Netflix announced a live-action film version of the popular anime and manga series Death Note set to premiere in August. From the trailer, it seems that Netflix will be doing a remix on the source material, taking place in America rather than Japan and with characters that look very different than their original versions. While I’m sure you won’t need to have seen the anime to enjoy the Netflix movie, I highly suggest that you watch it anyway, whether you love anime or hate it.
I got the idea to write this from an article by Alanah Pearce at IGN who shares the same belief as me that everyone should go back and watch the anime before the movie comes out. However, hearing this from me might bring something slightly different to the table because of one fact: I don’t really like anime.
Growing up I have always had many friends who watched anime religiously, constantly moving from one series to another but it has never clicked with me, and it wasn’t from lack of trying. I have forced myself to watch numerous shows and while I have tried my best to like them, I just can’t get over the annoying tropes, bombastic art-styles, inconsistent tones and the general form of storytelling that so many of them use.
However, Death Note is different, and when I watched it many years ago and when I recently sat down to re-watch it, it got me hooked in a way that few shows ever have. Death Note is about a high school prodigy named Light who comes across a strange notebook that says if someone writes down someone’s name in the book, that person will die. Light soon learns that the book is no joke, and after an admittedly rushed period of shock, he begins to use this ability to play god, killing criminals who he believes society will be better without.
The central pillar of the show is the cat and mouse game between Light and a mysterious and extremely talented detective who simply goes by “L.” And what a ride it is. Death Note has some of the most intriguing character development I’ve ever seen in any show and as you watch you are likely to go back and forth between sides of hard moral issues. By the end it is very possible for you and a friend to have completely different interpretations and allegiances when it comes to the battle between Light and L's opposing ideas of morality.
Death Note is not the only anime I’ve seen that raises thought-provoking questions with its stories but it is one of, if not the only one I have seen, that does so without falling into the tropes and cliches that drive me crazy in anime. With the potential exception of Misa, Death Note steers clear of the spontaneous bouts of cutesy fluff or goofy antics that plague other anime titles, and it is actually kind of easy to forget you’re even watching an anime. Sure, Light and L’s long bangs and the dark color palette date it somewhat as a product of early 2000s emo, but it still holds up as a mature and smart show that will test your intelligence but not so much so that it becomes convoluted.
So if the Netflix trailer interested you, I suggest you go back and watch the anime. It’s available on Netflix, there’s only one season and it is so easy to binge straight through it. (The other night I got the “Are you still watching” message for the first time in probably two years.) The new live action movie will release on Netflix on Aug. 25.