Death Note, vols. 6-7 (Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata)

[chomiji]

Ever since I started Death Note, people have been warning me that the plot takes a radical twist at one point and becomes a different story. Well, this (specifically volume 7) is that point.

The search for Kira - who may, of course, be more than one person - continues, as does the touchy cooperative relationship between brilliant college freshman Light Yagami and the eccentric but equally intelligent investigator who calls himself L. The overly cute, tremendously naive young actress Misa Amane, now hopelessly in love with Light, agrees to help with the investigation, and soon one Kira is cornered. But it turns out that Light's plans were much more involved and far-reaching than anyone else could have imagined -- and things proceed exactly as he had planned.

The world may never be the same.

Death Note, vols. 6-7 (review)

My reactions to volume 7 were (1) arrrrrgghhhh! No! He didn't! and (2) well! I was right all along - Light Yagami is the Antichrist.

Because L is dead as a doornail, and Light killed him. By proxy, because he's such a scumbucket. He manipulated poor, confused, tormented Rem - Misa's original shinigami, who had a bizarre, temendous love for Misa - into doing to actual deed, in such a fashion that Rem was destroyed as well.

I'm cross with the author for a number of reasons. L's death is the obvious one, but that's a dramatic choice that I can - I guess - respect. And the cover of the tankoubon volume telegraphed it: L is upside down, and as Sanada pointed out to me, the black cross (which I didn't notice at first) and white roses are also tremendously suggestive of death. (In Japan, as in many cultures - including some in Europe - white flowers almost always symbolize death.) But what really makes me angry is the blatant sudden manipulation of the text and the reader. Up until now, most of Death Note's narrative has been pretty straightforwardly chronological. Now all the sudden, we get flashbacks - retcon, plain and simple - to have Ryuk insert fake rules into the Death Note at Light's command, so that L's conclusions will be faulty, and to re-invent W as the founder of a series of orphanages, one of which is home to the young boys Mello and Near. These kids are magically inserted into the timeline so that L has been having his possible successors raised under, I guess, controlled conditions - all this time, of course.   > Gack <

OK, so the kids are moderately entertaining - it's fun the way they've split L's quirks, with Near (the good boy) getting L's mildly autistic personality and fidgeting, and Mello (the very naughty bad boy) getting the junk food habit (although the only thing I've seen him munch so far has been many, many chocolate bars, unlike L's endlessly varied parade of sweets and caffeine). And I guess I want to find out what's going to happen, from the problem-solving point of view. But the story had actually gained a bit of heart - which I'd felt, initially, that it completely lacked - and now it's gone.

Comments

[chomiji]

Hmmm? Can you explain to me more about what you meant when you said

>> I had to stop to wait for the english release <<

and

>> I dont want to ruin it for myself <<   ?

Were you looking at the Japanese ones?

[b3nitora.livejournal.com]

You are correct in your assumption that I was reading the Japanese versions! Sorta *cheers* I was reading the scanlations from StopTazmo. I started reading death note probably right after you could get the english scanlations online. But, once it started comming out in english, I had to stop myself from reading it online so as not to ruin the end...I had gotten pretty far into the thick of things and it was getting oh so very juicy...I didnt know it could get any juicier post the death of L...was I wrong! ANTICHRIST! I want to buy the last few volumes without reading them online beforehand....if that makes sense. ^_^