Story (8/10): For those of you who DON'T know, Death note is basically an anime featuring a crazy man that self-proclaims himself as god and a detective that can make Sherlock Holmes his bitch, chasing around each other with overly complicated plans with insane amounts of resources, trying to find out each other's identities so they can bring the other person to justice. While for the most part this anime does do well with its concept of its cat and mouse chase, it falls very flat with its final 8 episodes by changing one of the key characters and making it drag out in the most BORING way possible. While there is fairly good pacing, the anime does stretch itself too much sometimes.
Characters (8/10): First is Light Yagami. As the "protagonist" of the series, (I use protagonist lightly), he starts out as a very bored character. Until one day, a magical notebook with the ability to kill people by simply writing their name down falls from the sky, his life changes forever. With the mindset to be god and bring all evil villains to justice, (oh, the irony), his personality drastically changes to a more chaotic evil. And finally, we have L. As the "antagonist" of the series, (Again, lightly.) L always has a calm way of approaching any situation, and does not hesitate when he finds a potential clue. With an addiction to sweets, L is a rather interesting character with the uniqueness that he holds. Beyond these 2 main characters, the rest of the cast is filled with generally well-done supporting cast that mainly play a role as the 'toys' for the main 2 characters to use and play around with, so that they can succeed in their goal. Overall, the quality of the characters are more well done then what I have seen in previous animes that I have watched.
Art and Sound (8/10): As many people may know, the art style in Death note is a very high point. With a more, 'realistic' feel and a very dark scheme of colors in the very detailed background, death note becomes a more standout anime from an art point. Next, sound. For sound, Death note has a very interesting soundtrack from it's energetic first opening to its somewhat softer first ending, and its taken by surprise second opening.
Personal Enjoyment (3/10): Now, just by the rating for personal enjoyment alone, I know for a fact that I will get a lot of hate. If you must, post a comment. As I had said in the beginning of the review, I don't like this series. The main reason? My brain CANNOT understand what the hell the characters were saying. For the most part, Death note is mostly dialogue and in order to understand what exactly the characters were saying one MUST read or listen to every part of the plan as the characters are explaining it, in order to fully comprehend what they are precisely explaining. If you're an idiot like me, it basically means that you have to listen to them talk and just watch on to see their plan in execution. For me, this series was really boring and I was painfully watching every second of it to finish it. I would recommend this to people who want a unique experience with a completely original anime or, to people who have a higher IQ then I do. (That really shouldn't be hard to achieve.)
