TOKYO VICE Season 2 Episode 3 Review: The Slowburn Builds Momentum

The third episode of Tokyo Vice season 2 is now streaming on Max. Check out our full discussion on the latest episode here.

Editor’s Note: The following contains spoilers for Tokyo Vice Season 2 Episode 3.

After Episode 2 of Tokyo Vice Season 2 positioned our main characters in several interesting places for the new season, the third episode, titled “Old Law, New Twist,” starts to pay off some of the subplots and storylines introduced in the previous episode — to various levels of success.

Written by Francine Volpe and directed by Josef Kubota Wladyka, the new episode begins right away by addressing one of the concerns that I had last week after watching the first couple of episodes. Jake (Ansel Elgort) and Samantha’s (Rachel Keller) friendship seemed to have been reduced to a quid pro quo situation, and it always felt like there should be a lot more to it than that. In this new episode, we had several interactions between them that felt earnest, which I deeply appreciated.

Jake’s arc in this episode was the weaker part for me, as I’m still slightly confounded by where the whole motorcycle subplot is going. That’s not the whole thing, of course, but it’s where we start and where we end the episode too, and I remain skeptical when it comes to the relevance of this storyline. We also get new developments regarding Misaki (Ayumi Ito), but I’ll leave those for spoiler-tagged discussions.

Katagiri (Ken Watanabe) is now embracing his new role as part of the task force striking the Yakuza with no mercy, while also struggling with living without his family. It was a necessary, albeit predictable development for the new season, though I’m sure it will only lead to much more interesting paths. I still think that there is a lot more character work that could be done around him. At the end of the day, he doesn’t come across as any different from any other “incorruptible” cop we’ve seen before, and though the end of the previous episode did tease an intriguing route for him, episode 3 barely acknowledged it.

But then we have Sato, whose arc seems like it’s going to be the most interesting this season. He’s clearly struggling with his position inside his criminal organization, and those second thoughts will only grow stronger now that his brother is getting his hands dirty too.

Obviously, there is still unfinished business between him and Samantha — and I mean that literally, as his overseeing the club had some interesting ramifications in this episode that will be brought back later, I’m sure.

WHAT HAPPENED IN THE LATEST EPISODE OF TOKYO VICE?

I’d like to begin this part of the review by mentioning Jake’s editor, Eimi (Rinko Kikuchi), who is certainly an interesting character in the series. I’m glad that we’re getting to know her and her complicated household this season, but there are still a few things that I think could be improved about her, especially in her workplace.

We’ve seen her go back and forth with Jake on many stories, defend him before her supervisors on many occasions, and work side-by-side with him a lot of times too. But have we seen Eimi be genuinely good at her job? I’m not saying she isn’t, or that we’ve seen the opposite, but I can’t recall an instance in which she truly earned some accolades for her job as an editor.

Of course, this is a complicated position to properly capture on camera, but I look at movies like Spotlight where everyone felt vital for any story to run, while Eimi just feels like Jake’s superior with whom he’s somewhat friendly. The party at the US Embassy would have been the perfect opportunity for us to see her not only cultivate sources, as she told her subordinates earlier in the episode but also check out how long her reach goes as a crime editor at the most important newspaper in Japan.

And speaking of that party, we have to talk about Misaki. First of all, Jake’s character was seriously underwritten by deciding to make him think that there wouldn’t be any risk for her to be at an official party at the US Embassy. It was glaringly obvious this was going to backfire. You can argue that Jake is too blinded by love, as evidenced by his inviting her to the US to meet his family only a few weeks into their closely guarded relationship… But still.

It backfired so hard against the two of them that we find out at the end of the episode that she’s back in Tozawa’s hands. Her look of terror said it all. On the flip side of that, Samantha has apparently found a way out of Ishida’s (Shun Sugata) grip, though it entails breaking up a few of her own rules. I’m a bit lost as to where this is going, but I can’t wait to find out more.

Episode 3 of Tokyo Vice season 2 is currently available to stream on Max. As usual, we’ll be raising a spoiler alert before we discuss any further.

About Tokyo Vice

Release Date: Feb. 8, 2024
Created by: J.T. Rogers
Executive producers: J.T. Rogers, Alan Poul, Alex Boden, Josef Kubota Wladyka, Brad Caleb Kane, Adam Stein, Ken Watanabe, Emily Gerson Saines, Ansel Elgort, Jake Adelstein, Kayo Washio, Destin Daniel Cretton, John Lesher, and Michael Mann
Distribution: Max
Cast: Ansel Elgort, Ken Watanabe, Rinko Kikuchi, Rachel Keller, Show Kasamatsu, Ayumi Ito, Yosuke Kubozuka, and Miki Maya.

Synopsis: Loosely inspired by American journalist Jake Adelstein’s first-hand account of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police beat, season two of the series, filmed on location in Tokyo, takes us deeper into the city’s criminal underworld as Adelstein (Ansel Elgort) comes to realize that his life, and the lives of those close to him, are in terrible danger.

What did you think of the third episode of Tokyo Vice season 2? Do you have any predictions for the rest of the season? What is your favorite subplot so far? Let us know your thoughts on our Twitter or on our Discord server!