"We protect what is ours. We fight for what was taken from us."
Hello everyone!
I hope that your entry into 2026 was calm enough, and that it's treated you well so far. I know for my part that I'd have LOVED if I could have spent a little more time at home - I got super lazy over the four days off I had LOL!
Then I went back to work yesterday and my entire body protested.
Such is life.
BUT.
That said, we are back to blogging on a semi-regular schedule, bby! And I have a special treat for you all with this first post of the year.
Because sometimes, tigers get to walk on two legs, and this one's handsome as sin to boot.
Introducing: Sandokan!
As I have nothing that remotely compares to this, there won't be any links down at the bottom of the page, like there usually are. Instead, let's hope right into it.
When a remake of Kabir Bedi's iconic role was announced, I was initially skeptical, because remakes have a very dodgy track record. But then casting news started coming out, and I admit I was hooked: Can Yaman looked the part of a pirate who would be an undetermined ethnicity in this show, and Ed Westwick as a British lord was a match made in heaven.
Add John Hannah of Mummy fame into this mix, and I was convinced there would actually BE mummies running around! Alas, we only saw skulls of decapitated people, but I digress.
Sandokan begins with a pirate ship attacking a cargo one, and its captain, Yanez, engages the crew. It takes you about five seconds to figure out he's only posing, because the REAL captain has his face hidden. Turns out, Sandokan's on the hunt, as the pirate prince of the South China Sea, to ensure gold and prosperity for his crew.
They find antimony on board, however, rather than gold, and free a tribesman who's convinced that Sandokan may be part of a prophecy - the prophecy his people have of a saviour who will unite them all, and free them.
Unfortunately, he doesn't survive long enough to make it make sense, and even Sandokan gets washed up ashore on the island of Labuan, rescued by the daughter of the British Consul, who just so happens to look like an angel: Marianne.
She makes sure dude doesn't drown on the beach, and is interested in him enough to keep him in her orbit while her father's busy arranging her marriage to Lord James Brook, who arrives on his huge ass frigate, a famed and feared pirate hunter. Our pirate, of course, is pretending to be a humble merchant, but how many merchants do you know who'll attack a tiger head-on with a knife to save the pretty girl, when his gun gets jammed?
Hint: no, sadly, we didn't get the whole scene that eventually got Sandokan his title 'Tiger of Malaysia', because I suppose RaiUno was concerned it would be too gruesome nowadays. I feel jipped.
No one, that's who, but Marianne's all confused up in her feels because James is playing all sweet and nice and just feeding her adventurous spirit enough that she can't decide if she likes him better, or Sandokan. She definitely doesn't like the Sultan of Brunei, who also wants to marry her, and who she usually rolls her eyes at.
Pretty privilege, thy name be Marianne, because I'm sure she'd have been gutted ten times over otherwise.
Anyway, since Sandokan's only here to rescue his men from the gallows (they were caught by Brooke, of course), he tries not to let the waltz with Marianne get to him, and his brilliant idea of shaking off Jonathan - I mean, Sergeant Murray, is to yeet a monkey at his head.
I mean, whatever works, right?
Unfortunately, because Marianne and her maid, Sani (who happens to share the same tribe and people with the deceased guy Sandokan originally saved), end up right where they shouldn't be, Sandokan kidnaps them both. Okay, to be fair, Sani goes with him willingly, and Marianne is just not in the proper place at all, so she gets tied to the ship's mast for her troubles.
However, Sandokan DOES protect her, even from his own crew, and promises to ransom her off to her father with no harm done to her. In fact, they'll go through a lot of trouble just to keep her from harm, period, but they do open her eyes to the cruelty her father willingly allows to happen right under his nose, as the Dayak people - Sani's people, natch - are enslaved in his antimony mines.
Shaken, she tags along with the rag-tag crew that head to Singapore where they can regroup and wait for Brooke to find them. They stay with Sandokan's mother Nur at what was once a brothel, but he bought it and now the girls run it for themselves; their arrival coincides with the Lunar New Year celebration, so I mean, more excuse to dance, right? Especially since Marianne's father agrees to pay the ransom, and the exchange is about to go down.
Until, that is, the Sultan's men attack the entire thing, mortally wound Nur, and we miss a golden opportunity for Sandokan to drag an unconscious Brooke along with him when they flee, because I guarantee THAT would have been absolutely hysterical.
Sadly, that's not to be, but he at least know to put two and two together, while Sandokan still keeps Marianne with him as he travels to the village of Sarawak, to try and find out who he really is.
See, Nur dropped a little hint: she isn't his biological mother. And Yanez apparently knows more than he's letting on, too, bu seeing as he's someone who used to be a priest but turned from God when the English brutally attacked his church, well ...
Sandokan, Sani and Marianne get taken by the Dayak who are still free, and it turns out they're Sani's tribe, which makes for some happy reunions. Unfortunately, however, they don't readily believe Sandokan's their saviour, so they make him take a test all Dayak youth undergo: fighting the cobra.
LISTEN. I don't make these rules.
Because this series wouldn't be what it is without him, Sandokan survives, though is blinded by the snake venom; he also remembers that he, too, is a Dayak, his suppressed memories resurfacing, of a warrior tribe led by his father, who opposed the British and fought them, but who eventually got surprised and slaughtered in an attack led by Marianne's father himself, along with the now-Sultan.
This last revelation, that Marianne's father killed his own, manages to railroad the budding romance between our titular hero and his lovely hostage, who's also more than happy to be out and about exploring, and who got married to him in a Dayak ceremony I'm CONVINCED we'll circle back to someday.
First, however, he doesn't fight Brooke when he and Murray pop up, having gone through their fair share of trouble to get this far (including, but not limited to, getting high on opium, saving some Dayak kids ... the usual), and Sandokan distracts them all when he remembers that a young Murray sparred him, 25 years ago, when Marianne's father ordered the massacre of his village and family.
His escape proves in vain, though, as the Sultan's men later capture him when the Dayak dude who's been against him since the beginning doesn't come to his aid, and the Sultan ends up dragging a badly tortured Sandokan to Labuan, as a gift for the consul.
The only thing that accomplishes, however, is that Marianne (rightfully) loses it on the spot, showcasing just how deep her emotions for the pirate run, but as her father has her diagnosed with hysteria, there's little she can do other than explore clues her mother left her. See, Marianne's mother died when she was young, but Marianne now learns that her mother tried to flee with little Marianne back in the day because the consul was absent so often, got caught, and the consul's sister locked her up in an asylum for her troubles.
She then took her own life, to emphasise that SHE was the one making decisions, not the people who put her there, and it turns out that she was still alive the last time her husband returned, even when he keeps saying that no, she was dead already.
Well, he's now dead to Marianne, in any event, who learns that there's nothing he won't do to further what HE believes is right, but she enlists her aunt's help (the same aunt who had her mother locked up), because, obviously. She's a resourceful girl, our Marianne.
Equally, Sergeant Murray is beginning to question his position and all that's happening, and he gets Marianne into Sandokan's cell the night before his hanging. It's unclear whether they actually do more than just kiss during this time, but she DOES give him a potion that Brooke's nanny Hita mixes up, when Brooke finds Marianne on the verge of suicide, promising to help save Sandokan.
There's a catch though: Marianne has to marry Brooke. She agrees, because she loves her pirate, only to then learn that her would-be-husband was just named Rajah of Sarawak to put down the Dayak rebellion in the mines - a rebellion HE helped plan, for Sandokan!
She's like, SO not happening! and storms right out, with Murray in tow, who took the fall for Sandokan's "death" (that potion made him look dead, natch), and they reach the Sultan's palace just as Sandokan's tearing through it, in true tiger fashion. He's already dealt with the mines, his people are now free again, and he's going to take the Sultan down if it kills him.
Well, it doesn't, but only because Marianne shoots the Sultan first before he can do any lasting damage, and the two flee together. Murray tells Brooke - who arrives too late - that, while she's flattered by the man's offer to make her his queen, she'd rather not. K tnx, byeeeeee!
I really hope Murray joins Sandokan, and ends up the babysitter, I truly do.
Because the series ends with Marianne, Sandokan and the rest of the crew plotting where to go next, since they'll be wanted everywhere. They settle on a supposed island that can't be found and isn't on any maps, other than if you know the route following the stars, and off they go!
The best bit?
We're getting a season two!
That's right, Italians loved this show enough that it warrants a second season, and I, for one, am THRILLED. This has just the right amount of drama, action, romance, and the high seas combined to make it worth your while. It also pulls at your heartstrings, through learning about everyone's backstory (especially Sandokan's), and then losing Sani, of all people! She gets caught by shrapnel during the mines rebellion, and for some reason nobody figures to patch her up sooner, and I'm devastated because she's the driving force behind every action Sandokan takes until he makes the conscious choice to return to the Dayak.
But the show is worth a watch, it's 8 episodes in total, each roughly an hour long, and there's enough intrigue to go around (Hita's actually Brooke's mother, not nanny? Marianne's father warns Brooke not to make the same mistakes he made, but Brooke doesn't listen? SAY IT ISN'T SO!). I'll have to rewatch again sometime soon, but for now, I'm just stoked that it's coming back in 2027.
Absolutely highly recommend. Every generation needs a hero of their own, and the Tiger of Malaysia has found a worthy successor in Can Yaman!
xx
*images and video not mine
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