Review : Death Note.

What would you do if you were offered the power to kill anyone? Would you take it? Would you use it? What if you could make the world a better place, reduce crime and punish the wicked, could you bare the burden?

Death note is the name of the novel and is also the name of it's plot device, a shinigami (soul reapers) notebook. All you have to do is write a name in a notebook, envision the persons face in your mind and write a cause of death and BAM, they're dead.

Light Yagami, an grade A student is bored out of his mind and sick of the way justice is handled in the world. Light stumbles upon the death note by chance, on the grass outside his school. At first he believes it's a hoax, like anyone would, but after testing it on a criminal holding kids hostage, he confirms it's legality.

A few days later Rukk, a winged dirty looking shinigami confronts Light and explains the rules of the death note. Basically Rukk who is visible only to him intends to follow Light around watching what happens purely because he's bored. Light plans to force his sense of justice on the masses, killing the wicked and sending a message out that if you sin, you will be judged.

Unfortunately for Light, it does not take too long for L, world's greatest detective to get hot on the trail. L also remains anonymous to all, making it impossible to simply kill him with the note. L doesn't agree with Light's version of justice and sees him as nothing more than a murderer.

The art is dark and everything remains in proportion, although the theme and plot of Death Note is quite sinister, it's not very violent visually. Once again, a 13+ year old could read it, but to really enjoy and understand it's themes/messages about justice, being slightly older would be preferable.

Death Note is a great detective/crime story, with an anti-hero protagonist, but is Light really bad? I guess it's up to you and your sense of justice, should one person really judge us all by their standards?