I can’t think of anything more terribly, stupidly fitting than having Tongotsu Taira, a petulant nepobaby with snot literally dribbling out of his nose at all times, act as the leader of this ill-advised mission Seii? He’s obviously an exaggerated, satirical representation of all the underqualified losers that have run armies and nations into the ground throughout history, but at the same time, is it really that much of an exaggeration? I’m doing my damndest not to drag all of my trauma over America’s Century of Humiliation into these analyses, but it is just so hard not to physically recoil in disgust whenever that little Taira shitstain pops up on screen, as my brain is being bombarded with flashbacks of all the sociopathic influencers-turned-government-stooges that have been tearing down our democracy brick by brick over the last decade. Granted, I suppose pretty much every person on Earth has some horror story or another to tell about the damage done by their government’s ineffectual (if not outright malicious) machinations. I guess everyone reading this can at least take some cold solace in the fact that we haven’t been asked to make a suicidal charge right into the maw of death on behalf of Secretary General Weenie Hut Junior.

Not yet, anyway.

The poor sons-of-bitches under the command of Taira the Rhinorrheic are not so fortunate. While Right Lieutenant General Goh Sugoh is clearly the voice of professionalism and experience, there’s only so much to be done when the Powers That Be have put incompetent nincompoops at the head of the formation. Sugoh does his damndest to convince Taira of the strategic and logistical foolishness of marching across the river into Kanezawa and play into what we, the audience, know is very much a Seii trick, but alas. All that this show of common sense earns Sugoh is a swift arrest as a traitor. Naturally.

Now, one of the things that makes Nippon Sangoku so delightful is the way that its structure as piece of speculative historical docufiction is the way that we’re afforded a bird’s-eye-view of the conflict that allows us to enjoy the messy political spectacle of it all, even when it means that objectively stupid and bad people are getting one over on the folks who should be in charge. It’s one thing to know that Seii is flagrantly deceiving the Yamato Army, but it’s another thing to watch Nagao lose his shit like a tween at a K-Pop concert over the prospect of making his Gentle Dictator smile. You could argue that we’re technically supposed to be on the side of Yamato, since that’s where our main protagonists are situated, but the whole conceit of this show is that we’re rooting for the everyday citizens of the nation to succeed over their own incompetent government.

In that sense, the show’s more removed narrative distance is actually what makes its moments of tragedy and bloodshed hit that much harder. When I first started really getting into history in my 20s, it was because of podcasts like Hardcore History that went out of their way to put a face to the human suffering caused by all of the political machinations we learned about in school. I understood the gist of the First World War based on the maps we studied and the lectures we sat through, but the details that turned that historical event into truly compelling human drama all came from the stories of the men on the frontlines being forced to fight a stupid and bloody conflict for reasons that had little to do with justice and peace and everything to do with ensuring that the aristocrats in charge got to make good on all of their backroom deals and treaties.

The point is, even though it is fun to see the bigger picture of how Taira the Younger’s boneheaded decisions will inevitably clash with both Seii’s schemes and his own father’s bloodthirsty power grabs, Nippon Sangoku has not forgotten that humanity that is core to making a war epic like this matter to people that aren’t die-hard nerds for military stratagems and politicking. As the episode draws to a close, we see the seeds of Taira the Elder’s plot bear their bloody fruit. The loyal soldiers of Yamato rise to meet Seii’s army as it bears down on Kuzuryu Castle, and then Kevin Penkin‘s rousing score hits just as the war between the nations truly begins. It’s…well, you hardly need me to tell you. This right here is just pure, absolute cinema, baby.

Episode Rating:

Nippon Sangoku The Three Nations of the Crimson Sun is currently streaming on
Amazon Prime.

James is a writer with many thoughts and feelings about anime and other pop-culture, which can also be found on BlueSky, his blog, and his podcast.