About

Would You Prefer a Male Companion? refers to two reaction images of Shogun character Lady Mariko (played by New Zealand actress Anna Sawai) asking character John Blackthorne (played by British actor Cosmo Jarvis) if he would prefer a male companion after he refuses to have a courtesan visit him, suspecting that he might be homosexual. Online, the images have been used to react to social media posts in which a user dismisses or downplays someone's attractiveness, as well as for caption memes.

Origin

On March 5th, 2024, episode three, titled "Tomorrow Is Tomorrow," of season one of the historical drama series Shogun premiered.^[1] In one scene of the episode, a doctor tending to the character John Blackthorne suggests that he is too tense and that he needs a visit from a courtesan more than medical care. As Blackthorne avoids answering the question directly, Lady Mariko, who is in the room with them, asks if he would prefer a male companion instead (scene shown below).

On March 5th, 2024, X^[2] user @sammyloey posted a still image from the scene caption with the line (shown below)

Spread

On July 27th, 2024, entertainment website JBZD^[3] posted the earliest found meme based on the scene, captioning another screencap with a joke about the 2024 Paris Olympics opening ceremony. The post (shown below) gained over 40 upvotes on the site.

On December 29th, 2024, X^[4] user @Andr3jH used the image as a reaction to a bait 4chan post about women in Brazil, implying that the posted was homosexual. The quote post (shown below) received over 10 reposts and 840 likes in two months.

On February 1st, 2025, the same user used the reaction image to quote an X^[5] post in which a user argued that singer-songwriter Sabrina Carpenter was a "4" on the attractiveness scale. The post (shown below) received over 9,900 reposts and 256,000 likes in two weeks.

Various Examples

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Search Interest

External References