telophase | (no subject)

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Earlier today, before I left town, I posted a few thoughts on Death Note here in response to someone's question on

death_note about whether the characters ever become interesting. I figured I'd see if anyone out there had any opinions or discussion on it. Or not. SPEEEEEEEEAAAK TO MEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now to watch Paranoia Agent, which officially own my brain. (I'm on my mom's laptop and the keyboard is driving me crazy...)

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First off- Paranoia Agent is love. Especially the episodes where Satoshi Kon decides 'aw lets do something different and throw people off track'. And Shounen Bat/Lil Slugger is damn scary.

As for Death Note, I can see where the OP is coming from. Since Light is the first character introduced, we assume that he's the hero aka the person the author wants us to root for. However, as the manga goes on, well, we realize that that isn't the case.

At the beginning, Light's the type who's got the brains and the looks, and damn it, he thinks he knows just what the world needs (.... hey, I know some people like that). However, where the plot's path careens sharply from being a story about a good-looking snotty kid is when he actually *gets* the power to change the world as he sees fit. The more he uses this power, more he willingly lets go of his humanity to get his goal.

I find myself attracted to this kind of anime and manga- that's why I love Monster. It's subplot after subplot after subplot after subplot, so even if the plot moves slower than a glacier going uphill, you don't mind. The emotion inherit in shoujo isn't going to be as prevelant in series like DN, but, if it's crafted well, it'll be there. While there were some temporary skirmishes, L and Light don't duke it out for the sake of the world like two grunting Saiyujans(sp?) in space (apologies to Toriyama), they mentally stare at each other in a room for the one moment one of them leaves a spot open. They get nervous, they get paranoid, etc, etc.

..... Can you imagine Death Note DBZ-style? ._.;; "... Hey, uh, let's meet in a few episodes. I need to go ~~gorge myself on various sugary products~~train."

I only halfway watched tonight's episode of PA because I was poking about the Net on the laptop, revelling in th4e wireless access Mom's got set up, but I'm planning on Netflixing these anyway and watching them more closely. :D

Yeah, the OP admits up front that she primarily reads shoujo, and obviously the stories she likes lie in the emotions of the characters and stories that push that beneath the surface don't push her buttons. I hadn't really articulated the idea that all these characters with the high intellectual abilities are all disconnected from their sense of empathy, actually. Not really emotions - Misa's moved almost entirely through her emotions, as is Mello, but Near and L both have major disconnects there. My favorite scene of L's is when Light asks him how he thinks it feels to have his sister accused of being a murderer, and L actually has to think a moment before saying he imagines it would feel pretty bad. XD

Death Note DBZ-style breaks my brain. XD Imagine the pace... Ooba throws in everything she thinks of as soon as she thinks of it because she has no patrience, so except for the bit with that financial group (Yotsuba?) where it dragged because they had to widen the story to continue it, it's at a fairly breakneck pace compared to most manga. DBZ-style means they'd just be staring at each other for three episodes before dropping a hint or essaying a comment. XD

edit: reposed as a comment because i r megatard.

Yeah. PA's one of those series where you really can't jump in the middle of it except for a few. There's one episode that has absolutely *nothing* to do with the major plot, but is just so off-the-wall and darkly hilarious that it's one of my favorites. Not as tight in storytelling as DN, but we're talking thirteen episodes versus 60+ issue manga.

Anyway, back to the OP. She also hinted at that it was also maybe to gain some insight into some yaoi doujinshi. Thus, she might have been thrown off. L and Light (unless we're talkin' later on) aren't very slashy couple by any stretch of the imagination. Just the capacity for 'liking' someone in that way is beyond Light's means by the time he meets L in the flesh. To make him want to be with someone (female or male) is going to skew with his personality. That is, unless later on Misa manages to worm herself into his heart by some major twist in plot. Thus, the OP may be getting an unpleasent surprise when they see the way Light is in canon, rather than fanon.

L's a little easier to stretch, but he seems extremely child-like when it comes to the rare occasions when he's not being the 24/7 detective with no-life (including social). I mean, he ringed-around-the-rosey with Misa and Light in one scene. I think that's as close to first-base as he'll get with anyone. *coughs* 9_9;;

.... Wait, I'm the one making small essays on the fly on fictional characters and L's the one with no life? Oy.

L and Light (unless we're talkin' later on) aren't very slashy couple by any stretch of the imagination.

Truthfully, from the little bit of DN I read? The thought of Light and L having sex together leaves me COLD.

No. Just...no.

And I'm in the same boat as the OP; DN bored me silly because I can not see *why* anyone is doing anything. I think if there was something vaguely resembling character development (which would have happened if the writer slowed it down, I think) I would like this series a whole lot more.

Just to clarify, when I meant 'later on', I meant other characters which I really can't write mini-essays about, not that L and Light would make happy fun-fun time together. XD

However, no rational reasoning can erase the memory of the Milkshake fan-made flash video. *shudder*

*g* When I was reading DN, I remember thinking, "Dear god, I have found the one series I never want to see doujin for, because none of these characters shoudl be having sex. Just no." And died a little inside because OMG, the amount of DN doujin has been increasing exponentially lately.

And dare I ask about the Milkshake vid?

Milkshake vid ... THE HORROR!!

go_devil_dante is for the most part responsible for it, and I'm not going to look for it because I'm on my mom's dial-up right now, but if you can't find a link to it by poking through her DA gallery at go-devil-dante.deviantart.com, then I'll find it and post it when I get back home.

For me, I found Light interesting from the first chapter I read. It a pretty different character from others I've seen before. I started on chapter two and thought, "Oh wow. There's... an interesting set-up ...I need to go stop reading and think about this for a second."

In retrospect, it was probably more the concept than the characters, the characters were just the way they were because if they weren't the plot wouldn't have worked as nicely at that point.

In reference to the OP, I politely disagree that Light doesn't have a personality or that the plot is about him killing people. It would be pretty dull if it were just 18 pages a week of someone writing names down. "Next week on Death Note: Light learns Russian and starts writing in an appointment for the Mafia."

I've had friends I tried to get into Death Note say the same thing, really. No matter how pretty I say the art is or how great the plot gets later on, they don't really connect with the story in the first chapters. They usually crack a joke about sociopaths and ask for more chapters of Fruits Basket next time instead.

"In Soviet Russia, the book writes on you!"

I couldn't resist.

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