Each episode of the series was a self-contained story, involving different sets of directors and screenwriters, including Isao Yukisada, Gakuryū Ishii, and Alex Cox.
Nagase originally starred as Mike Hama in a trilogy of films directed by Kaizo Hayashi, beginning with The Most Terrible Time in My Life.
In addition, the television dramas that Nagase and much of the cast and crew had watched as children, such as Detective Story, had been shot on film, which was then being displaced by video.
A feature-length version of the episode was screened at the 52nd Berlin International Film Festival under the title Mike Yokohama: A Forest with No Name before the series proper aired on television.
The series' opening sequence directed by fashion photographer Glen Luchford with theme song by Ego-Wrappin' was excluded from feature-length version of the episodes.