Death Note v.1-3 by Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata
This Book Is About
Light is a wide-eyed Japanese high school honors student who’s boredom with life is suddenly relieved when an equally bored Shinigami (death god) drops a Death Note into the human world in order to relieve his own tedium. The Death Note of the Shinigami gives Light the power to kill people by just writing down their name while thinking of their face. Light quickly decides that this is his chance to make the world ideal, to rid it of bad people and bring all the evil in it to justice.
Soon violent criminals the world over start dying of heart attacks while in custody and people begin calling the force behind these deaths “Kira”. When Interpol takes notice, the mysterious detective known only as L. steps in to capture Kira at any cost. But how far is Light willing to go to pursue his ideal world and protect “Kira” from capture?
My Thoughts On This Book
What I like about this manga is the battle of wits between Light, a.k.a Kira, and the mysterious and intense L. who is trying to capture him. Personally, I think L. is a bit more interesting than the main character, Light. But that may be because L. is a distinctly unusual individual and, moreover, a mystery. So, I want to know more about him, whereas the books are about Light so he’s ‘on stage’ all the time and about as mysterious as butter. I like to find out what’s behind a character, and the series does a good job of slowly stringing out information about the identity-less detective who is after Kira.
Volumes 1-3 of Death Note focus on the psychological horror of Light’s slide from wide-eyed honors student 
who throws up and trembles in shock after killing someone with the Death Note, to cold-eyed Kira who can talk casually about using the Death Note to kill innocent CIA officers who were investigating him.
The author does a good job of developing the plot and of showing the knife’s edge that is the path of the self righteous and how easy it becomes to kill again once a person takes a human life. The characters are all fairly human, even Light/Kira.
The art is decent as well, standard manga style and quality. The artist, Takeshi Obata, does a good job with the character’s expressions and in showing the intensity of L. The covers are very eye-catching and dramatic.
Shade-tastic Or Blank-Space-City?: How Well This B&W Comic Was Shaded
I’ve got this problem with black-and-white comics. It’s my brain. It’s a strange, abstract place that turns streaks of cloud in the night sky into a massive diving eagle. And that’s after a casual glance.
I have trouble reading most B&W comics, graphic novels or manga because the lack of color and the often sparse shading gives my wandering brain nothing to follow; my eyes are left drifting around and my brain can’t latch on to anything to pay attention to.
So, how good is the shading in Death Note?
The manga’s art is well shaded. I can tell objects apart and have no trouble reading or following the images.
Rating & Levels For This Book
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# of actual vikings in book: 0What do these levels mean? » |
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Author and Publishing Information For This Book
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