The second season of MAX’s “Tokyo Vice” continues the often dangerous investigative exploits of Ansel Elgort’s Jake Adelstein, the first non-Japanese reporter on a Tokyo daily paper, and Ken Watanabe’s Hiroto Katagiri, an organized crime division detective and Jake’s mentor.

Specifically, the duo are infiltrating a forbidden 1999 Japanese cityscape where organized crime gangs known as the yakuza officially do not exist.

“In Season 2,” Elgort, 29, said in a Zoom interview from Kyoto, “Jake becomes more Japanese actually in the way he approaches things. He was so American the way he approached things! He doesn’t listen to what Katagiri says. Maybe he disrespects his boss or questions things too much.

“Even though his job is to be a journalist, it’s about finding a balance. The first episode of Season 2 we see Jake learning patience. Learning to not always be crossing dangerous bridges, but just learning to do his job the way it’s supposed to be done, by the book.

“Which is very Japanese and not American. Once he’s learned those qualities, he can work with Katagiri and through the right channels they’re able to go try to take down the big bad yakuza boss.”

Filming entirely in Tokyo adds a critical dimension and Elgort became aware of the necessary process where in the past, “A lot of these big crowd scenes were just stolen — ‘stolen shots.’ Meaning they filmed scenes out in public with no permits — they just filmed the extras.

“That prompted a Japanese government crackdown. They said you can’t just go steal shots. But for us because the show is in the 1990s, we’re not really able to steal shots.

“So we had to pull permits for everything. Everything has to have a lot of permission for it. And a lot of our shooting was still while COVID restrictions were still in place and everyone was in masks.

“After Season 1 we gained some trust from the government and during Season 2 we were able to pull permits for streets where people usually do not film.”

“Yes, we got a permit for the Tokyo Government office, it’s really huge,” Watanabe, 64, noted on his Zoom from Tokyo.  “It’s not dangerous but it’s in the middle of the city.

“We had a really great permit with guards. To film we have 50 to 60 cars, maybe a hundred people and a guy shoots!  It’s so complicated and we have so much hustle until we finally got it. I have to run around a lot. So many times. I was so exhausted. But it was fun.”

“We were able,” Elgort concluded, “to really have the city illustrated well in the show.”

“Tokyo Vice” streams on MAX