SPOILER WARNING: The Following story contains spoilers for the Tokyo Vice Season 2 premiere. If you have yet to stream the first two episodes with a Max subscription, please exercise caution!
More times than not, TV series' second seasons pick up some time after the events of the previous seasons, allowing viewers to ease back into the stories. But it’s a completely different sitch for Tokyo Vice Season 2, which picks up almost immediately after the Max original series’ debut season ended. In fact, I initially thought I was watching the wrong episode when diving into Tokyo Vice ahead of its February 8th debut on the 2024 TV schedule, but quickly realized that series creator JT Rogers and director Alan Poul were taking a completely different approach to the structure and presentation of what was one of the best 2022 TV shows. And guess what, it works!
I recently spoke with both Rogers and Poul about Tokyo Vice and the major storylines that will be weaved through the expanded 10-episode season. (The first season was only eight episodes long.) When asked about the unique approach to starting a new season, Rogers had this to say:
We ended Season 1 with all these cliffhangers because I already knew what they were going to be. What was great, Alan [Poul] directed the climax of Season 1, which is really Part A, and Part B is the second half of that climax, which is what starts Season 2.
Adding to this, Poul, who directed the Tokyo Vice Season 1 finale and then the first two episodes of the second season, touched on how this narrative structure did present some challenges when it came to picking up where they left off two years later:
It was really a unique challenge that it's really like episode eight of season one is part one of the season finale, and then part two of it is episode one of season two. And so there it's like a special two-part episode, except the two parts were shot two years apart. And so, thank god our cast retains the feeling and the emotion so clearly that they were able to jump right back in.
The Season 2 opener feels like both an epilogue and prologue in that it bridges the gap between the first eight episodes of the series before leaving the main characters in their lowest spots – Jake Adelstein (Ansel Elgort) is forced to abandon his yakuza coverage; Hiroto Katagiri (Ken Watanabe) is removed from his investigation into the crime syndicate; Samantha Porter (Rachel Keller) is coming to terms with her friend’s murder; and Sato (Show Kasamatsu) is in a coma after being stabbed.
The show does jump forward three months between the first and second episodes of the new season, which essentially feels like the proper start of the next phase of the show. Jake is covering a string of motorcycle thefts, Hiroto is working in a less stressful environment, Samantha’s club is up and running, and Sato is alive and well. Though those wounds are beginning to heal, they are still fresh, as Rogers put it:
It's only three months later so things have changed and we have to catch up … But only enough distance has passed so that the wounds are still fresh for what people have suffered and dealt with. And then, a lot happens and it gets bigger and bigger.
After watching the first five episodes of Tokyo Vice Season 2, checking out the show's trailer, and then hearing Rogers and Poul talk about how the show gets bigger and bigger, I’m more fired up than ever to see how this ambitious and expansive story unfolds in the coming weeks.
The first two episodes of Tokyo Vice are currently streaming on Max, with subsequent episodes being released every Thursday until the April 4th finale.
