Ray wrote:I'll say here about the female characters in Death Note what Bob Gale and Robert zemeckis said about Marty McFly a white guy stealing Chuck Berry's ( a black guys) biggest hit.

" as Freud said, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar".

Perhaps, but when a character exists only to look sexy and act as a plot point, it's stupid, regardless of their gender.

Gendo'sPapa wrote:Now the little sister who has been a nonexistent side character returns as a sexy young adult... and is immediately kidnapped & used as bait for dumb plot shenanigans.

This must be what fans say when they talk of the show's "character 'development.'"

Though, to be fair, I'm not sure how old the fan base for this show was in the US. It might just be a fandom that survives solely on endless supply of adolescent kids getting all horny over pretty girls, using that motivation to save the day, then slowly losing interest in the show as they get older and the hormones calm down a little. This doesn't condone anything, obviously, but it's usually a passing phase that people tend to get embarrassed about as they get older.

Wash, rinse, repeat for the next generation, due to the tendency of younger US audiences to constantly rediscover anime titles and perpetuate a fan base. (Rediscovery by younger generations is, in part, why Cowboy Bebop continues to popularity in the States better than it does in Japan.)

I watched Death Note when I was 15 and the premise alone made me think that this is the coolest thing ever.
And that's about it.
Looking back to it I can recognize how dumb it is, but when you're a teenager an edgy premise suffices to make it enjoyable. And most people who watch Anime are at that age-range. See Sword Art Online for a more recent example.

As for the Netflix version; I still think the premise is cooler than a frozen hell, and without the Shonen-shenanigans/a proper script this might work out to be pretty dope. I've also watched the new Japanese Live Action movie that came out last year and the premise coupled with exactly my kind of slick aesthetic made me enjoy it. Sure, I've already forgotten most of it, but it was enjoyable enough.

What I'm trying to say is, most people don't have the time or the education or both to even bother with the intellectual content of anything. If the premise is cool, and the execution flashy enough people will thankfully take the break from their lives. That is why Death Note has become a phenomenon. It felt fresh, emo, cool, edgy, suspenseful and quirky.

Cybermat47 wrote:Perhaps, but when a character exists only to look sexy and act as a plot point, it's stupid, regardless of their gender.

Death Note had a large cohort of fujoshi so I don't know why anyone cares that it's the other way around now, Death Note was burning edge nonsense when it came out, now it's just a dated 2000's anime that really is nothing outside of its own era. To put it a little bluntly: It's not on many 2000's anime watch lists created by reputable individuals, unless you're curious about that era and wonder why it was so popular (though the premise should suffice for most people).

Show was a disappointment. Was planning on writing a lengthy essay on why it's not good but I'm two days post finishing it.... and I can barely remember the damn thing anymore. The characters, the plot, everything has just vanished from my mind. I think that speaks more about the show than anything else I could say.

Either way, still interested in Adam Wingard's adaptation because I do think there's the skeleton for a great story there & I think he could bring it out. On the plus side it's screening at the San Diego Comic Con tomorrow night (July 20th) a whole month before it gets released on Netflix. That's a very positive sign of confidence for the finished film.

By all means, I'd love to see a full rant on why you didn't like what many people have claimed to be a great anime.

Look, I'm not gonna say it's perfect, but it didn't have to be a perfect, it just had to be a great detective show with some supernatural elements.

Ultimately the only thing still up in the air is the casting controversy, and even that seems to have died down considerably after the GITS and Iron Fist Controversies.

Speaking of which, really Netflix was probably the best choice the director could have made. Iron Fist broke records despite it's controversy while GITS failed because of the mere difference between streaming services and movie theatres. A movie on a streaming service is free with a subscription, so if you hear about a controversial film and are curious about it, you can watch it without having to spend anymore money on it. While with a theatrical release, Box Office Numbers ultimately determine the bottom line, and that's something negative press can for better or worse affect.

Just reading through this thread now and I'm honestly surprised to see how much hate the original anime series is getting. I watched through all of it for the first time fairly recently and I thought that it was pretty good, albeit not perfect and (as many have already said) quite lacking in the latter third.

Let me make this clear though: just like pwhodges and Gendo'sPapa, I was initially taken aback by the utter lack of discussion the show had surrounding the moral implications of the Death Note, and specifically what Light was doing with it. There were about 5 seconds of inner-monologue in the first episode and that was it. And at that moment, I really did ask myself, "what could possibly be the appeal of this show?"

But then I watch episode 2 and I immediately get it.

The appeal, at least for me, never had to do with rooting for Light. The appeal for me, and what I think was the intended appeal for the viewer, was in watching two very smart people play a life-and-death chess match with each other (for lack of a better term); it was in the ever-shifting dynamic between two geniuses who were so alike yet so different from each other, actively trying to one-up their opponent every chance they get. The show is Light and L, and I don't think it makes any attempt at hiding that. In my mind, the viewer is meant to inhabit the same space as Ryuk; we are just along for the ride, not on anybody's side if we don't want to be, just there to watch and appreciate all the twist and turns. And that's exactly why...

Ryuk Meets light.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sFzvJMmH9x0

Okay the rest of the film might be garbage but the scenes with Ryuk look like they could at least make the film worth it.

CommanderFish wrote:

SPOILER: Show

The show never tells you to root for him. On the contrary: it shows you how sadistic, evil, manipulative, and uncaring of a guy he is throughout the entire show. And when he thrusts out his whole "new-world" thesis at the end of the show, he is not in any way validated for it. He gets called out as what he is--nothing but a murderer with a God complex--and then proceeds to writhe in a pool of his own blood, pitifully calling for help, while everyone else in the room looks down on him in utter disgust. When L dies, sad music plays. When Light dies, happy music plays. The show could not make it any more obvious in my mind, and it simply baffles me how anyone could interpret it as supporting Light's beliefs in any way.

What Death Note does is it presents us with a very smart young man who comes into contact with absolute power and is corrupted absolutely by it. We are not meant to sympathize with Kira, (or Light when he has the notebook). We could, if we wanted to, sympathize with Light (when he loses memory of the notebook), because it shows us--for really the only time in the entire show--what Light is like without the Death Note, and he's a genuinely good person. Regardless--by the end of the show, countless people have died, including but not limited to: most of Light's family, Light's only friend, one to two women who truly loved Light, and a few honest-to-goodness police officers; and in his dying moments we get to see Light as he reflects upon all of this and realizes just how badly he fucked everything up.

My thoughts exactly. See, to me (I know I'm going OT, but) that's the main difference between Light and Lelouch. Light is a bad guy. He's not likeable. His is a classic story of how absolute power corrupts absolutely. Code Geass is completely different. Lelouch manages not to sell his soul to Geass, and remains a (fairly) good guy, with understandable motivations, right up to the end. He's still a magnificent bastard, and he definitely has a certain... flair, but he is a good guy.
I grew to love Lelouch, and to share his joys and sorrows with him. Death Note is a great story, but they never got that from me. As it says on the back of Vol. 1, it's a suspense story.

@imprimatur13, I'm glad to see someone interpret Death Note the same way I do. Unfortunately, I haven't seen Code Geass as of yet so I can't really say much on that matter.

Ray wrote:Ryuk Meets light.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sFzvJMmH9x0

Oh yeah, I sorta forgot this was actually a thread about the new movie.

In regards to that, the aspect of most concern to me is how they're dealing with Light. Namely, it seems to me that he is going to be much less self-motivated in this version, instead having to be egged on to write names by Ryuk (as shown in this new clip) and possibly Misa, or the "new Misa" (based on one of her lines in a trailer). Granted, I don't think this is an inherently negative thing. It's obvious that they're making a lot of changes, probably including a brand-new plot, and I actually prefer this approach opposed to doing a direct adaptation. This is Death Note in America, after all, so I'd think them fools if they were to not take advantage of all the cultural and societal differences this change of setting provides. However, this change in particular has me worried because it could signify that the film is going to try and make Kira sympathetic. The original series never really did this, which made it an easier watch because as a viewer we never had to agree with what Kira was doing, or what L was doing for that matter; we were never coerced into taking the side of one character over another. So, people rooting for Kira and people rooting against Kira were given equal opportunity to become fully invested in the story. If the movie changes this approach, instead giving us a Kira who's designed to be understood, reasoned with and sympathized with as he is slowly transformed by the people around him -- as irrational as it may seem I believe this will actually alienate audiences (namely those who disagree with Kira, myself included), far more than it will invest them.

Of course, the movie's not out yet, and nothing is set in stone. Maybe this Kira will have a completely different ideology, or kill less people, or have some other aspect to his character that makes him fundamentally different than his predecessor. Who knows for sure what they'll do. All I know is that I'm going into it with some caution.

Tankred wrote:Death Note had a large cohort of fujoshi so I don't know why anyone cares that it's the other way around now, Death Note was burning edge nonsense when it came out, now it's just a dated 2000's anime that really is nothing outside of its own era. To put it a little bluntly: It's not on many 2000's anime watch lists created by reputable individuals, unless you're curious about that era and wonder why it was so popular (though the premise should suffice for most people).

Which is curious because if you try to look for fan material on DN (fanfics, fanart, articles, forums, porn), over half of it is shipping L and Light, whereas other actually present relationships are far less proeminent or even ignored. Likewise, DN had a solid-ish cast of secondary characters which were interesting yet I don't see any mention on them in the fanbase either. It's kinda funny because it often seems to me that fujoshis just get into something because of their perceived gay pairing but completely ignored everything else about that show, regardless of how good it may or may not be. As a result, the fanbase has grown stale and repetitive, as well as hostile to outsiders, and it's now effectively dead, because despite it's once emo fad appeal (some fandoms manage to keep living on after a fad goes away), the fanbase failed to renovate itself and keep interest going on. Which is also why I have grown to detest fujoshis in the Eva fanbase, which give their full attention to Kaworu, or most often Kaworu wih Shinji, and rarely if ever even talk about all the other people, the themes and elements presen in the other 25 episodes and 3 movies in which Kaworu shows up for 2 minutes, or not all. On Facebook they've gotten rather toxic and pushy with everyone else. But I digress...

I've seen DN compared a lot with Code Geass, mostly because people look at Lelouch and at Light and they both have that "genius taking over the world with his shenanigans" vibe, and to be fair Lelouch does make some absurd plans that only work because the plot wants them to. Likewise, L makes complete asspulls for most of his brilliant deductions and so does Light. And the Geass is such a lazy, unexplored and (effectively) unexplained plot device. Curiously, the Death Note itself is far more consistent. Both shows make constant use of deus ex machina, but at least CG manages to stay entertaining throughout its 48 episodes. Meanwhile, Death Note loses any narrative edge it still has in And after that it grows into a progressively more dull affair. Initially I was generally interested in Light as a character. While he was also this bored genius archetype, he also had some very interesting flaws, like his arrogance, pretentiousness and overconfidence, which was explored and even explicitly mentioned by L in the earlier episodes when he stated he was childish (though I think it's kinda shaky to conclude from that that he must be young and a student). They've tried to make him a more human interpretation of that archetype, but as the show went on he just started making stupid and taking actions that made little same. Lelouch wasn't really what I'd call humanized, on the contrary, he remained larger than life and generally unshakable. But, again, he was still more interesting and, specially, more consistent than Light.

I've also read the author originally intended Death Note to be more focused on Kira himself, as a phenomenom, and its effects on the world and Light's personal life, with the "cat-and-mouse" game with L taking a more background role. Of course, L proved quite popular so he changed his plans. I wonder how it would have been if he didn't make that decision.

FelipeFritschF wrote:I've also read the author originally intended Death Note to be more focused on Kira himself, as a phenomenom, and its effects on the world and Light's personal life, with the "cat-and-mouse" game with L taking a more background role. Of course, L proved quite popular so he changed his plans. I wonder how it would have been if he didn't make that decision.

That might have hampered the Anime and Manga's popularity.

I mean, by keeping the story focused on Light and L and not the wider world it avoids having to make storytelling decisions that might have been a bit too extreme for a Shonen Jump comic.

I mean, all the manga itself says is that Kira is killing people. It doesn't say WHO he's killing. Criminals, yes. But which ones? Only the ones the news feels is worth talking about? Does he go out of his way to google the sex offender database and take them out one by one? Does he go after politicians he personally disagrees with? Is Kira a Republican or a Democrat (or whatever the equivalent is in Japanese Politics)? How would people holding those positions react to the fact that Kira could WIPE THEM OUT if they dared go against their ideological opponents? Would people from Kira's faction be emboldened?

If you made a story about how a kid with a killer notebook and make the story focus on the wider world. You'd have to make some creative choices that would alienate people. and DEFINITELY would have been too much for a Shonen rating. You get around that by focusing exclusively on the character of Kira and him trying to avoid getting caught for killing people, and you never have to mention WHO he's killing.

Ray wrote:If you made a story about how a kid with a killer notebook and make the story focus on the wider world. You'd have to make some creative choices that would alienate people. and DEFINITELY would have been too much for a Shonen rating. You get around that by focusing exclusively on the character of Kira and him trying to avoid getting caught for killing people, and you never have to mention WHO he's killing.

Very nice points. I guess this is why Death Note is a shounen after all, although because it does have more mature themes, and also a more properly seinen aesthetic and artstyle, lots of people still think it is a seinen after all. But if the plot never really tried going beyond a shounen. Eva is of course a bit of both - the first half is decidedly shounen, then it moves on to more explicitely take on darker and more mature themes, all the while keeping a shounen aesthetic (which is however filled with details that become more significant in retrospect, even all the way back to Episode 1). Still, the target audience of Eva is children and teenagers after all. It's just that Anno doesn't seem to think that that should mean the show shouldn't try to cover dark themes, because you know, the world isn't always so nice after all. Which he makes quite evident in multiple interviews, like this one. Then we have other works that make use of darker themes but don't go too deep into them, so they remain strictly within the "borders" of shounen. FMA comes to mind.

FelipeFritschF wrote: It's kinda funny because it often seems to me that fujoshis just get into something because of their perceived gay pairing but completely ignored everything else about that show, regardless of how good it may or may not be.

That's not just fujoshi, that's true for most of Anime and beyond. I guess that's because most of them are horny teenagers. SUBJECTiVE OPINION: A good share of people who dislike Eva is because the show actively discourages their lust for sexy women and explosions. And I guess lot of people sludge through the dialogue of Game of Thrones is because of lots and lots of sex scenes. And then there's Transformers.
I reiterate my stance. A good chunk people just want to entertain their lizard brains to turn of their thinking brains from exhausting RL, and never think about anything they've seen. And that's perfectly fine.
But implying it's just fujoshi who are "dumb enough" to overlook flaws, because of their lust for gay pairings is insultingly sexist.

Ray wrote:But which ones?

He starts of killing people who he thinks deserve capital punishment anyway and progresses throughout the story, ending up at a point he kills everyone who he sees as deviant. Like a dictator.

Ray wrote:Only the ones the news feels is worth talking about?

Nah, everyone who he can get name and picture.

Ray wrote: Does he go out of his way to google the sex offender database and take them out one by one?

For instance. Or he watches TV. Or he trawls through the internet.

Ray wrote:Does he go after politicians he personally disagrees with?

It's been a long time since I've seen the show, but I don't think he can gauge personalities per se. I think he let's actions decide if a person becomes a target.

Ray wrote:Is Kira a Republican or a Democrat (or whatever the equivalent is in Japanese Politics)?

Japanese politics is not nearly as polarized as the US, they are much more low-key, much more constructive, but as corrupt, from what I gathered.

Ray wrote:How would people holding those positions react to the fact that Kira could WIPE THEM OUT if they dared go against their ideological opponents?

We can see the effects in the Manga, iirc. But Kira only goes after criminals or people in his way. Politicians have not been on his agenda - especially in a later stage of the Manga, in which the whole world seems to abide by his laws anyways.

Ray wrote:Would people from Kira's faction be emboldened?

I think that changes throughout the manga, but I'm not sure.



Also the debate which genre it belongs is rather hollow. First, Manga series are entirely categorized by in which magazine they run, and more importantly a good story works, whatever tropes they use. HunterXHunter is a great example of great story telling, despite being labeled as shonen.

robersora wrote:Also the debate which genre it belongs is rather hollow. First, Manga series are entirely categorized by in which magazine they run, and more importantly a good story works, whatever tropes they use. HunterXHunter is a great example of great story telling, despite being labeled as shonen.

Just one thing: I understand what you're saying; that genre is not as big a factor when it comes to manga, because every series is targeted to the specific demographic of the magazine in which they are serialized.
Even so, genre IS an important distinction. For instance, Death Note, Bakuman, and DragonBall all ran in Weekly Shonen Jump, but I think one would be hard-pressed to find many similarities between them. Even demographic: IMHO, Death Note's target audience would be somewhat older than DB's.
Thanks to genre distinctions, it makes it much easier to say: "Oh, you liked DragonBall, so you'd probably like (e.g.) HunterXHunter", rather than saying, "Oh, you liked DragonBall, so you'd probably like Death Note."

Anyway, on the back of Death Note Vol. 1, it says it's an 'unbeatable thriller and suspense' story. Which it demonstrably is (just compare it to suspense novels, like the works of Michael Connelly). So, I think that pretty much settles the 'genre debate'. Bakuman is more of a romance-focused manga, and DB is straight shonen-style adventure and action. Very different stories, which I personally all like, but which have precious little in common with each other, despite the fact that they're all published in the same magazine.

Apologize for ranting, btw. I actually agree with most of your post .

^
I don't see your post as a rant, as you've made a very important distinction, I've mistakenly omitted.
It's true, that Dragonball is closer to HunterXHunter than to Death Note, even if all three of them are marketed as Shonen. That is, because Shonen does not describe the genre, but the intended demographic. All three of them are aimed at boys and young teenagers, despite corresponding to different genres.

robersora wrote:That's not just fujoshi, that's true for most of Anime and beyond. I guess that's because most of them are horny teenagers. SUBJECTiVE OPINION: A good share of people who dislike Eva is because the show actively discourages their lust for sexy women and explosions. And I guess lot of people sludge through the dialogue of Game of Thrones is because of lots and lots of sex scenes. And then there's Transformers.
I reiterate my stance. A good chunk people just want to entertain their lizard brains to turn of their thinking brains from exhausting RL, and never think about anything they've seen. And that's perfectly fine.
But implying it's just fujoshi who are "dumb enough" to overlook flaws, because of their lust for gay pairings is insultingly sexist.

Sorry, I didn't want to imply that or even fujoshi exclusively. Naturally the steryotypical male otaku that complains that "Shinji is a pussy and should just get in the robot and screw Rei/Asuka/Misato" isn't very positive or constructive either, but when any of that sort of fan becomes the norm in the fanbase and shies other people away, I don't think it's very productive for any fanbase. DN is just one of these cases where its fans have such a bad reputation (and have failed to keep interest in the franchise going) that it has actively hurt the average perception of the work.

Anyway, about the genre thing, I think TheAnimeSlob actually had it right in this video, for once.

New Clip: L meets Light

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1mcQ6C ... e=youtu.be

Yeah. . . not sold on L here. He just comes off as inauthentic. He doesn't seem like a 'real' weirdo, he feels like he's faking it. Which I guess 'could' work. He could be Pretending to be an eccentric weirdo while he's really rather intelligent and is putting on this act to weird people out and put them off their guard. But . . .that's not L. At least not the way he was in the source material.

I thought the anime was a goddamn hot mess of tone & character but the Netflix adaptation sure is.... whoof.... something else.

I just watched it tonight, and while it's an ok film by itself, I still think the 2006 live action film from Japan was better; that one I believe stayed more true the original anime series. There were some differences in the Netflix adaption, some of which would go slightly against the rules of the Death Note.



So yeah, out of the two of film adaptations of Death Note, I'd choose the Japanese one over the American. Japan has done pretty good with producing live action films based the anime and manga series, and managed to stay true to them.

(Look at Rurouni Kenshin. That was a damn good film.)