The trailer for HBO Max's Tokyo Vice showcases a neon-drenched Yakuza underworld

HBO Max has released the first official look at Tokyo Vice, the long-in-the-works drama from executive producer Michael Mann and series creator and playwright, J.T. Rogers.

The compelling trailer introduces audiences to Jake Adelstein (Ansel Elgort), an American journalist in Japan covering the crime beat in Japan in the late ‘90s. “I want to know the real Tokyo,” Adelstein states in the trailer. “What’s beneath the surface.”

The series looks to take viewers from the sterile offices of Japanese newspapers to action-packed police raids, and the neon-drenched Yakuza-owned underworld of Tokyo. To immerse himself in both worlds, Adelstein aligns himself with vice squad officer Hiro Katagiri (Ken Watanabe) and Yakuza member Sato.

The touch of executive producer Michael Mann can be felt all over the trailer, hitting many Mann-erisms expected from the crime story auteur: themes of brotherhood, the grey area between cops and robbers, tough-guy dialogue (“A man without enemies is no man at all”), and a glimpse at a sword fight with Yakuza ninjas. And it all looks 100% cool.

The series is based on journalist Jake Adelstein’s 2009 memoir of the same name that recounted his time working as the first non-Japanese reporter at the Yomiuri Shinburn, one of the country’s largest newspapers. The book has yet to be published in Japan because according to Adelstein, “it steps on too many toes” and could result in “acts of violence.”

The project was originally announced back in 2019 and will finally premiere on HBO Max on Thursday, April 7. Mann will be behind the camera for the debut episode which was written by Rogers.

Tokyo Vice will follow an interesting release schedule, splitting the difference between the water cooler week-to-week model and the new binge-able streaming model. Three episodes will debut on April 7 and two episodes will run each Thursday after that leading up to the finale on April 28th.