The Shinsengumi are a meme by now, there's endless TV dramas, movies, manga adaptations, etc. It's kind of hard to draw a Western parallel, but maybe the FBI du

The Shinsengumi are a meme by now, there's endless TV dramas, movies, manga adaptations, etc. It's kind of hard to draw a Western parallel, but maybe the FBI during the Al Capone/Prohibition era when they were fighting against cartoon villain gangsters. Other Japanese obsessions that tourists struggle to grok include Saigo Takamori and Ryoma Sakamoto, who ironically enough were both opponents of the Shinsengumi. For HNers who've never heard of these: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shinsengumi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shinsengumi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sakamoto_Ry%C5%8Dma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sakamoto_Ry%C5%8Dma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saig%C5%8D_Takamori https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saig%C5%8D_Takamori