DEATH NOTE / First Impressions

OP Sequence

OP: 「the WORLD」 by ナイトメア (Nightmare)
Watch the OP! Mirror 1 Mirror 2 (8.4MB, XviD)

Summary:
In the Shinigami world, there sits a Shinigami named Ryuk watching all the other Shinigami lay around. At the same time, in the human world, Yagami Light is sitting in a class of students who aren’t paying attention to the teacher. As he’s walking home reading, all around him are news reports about crimes and murders. Light feels that everyday is the same repetition, and both he and Ryuk feel that their world is rotting. In class again the next day, Light notices a black book fall from the sky outside the school. He goes to check it out and finds a notebook labeled “DEATH NOTE.” Inside is a list of instructions about how to use this Death Note and the very first bullet says that “The human whose name is written in this note shall die.” At first, Light thinks the notebook is trivial and puts it back down on the ground, but then he decides to take it after all. When he gets home, Light reads the rest of that page, which includes the following rules:

–The human whose name is written in this note shall die.
–This Note will not take effect unless the writer has the person’s face in their mind when writing his/her name. Therefore, people sharing the same name will not be affected.
–If the cause of death is written within 40 seconds of writing the person’s name, it will happen.
–If the cause of death is not specified, the person will simply die of a heart attack.
–After writing the cause of death, details of the death should be written in the next 6 minutes and 40 seconds.

Light recognizes that this means you can make a person die in comfort or in pain, but he still thinks that this is a practical joke of some sort and finds it all absurd. Despite this, Light gets off his bed and prepares to write a name into the Death Note. The thought suddenly occurs to him that if this does indeed work, it might make him a murderer. Playing on the TV nearby is a live news feed of a killer currently holding young children hostage. The broadcast displays the face and name of the murderer, so Light transcribes that name into the Death Note. With the 40 seconds and heart attack rules in mind, Light waits out the period of time, but sees that nothing happens. Just as he’s about to dismiss all this and turn off the TV, the program suddenly shows the children being released and the police storming the building. He is startled when news breaks that the criminal has died and even more surprised when word comes out that the criminal had suddenly collapsed. Light thinks that it must be a coincidence, but his thoughts get interrupted by his mother reminding him that he has to go to cram school.
Light wants to confirm with another test, and he reasons through possible targets. He can’t kill a really important person because there’s the possibility that the news could be kept secret for a while. And it’d be better if he doesn’t go after someone close to him. Still, Light starts to think that this world would be better off without some of the people here. It is outside a store where he’s browsing a magazine that Light finds his target: a thug and his friends trying to rape a woman. The thug had said his name earlier when he introduced himself to the girl, so Light writes down all the kanji variations of the name that he can think of, along with “accidental death.” Outside, the thug chases after the girl on his motorcycle as she runs away, but gets hit by a dump truck going full speed in the middle of the road. From this, Light realizes that the Death Note is genuine. Meanwhile, in the Shinigami world, Ryuk prepares to set out for the human world, explaining to his fellow Shinigami that he’s lost his Death Note. One of them remembers that Ryuk actually has two Death Notes, one of which he got from the Shinigami King. In any case, Ryuk approaches the portal, sprouts his wings, and dives in. He finds it raining when he arrives in the human world.
When Light returns home, his mother is waiting for the report of his placing on the nationwide practice exam. It seems that Light was ranked first again. She asks if he wants anything, but Light doesn’t because he knows that what he wants is already in his hands. By now, Light has actually filled two pages with names, and he laughs to himself as he reads over them. But this glee is interrupted when a scary figure appears behind him, causing Light to fall out of his chair in surprise. Ryuk identifies himself as the Shinigami who lost the Death Note, and he can tell that Light already knows that the Death Note isn’t a normal notebook. After Light gathers himself together and gets back up, he explains that he’s not surprised. In fact, he claims to have been waiting for Ryuk. Light explains that he no longer doubts the Shinigami’s Note and he shows Ryuk all the names he’s written in it. Ryuk has heard of stories in the past of the Death Note appearing in the human world, but this is the first time he’s seen someone do so much in five days.
Light is ready for whatever Ryuk is going to do to him, which he thinks will entail taking his soul. But Ryuk surprises Light by saying that he’s not going to do anything. It seems that when the Note reaches the ground of the human world, it becomes part of the human world. In other words, the Death Note now belongs to Light. Ryuk says that Light can give it away to someone else, but then he’d have to erase Light’s memories of the Death Note. When Light tries to confirm that there’s really no price to pay for using the Death Note, Ryuk suggests that the only one is the suffering and fear of being the human using it. He also mentions that when Light dies, he will write Light’s name in Ryuk’s own Death Note, but a user of the Death Note won’t be going to Heaven or Hell when he dies. Light’s mother suddenly knocks on the door, and when Light opens the door, she can’t see Ryuk at all. Ryuk explains that since Light is using a Note that used to belong to him, Light can see and hear him. The Death Note is the bond that connects the human Light with the Shinigami Ryuk.
As Ryuk starts gobbling down apples that were sitting on Light’s desk, Light asks why the shinigami chose him. Ryuk actually didn’t choose Light – he only dropped the Note, and Light picked it up by chance. That’s why Ryuk had written the “How to use it” explanation in the most popular English language. As for why Ryuk dropped it, it’s simply because he was bored. The current Shinigami world only has Shinigami napping or gambling, and they laugh at you for working hard if you write some names into the Death Note. Since writing Shinigami names into the Note doesn’t cause them to die, and since writing human names into the Note while in the Shinigami world isn’t amusing, Ryuk thought it would be more fun to come to the human world. It is at this point that Ryuk notices that Light hasn’t written a cause of death for any of the people save for one who got hit by the dump truck. Light thinks that the best part of the Death Note is that no cause of death means a death by heart attack. He’s been writing in names of criminals so as to gradually lower the level of bad guys. People will realize that bad people are being erased by someone, and the world will know of his existence. They will know that there is someone doing justice with his judgments.
Light admits that the reason he’s all this is the same as Ryuk’s: because he’s bored. He also reveals that at first he didn’t believe it, but that Note has the magical power to make anyone want to try it once. Back then, after he had gotten the thug killed by the dump truck, Light had stumbled home in the rain thinking about how he had killed two people. He had reached the conclusion that the world is rotten and it’s ok for the rotten to die. Light had gone from thinking that someone had to do it to thinking that only he could use the Death Note and change the world. That’s the motivation that caused him to kill countless criminals in the pages that he filled. He has a plan to cleanse this world by killing the criminals with heart attacks while killing troublesome people with disease. Light intends to create world of serious and kind people, and he thinks that he’ll become the god of this new world. Ryuk realizes that humans are amusing, just as he thought.

ED Sequence

ED: 「アルミナ」 (Alumina) by ナイトメア (Nightmare)
Watch the ED! Mirror 1 Mirror 2 (11.9MB, XviD)
Well I wasn’t familiar with Nightmare before I heard them here, and their music isn’t bad. Still, I’ve never been a huge fan of visual kei bands. The opening and ending animation are quite good though, with lots of gray, putting focus on the red vs. blue between Light and L. Those carries carry over to the ED too, and I thought both were rather impressive.

Well the much anticipated premiere of DEATH NOTE didn’t disappoint. You can tell immediately that there’s a certain style to the series that makes it dark, but not in the violent sense. Light’s eyes seemed positively red sometimes, and it made him so much creepier than I remember him being in the manga. And Ryuk’s face alone is enough to scare little children. But seriously, the atmosphere is rather dark and there’s some great background music. I also thought Miyano Mamoru did a fantastic job voicing Light, which is a role quite different from his Tamaki voice in Ouran.
Thematically, this first episode of this series takes an interesting look at one person’s quest to cleanse the world and the notebook that makes it all possible. I personally think that Light’s ambitions are a little cuckoo, especially when he’s talking about being the god of this new world. But what I find more intriguing are the numerous rules of the Death Note past the five that Ryuk originally wrote, and how they play into the story as they are revealed little by little. You can find them all listed on Wikipedia, though I do warn that there are spoilers there.
Given that this delivered what I was hoping for, I’m almost positive I’ll continue to follow DEATH NOTE. I’m looking forward to seeing next week’s introduction of L.

88 Comments

  5. Madhouse is animating this? Alright, sign me up! Haven’t read the manga, but considering the hype it’s getting it sure sounds interesting, moreover it’s madhouse animation! So chances are animation quality will be good!

    Lana
    Reply

  15. This looks very good. I hope it really goes smoothly; such an interesting/complex plot. Ahh its here. I’d really like to see any alterations to the plot details or characters.

    Ryan A
    Reply

  16. *gasp* Finally ^^ I’ve been waiting for this day since the anime was first announced XD I can’t seem to find a RAW anywhere though Blah. I wonder if they’re going to do the story all the way to the end o.O Someone said they weren’t going to.

    Mph
    Reply

  18. I loved the manga, and the anime looks so nice. I’ll have to wait till my lectures end before I can go home and download the raw.

    Overall from the pics shown, I love the dark mood.

    Basilimux
    Reply

  26. Animation and music aside…god, I did not like episode one. I found it so boring, I had fears that I would, but I was hoping they wouldn’t come to pass. Death Note really does not work all that well as an anime. The story is too slow for the anime, the movie worked a lot better because it had a great cast to help it along. This…just was not that good really, I hope it gets better, I really do. Death Note is a great manga, but this was just bad.

    Blue
    Reply

  31. Looks interesting! The animation looks great! I’m dl’ing it right now with about 15 mins left. Haven’t read the manga but it must be good with all the hype it gets. I’ll just have to wait and see if I’ll keep watching. Black Blood Brothers already has me hooked though and I’ve only seen the first 3! Hopefully DN will the second fall season show I’m hooked on.

    animebabe
    Reply

  44. now loading

    D.gray-man 01
    Death note 01
    Yamato Nadeshiko Shichi Henge 01
    Ghost hunter 01
    Shounen Onmyouji 01
    RED GARDEN 01
    I´ll post my impressions later ” STAY TOON FOR MORE SECRET AGENT CLANK ”
    -> I JUST LOVE THAT SHIT MAN 😆

    tensai_otaku
    Reply

  51. Mph at 5:41 pm on October 3rd, 2006
    @ Lalita, yes there is one main female character, Misa.

    Speaking of which..is it just me or does she have blue hair in the opening o.O

    —
    Yeah i think its blue…I thought she had pink hair in the manga??

    Love the OP!! So want it on mp3!

    ceecee
    Reply

  54. Studio Madhouse did an amazing job with this one, it made me happy to see them doing it. At least they got decent CVs for Ryuuku and Raito. I’m still worried about what they’re going to do with L, since I can’t see Kappei Yamaguchi doing his voice (I mean we’re talking about the same guy who did Usopp. XD) I’m also unhappy to see Aya Hirano popping up in every anime on my to watch list this season. Seriously, I’ve gotten 30 e-mails already stating, “Aya Hirano as Misa *orgasm*”, it’s getting really annoying.

    Likkun
    Reply

  57. Finally, something darker to watch…
    I’m hopping that this animated series of Death Note will cover most of the manga as possible. And the plus point is that the animation quality is simply wonderful.

    Yyi
    Reply

  59. Whoa, the art is pure out fantastic! I wasn’t a huge fan of the manga, but the anime looks better. I’ll give it a try when it comes out subbed. ^^ Light looks hot, but i can’t seem to get that fact that he’s got Tamaki’s VA. XD.

    Ai-Tan
    Reply

  62. I don know if i want to watch this… everyone is mad about a film much like i was abou he ring… But animation looks really good and story not so bad:) I’ll give it a try:D

    mettare
    Reply

  65. Watched it and I don’t think I’ll be keeping up with it. I’ll give it two or three more episodes to try to catch my interest (the only reason I watched all of ep.1 was because Light has Tamaki’s voice and I kept seeing him). The coloring made me think of X TV with the dull grey colors and I didn’t care for the Op and Ed song at all. The pictures were fine but the songs I could do without.

    Question: are there any of you who read yaoi manga? If so, then have you read Shiikugakari Rika? Light looks like Rika a bit.

    animebabe
    Reply

  67. It’s such a nice series! Gosssh I’m very happy it’s now on anime… although I’m a bit taken back beacue I already know how this is going to end *snif* I just had to download the whole manga from that torrent… anyway for the people who doesn’t know about this, Death Note is quite amazing I must say… it realy get to you deep under your skull, and leaved you like this O________O I haven’t downloaded the epi but by the screen caps it looks amazing, and if the animation is paced like in the op then I’m gonna download all this it seems the list of 4 anime series I wanted to watch grew to 5 ^^’

    RickaZ
    Reply

  68. Considering how far the manga’s storyline developed on this plotline, I’m surprised it took until now to get the anime out. But that’s the thing about animation – it takes time… after all, you have to get between 23 and 30 frames a second. (I imagine they’d draw/animate anime @ ~24/second to match the PAL timings used in Japan — a North American drawn “anime-style” (*coughyeahrightcough*) cartoon however would probably be done originally at NTSC’s 29.97 fps.)

    All said, I’m looking forward to this anime too… and I feel so will everyone I can think of.

    This year has been pretty good for anime… I’m only worried now about where one would even begin to look for a “best”.

    cbhl
    Reply

  74. This show rocks!!! I just saw the subbed version and I can confidently say it’s one the best manga-to-anime adaption so far.

    Very high quality animation and excellent music (orchestral choir kind) to match the mood. Especially the part, where Light writes in the names of the criminals into the Death Note fanatically, it was animated to be extremely thrilling and the psychological thrill the scenes induce are truly spectacular. A must watch, I will say

    deltazechs
    Reply

  77. As a first episode, I liked it. Sure, it didn’t have massive explosions or furious action for an anime series, but I think it takes a quieter road with its story; the main question being, if you had the power of Death itself, what would you do with it? Light, obviously, sees himself as a champion of justice (however deluded that is) and seems to enjoy playing God with people’s lives using the Death Note. His life is so hum drum normal and banal by comparison.

    Ryuk’s character design is awesome too; he’s like an even more psycho-looking version of the Joker. I was expecting his voice to match his appearance; that is, all crazy and bloodthirsty like. But that isn’t the case at all. He seems eerily calm, patient, and collected; he knows what he’s doing but at the same time there’s an edge of insanity behind that ever-smiling face and hollow voice. When you’re immortal and death becomes so routine that your comrades’ only outlet is to gamble meaninglessly throughout eternity, and you’ve got all this time to kill (no pun intended), something’s got to give. I also like how Ryuk has a thing for apples (forbidden fruit, anyone?).

    His remarks about humans who use (or abuse) a Death Note don’t go either Heaven or Hell leads me to believe that such humans also turn into shinigami themselves eventually; it’s just speculation on my part since I’ve never read the manga. The spirit world seems like such a morbid place, and the shinigami themselves are grotesque beings too, not like the shinigami interpretation in anime such as Bleach. I like it a lot.

    I’ll definitely keep following this anime; it’ll be interesting to see what Light does with his Death Note throughout the series.

    Ryuma
    Reply

  78. i think the color was kinda anoyying, they werent too bright which i didnt like. I think they made the anime alot “DARKER” then the manga, overall it was okay but i dont really lke it, once they get to the hardcore investigations ill probably start hating it.

    keith
    Reply

  80. Wow! It’s Death Note! XD I waited fro so long~~ It is awsome! But I love the manga better though. The manga is more original and better. (I think) Anyway, I am so happy to see Death Note animed. XD Go! Death Note!

    Duma
    Reply

  81. Ive read the manga, and i was really bored out by the plot :X its too exaggerated and unrealistic.. how can ryuk take it so lightly when his deathnote book had been found? and writing names in the notebook is simply murder. Light’s hope of bringing justice has got the better of him. His concept is totally out of point! whats with ridding the world of all the bad people? he thinks he’s the only perfect one? the amount of people dying in Japan is just too unreal to be true. Well, im not a boring person! I enjoy animes like Bleach and Rozen Maiden, with really great plots. Maybe its just me but.. i think Death note’s a bore. nevertheless, the art is great 🙂

    Ace
    Reply

  83. They did the first ep completly wrong, Raito is supposed to be this chearful happy and carefree person who sincirly belives he is only using the note to do good. It’s not until the FBI “arc” of the story does he start to really decline into madness and start to think that it’s also ok to kill anyone that gets in his way. Raito does’t hate life, he loves it so much that he’s willing to change it.

    Xei
    Reply

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