Review of Death Note (2017) by Nathaniel W — 24 Aug 2017

Just watched this film tonight... It doesn't follow every rule of the anime, but not even justly.

Before I continue, I do regret that I haven't actually finished watching the anime and do plan on getting into its manga version too. Despite this, I know my fair share of the plot to notice what the Netflix film misses.

Unsurprisingly, for cramming so much of the anime's story into 1 hour and 40 minutes, it's fairly fast-paced. Unfortunately, in doing so, it misses plenty of plot parts and characters, as The Last Airbender (2010) once had, changes the attitudes of present characters (yes, looks too, but those don't necessarily matter to me here, not even L being black-he at least maintains most of L's calmness and intellect), and in the end, changes at least a bit of the tone, if not more.

Unlike the anime, this is rated TV-MA. What seems to make this more mature-rated than the anime is simply adding more gore, more profanities, and more sexuality... none of which I have ever seen in the anime.

In all ado, the only points I find they got right here was the basic concept of the Death Note (although even as a fan of the anime, I notice some people may be confused due to seeming lack of explanation), Ryuk (yup, he was almost perfect), L ( wasn't obscure enough and until he got overly aggressive), and only a smidgen of the dark tone.

To conclude, this was a disappointing watch and move for Netflix again... and I am more excited now to finish the anime before month's end (as well as Fullmetal Alchemist too)!