‘Tokyo Vice’ Ventures Into the Yakuza Underworld With Neon Grit

Alci Rengifo

The ads for “Tokyo Vice” promise a stylish and gritty crime drama set in a late ‘90s Japanese underworld. That is indeed the case. But what makes this HBO Max series more enthralling than your average cops and gangsters show is that it’s actually about the hard work of journalism. The source inspiration is the memoir “Tokyo Vice: An American Reporter on the Police Beat in Japan,” which chronicles the adventures of Jake Adelstein, a journalist who became the only American admitted into the prestigious Tokyo Metropolitan Police Press Club. Great reporting can mean an attention to fine detail and narrative, so it’s no surprise this material caught the eye of Michael Mann, one of the most meticulous of all modern filmmakers. Mann directs the darkly slick pilot and is also executive producer, bringing his eye for gloss and edge.

The story begins in 1999, as Jake Edelstein (Ansel Elgort) works as a tutor in Tokyo while preparing to apply at The Meicho Shimbun, Japan’s top newspaper. A Missouri native, Jake has mastered Japanese, which impresses the paper’s editors after scoring high in their rigorous application exam. The romantic appeal of being a reporter on the beat at first proves elusive. Jake realizes there are unspoken pacts between publishers and the police, where an obvious murder can’t be immediately termed as such in articles. This sparks his interest in the local underground, dominated by the infamous crime gangs known as the yakuza. They extort people, engage in contraband, and hang out at the local clubs with intimidating air. For a young writer, it’s too tempting to brush away. The challenge will be how to find a way into the yakuza world. Jake begins forming two important contacts, a rough but honest detective, Hiroto Katagiri (Ken Watanabe), and Samantha (Rachel Keller), a bar hostess who happens to be another expatriate American.

Viewers proficient in TV history will instantly get curious with Michael Mann’s name appearing in another show with the word “Vice” at the end. Mann produced the classic ‘80s cop show “Miami Vice,” and directed the 2006 movie update that has built a cult following. “Tokyo Vice” opens with the cool shadows and neon glow typical of Mann’s work. His films like “Heat” and “Thief,” have also felt at home in the underbelly but always with a fierce visual elegance. Mann has also been renowned for his extreme attention to realism and detail, which goes perfectly with a series about a hungry newspaperman. The more exciting moments of the pilot, before Jake makes contact with the yakuza, focus on the rush of a newsroom. He needs to find a good story to prove his worth in an environment where he’s a total outsider. The editor-in-chief already feels strange having a white Jewish American kid on the staff, bullying him for turning in boring copy. There’s also that sense of camaraderie you develop on a paper staff with the other underdogs. Jake makes friends with two new staffers, including one who can’t believe his literature degree doesn’t translate into instantly engaging material. Any experienced journalist has had a supervising editor like Eimi (Rinko Kikuchi), who keeps the office in check and warns Jake to stop using so many adjectives. 

In a sense “Tokyo Vice” can also be accused of peddling the old “white savior” complex common to American TV, where a white American character is needed as a convenient excuse to explore another society. This is indeed the show’s potential weak spot. But Edelstein’s story did happen and that also makes it quite intriguing. Ansel Elgort doesn’t play the role like the all-knowing American, he’s a rookie who stumbles and is forced to learn on the job. He’s learning from the city he now calls home, not the other way around. Few characters cater to him in English. Jake has to make his way around Tokyo with fluent Japanese. With each episode we also learn a bit more about the troubled home he’s running from in Missouri, which we get a glimpse of when his sister sends cassette tapes with messages. There have always been restless personalities like this, drawn to writing, who feel out of place everywhere. Jake has something in common with Christopher McCandless in “Into the Wild,” or Joe Sanderson, who leaves to fight in El Salvador in Hector Tobar’s amazing novel, “The Last Great Road Bum.” Jake is stumbling into an adventure he may not be able to even control. Elgort, who keeps getting called out for watered-down acting, has the right amount of youthful enthusiasm and naivety needed for the role.

While Mann produces, the showrunner and creator is playwright J.T. Rogers, whose play “Oslo” was turned into an HBO movie last year. The directing roster includes “Narcos” regular Josef Kubota Wladyka and Hikari, who keep a combination of grit and gloss in the show’s rhythm. While “Tokyo Vice” is more of a journalism drama, it also has many elements of old-fashioned noir. Jake meets a chain-smoking, womanizing detective who wants lessons in how to flirt in English. Ken Watanabe’s Katagiri is the older, more experienced detective and family man who wants to stay honest while maneuvering around the yakuza.  He also sees working with Jake as an opportunity to calm the growing fires of a brewing gang war. Meetings take place in smoky clubs where sad women see no option but to cater to the mobsters. There’s plenty of TV gangland intrigue with the yakuza themselves. Jake befriends a gangster, Sato (Shô Kasamatsu) over drinks and insights into how U.S. jeans are counterfeited. But Sato is himself a restless soul within his clan, and he starts liking Samantha. Her growing link to Jake forms the show’s apparent need for a cliché triangle to form tension. While there are plenty of ominous Japanese men in suits and sunglasses in this show, “Tokyo Vice” also doesn’t exaggerate the yakuza scenes. They come across more as violent businessmen who speak in archaic manners, dividing up neighborhoods like investments. Rogers and Mann give them personalities.

There is such a saturation of cliché mafia movies and shows about cartels and assassins, that a crime show focused on journalism and atmosphere feels like a welcome alternative. “Tokyo Vice” pulsates with the sensation of being a chronicler and witness to underground events. Some plot elements feel half-formed in the first episodes and it’s too early to tell just how a character like Samantha will play out. That’s also the nature of reporting, you don’t know how events will unfold in five minutes or five days. In a time of dying newspapers and a rapidly changing publishing industry, Jake’s journey might seem taken from a bygone era. And yet, we’re always going to need someone snooping around and finding illuminating stories to tell. Jake Edelstein felt a call to tell stories in an adopted country. Beneath all the flashy suits, criminal intrigue and rich lighting, that’s the real value of “Tokyo Vice.” It celebrates journalism as a craft still worth pursuing.

“Tokyo Vice” season one begins streaming April 7 with new episodes premiering Thursdays on HBO Max.