Shōgun SFX reel shows how series' visual effects brought feudal Japan to life

Last week, FX on Hulu aired the season finale of its spectacular Shōgun limited series. Based on the 1975 novel by James Clavell, Shōgun is an intelligent, bloody historical drama that takes place during the late 16th century in feudal Japan. It follows English sea pilot John Blackthorne (Cosmo Jarvis) after he's stranded on the island nation and becomes embroiled in its complicated web of politics, honor and warfare.

Shōgun is a beautiful period piece. From its detailed settings to its intricate costuming to its painstakingly crafted multilingual script, it's obvious that the people behind the cameras put in a lot of work to make Shōgun as culturally authentic to its time period as possible.

Not all of that was achieved on camera though. For all its practical effects magic, Shōgun still has plenty of digitally created elements, many of which are grafted into what you see onscreen so well that it can be hard to differentiate. Which just makes it all the more fun that visual effects company SSVFX just released a visual effects reel highlighting their work on Shōgun. Check it out:

There's something awe-inspiring about seeing all the effects come together into the final scenes that we saw on television. It's no surprise that many of Shōgun's sweeping city shots were composed with digital effects, but it's also cool to see lots of little touches added in as well, such as extra trees, torches or people in crowds. I think my favorite shot might be the one of the warriors racing through the streets of Osaka, torches held high, as shown from above.

All 10 episodes of Shōgun are available now to watch on Hulu. That means you can relive the entire emotionally devastating journey again from start to finish. And hey, if you still can't get enough of Shōgun, author James Clavell has written a bunch of other books in the same series:

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