Demand for Japanese content booms post 'Shogun'

'Let a hundred flowers bloom' to steal from Mao and there is a lot of native talent.

Unfortunately it is often appropriated by 'agencies' and 'offices' which are just overcompensated middlemen and the actual creators do not even have living wages.

Witness the case of manga artists.

Shogun is an outlier, the majority of Japanese "content" other than manga and anime made in Japan are B movie quality at best. Too much lazy cheap copy-cat high-school love story. South Korean's content took over Japan two decades ago.

Guess why Shogun is an outlier ? It's not funded by Japanese media conglomerate, the likes of Johnny or smile up or whatever.

But Japanese companies lack "know-how"

Japanese companies lack of everything while blaming industry decline because piracy.

While Japanese animators are being underpaid and overwork.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/24/business/japan-anime.html

https://www.cartoonbrew.com/artist-rights/new-survey-shows-japans-animation-workers-are-overworked-underpaid-and-face-regular-harassment-239390.html

https://www.vox.com/culture/2019/7/2/20677237/anime-industry-japan-artists-pay-labor-abuse-neon-genesis-evangelion-netflix

Shogun is an outlier, the majority of Japanese "content" other than manga and anime made in Japan are B movie quality at best. Too much lazy cheap copy-cat high-school love story. South Korean's content took over Japan two decades ago.

You post was exactly what I wanted to say. Japan just does not make the TV content that appeals much beyond it's borders.

A lot of its content looks fairly cheap, and revolves around themes of high school romance, and, for some reason, time travel.

The acting is often deliberately exaggerated and over the top. It's a pity.

Guess why Shogun is an outlier? 

Another reason is that while the narrative was based on real historical persons, the book itself was written by James Clavell, an Australian (and later a naturalized American), writing for a western audience. He was able to incorporate his experience of spending three years in a Japanese POW camp in Singapore.

Why have previous films themed around Japan been a flop? It's because Japanese people have not been involved much. With "Shogun," Hiroyuki Sanada has produced the film with meticulous attention to detail. Even to Japanese viewers, the film is set in Japan and will not feel out of place.

Hollywood films set in Japan often use Chinese and Korean actors, who have no understanding of Japanese culture.

A film that is not even accepted by Japanese people is unlikely to be accepted overseas either.

Quality Japanese content...created by westerners for westerners.

Ah_soToday  09:16 am JST

You post was exactly what I wanted to say. Japan just does not make the TV content that appeals much beyond it's borders.

A lot of its content looks fairly cheap, and revolves around themes of high school romance, and, for some reason, time travel.

The acting is often deliberately exaggerated and over the top. It's a pity.

Completely agree and for the same reasons, J-pop will never be popular overseas. And it's not for lack of trying. I've sat down and watched Japanese TV series and listened to J-pop wanting to like them. Nothing clicked for me. That's not to say that there aren't great Japanese films and musicians. There are. But the ones I like just aren't that popular in Japan.

Quality Japanese content...created by westerners for westerners.

Quality content based on Japanese history, through a collaborative work by Japanese and Westerners.

Japanese artisans and craftsmen created a Japanese village in BC, Canada. Japanese wardrobe people. Much of the core was Japanese as it had to be to create a piece of work depicting Japan and a work of fiction based closely on historical events in Japan.

The original work was written by a westerner but the quality program "Shogun 2024" could not have been made by westerners alone. It would not have even come close.

Sanada was the linchpin that allowed for authenticity in reproducing that era of Japan, from costuming, to sets to character portrayal. He was the producer responsible for such.

But he was only one member of an incredibly devoted, creative enthusiastic team.

Other producers were Western, as were the script writers and the director was American, and as noted the sets were in Canada.

A truly collaborative effort.

If all of the above principals - and others - were Japanese, then it could be called a Japanese production.

Shogun is a perfect collaboration between western directors and very good quality local actors and advisors. Acting was good, sets and wardrobe were perfect, and the story, even if fictionous, was believable and not over the top.

Perfect combinations.

Colorize "Seven Samurai," from 1954, and one has an instant success. Most Western audiences still have not seen the Japanese classics. Some movies are so good that they just do not merit a "modern" update.

Shogun is a perfect collaboration between western directors and very good quality local actors and advisors. Acting was good, sets and wardrobe were perfect, and the story, even if fictionous, was believable and not over the top.

Perfect combinations.

But the point is was that it was principally made for foreign audiences. Whether it was fictional or fact-based is largely irrelevant. It got a bit budget and avoided some of the laughable over-acting that is so common in Japanese dramas.

Western viewers have overcome their initial reluctance to watch series with Asian actors, believes Masaru Akiyama, chief executive of the BEAJ.

They have been watching Korean dramas for some time - it's the low quality of the Japanese dramas which means that they don't do so well internationally.

The Japanese film and TV industry doesn't produce for anything outside their domestic market. The legendary Akira Kurosawa was an exception in that he deliberatly chose themes that would resonate with both a domestic and western market. In both TV and films there is now an interest in the US (and elsewhere) for tapping Japanese content. That also has opened the door for some Japanese actors who can work with an English script.

The subject of K Dramas vs. J Dramas is an interesting one. In my opinion, while some of the J Dramas are worth watching, the best K Dramas are better than the best J Dramas. There is a lot of Japanese talent in the film industry, I have no idea why there are not more exceptional J Dramas.

Korean movies have gotten a lot of recognition in the last few years, but the Japanese classics are far better (IMO). While there are some very good Korean movies, some of them real mind blowers, the Japanese classics have not yet been matched by the Korean movie industry.

Kurosawa made a film during World War II with a scene that somehow made it past the censors. If my memory serves me, there are two samurai wrestling fruitlessly in a big puddle of mud, and one says to the other something about "This is what happens when we don't think about what is going to happen in the future." I can't imagine what he was talking about.