History UsefulNotes / The47Ronin

* In ComicBook/Wolverine1982, Logan's LoveInterest and her [[BureaucraticallyArrangedMarriage husband]] go to see a kabuki troupe perform ''Chishingura''. Logan, watching from the shadows, remarks to himself that it's one of the best renditions he's ever seen. Then it turns out that the kabuki troupe are {{Ninja}} and attack the couple. [[CurbStompBattle This does not go well for them]], due to [[TheBerserker Logan]]'s presence.

On April 21, 1701, ''Daimyo'' Asano Naganori and ''Daimyo'' Kamei no Tsuwano received an envoy from the Shogun in [[UsefulNotes/{{Tokyo}} Edo]]. Since they had no experience in courtly etiquette, Kira Kodzukenosuke Yoshinaka was appointed to teach them. Unfortunately, Kira was quite a {{Jerkass}},[[note]]Allegedly, he scorned Asano for not offering a large bribe. Incidentally, Kira's neighbors didn't like him very much either.[[/note]] and Asano, a devout Confucian, could barely tolerate him. Eventually, Asano [[RageBreakingPoint had enough]] and attacked Kira. He managed to scar him, but he had committed a [[DisproportionateRetribution capital crime]] by drawing a weapon in Edo Castle.

On April 21, 1701, ''Daimyo'' Asano Naganori and ''Daimyo'' Kamei no Tsuwano received an envoy from the Shogun in [[UsefulNotes/{{Tokyo}} Edo]]. Having no experience in courtly etiquette, they hired Kira Kodzukenosuke Yoshinaka to teach them. Unfortunately, Kira was quite a {{Jerkass}},[[note]]Allegedly, he scorned Asano for not offering a large bribe. Incidentally, Kira's neighbors didn't like him very much either.[[/note]] and Asano, a devout Confucian, could barely tolerate him. Eventually, Asano [[RageBreakingPoint had enough]] and attacked Kira. He managed to scar him, but he had committed a [[DisproportionateRetribution capital crime]] by drawing a weapon in Edo Castle.

On April 21, 1701, ''Daimyo'' Asano Naganori and ''Daimyo'' Kamei no Tsuwano received an envoy from the Shogun in [[UsefulNotes/{{Tokyo}} Edo]]. Having no experience in courtly etiquette, they hired Kira Kodzukenosuke Yoshinaka to teach them. Unfortunately, Kira was quite a jerk, and Asano, a devout Confucian, could barely tolerate him. Eventually, Asano [[BreakTheHaughty had enough]] and attacked Kira. He managed to scar him, but he had committed a [[DisproportionateRetribution capital crime]] by drawing a weapon in Edo Castle.

After a year in hiding, during which time Kira has stopped fearing assassination and dismissed most of his bodyguards, Yoshio secretly gathered his men and infiltrated Kira's home on December 14th, 1702. They attacked from front and back, sparing the noncombatants, and captured Kira. Yoshio offered him the chance to die by his own hand, with the knife that Asano had wounded him with, but he clammed up, so they held him down and used the knife to decapitate him. They took Kira's head to Sengaku-ji and laid it and the knife on their master's grave, saying prayers at the temple and giving all their money to the abbot. They then proceeded to Edo and turned themselves in.

One thing, however, was perfectly clear to the Shogunate: Questions of honor aside, letting Asano's retainers off the hook for killing a court official would set a dangerous precedent. After receiving numerous petitions from the public, the Shogun decided to sentence them to death by ''seppuku'' instead of execution as criminals. Forty-six ronin died by their own hands on February 4, 1703; Yoshio had sent the last one, Terasaka Kichiemon, back to Ako to inform Asano's former retainers that their revenge had been completed. The Shogun [[ThePardon pardoned]] him and Terasaka died at the age of 78, buried next to his comrades and his lord. Their weapons, armor, and clothing are still kept at Senkagu-ji. The Satsuma man who had insulted Yoshio came to Sengaku-ji to pray for forgiveness and then took his own life; he is also buried next to the ronin.

It is probably appropriate to point out that despite the long-pedigreed valorization of the actions of the 47, there are still actually people [[AlternateCharacterInterpretation who take a very dim view of them]] -- among them obviously the surviving descendants of Kira Yoshinaka, who pointed out that he was merely a dutiful courtier whose life and legacy was stained by this controversy. Japan-based British historian Stephen Turnbull takes this view (even suggesting that, at best, their fight was more like a gang war-style execution) in a military history [[https://ospreypublishing.com/the-revenge-of-the-47-ronin-edo-1703 report published by Osprey]] in 2011.

* An [[Film/FortySevenRonin American live action film]] starring Creator/KeanuReeves [[ButNotTooForeign as the main character]] hit theaters on Christmas of 2013. In-story, Reeves's character is a half-Japanese/half-English slave man named Kai who befriends the ronin and joins them in their path to revenge. [[spoiler: He ultimately commits {{seppuku}} with them.]]

* This incident is mentioned in ''{{Film/Ronin}}'', a 1998 thriller about a team of ex-Cold War spies who hire themselves out as mercenaries. The French doctor they seek help from is building a diorama of the 47 Ronin, and relates the tale to the protagonist 'Sam'. Sam approves of the methods of the 47 Ronin, but not their subsequent suicide -- but the scene is a clue to Sam's own nature. Just as the ronin were pretending to have forsaken their duty, so Sam is only pretending to have left the [=CIA=].

* ''Daichushingura'', literally ''Epic Chushingura'' is NET's 1971 TV adaptation that Mifune himself bankrolled. If the 1962 movie had an AllStarCast, then this one arguably took the term UpToEleven by throwing in a grand majority of Japan's greatest film the stars from the sixties - with Mifune at the helm. The entire series ran exactly for one year, so viewers felt and experienced the same waiting game the forty-seven had to go through for their revenge in real time.

* In ''Manga/{{Ooku}}'', the Forty Seven are almost all men, a rarity in post-{{Gendercide}} Japan. This naturally makes the fallout worse for Shogun Tsunayoshi.

After receiving numerous petitions from the public, the Shogun decided to sentence them to death by ''seppuku'' instead of execution as criminals. Forty-six ronin died by their own hands on February 4, 1703; Yoshio had sent the last one, Terasaka Kichiemon, back to Ako to inform Asano's former retainers that their revenge had been completed. The Shogun [[ThePardon pardoned]] him and Terasaka died at the age of 78, buried next to his comrades and his lord. Their weapons, armor, and clothing are still kept at Senkagu-ji. The Satsuma man who had insulted Yoshio came to Sengaku-ji to pray for forgiveness and then took his own life; he is also buried next to the ronin.

* In ComicBook/FrankMillersWolverine, Logan's LoveInterest and her [[BureaucraticallyArrangedMarriage husband]] go to see a kabuki troupe perform ''Chishingura''. Logan, watching from the shadows, remarks to himself that it's one of the best renditions he's ever seen. Then it turns out that the kabuki troupe are {{Ninja}} and attack the couple. [[CurbStompBattle This does not go well for them]], due to [[TheBerserker Logan]]'s presence.

* An episode of Anime/LupinIIIRedJacket, [[Recap/LupinIIIS2E113 "The Name of the Operation is Chuushingura"]], is a {{Homage}} to the 47 Ronin, where the ghost of Kira asks for Lupin's help in regaining an earthly treasure.