[Manga Reviews]

Death Note volume 8

Posted by Martin  [Tags: Death Note]

Ah, L, how I miss you. The crazy snack-addicted guy who sat on the edge of his seat awkwardly holding a teacup and plotting his next move to bring Kira to justice is no more. In all honesty the story should be winding down now, with only a denoument involving Light’s fate left to address. Sadly this is SJ we’re dealing with here so I suppose the show must go on. I wasn’t too keen on reading this far actually, but since I’d already bought the thing and I was waiting for a train with only a pint of cider for company I thought I might as well give it a shot.

Actually, the new arc isn’t half bad. To (mis)quote Mike Myers in Wayne’s World, “Ah, it is like Star Trek: the Next Generation. It is in many ways superior but will never be recognised as the original.” Mello and Near are worthy enough adversaries, with the only sticking point that they’re pretty much clones of L. Seriously guys, if you can create such great characters, why make carbon copies of the important ones? It does spice things up a bit though since the two of them are going after Kira separately: it becomes a three-way battle of wits as the two successors to L become rivals in bringing Light down.

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[Manga Reviews]

Death Note chapters 53-61: Zero

Posted by Martin  [Tags: Death Note]

It’s been a while since I sat down to read any Death Note, which might explain why the seventh volume didn’t leave me as gripped as the earlier ones did. Maybe it could also be down to the fact that we lose a major character at this stage of the story which leaves me sceptical about how the quality can be maintained from here on. As always the plot twists and turns with Light and L trying to outguess one another; for me at least, the seemingly endless repetition of reasoning and counter-reasoning is beginning to lose its edge, and I ended up feeling a little lost and detached from the proceedings. Which is a shame, because one of the main reasons I enjoyed Death Note was because it draws the reader into its tense and morally ambiguous world.

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[Manga Reviews]

Death Note Chapters 44-52: Give and Take

Posted by Martin  [Tags: Death Note]

The third Kira continues to cause problems for L and the investigation team as they disagree on how to deal with this new threat. One thing is clear though: the Kira of the Yotsuba corporation must be stopped at all costs.

I now find myself repeating what I’ve already said about how gripping and intelligent this series is. The artwork, the plotting, the characters…all this makes Death Note one of the finest pieces of manga on the market today. So, what can I say about this volume that doesn’t spoil anything?

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[Manga Reviews]

Death Note Chapters 35-43: Whiteout

Posted by Martin  [Tags: Death Note]

Ok, my fansubs are on CD in a room where other people are sleeping (such is the nature of my chaotic home life right now) so screenshots for Haruhi ep 12 will have to wait until tomorrow…instead I’m turning to the latest volume of Death Note. It just so happens to continue the trend of every volume being better than the last - excellent stuff.

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[Manga Reviews]

Death Note Chapters 1-34: Boredom, Confluence, Hard Run and Love

Posted by Martin  [Tags: Death Note]

Unknown to humans there is a separate world in which the shinigami, the death gods, live. They decide how and when people die by writing the names in Death Notes, notebooks that give the shinigami their powers to take life. One shinigami by the name of Ryuk is bored so drops his death note into the human world, just to see what will happen. It is picked up by a high school student named Light Yagami who is also bored and, initially skeptical of this mysterious notebook and its strange owner, decides to use the Death Note to kill off notorious known criminals and make the world a better place. Not surprisingly the authorities get a bit worried about murderers and rapists dropping down dead left, right and centre without their intervention so enlist the help of reclusive master detective known only as ‘L’. Soon a deadly game of cat-and-mouse begins between L and Light, whose faceless vigilante persona becomes known as ‘Kira’.

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