertainment purposes and made on a budget, understood, and the armor used and shown in the series was the cheapest they could get, and it looked it. (Disclosure; I was apprenticed to a traditional armor craftsman from 1994, and have been a member of the Japan Armour and Weapons Research and Preservation Society, both the national and Tokai (Central Japan) branches ever since. For that reason, I am an armor snob, and hate seeing it misrepresented in any way.) The styling, the fit, the shape, the design was all dreadful and horribly incorrect. Some looked as flimsy as cardboard. Swords worn were often katana, not the proper downward slung tachi worn with armor. During Hideyoshi’s scenes we had him wearing his sode, shoulder guards left on right in a number of scenes. (Someone noticed a samurai with his armor on backwards!) Still, this is a TV show for entertainment, and the average person won’t be looking too closely at such things.

Things that evoked gasps and groans from She Who Must Be Obeyed and myself; Swords being drawn while making a grinding, steel on steel sound. Anyone associated with Japanese swords will know they slide silently in and out of scabbards. And samurai slamming their swords back into the scabbards. Another no no!

There was one scene where a samurai about to go into battle used a stone to “sharpen” his sword. Numerous times samurai were shown cleaning blood off their swords by running the blade thorough the crook of their arm. Even in armour! That would scratch the blade on the chain-mail! There were numerous scenes of decapitations, the majority showed the decapitating swordsman to the right of the victim. How clumsy. Balance wise and physically! Standing to the left is easier, cleaner and historically accurate. The scene of Date Masamune cutting his own eye out showed him using what looked like a rusty scalpel. Rust? On a samurai weapon? Highly unlikely!

Obviously, this is entertainment. Scenes were created to excite the viewers. The NHK World English language program I host, Ninja Truth (also available On Demand, On-Line!), is also guilty of creating imagery that exaggerates in order to excite and entertain. I’m sure that the commentators probably also had to cater their comments to fit with the producer and director’s line of thought. It happens in TV in Japan a lot too — stuff the truth, the story is so much better!

One rumour I have heard is that the NHK was supposed to have assisted in production, but pulled out at the last minute due to the Covid pandemic, forcing Netflix to go it alone. This could explain the lack of authenticity.

While there were many cringeworthy moments, and I’m sure that by subjecting myself to re-watching would remind me of many more inaccuracies, but I couldn’t bear to watch it again. Looking at this positively, if people watch this series, and through it, find an interest and appreciation for samurai history and culture, and it spurs them into reading and researching more, wanting to sort the fact from fiction, then maybe that’s not a bad thing at all.  4/10. F grade.

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