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yelpI started watching Ooku on a whim and got through it over the holiday. (It's only 10 episodes!) It's about an alternate history of Japan where a plague wiped out most men and continues to keep the population gender-imbalanced, and women began to take over their roles in society. The story centers on the Ooku, the male harem of a female shogun.
I always love the formalism of these period settings: the rigid hierarchy, the formal rites, the strict obeisance to the shogun. It's an unimaginable social distance in these modern times where, inequality aside, no one is expected to get on the ground and bow just coming into someone's presence. At the same time, there's the complicated power dynamics behind the scenes, where supposed servants and retainers exert greater power than those nominally in command, and we find out in some ways the shogun herself is a prisoner as much as the men of the Ooku.
There is definitely a lot of attention paid to historical accuracy. I'm not the biggest expert on Edo Japan, but even I could tell that they're taking care to tell this story in a way that lines up with the actual recorded events. Hence, Japan's period of isolationism was enacted to keep foreigners from finding out about the lack of men in the country. The reason the shogun sits behind a screen during her meetings with foreigners and with her subjects, is not just to maintain distance and authority, but so she can use a body double to prevent them from realizing she's a woman. Even as women are taking over these roles of power, they adopt male names in the official records, so that only a few generations in, people seem to have forgotten that the earlier shoguns/lords in the lineages, before the epidemic struck, really were all male. Not to mention, a lot of careful attention is paid to depicting the haircuts and clothing of the times, making points of culture/style that go over my head, and it always tickles me to see the highest ranking people using that single armrest thing like a throne, leaning against it with perfect, regal posture.
The first episode is about the 8th shogun coming into power, but she becomes curious about how things got to be the way they were, why all the shoguns also have a male name, and she begins digging into the history. The rest of the season jumps back in time to when the plague first came, and how this gradual transition happened. It's fascinating to see how women at first take power stealthily: either pretending to be men (taking over their recently-dead brother's role), or in the shogun's case, as some kind of placeholder in the bloodline until a male heir can be produced. There's a lot of world-building about not only how the reduction in the male population has changed society, but also even then the resistance to women taking power, with traditionalists protesting the whole way.
One surprising thing I really love about the show is that it takes so much care to portray the male protagonist in both eras as moral, kind men. It's not a trait that's often valued or emphasized in male leads, but here it seems to be the main defining characteristic of both men. To me it feels like something that would primarily appeal to a female audience, and somehow the prominence of this trait feels like a takeover of the "female gaze" (if you will) that's appropriate for the subject matter of the show. I like the match-up of these kind men with their respective shoguns, two women who are commanding and assertive in quite different ways. A+ dynamic, needs to be explored more!
(If you've gotten to this point and think you might want to check the show out, I should probably leave some content warnings. The show contains rape, one instance of animal death, and a bunch of people's lives being ruined for no good reason.)
I always love the formalism of these period settings: the rigid hierarchy, the formal rites, the strict obeisance to the shogun. It's an unimaginable social distance in these modern times where, inequality aside, no one is expected to get on the ground and bow just coming into someone's presence. At the same time, there's the complicated power dynamics behind the scenes, where supposed servants and retainers exert greater power than those nominally in command, and we find out in some ways the shogun herself is a prisoner as much as the men of the Ooku.
There is definitely a lot of attention paid to historical accuracy. I'm not the biggest expert on Edo Japan, but even I could tell that they're taking care to tell this story in a way that lines up with the actual recorded events. Hence, Japan's period of isolationism was enacted to keep foreigners from finding out about the lack of men in the country. The reason the shogun sits behind a screen during her meetings with foreigners and with her subjects, is not just to maintain distance and authority, but so she can use a body double to prevent them from realizing she's a woman. Even as women are taking over these roles of power, they adopt male names in the official records, so that only a few generations in, people seem to have forgotten that the earlier shoguns/lords in the lineages, before the epidemic struck, really were all male. Not to mention, a lot of careful attention is paid to depicting the haircuts and clothing of the times, making points of culture/style that go over my head, and it always tickles me to see the highest ranking people using that single armrest thing like a throne, leaning against it with perfect, regal posture.
The first episode is about the 8th shogun coming into power, but she becomes curious about how things got to be the way they were, why all the shoguns also have a male name, and she begins digging into the history. The rest of the season jumps back in time to when the plague first came, and how this gradual transition happened. It's fascinating to see how women at first take power stealthily: either pretending to be men (taking over their recently-dead brother's role), or in the shogun's case, as some kind of placeholder in the bloodline until a male heir can be produced. There's a lot of world-building about not only how the reduction in the male population has changed society, but also even then the resistance to women taking power, with traditionalists protesting the whole way.
One surprising thing I really love about the show is that it takes so much care to portray the male protagonist in both eras as moral, kind men. It's not a trait that's often valued or emphasized in male leads, but here it seems to be the main defining characteristic of both men. To me it feels like something that would primarily appeal to a female audience, and somehow the prominence of this trait feels like a takeover of the "female gaze" (if you will) that's appropriate for the subject matter of the show. I like the match-up of these kind men with their respective shoguns, two women who are commanding and assertive in quite different ways. A+ dynamic, needs to be explored more!
(If you've gotten to this point and think you might want to check the show out, I should probably leave some content warnings. The show contains rape, one instance of animal death, and a bunch of people's lives being ruined for no good reason.)
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Date: 2025-12-30 10:03 pm (UTC)The first episode is about the 8th shogun coming into power, but she becomes curious about how things got to be the way they were, why all the shoguns also have a male name, and she begins digging into the history.
Fascinated by this! Historical research as a plot point. <3