Afaim's Corner

So since I have sat through all the Version of "Death Note" now, here are my conclusions.

The versions I am comparing are:

The "We need a More Dramatic Ending"-Version (=the Original Anime)

The "Cut Down and changed some stuff to make it worse"-Version (=Relight)

The "Light is a Bastard and L has an Eating Disorder"-Trilogy (=2006 Movie Trilogy, minus the Continuation, which I haven'd inflicted on me yet)

The "LawLight: Doomed Love"-Saga (=The TV-Drama)

The "Violent Delights and Violent Ends"-Sing Along (=The Original Musical Version(s))

The "Final Destination: Death Note Edition"-Movie (=The Neftlix Movie)

Overall they all have their perks in some shape and form, and it's a good thing they are so different, because you can actual enjoy that if you let yourself go along with it. The twist and turns in the Japanese Live Action-Versions are great and make you gasp even if you are familiar with the story. The Musical is legitimatley great, and well Relight and "Final Destination" do exist too, I guess, someone might even like them and is welcome too it. Like I said there is good stuff in them as well. So this is actually a celebration of the DN-Multiverse!

Still, let's compare notes:

The Most Evil Version of Light lives in 2006-Movies. I will never get over the fact that bastard fridged his girfriend, who loved him, was no threat to him, and never did anything wrong in order to infiltrate the Kira Task Force. And he does not get much better in the second movie, where he is actually willing to wright his fathers name down for no real reason other then convience. L telling him "I am sorry we couldn't be friends" is just L-speak for "You are just too much of a bastard for me" and he is right! (However, amnesia-Light ist really sweet to L in a couple of moments, so that said, maybe the Death Note just took effect sooner. On the other hand he hacked the Police Data-Base even before he found the Note in this one, just because he "needed to know what happens to the Criminals", so there was something wrong with him from the get-go.).

The Most Empathic Version of Light is the Drama-Version, who ends up becoming the Craziest Version of Light as well, which is only consiquential. I have seen people making fun of the ending (Light finding his end in a burning building because he refuses to leave the Death Note behind, which is sealed via an explosion), but it is very fitting for this version of Light, who essentially died with L and went full-on crazy after his father's death because he wouldn't have been able to cope with everything he sacrificed otherwise. The Death Note is all he has left, he would rather die than give him up, and this is the version where literally everyone - L, his father, the Task Force, even Near to a certain point - tries to save him.

I love all the versions of L, no L-bashing in this house. The dice just fell a little bit different on the spectrum in every universe, and I really like that too. I can't choose between my L's and I refuse to.

Misa is a better character in every non-anime version than in the anime. Especially the Muscial works hard on her, but so does the Drama-Version. However even the Japanese Movies have done her a solid already by changing her up a little bit.

I don't like what they did with Takada in the 2006-Movies. Her killing a rival at work feels cheap and out of character for my unterstanding of her, especially since the built her up as a woman who wants women to be treated based on their work rather than their attributes. Yes, she and Misa are very ready to kill each other in the anime, but that's over Light. One could argue having her not be driven by the love for a man makes her a better version of the character, but the execution is - in my opinion- still lacking. So I would take Anime-Takada over her any day.

One should also note, that those Movies present an overall cast of darker characters than the anime. Light and Takada are not the only ones, Misa also kills a policeman in uniform for no reason other than to create panic, and the Task Force and L screw Light over really bad at the end. Even Rem is worse because (s)he chooses Takada instead of an actual criminal for the Kira-Scapegoat.

Oh, yes, and Rem is voiced by a male in those movies, that's of course a big no-go, but at least Shinigami-Gender is never discussed or mentoned in these movies.

However this is probably the reason why both the Musical and the TV Drama take the time to point out that Misa has "a girl shinigami".

Manga/Amime-Light kind of seems to hate women at times, yes? Well, he is kind of more misogynistic in the Movies, given what the bastard does to his girlfriend, Naomi and Takada (via Rem) in this version. The movies try to make the female roles more important (and were the first version that introduced a female Task Force Member), but somehow end up making things worse by the way they treat those women. (And they introduced a particular horrible female character in the third movie, that ends up getting forgiveness from L, which is infurating for many reasons, but that has nothing to do with the other versions, so let's leave it at this). 2010 versions of course did a much better job with the female characters overall. They also toned Light down, which is a good thing. I personally thing that he just hates everyone (no matter their gender) in general, because he thinks he is smarter than everyone else, so yeah, not women-hating Light in my view, but it sure seems like it at time. On the other hand the whole Naomi-Raye-thing with "she has to give up her job now that they are getting married" also comes across in a certain way in the manga and the anime that had to be explained away in additional media, so maybe the Original Manga just wasn't very woman-friendly overall.

LawLight is the most pronounced in the TV-Drama (see my title), but also very present in the Musical and has it's moments in the Movies and even the Netflix-Version. It's never forgotten, which is great.

However Matsuda is mostly forgotten in the Movies (which makes the existence of the Spin-Off even stranger) and not really in the Musical and no member of the Task Force even exists in the Netflix-Version. Sad. However he is great in every way in the TV-Drama. So is Mikami by the way.

Ryuk is kind of the same in every version (maybe he even remembers the other versions), however some versions of the Musicals show him being softer, which is okay I guess, he can't always be mean, let him have friends and doubts from time to time too.

The TV-Drama actually my favorite Version of "Death Note" (yes, I am a heretic). No surprise there. I even like the Near/Mello-Twist and what they did with the female Task Force Member in this version.

I also really like the Musical.

But I am not whelmed with "Relight". Shinigami-Light is not my thing and not Canon for me.

Light and L always need to mirror each other. Which is why we have more empathich versions in the TV-Drama, more cut-off from everyone else versions in the Movies, and more stupid versions in the Netflix-Movie. It has to be that way.

That said, I have a theory about the Netflix-Version (because I think too much about why someone is making what choice in an adaption): Mia is not supposed to be Misa in this movie. For quite some time of the movie I actually thought that Mia was supposed to symbolize Light and Light Turner was supposed to symbolize Misa. Light Turner is the one with a dead family member, Mia is the one who originally wants to build a new world and the one unwilling to give up the Death Note and also the smarter one of the Killer-Couple, she wants to matter, Light is just so in love with her that he goes along with almost everything she wants. He has qualms, she doesn't. But then the big Twist happens and suddenly Light Turner is Light. So my theory is that the writers actually took Yagami Light and split him into to characters: Light Turner, who finds the Death Note, talks to Ryuk und has a cop as a father who hunts Kira and Mia, who is the actual Death Note possessed justice warrior turned stone cold killer. This is why Light Turner is so different and why Mia has nothing in common with Misa - because Light Turner and Mia are the two sides of Yagami Light.

Through the times DN has become increasingly violent from version to version. It has always been dark with some hard violence, but I do think this was amplyfied in different ways from version to version. That strange gross virus in "L: Change the World" and all those more cinematic murders instead of heart attacks in the the Movies, the warehouse shooting in the Musical, Light's fiery death in the TV-Drama and of course "Final Destination: Death Note Edition", which lives from the violent outburst and has protagonist that relish in the violent deaths of their victims. This is probably a reflection of the RL changes in the world as well.

Final Conclusion:

After seeing all the versions, I can attest, that I don't think Yagami Light is gay - he is asexual und overall uninterested in other people, with the exception of people he thinks are like him: Takada is interesting intially to him, however he does go crazy for L - big time, in almost every version. As we have established MiaandLight are actually Light, and therefore in love with each other, because Death Note-User-Light is a narcissist. It ends badly because Light actually hates himself as well.

Also yes, the Death Note does possess or at least influence it's users. They become corrupted by it, the speed and pace of this depending on the circumstances and the frequencey of the usage. They also become addicted to the Death Note. Which is why Ryuk ends up killing them so oftern in the end, because useless junkies who cry about dead loves of their lives are no fun for him.

And yes, others have made this claim before, but I think there is hard evidence for the fact that alle Death Note-Stories take place in the same multiverse and take place after each other, with only Ryuk being able to remember. He slips Light the Note in the TV-Drama and the scene where he sees Misa on the TV in the Movies might actually be him recognizing her instead of seeing her remaining life span (or both). He also taunts Rem in the Musical about her upcoming fate (or warns her depening on the version) and the reason he kills Light after L dies in the Musical is that he just went throught TV-Dramas Light meltdown after losing his version of L and does not want another go at this, thank you very much. The others can't remember but have sometimes deja vus and flashes and kind of remember their emotions - which is the reason why L and Light connect so quickly in the Movies and TV-Drama and even in the Netflix-Version and why Misa is always devoted to Light and Rem always devoted to her.

And finally: Light is not pretending when he is pretending he is distraught about L's death. Yes, he is overacting, but he is actually using is true feelings about L for that. This is very clear in the TV-Drama, but also true in the Anime, the last remenants of Light die in this moment and becomes full-on Kira. The Laughter is Kira being reborn with no more whiney Light, who might have qualms and doubts and real feelings. Light only ever comes back at the end, when he is dying and begs for his life. But it's too late then. He can never be saved, because he is never willing to compromise and give up the Death Note, which I think was something L was willing to offer him not only in the TV-Drama but in most other versions as well.

I have started to write a fanfic about the Death Note-Multiverse-Experience, but it's in German, so yeah:

So this is the continuation, because there is another adaption of "Death Note" I did not include in the above, that I am adding now: The German Audio-Drama.

The "Death Note: Voices only Edition": The Audio-Drama-Series (2018)

Since this is a German Hörspiel it follows the tradition of German Audio Drama to present itselfs mainly as a Mystery/Crime-Piece. That means the plot matters more than the characters, which also means that this is actually the most faithful adaption of the plot of "Death Note" since the Anime. Until the Time Jump at least, after which new storylines are added and things get changed up quite a bit until it explodes in a pretty blood-thirsty finale in Episode 12.

Since it was published in 2018, there are quite a few changes in there that try to "update" the material. Light has a secret blog-diary, we have Ryuk calling Light a Social Justice Warrior for killing the guy who molestes the girl as his second victim, Social Media and the Internet are specificially named as the reason why Kira can operate on such a big international level, a certain than and sadly now again orange US-President is actually in the show (and other than in the case of the Manga there is no mistaking about who this should be, it's First Term Orange Menance the way we know him), we have a frankly very strange discussion about "Serial Killers can be gay" after Light profiled the second Kira as as teenage girl, Fake News is mentoned when it turns a girl put her ex up for death via Kira by spreading lies online, and underaged crime and punishement are discussed (this is Mikami's stick in this one).

They added a new major female character in the form of Paula Varrilo, L's boss at Interpol, who ends up becoming a Kira expert in Japanese Television after a falling out with the former mentoned US-President. Light and Ryuk seem to actually want her as the successor of Demegawa as the voice of Kira, however we never learn why they thought she would go along with it since Mikami recruits Takada instead because of a "misunderstanding" with Ryuk.

Sachiko Yagami has a bigger role than in any other version. In the beginning she mainly serves as mother and wife, but she ends up in an interesting position when she loses her husband, after she had been looking forward to finally having her husband to herself after all this years as a cop-wife. In a meltdown she even warns Misa off marrying Light for that very reason and blames Light for his father's death because he is the head of the Kira Task Force at this point.

Misa is more OG-Misa than in the other versions, however this is actually discussed by the other female characters. Misa is shown to lose herself and her sanity after giving up her memories for the second time, Sayu recalls her actually being more like Light's stalker than his girlfriend when they originally met, and Takada accuses her of failing the Bechdel-Test (Misa does not know what this even means) and having no personality of her own outside of her man. Strangely enough Misa also provides the most emotional moments of the whole series in the finale, which shows that the author actually did think hard on how to honor the OG Version but still change her up enough to make her better.

The Task Force has a bigger role than in most other adaptions, we have a lot of squabbeling between the guys. Character arcs are in there, but most of them like Aizawa quitting and Matsuda and Yotsuba are only partly there and are missing the point of the Original Storyline.

Since we only have voices we also got more Shinigami-Stuff than ever before. Rem and Ryuk discuss these strange mortals quite a lot. Ryuk is the most mild we have ever seen it, which turns out the be a red herring since he ends up murdering both Yagami-Men via his Death Note after the Time Jump, while Rem is the sassiest we have ever seen her. She tortures Higuchi in a quite Ryuk-like-way all the time (she really doesn't like him!). We also visit Mu and learn how Shinigami are made. If you died via Death Note, you end up there and are offered the choice to become a Shinigami. Ryuk took that deal and was a human before, we even learn his real name. We also meet a Shinigami named Sidu, who owend the Death Note Ryuk stole, and ends up taking the dead L back to Earth in exchange for getting help in regaining his own Death Note. He takes the Death Note from Mello and flies of with it, which is one of the most major changes from the Original in this version.

LawLight is pretty strong in the first half of the series. Episode 3 in which they meet is called "Beloved Enemy" and since there is no tennis or chess L ends up inviting Light to coffee every time they meet on campus. When L has a meltdown over not wanting a blueberry muffin, Light apologizes to the waitress for the behaviour of "his friend", which L comments with: "Friend? I feel honored". Sadly that's the extend of it. Since the triple-death is only ever shown in a short flashback with Rem and L, we never see any reaction to L's death from anyone, and the rooftop-scene was cut as well as anything else that should come before the death. L is the last thing Light sees though. However more about the boys and their character in this later on.

Since this is all audio most of the exccentrics of L, Near and Mello are gone. L is mainly known for never wearing shoes, Near's childlike behavior and Mello's love for chocolate are only easter egged in one scene each.

Probably time restraint is the reason why many plot threats are made less complicated in this. This includes Light using Raye to get the FBI-Agents names, Higuchi trying to find out Matsuda's real name, Mello's plans and Near's plan to expose Kira. However the Yotsuba-Arc really is a highlight, and includes Wendy (=Wedy) and Ivo (=Aiber) as a appearantly married couple, that coaches Misa and Matsuda through the whole infiltration operation. Sadly they die off screen during the time jump.

So the L-Problem is solved by a brand-new storyline involving L in Mu reuniting with Watari after five years and getting back to Earth after a mysterious talks with the Shinigami-King. He mainly hangs around with Ryuk as some kind of ghost after that and only comments but never gets to interact with the others again. No one can see him (until Light dies), and he seems to be there to protect Near, but this is not what is really going on. The twist at the end reveals what this whole story-arc is all about (other than keeping the character in the series after his death).

Mello kidnaps the chief of police alongside Sayu and kills him, even though he was an old friend of Soichiro and a suitor of Sachiko. Sayu is saved and Mello get's the Death Note, however in an Japan-Only-Attack without Near's knowledge the Kira Task Force tries to get the Note back, which ends with Soichiro getting the eyes for himself but never using them since Ryuk writes his name down ony minutes later. The Note is taken back to Mu by Sidu, and Mello manages to get away but is furious.

So the final episode is savage. Takada kills Misa via Death Note, having her jump from a building in front of Light, even after he proposed to her to get her down from the brink. Light has Takada burn herself to death as retaliation. Matsuda is really upset about Misa, however only Light attends her funeral alonside Ryuk und L. The rites are for some reason Christian, which is confusing but probably because this is a European Adaption, however having Light, L and Ryuk saying a prayer together for Misa ends up being the most emotional and touching moment in the whole series.

The showdown takes place at university instead of a warehouse. Almost everyone dies. Near burns the Death Note, which leads to Mello and Mikami taking off and Mikami shouting out everyone's true names (except for Light, which is seen as confirmation for him being Kira). Mello shoots him, but Near, Giovanni and Mello are killed by Light via the Death Note Page in his watch. Matsuda is shot by Mogi due to a misunderstanding, but manages to shoot Light before he can kill Aizawa, Mogi and Haley (=Halle). Ryuk then writes Light's name down in his own Death Note. Light sees L, who was there the whole time, and dies. L than reveals what his actual deal with the Shinigami entailed: He has a white Death Note, which is meant for killing Shinigamis. He writes down Ryuks name and goes on to continue doing his new job. Which is the end of the series.

Light's voice actor portrays him overall as condescending and sly most of the times, which is the most effective in the few moments he isn't either. However the interesting thing is that the time jump Light is much different from the Light we met before. Probably because he isn't using the Death Note very much anymore, he is much more human and genuine. He is truely upset about his father and Misa, and also hurt by Ryuk's betrayal, whom he believed to be his friend. This coincides (as it should) with a new version of L, who had five years to think about it all, and had decided that the true villain of this piece is Ryuk, whom he blames for killing and destroying Light by giving him the Death Note, and who is in truth responsible for all of Kira's victims. So we end this version with versions of our boys, who actually see clearer and are not even playing games anymore, but are also much more driven by their emotions and thirst for revenge than at any other point of the series. Which is a strange but effective combination.

So there are again some inconsitencies with the rules regarding the burning to a Death Note, it seems. But I still remain, that most versions work together and have the same rules, with only the Netflix-Version being the odd one out.

Because: "Light Up the World" implies that L did in fact not burn both Notes, but kept one. Which is why he could remember everything even after his death. The Note he kept is the one which Misa is given back in the movie. The TV Drama shows that pages burn up when the Death Note is destroyed, however the Audio Drama shows us Light with a page and is memory intact after Near burns the Note. However the explanation for this is, that there is a third Death Note around. There is speculation over another one in the last couple of episodes and I can confirm that there must be one, because we never learn what happenes to Rem''s own Death Note after her death. Like in the Anime Light probably took it and still has it somehwere, which is why his watch-page didn't burn up and why he still has his memories in the last scenes.

Sosuke Ikematsu & Masahiro Higashide in