Death Note.......I Think I Missed Something
Mark Jones
episode, but she obviously wasn't back to her old self
Saturday.........was she just in shock, or was it something worse?
Also Saturday, happened to catch a Japanese quiz show on ImaginAsian TV
which had DN as its topic......had a guy dressed up like Ryuk and
everything. It wasn't dubbed, dang it..........
Doug Jacobs
> I had thought that Lights father had rescued his sister in last weeks
> episode, but she obviously wasn't back to her old self
> Saturday.........was she just in shock, or was it something worse?
My wife read the manga as she got tired of waiting a week to find out what
happens next. According to her, Saiyu basically goes into shock and never
really recovers after being taken hostage. Seems pretty strange to
me...but then this seems to have acted as a catalyst for the father's
actions later in the episode.
The thing I don't get is why the father faltered? He was clearly in a
"kill or be killed" situation. The target had already taken out several
cops already. Why didn't the father have a gun? They weren't in Japan,
so it wouldn't have been illegal for him - and I'd think the US cops would
think it suicidal NOT to have a gun in that situation. I know that
Japanese cops don't carry guns, and so it's doubtful the father would have
had training, so that could be a reason... Then again, I'd think if he
was going to go into such a situation, someone would have taken him down
to the firing range for a quick lesson or two. Even so, he WAS armed - he
had the deathnote. He failed to use it. So he died.
Oddly, I never felt any sympathy for the father. I always thought of him
as a naiive idiot who was being blindly being manipulated without his
knowledge. In the process, he was nothing but a pawn used by both L and
Light for their own means, and it cost him his job, his daughter, and
finally, his life.
Hm. I just thought of something. Didn't Ryuk say that anyone who used
the Deathnote would be sent to Purgatory? In this sense, the father has
unknowingly triumphed over Kira/Light and L. His unwillingness to use the
deathnote means he'll probably go to heaven. However, L will probably end
up in hell for his "ends justify the means" manipulation of people, while
Light gets off with a "light" sentence by just being sent to purgatory.
--
It's not broken. It's...advanced.
Massimo Sabbadini
<dja...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote:
>knowledge. In the process, he was nothing but a pawn used by both L and
>Light for their own means, and it cost him his job, his daughter, and
>finally, his life.
At least he died happy, thinking that his son was innocent.
>Hm. I just thought of something. Didn't Ryuk say that anyone who used
>the Deathnote would be sent to Purgatory?
No, he said that the user won't go to Heaven nor to Hell, but this
doesn't necessarily mean that he goes to Purgatory. Some rules of the
Death Note seem to imply that the user just disappears into
nothingness (Mu).
--
Massimo "Gohan" Sabbadini
Email: gohan(at)megane.it
"Tibi, magnum Innominandum, signa stellarum nigrarum
et bufaniformis Sadoquae sigilim" (De Vermis Mysteriis)
Bill Martin
> On Tue, 13 May 2008 13:13:00 -0500, Doug Jacobs
> <dja...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote:
>
>> knowledge. In the process, he was nothing but a pawn used by both L and
>> Light for their own means, and it cost him his job, his daughter, and
>> finally, his life.
>
> At least he died happy, thinking that his son was innocent.
>
>> Hm. I just thought of something. Didn't Ryuk say that anyone who used
>> the Deathnote would be sent to Purgatory?
>
> No, he said that the user won't go to Heaven nor to Hell, but this
> doesn't necessarily mean that he goes to Purgatory. Some rules of the
> Death Note seem to imply that the user just disappears into
> nothingness (Mu).
My own personal thoughts were, and this is just based on the preview in
Shonen Jump that I read some time ago, was that upon death, the soul
didn't go to it's intended destination of heaven or hell, but that it
went to the realm of the Shinigami, but I could be misremembering, or
the subject of a retcon that missed me. If the Shinigami are capable
of dying, wouldn't they have a system in place to repopulate, if their
numbers get too low?
sanjian
> On Tue, 13 May 2008 13:13:00 -0500, Doug Jacobs
> <dja...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote:
>
>> knowledge. In the process, he was nothing but a pawn used by both L
>> and Light for their own means, and it cost him his job, his
>> daughter, and finally, his life.
>
> At least he died happy, thinking that his son was innocent.
>
>> Hm. I just thought of something. Didn't Ryuk say that anyone who
>> used the Deathnote would be sent to Purgatory?
>
> No, he said that the user won't go to Heaven nor to Hell, but this
> doesn't necessarily mean that he goes to Purgatory. Some rules of the
> Death Note seem to imply that the user just disappears into
> nothingness (Mu).
I was always thinking that he would eventually become another shinigami.
But they never really developed WHAT the shinigami were, so I can't really
justify it.
dot_wa...@hotmail.com
> I was always thinking that he would eventually become another shinigami.
> But they never really developed WHAT the shinigami were, so I can't really
> justify it.
Maybe Light changed his name to Aizen and went on to become a captain
in the thirteen squads... :)
-"Dot"
Mark Jones
an anime character. One little kidnapping, a few days of death hanging
over her head, some piffling gunshots and hello, catatonia..........what
does she think she is, real?
About DN users becoming shinigami.......it just seems right, doesn't it?
Can't go to Heaven, can't go to the other place, they've had on-the-job
training and demonstrated an interest in the profession.......what would
be more appropriate?
Doug Jacobs
>>Hm. I just thought of something. Didn't Ryuk say that anyone who used
>>the Deathnote would be sent to Purgatory?
>
> No, he said that the user won't go to Heaven nor to Hell, but this
> doesn't necessarily mean that he goes to Purgatory. Some rules of the
> Death Note seem to imply that the user just disappears into
> nothingness (Mu).
That's still a better place than being condemned to hell - assuming such a
place exists, that is.
Doug Jacobs
> My own personal thoughts were, and this is just based on the preview in
> Shonen Jump that I read some time ago, was that upon death, the soul
> didn't go to it's intended destination of heaven or hell, but that it
> went to the realm of the Shinigami, but I could be misremembering, or
> the subject of a retcon that missed me. If the Shinigami are capable
> of dying, wouldn't they have a system in place to repopulate, if their
> numbers get too low?
So, Light would become a Shinigami? I guess that would make sense.
Doug Jacobs
> Thanks, Doug.........so sis is toast, huh? Wow, not very resilient for
> an anime character. One little kidnapping, a few days of death hanging
> over her head, some piffling gunshots and hello, catatonia..........what
> does she think she is, real?
Yeah, this didn't set really well with me either. Then again, we really
don't get to know the sister very well from before, so we don't know how
resiliant she would be. It still seemed out of character for her, and was
just an excuse for the father's storyline.
> About DN users becoming shinigami.......it just seems right, doesn't it?
> Can't go to Heaven, can't go to the other place, they've had on-the-job
> training and demonstrated an interest in the profession.......what would
> be more appropriate?
Makes sense to me.
Bill Martin
Especially if now he couldn't kill someone just for disagreeing with
him. He had to select people that were already in dangerous
predicaments, since mass deaths by shinigami would probably incur the
wrath of their King... wait, from an anime perspective, was 9/11 a boon
to the shinigami, free life extensions to the first one that writes
down the names, or are things like that off limits to them?
sanjian
Considering that they were at the end of their lives to begin with, I doubt
it.
Doug Jacobs
> Especially if now he couldn't kill someone just for disagreeing with
> him. He had to select people that were already in dangerous
> predicaments, since mass deaths by shinigami would probably incur the
> wrath of their King... wait, from an anime perspective, was 9/11 a boon
> to the shinigami, free life extensions to the first one that writes
> down the names, or are things like that off limits to them?
That raises the question of what happens when a shinigami dies?
Why would a shinigami want a longer lifespan when their existence seems so
dreary and dull by even their standards?
David Johnston
<dja...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote:
>Mark Jones <faf...@msn.com> wrote:
>> I had thought that Lights father had rescued his sister in last weeks
>> episode, but she obviously wasn't back to her old self
>> Saturday.........was she just in shock, or was it something worse?
>
>My wife read the manga as she got tired of waiting a week to find out what
>happens next. According to her, Saiyu basically goes into shock and never
>really recovers after being taken hostage. Seems pretty strange to
>me...but then this seems to have acted as a catalyst for the father's
>actions later in the episode.
>
>The thing I don't get is why the father faltered? He was clearly in a
>"kill or be killed" situation. The target had already taken out several
>cops already. Why didn't the father have a gun? They weren't in Japan,
>so it wouldn't have been illegal for him - and I'd think the US cops would
>think it suicidal NOT to have a gun in that situation. I know that
>Japanese cops don't carry guns,
Japanese cops don't carry guns on routine patrol, but that doesn't
mean they don't carry when they are making an arrest of a suspect they
have reason to think might be armed.
Blade
news:IvGdnUtai7KxR7TVnZ2dnUVZ_oSunZ2d@rawbandwidth...
> Mark Jones <faf...@msn.com> wrote:
Massive, massive...
S
P
O
I
L
E
R
S
> Hm. I just thought of something. Didn't Ryuk say that anyone who used
> the Deathnote would be sent to Purgatory? In this sense, the father has
> unknowingly triumphed over Kira/Light and L. His unwillingness to use the
> deathnote means he'll probably go to heaven. However, L will probably end
> up in hell for his "ends justify the means" manipulation of people, while
> Light gets off with a "light" sentence by just being sent to purgatory.
Ryuk says people who use the Death Note don't go to Heaven or Hell. He is
not lying. Light figures out the truth almost immediately - there IS no
afterlife. There is nothing after you die. No heaven, no hell, no purgatory,
no nothing.
This feeds into Light's general impression of himself as the actual God,
dispensing judgement upon the evil and unworthy. It also is a large part of
the reason his own death is (in the manga) so utterly humiliating - he begs
and crawls and screams and cries trying to avoid it. The anime softened this
considerably, by far the change in it I like least.
I don't think L is evil - just very tactless and pragmatic. Everything he
does to Misa he does because he knows damn well she's guilty as sin, and
he's right - even if he almost doubts himself later.
-
Blade
sanjian
Oddly enough, even though it's just, I found that part severly unsatisfying.
Kira should not go out with a whimper.
Blade
awhile, though I can read just fine...
"sanjian" <mun...@vt.edu> wrote in message
news:PNSdnbh6c-R3JbPV...@posted.internetamerica...
Interesting. I felt it was the only satisfying way to end it. Near also has
his most truly satisfying moment, when he listens to Light rant about how
he's done all this good and blah blah blah and he's too important and cuts
him off with "No, you're just a murderer."
Light isn't god. He's just a guy who killed a lot of people and got a
swelled head over it. He has no real morals or convictions other than to
himself; he deserves to be exposed for the shallow and cowardly creature he
is. Any ending that does not strip him of his dignity is, I think,
completely the wrong message to send.
-
Blade
sanjian
I'm not so much worried about the message. If someone's getting their moral
truths from anime, we've got problems. I found him to be an interesting
character, and I wanted him to go out well.
Blade
":phant" <ph...@usagi.comix> wrote in message
news:tfvv249ajhmvmfbsc...@4ax.com...
Why?
He does the exact same thing when L strolls into the university and says
"I'm L". There's nothing that makes you think Light can accept defeat with
dignity. In fact, quite the opposite.
I tend to believe (with some interesting anecdotal evidence from Hybrid
Theory) that a lot of people seem to buy into a villain's own self-promotion
if they're smooth enough about it.
Ask yourself precisely why you think Light wouldn't scream and cry and beg
if he himself was the one being killed.
-
Blade
Blade
":phant" <ph...@usagi.comix> wrote in message
> ":phant" <ph...@usagi.comix> wrote:
>>"Blade" <kumo...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>>":phant" <ph...@usagi.comix> wrote in message
>>>news:tfvv249ajhmvmfbsc...@4ax.com...
>>>> "sanjian" <mun...@vt.edu> wrote:
>>>>>Blade wrote:
>>>>>> "Doug Jacobs" <dja...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote in message
>>>>>> news:IvGdnUtai7KxR7TVnZ2dnUVZ_oSunZ2d@rawbandwidth...
>>>>>>> Mark Jones <faf...@msn.com> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Massive, massive...
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> S
>>>>>>
>>>>>> P
>>>>>>
>>>>>> O
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I
>>>>>>
>>>>>> L
>>>>>>
>>>>>> E
>>>>>>
>>>>>> R
>>>>>>
>>>>>> S
>>>>>>
>>>
>>>Why?
>>>
>>>He does the exact same thing when L strolls into the university and says
>>>"I'm L". There's nothing that makes you think Light can accept defeat
>>>with
>>>dignity. In fact, quite the opposite.
>>>
>>>I tend to believe (with some interesting anecdotal evidence from Hybrid
>>>Theory) that a lot of people seem to buy into a villain's own
>>>self-promotion
>>>if they're smooth enough about it.
>>>
>>>Ask yourself precisely why you think Light wouldn't scream and cry and
>>>beg
>>>if he himself was the one being killed.
>>>
>
> a criminal, or is he criminally insane? I think that with all his
> reasoning,
> planning and careful manipulation, some may tend to forget, that although
> he
> can be rather brilliant at times, he is also very much a psychopath. For
> me, It's not that I buy into his self promotion, but that I believe that
> he does. So much so in fact, that I just don't see Kira's narcissism ever
> allowing him to believe he could be so completely defeated, even with it
> staring him literally in the face. He thinks about it, he talks about it,
> he even plans for it, and at times shrugs the idea off, but none of that
> is quite the same thing as accepting it. Becoming enraged that his
> opponent
> believed the game was over, and they'd won, seems more likely. That or
> scheming and manipulating to the very end.
As I already pointed out, he did the exact same thing when he thought L beat
him - freaked out and carried on like a lunatic. He also reacts badly to
when the "Lind L. Tailor" incident happens.
Light is capable of knowing when he's beaten, and he reacts extremely poorly
to it. This is repeatedly demonstrated. The difference in the two previous
times is that he eventually thinks of a plan and calms down. He doesn't here
because he's lost everything and there's no going back (actually, he DOES
come up with the backup plan of getting Ryuk to kill everyone, but it
fails). It's completely consistent with his character throughout the series.
Again, there's the Light mystique playing up here. He's not so insane he
can't tell when he's beaten. He's not anything other than a smart human
murderer. Nothing else. That's the whole point and it's pretty consistent.
> Also, and maybe it's just me, but with all that aside, I don't see someone
> who's on such intimate terms with death, and who has first hand knowledge
> that their are no eternal consequences to his actions, being so terrified
> of dying. Not wanting to die, sure, but not being reduced to a sniveling
> wretch.
He's terrified of death for the exact same reason many people turn to
religion - nothing terrifies people more than ceasing to exist. In Light's
case, there's also being completely beaten which (as we know) freaks him
out.
> Maybe the sniveling ending seems appropriate to some because of Light's
> incident in the car with his father early on. But that was Light alone,
> without the influence of the deathnote inspiring and feeding his delusions
> of godhood, without the knowledge of all the blood on his hands.
Once again, that's still the exact same guy. It took him less than a week of
having the Death Note to become the character we see in most of the series.
> Out of curiosity, how is the death of Kira handled publicly? The
> conspiracy-
> theorist in me would think the governments of the world, would have a
> vested
> interest in keeping his death silent, allowing the general public to
> believe
> he was still a boogy-man, out their waiting to dispense death to the
> deserving.
It doesn't really say precisely. Many people believe Kira will return,
obviously (including, ironically, Misa).
-
Blade