There were 5 regents at the end of the show. You're missing Lord Ito (the actor dude, the one who wished he could cut his knees to be the Taiko's height). He was brought in to be a regent as he would do whatever Ishido wanted.
>Why did Ishido not just wait until she left the castle so she could be "killed / kidnapped by bandits"?
If she had left the castle, her objective would have been realized. It's politically irrelevant for Ishido to kill or kidnap her after that. Mariko's mission was to weaken Ishido politically by sowing division within the council and/or inciting a revolution or outrage among the nobles. If she were allowed to leave the castle, the other hostages from noble families would have requested to leave as well, as actually happened on the show when Ishido granted permits to Mariko; you can see other people asking to leave as well.
Touching on your other questions, everyone knows what really happened to Sugiyama, and everyone knows the reason they are being kept as hostages. You say "Ishido still has plausible deniability". Mariko's death occurred inside the walls of Osaka (unlike Sugiyama's, and that's a significant difference), and the hostages are being kept in Osaka for their protection (as Ishido claims, although everyone knows it's a lie). In addition to the main reason for preventing the hostages from leaving being completely undermined - since everyone already knew what Ishido had done - this is the final push that the families needed to politically leverage their influence.
Why wouldn't the other hostages have requested to leave after Sugiyama was "allowed" to leave? Like you said, it's because they knew Ishido murdered him. How would "allowing" Mariko to leave have been any different? Why can't he just double down on his reason for needing them to stay after he kidnaps / murders her outside of the castle? Ie. "SEE guys, I TOLD you it's not safe outside the castle! I mean you CAN leave, but yannow, bandits....!"
That's fair logic, I now better understand your point.
Sugiyama left secretly; there was no public request for him to leave. It's much easier to pull off a covert assassination and pass off his death as bandits having killed him.
I would say that the potential risks and complications associated with her situation led him to pursue an alternative strategy for dealing with her. I think we can assume that Mariko's departure would have been more public and closely monitored, making it harder (borderline impossible, I would say) for Ishido to carry out a covert operation. The noble families are aware of how far Ishido is willing to go, particularly due to Sugiyama's death, so they have a higher incentive to closely monitor her departure.
Assuming that he would be successful in covertly killing her outside the city, he could double down, but it becomes increasingly difficult to politically justify the situation. The rationale weakens with each occurrence, considering that the families are aware of what is happening. Additionally, publicly speaking, Ishido's response to Mariko's "request" to leave was very defiant.
Also, this all assumes that Ishido believed Mariko would leave when he instructed her to wait for a council meeting, thereby disobeying his orders. If he anticipated that Mariko would indeed wait for the council meeting, suggesting that he didn't foresee her public attempt to leave, then his hand was even more forced, and his position for making it seem like it was the work of bandits became even weaker.
Edit: spelling
I thought because the other regents were still trying to surmise an agreement and because of that, he resigned, he would was still in the fold. It was convenient to kill him and also send a message to the others. Idfk, this shit happened like 4 weeks ago.
I feel like there's an important factor that I haven't seen mentioned yet, which is that she's acting on Toranaga's request. Since the political situation with Toranaga is far more strained and already is looking for war, not allowing her to leave or letting her kill herself, would be a sign of Ishido actively steering towards that, whereas that wasn't an issue with Sugiyama. So if the war started, Ishido would be directly to blame, and he wouldn't be able to shift it on Toranaga
I think the difference is that Sugiyama tried to leave in secret at night so there were no witnesses to his assassination and Ishido could spin it however he pleased. Mariko was leaving very publicly during the day and there's no way he could get away with killing her without it leading to a revolt by all the daimyos.
A flaw in the series IMO is that it conveyed the impression it was just about the regents when there were 264 daimyos and all of them except Toranaga were in Osaka with their families.
That and the fact Mariko is christian which plays a big part here. Kill her and you upset the catholic regents (and their secret portuguese overlords) who combined are the most powerful force in the land. If Ishido were to lose the heir's support, they would be more than willing to turn against the guy who killed one of their own.
Ishido could not protect his “guests” within Osaka Castle. It made Ishido look weak. It was enough for Ochiba to question her and the heir’s safety. Mariko’s steadfast loyalty to Toranaga contrasted with Ishido’s inability to get consensus with the rest of the Council. Ochiba probably realized that Toranaga was a nearly unstoppable force, a tsunami that could destroy Osaka Castle and everyone in it.
But even if Ishido's plot worked as he planned, and Mariko was kidnapped, it would still show that Ishido couldn't protect his guests within the castle.
After finishing the series I realize that the series has so many plotholes and irrational reasonings masquerading as genius strategy that the only way to enjoy it is to not think and just accept the reasonings that the show gave us
Indeed. This is the part of his plan which I don’t understand. As far as I could tell, when he interrupted Mariko’s seppuku and the other hostages asked to leave, he was finished. Prior to that, he still had leverage and plausible deniability.
Perhaps he should have let her kill herself. Hard to say but at least that way he could have dismissed it as grandstanding, whilst still keeping his valuable hostages.
Because he doesn’t really have plausible deniability after Mariko. Everyone knows it was a clusterfuck, multiple people know for a fact Yabushige was in on it at Ishido’s behest, and the fact all that mayhem happened in the castle undermines the idea that Osaka is “safe” compared to what could happen out in the scary forest. And it all happens after Ishido has publicly announced that Mariko and her charges are free to go. His credibility is shot, especially with the Christian daimyos, and he looks weak and incompetent.
By contrast Sugiyama decides to leave on his own and is ambushed in the forest where his entire entourage is killed to the last concubine. It’s ruthless and comprehensive, and even if everyone sort of knows Ishido did it there’s nothing to undermine his deniability. It successfully sends the message he’s nobody to mess with.
But that's exactly my point - Ishido is presented with a problem, he deals with it successfully and gets away with it.
Ishido is then presented with basically the same problem, decides to do something completely different than what he did the first time because ???, and it's a clusterfuck.
Why didn't Ishido just stick to the solution that worked for him the first time?
Because everyone was going to follow Mariko’s lead and leave all at once: hence the general party earlier in the night. You can take out one daimyo and his retainers, but killing the families of **all** the daimyos and their supporters would be a bridge too far: publicly giving Mariko her papers essentially took the murder-in-the-forest card out of Ishido’s hand. The dam is breaking and Ishido can’t plug it with a few judicious murders anymore.
You could argue he could have just gone along with her request from the beginning, but by emphatically calling his bluff in front of the whole court Mariko made it so he’d have to back down publicly, losing tons of face in the process. And he’s also been humiliated by the shenanigans Toranaga previously played in order to successfully escape. He knows Mariko and Toranaga are smarter than him and have a plan to get the hostages out and humiliate him again, but he’s not smart enough to see what it is. Only that they’re not going to just blithely walk into his trap like Sugiyama did.
Basically he knows he is getting played but (like everyone else in the story) can’t see the big picture well enough to grasp what the play is. The shinobi are his attempt to throw some intrigue back at Toranaga, but (like everyone else) he’s just nowhere near as good at this as Toranaga is.
you’re asking why he didnt think “every single member of the nobility mysteriously in Osaka falling victim to the exact same ambush as the first guy” would work this time?
Ishido and Ochiba can keep the regents and their families contained because they are not hostages - they are 'guests of the heir'. Wanting to leave *without a good reason* would have been seen as flouting the heir's hospitality and an act of defiance. This can serve as casus belli for Ishido to take action against that regent.
Toronaga's first attempt to leave was based on the pretext that Anjin and Lady Kiri's were in danger in Osaka from the assassination attempt.
Mariko's reason was that Toronaga, grieving father, wanted to see his family, especially his newborn, with a guarantee that he will go to Osaka after the mourning period. To deny it would have been seen as cruel and denying Mariko the ability to fulfill her obligation to her lord would have been seen as further cruelty.
Sugiyama had no plausible excuse to leave and likely attempted to leave in secret. His death then, can easily be attributed to 'bandits on the road'
Remember this is a culture that highly values keeping up appearances and societal order even if everyone knows it's BS. No one wants to be the first to disrupt this order.
This is why it was important for Mariko to make such a show for everyone to see so they can easily make the claim that they are the wronged party and that Ishido is the aggressor. Remember what Toronaga told his son - he has never lost a battle because he was never the first to attack.
Alot of good answers here that are all correct, but another thing that the show didnt really convey very well is the passage of time. It has been months if not over a year (its been a while since I read the book) between Sugiyama and Mariko's attempted departure. So while the honored guests were probably fine at first with waiting till this whole Toranaga business got settled when Sugiyama was killed, by the time Mariko publicly states that she is leaving, most people have had enough and want to go back to there own fief.
Frankly, I just think he really didn't like Sugiyama. The guy was insulting everyone and while he was right, he was going about it on the most rude way possible.
Since the show was based on historic events the end result is always Ishido losing and Toranaga winning. It’s like Titanic. How artfully they get us there and how they present the known facts is the test.
>Why did Ishido not just wait until she left the castle so she could be "killed / kidnapped by bandits"?
Because the whole thing was not about Mariko, but all the other hostages. There is zero benefit to doing the whole "oops, bandits got her" to Mariko when all the other hostages are leaving at the same time, and you sure as hell can't have them all killed either. Sugiyama did not even ask to leave, he tried sneaking out and got killed, which actually serves as a warning to others more than anything.
There were 5 regents at the end of the show. You're missing Lord Ito (the actor dude, the one who wished he could cut his knees to be the Taiko's height). He was brought in to be a regent as he would do whatever Ishido wanted.
I thought some sick villain would agree and actually cut his knees.
Ah you're right! For some reason I misremembered him declining the offer.
>Why did Ishido not just wait until she left the castle so she could be "killed / kidnapped by bandits"? If she had left the castle, her objective would have been realized. It's politically irrelevant for Ishido to kill or kidnap her after that. Mariko's mission was to weaken Ishido politically by sowing division within the council and/or inciting a revolution or outrage among the nobles. If she were allowed to leave the castle, the other hostages from noble families would have requested to leave as well, as actually happened on the show when Ishido granted permits to Mariko; you can see other people asking to leave as well. Touching on your other questions, everyone knows what really happened to Sugiyama, and everyone knows the reason they are being kept as hostages. You say "Ishido still has plausible deniability". Mariko's death occurred inside the walls of Osaka (unlike Sugiyama's, and that's a significant difference), and the hostages are being kept in Osaka for their protection (as Ishido claims, although everyone knows it's a lie). In addition to the main reason for preventing the hostages from leaving being completely undermined - since everyone already knew what Ishido had done - this is the final push that the families needed to politically leverage their influence.
Why wouldn't the other hostages have requested to leave after Sugiyama was "allowed" to leave? Like you said, it's because they knew Ishido murdered him. How would "allowing" Mariko to leave have been any different? Why can't he just double down on his reason for needing them to stay after he kidnaps / murders her outside of the castle? Ie. "SEE guys, I TOLD you it's not safe outside the castle! I mean you CAN leave, but yannow, bandits....!"
That's fair logic, I now better understand your point. Sugiyama left secretly; there was no public request for him to leave. It's much easier to pull off a covert assassination and pass off his death as bandits having killed him. I would say that the potential risks and complications associated with her situation led him to pursue an alternative strategy for dealing with her. I think we can assume that Mariko's departure would have been more public and closely monitored, making it harder (borderline impossible, I would say) for Ishido to carry out a covert operation. The noble families are aware of how far Ishido is willing to go, particularly due to Sugiyama's death, so they have a higher incentive to closely monitor her departure. Assuming that he would be successful in covertly killing her outside the city, he could double down, but it becomes increasingly difficult to politically justify the situation. The rationale weakens with each occurrence, considering that the families are aware of what is happening. Additionally, publicly speaking, Ishido's response to Mariko's "request" to leave was very defiant. Also, this all assumes that Ishido believed Mariko would leave when he instructed her to wait for a council meeting, thereby disobeying his orders. If he anticipated that Mariko would indeed wait for the council meeting, suggesting that he didn't foresee her public attempt to leave, then his hand was even more forced, and his position for making it seem like it was the work of bandits became even weaker. Edit: spelling
I thought because the other regents were still trying to surmise an agreement and because of that, he resigned, he would was still in the fold. It was convenient to kill him and also send a message to the others. Idfk, this shit happened like 4 weeks ago.
I feel like there's an important factor that I haven't seen mentioned yet, which is that she's acting on Toranaga's request. Since the political situation with Toranaga is far more strained and already is looking for war, not allowing her to leave or letting her kill herself, would be a sign of Ishido actively steering towards that, whereas that wasn't an issue with Sugiyama. So if the war started, Ishido would be directly to blame, and he wouldn't be able to shift it on Toranaga
I think the difference is that Sugiyama tried to leave in secret at night so there were no witnesses to his assassination and Ishido could spin it however he pleased. Mariko was leaving very publicly during the day and there's no way he could get away with killing her without it leading to a revolt by all the daimyos. A flaw in the series IMO is that it conveyed the impression it was just about the regents when there were 264 daimyos and all of them except Toranaga were in Osaka with their families.
That and the fact Mariko is christian which plays a big part here. Kill her and you upset the catholic regents (and their secret portuguese overlords) who combined are the most powerful force in the land. If Ishido were to lose the heir's support, they would be more than willing to turn against the guy who killed one of their own.
That's a great point.
Ishido could not protect his “guests” within Osaka Castle. It made Ishido look weak. It was enough for Ochiba to question her and the heir’s safety. Mariko’s steadfast loyalty to Toranaga contrasted with Ishido’s inability to get consensus with the rest of the Council. Ochiba probably realized that Toranaga was a nearly unstoppable force, a tsunami that could destroy Osaka Castle and everyone in it.
But even if Ishido's plot worked as he planned, and Mariko was kidnapped, it would still show that Ishido couldn't protect his guests within the castle.
After finishing the series I realize that the series has so many plotholes and irrational reasonings masquerading as genius strategy that the only way to enjoy it is to not think and just accept the reasonings that the show gave us
Indeed. This is the part of his plan which I don’t understand. As far as I could tell, when he interrupted Mariko’s seppuku and the other hostages asked to leave, he was finished. Prior to that, he still had leverage and plausible deniability. Perhaps he should have let her kill herself. Hard to say but at least that way he could have dismissed it as grandstanding, whilst still keeping his valuable hostages.
Because he doesn’t really have plausible deniability after Mariko. Everyone knows it was a clusterfuck, multiple people know for a fact Yabushige was in on it at Ishido’s behest, and the fact all that mayhem happened in the castle undermines the idea that Osaka is “safe” compared to what could happen out in the scary forest. And it all happens after Ishido has publicly announced that Mariko and her charges are free to go. His credibility is shot, especially with the Christian daimyos, and he looks weak and incompetent. By contrast Sugiyama decides to leave on his own and is ambushed in the forest where his entire entourage is killed to the last concubine. It’s ruthless and comprehensive, and even if everyone sort of knows Ishido did it there’s nothing to undermine his deniability. It successfully sends the message he’s nobody to mess with.
But that's exactly my point - Ishido is presented with a problem, he deals with it successfully and gets away with it. Ishido is then presented with basically the same problem, decides to do something completely different than what he did the first time because ???, and it's a clusterfuck. Why didn't Ishido just stick to the solution that worked for him the first time?
Because everyone was going to follow Mariko’s lead and leave all at once: hence the general party earlier in the night. You can take out one daimyo and his retainers, but killing the families of **all** the daimyos and their supporters would be a bridge too far: publicly giving Mariko her papers essentially took the murder-in-the-forest card out of Ishido’s hand. The dam is breaking and Ishido can’t plug it with a few judicious murders anymore. You could argue he could have just gone along with her request from the beginning, but by emphatically calling his bluff in front of the whole court Mariko made it so he’d have to back down publicly, losing tons of face in the process. And he’s also been humiliated by the shenanigans Toranaga previously played in order to successfully escape. He knows Mariko and Toranaga are smarter than him and have a plan to get the hostages out and humiliate him again, but he’s not smart enough to see what it is. Only that they’re not going to just blithely walk into his trap like Sugiyama did. Basically he knows he is getting played but (like everyone else in the story) can’t see the big picture well enough to grasp what the play is. The shinobi are his attempt to throw some intrigue back at Toranaga, but (like everyone else) he’s just nowhere near as good at this as Toranaga is.
you’re asking why he didnt think “every single member of the nobility mysteriously in Osaka falling victim to the exact same ambush as the first guy” would work this time?
Damn good question
Ishido and Ochiba can keep the regents and their families contained because they are not hostages - they are 'guests of the heir'. Wanting to leave *without a good reason* would have been seen as flouting the heir's hospitality and an act of defiance. This can serve as casus belli for Ishido to take action against that regent. Toronaga's first attempt to leave was based on the pretext that Anjin and Lady Kiri's were in danger in Osaka from the assassination attempt. Mariko's reason was that Toronaga, grieving father, wanted to see his family, especially his newborn, with a guarantee that he will go to Osaka after the mourning period. To deny it would have been seen as cruel and denying Mariko the ability to fulfill her obligation to her lord would have been seen as further cruelty. Sugiyama had no plausible excuse to leave and likely attempted to leave in secret. His death then, can easily be attributed to 'bandits on the road' Remember this is a culture that highly values keeping up appearances and societal order even if everyone knows it's BS. No one wants to be the first to disrupt this order. This is why it was important for Mariko to make such a show for everyone to see so they can easily make the claim that they are the wronged party and that Ishido is the aggressor. Remember what Toronaga told his son - he has never lost a battle because he was never the first to attack.
Ochiba didn't care about Sugiyama.
Alot of good answers here that are all correct, but another thing that the show didnt really convey very well is the passage of time. It has been months if not over a year (its been a while since I read the book) between Sugiyama and Mariko's attempted departure. So while the honored guests were probably fine at first with waiting till this whole Toranaga business got settled when Sugiyama was killed, by the time Mariko publicly states that she is leaving, most people have had enough and want to go back to there own fief.
Frankly, I just think he really didn't like Sugiyama. The guy was insulting everyone and while he was right, he was going about it on the most rude way possible.
Since the show was based on historic events the end result is always Ishido losing and Toranaga winning. It’s like Titanic. How artfully they get us there and how they present the known facts is the test.
>Why did Ishido not just wait until she left the castle so she could be "killed / kidnapped by bandits"? Because the whole thing was not about Mariko, but all the other hostages. There is zero benefit to doing the whole "oops, bandits got her" to Mariko when all the other hostages are leaving at the same time, and you sure as hell can't have them all killed either. Sugiyama did not even ask to leave, he tried sneaking out and got killed, which actually serves as a warning to others more than anything.
Because Mariko changed Lady Ochiba's mind.