It is difficult to envision a time in which whole countries and civilizations were not yet aware of each other’s existence. Yet, this is the historic era in which the latest Hulu/FX series Shogun, based on James Clavell’s 1975 novel, is set.

The series plunges into the mysterious and perilous world of the 17th century, in which the global map still held blank spaces and cultural collisions shaped the future of empires. It is here, in Japan, amid an era of political turmoil, that intrepid English sailor John Blackthorne (Cosmo Jarvis) makes landfall. His towering vessel of the English navy approaching a quaint Japanese village in the first episode is a scene that today could only be analogous to witnessing an alien spaceship descending from the clouds.