The U.S. documentary crew that accompanied basketball star Dennis Rodman to North Korea over the winter says it had no idea it would meet the reclusive country's young leader, Kim Jong Un, until he showed up at a basketball game it was filming.

The media company VICE arranged the trip and invited Rodman after its first choice, Michael Jordan, expressed no interest. A 30-minute documentary on the unexpected bit of basketball diplomacy will air on June 14 on HBO as the final episode of VICE's first season. It was previewed for reporters on Wednesday.

The North Korean leader loves basketball so much that he overlooked the government's antipathy for VICE founder Shane Smith, who had made two critical documentaries on the country, and invited the crew in. Smith wasn't allowed back, but VICE's Ryan Duffy accompanied Rodman and three members of the Harlem Globetrotters traveling basketball troupe.

"We just wanted to make a good documentary," Smith said in an interview. "We didn't do it as a stunt."

Duffy quickly learned his place. One of the first things one of his "tour guides" told him was, "I know who you are. I don't like you, and I don't like your company," he said Wednesday. The crew was told when it could turn on its cameras and when they had to be off, and it feared landing in a North Korean prison if it didn't comply, he said.

The North Koreans did not go through the roughly 36 hours of footage shot by the crew.

Duffy said the group was surprised when Kim arrived to watch a game with the Globetrotters and members of a North Korean youth team. Rodman sat in the stands watching with Kim. After the game, the VICE crew and players were rushed across the capital, Pyongyang, for a dinner with Kim and other members of the North Korean government.

Although Rodman was key to securing the visit, he's only a bit player in VICE's documentary. Smith said Rodman declined to be interviewed about the trip by VICE afterward.

VICE hasn't spoken to anyone in the Obama administration about the trip, Smith said. During the trip, the administration had refrained from commenting about it.

The crew went through an elaborate week-long organized tour of Pyongyang, visiting a well-stocked mall with no other customers and the country's version of Sea World. It was shown a classroom with students sitting behind computers, but only one person did anything. He sat before a computer showing Google's home page and never searched for anything, just moving the cursor back and forth randomly.

The tour was meant to catch one or two glimpses of the real North Korean people, which the group finally achieved toward the end. Its minders let the bus stop at a park and the Globetrotters played around with some of the kids, helping them learn to spin a basketball on their finger.

Next time, VICE may take Rodman's former teammate Scottie Pippen.

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Associated Press writer David Bauder contributed.