Move over, Jake and Katagiri: I think I’ve solved the case. Yes, Shinzo Tozawa traveled to Minnesota for an illegal liver transport. Yes, he needed help to get around his travel ban and enter the country. Yes, Lynn Oberfeld (Geraldine Hughes), the US Embassy’s FBI liaison, is involved and is trying to cover it up. And yes, Oberfeld was bribed to make this happen.
But they didn’t bribe her like Jake Adelstein thinks she was. This wasn’t a case of Tozawa giving a doctor a $250,000 watch to keep him quiet. Consider, if you will, the FBI’s sudden success in rounding up the yakuza in the United States, a success achieved without any help from the Japanese authorities. (Jake points out that they probably wouldn’t have helped even if the Americans had asked.) So where are they getting this killer new information?
From Chief Tozawa, of course. Think about it. The entire season has revolved around Tozawa-gun consolidating power over Tokyo’s yakuza groups. Ceding territory to Chihara-kai as a pretext to wage war and recover it later. Leverage Katagiri’s successes to further strengthen his position while other groups are arrested and shut down. Kill your nominal boss to take over the entire Kansai-based syndicate. Exercising control of the meichi through his favorite publisher, Baku. In this same episode of Tokyo Vice PresidentTozawa successfully blackmails the man who aspires to become the next Prime Minister of Japan, placing all this economic power of a country comfortably in Tozawa’s pocket.
And even this has the side effect of weakening the power of Tozawa’s wife and enemy, Kazuko. Her wealthy family financed her rise to the top, and through them she continues to enjoy considerable, even hostile, independence from the wishes of her otherwise dictatorial husband. Even when she is cleaning up her messes, such as when her lover Misaki has been watching the same gaijin reporter driving Tozawa-san crazy, she withholds vital information from him. him so you can get vital information from his. Now this astute operator is replaced. With political connections as powerful as the damn Prime Minister’s, her days of chasing after her husband appear to be over.
So, with all that in mind, what’s a more deceptive and ethically dubious maneuver? All Tozawa needs to do to kill two birds with one stone (fix his liver and fix his enemies) is give up information on some guys he wants out of the way anyway? It’s a no-brainer.
At least it seems that way. I don’t know what kind of prohibitions yakuza culture has on talking to the police, since the relationship between the yakuza and the police is very different between, say, the mafia and the police or the cartels and the police. Those organizations may enjoy relationships with the police, but it’s usually through open corruption or intimidation, not the detente policy that the yakuza and the Tokyo Police Department had before Katagiri, Nagata, and Tozawa collaborated to ruin it. And they certainly don’t want you to give them actionable information about anyone, since they count as “anyone.”
By colluding with American intelligence to send his rivals to an American prison, Tozawa may have gone too far. This Whitey Bulger/The dead people The routine could mean the end for him if word ever gets out. And thank goodness we have a character who specializes in doing just that.
After Yabuki (Kazuya Tanabe), Tozawa’s surprisingly attractive right-hand man, threatens to kill the entire Adelstein family if Jake continues his work, his friend Katagiri encourages Jake to adopt “damn torpedoes, full speed ahead” mode. ” anyway. Anyway, letting the cat out of the bag before Tozawa kills him is his only safety, Katagiri argues. But time is running out and obstacles are piling up. Nagata has been transferred because the suppression of her was too successful. The incoming prime minister works for Tozawa. The information about Jake and Misaki is simply parked there in Mrs. Tozawa’s head, who can reveal it on any rainy day if she feels she needs it. Katagiri’s family has been forced to hide in a hotel. Jake Adelstein’s father may be the only person in the world with a sense of humor about how terrible things have become.
Meanwhile, reformed couple Samantha and Sato have some pretty intense criminal misadventures of their own. Sam tracks down Akira (Tomohisa Yamashita), the club host who stole all of her money and therefore got her friend Polina killed, leaving her deeply in debt. Despite the successful facade she puts on in her new career as a television personality, she actually has no money and wears clothes donated by designers in a practically empty apartment. Sam doesn’t get her money back, even though she likes to beat him up.
As for Sato, things with Hayama finally come to a head. After telling Sam that he is no longer in Chihara-kai, he heads to his bathhouse to rescue his younger brother Kaito from serving Hayama, who will almost certainly get him killed just to beat up Sato. . I don’t care how naked they are: walking into a room full of two dozen hostile yakuza soldiers and lots of hard tiled surfaces seems like a big mistake.
But neither we in the audience nor Hayama in that bathhouse were counting on Gen, Sato’s former enemy turned protégé. When Gen complains to his old boss that Hayama isn’t good for Chihara-kai, it sounds like two friends venting. But while we don’t see that happen, Gen clearly communicates something else to Sato: the entire gang is willing to stand down and let Sato eliminate Hayama, thus honoring Boss Ishida’s secret wish to have Sato take over Chihara-kai. after he’s gone. .
Which is exactly what happens. In a bathroom fight reminiscent of Eastern Promises, although with far fewer visible cocks, Sato and Hayama do it. With a little help from Gen, Sato wins and all of Chihara-kai helps him hold Hayama’s head underwater until she stops breathing. Sato then returns to his mother’s house to return Kaito and fix things (although he warns them that he can’t stay in contact with them so they don’t become targets), then returns home with Sam to spend the night. evening. Neither tells the other what happened to them that day. I don’t think that bodes well.
However, I think this episode bodes well for the final act of the season. It’s not just that he’s congratulating me for (I think) solving the case. It’s also exciting to see Tozawa and Sato reach peak power levels at the same time. The conflict there seems inevitable and inevitably exciting.
But as driving as Tokyo Vice PresidentThe plot may be, it’s the look and atmosphere that keeps me excited week after week. Carefully composed and illuminated night street scenes. Views of the city seen through windows behind our characters, or our characters seen through a window from somewhere high in the sky above the city. Unnecessarily beautiful interior shots. Seriously, if you look at my notes on the gifs illustrating this review, all the adjectives are effusive: “Awesome shot of the elevator,” “really cool shot of the hotel hallway,” “amazing street scene with the green phone.” Even in such a compelling series, director Eva Sørhaug and cinematographer Corey Walter do memorable work here.
Actors, of course, can contribute as much as anyone to the look and atmosphere of a show. All these handsome men in tailored suits. Ansel Elgort painstakingly lighting and smoking a cigarette as Jake proceeds to meet Yabuki. Rachel Keller and Show Kasamatsu going to bed at the end of a long day, looking exhausted and beautiful. The way actors look, move and sound is as much a part of the art of film as cinematography or editing, and in this case it’s all sumptuous material. This fits Tokyo Vice Presidentthe most sumptuous show on television right now, to perfection.
Sean T. Collins (@theseantcollins) writes about television forRolling Stone,Vulture,The New York TimesandAnywhere that has it, In fact. He and his family live on Long Island.
