Death Note - Spoilers & Speculation (for experienced Death Noters only!)

[akira300]

Originally Posted by Echoes

That hypothesis is utterly wrong, and goes against some of the most simple rules in the Death Note world. Sorry for being blunt, but this was debunked some time ago.

what am i missing ? what simple rules then? and there are only a couple post after harvests theory. enlighten me

would love to see Light come back, in my fantasy he will be the god of the new world but after a couple years the shinigami world starts to interfere with lights/kira's doing and a whole new plot begins, kira vs shinigamis

[Echoes]

I too would have preferred an ending with Light walking away victorious, especially since L's victory was no longer an option, and Near was just unappealing in every way. This if, however, far from how the plot ended.
If you've read the manga, you'll know that the last chapter contained a sort of a aftermath to the events in the anime. The fact that everyone was still alive at that point should be sufficient evidence to suggest that Light did indeed perish, and did not become a shinigami.

I'll try to point out a couple of facts which would conclude that Light did not gain any extra lifespan as well. As you probably know, the only way (the only way available to humans) to kill a shinigami is to make that shinigami extend their lifespan by taking someone else's life. In addition to this, the shinigami has to have developed feelings of love, care or affection for the person whose life was extended.
Ryuuku did not care for Light. He viewed him merely as a source of entertainment.
It is apparent in the anime that he does indeed find Light interesting and enjoys the feats he carries out with his death note, there are even times where Ryuuku is impressed by his determination and intelligence, rare as they may be. However, he is still far, far from being selfless enough to ever sacrifice anything for a mere human, whose life is as expendable as the apples he happily devours. It is never suggested that he likes Light in any way, shape or from beyond the fun that comes from his actions. Had Ryuuku liked Light enough to give his life for him, he would have surely killed everyone at the warehouse earlier. Matsuda did shoot Light, after all. I'm certain you see my point, if you love someone enough to die for them, you'd hate to see bullets pierce their flesh.
Exhibit A: Ryuuku does not like/love/care for Light.

This second part will make my first point sort of redundant, but nevertheless. For the sake of the argument, let us assume Ryuuku did like Light enough to die for him. The course of his actions would have been completely different. Writing Light's name in his death note would not have led to Ryuuku dying and Light acquiring his remaining lifespan. Shinigami exist to take life, therefore they are punished if they extend it. But now we've arrived at a circular argument. "Ryuuku died because he extended Light's lifespan, and he extended his lifespan because he died." Still, we have no explanation as to why he would die if he killed Light, it is perfectly legitimate to kill someone you love, even for a shinigami. The feelings are not the problem, the extension of human life is. If Ryuuku wanted to give Light his lifespan, he would have had to kill someone who threatened Light's existence.
Exhibit B: Ryuuku's actions would not lead to an extension of Light's lifespan, even if we assume strong emotions were involved.

Spoiler for Manga spoilers.. sort of:

The manga is also much clearer on Ryuuku's feelings towards Light, and the ending is a little different, but with the same results. Ryuuku calls Light a loser, and pretty much taunts him after his name has been written in his death note.
Misa also took her own life as a consequence of Light's death, she committed suicide because she heard the tragic news, which would have been impossible had Light not been dead. The last argument is perhaps the simplest answer I could give, and would really close the case alone. Death Note's author has explained the events at the end of the story, and confirmed that Misa killed herself because Light died, among other things.

Exhibit C: Nothing makes sense unless Light died.

[akira300]

thnx for the enlightenment , just hate that the author made light die in such a pathetic way, people talking about karma and that the series delivered in with this ending but to make such an interesting character die in such a shameful way, it really made me feel sad.

with the things you just explained i no longer have the hope of light coming back , but better to have the short pain then having false hope for a couple of months

[Echoes]

Hey, no problem, I'll take any excuse to discuss Death Note. I didn't care much for the way Light died either, I wish he would have at least taken someone down with him. This was probably not revealed in the anime, as far as I recall, but he was actually extremely close to finished Near's real name (Nate River, iirc) on his hidden death note. That does show that he payed close attention to detail until the last second, though, since he only learned Near's true name a couple of minutes earlier, when he displayed the death note Mikami had used, to show that Light's name was the only one missing.

The ending was pretty dark, but I often find that the series who dares to do something different are the ones I end up loving the most. The plot was delivered in a very real (as real as fantasy gets) and honest way, and the characters were truly unique. That of course, adds more disappointment when they perish. I do feel your pain, since pretty much all of the characters I cared for died. (Light, L, Misa, Mikami, even Mello) I'll always treasure the show, though, one of my very very favorites. I think I watched about 24 episodes in the first sitting, that's definitely a personal record.

[akira300]

even its not the ending that i wanted its one of the best and most powerful endings ever done in an anime in my personal opinion, the sad and angry feelings i had after watching the final episode even exceeds the ones i had with the full metal alchemist ending. truly a masterpiece that i will never forget.

still i will never stop hoping for another season of death note, but then again it will lose its power as we all can agree that that is what happened (a little bit) after L died

[Echoes]

I also hope they make a second season... sort of. I'd rather have no second season than a below average or bad second season, though.
L's death did accelerate the plot, and allowed for some great twists, but I still personally feel that it lessened the quality of the remaining episodes a bit. This isn't because it was wrong of the author or anything of the sort, it was merely because I loved L, hated Near, and thought Mello was ok. (still a bad replacement)

[baltostar]

Echoes, I liked your detail on post 2007-07-29 20:46


I would like to ask you this, how are death gods born? Do we actualy know? Even though I took a break from the show and jest finnished the last eppisode today, I don't remember them discussing it. For the second seasion, a posible plot could only (in my opinion) be acchived by bringing Kira back. True, for the sake of the arguments you discussed above, he is right now dead and Ryuuku should have gained the remaining years of his life, asuming that he would have lived a full life without getting the death note. Back to my first comment; how are death gods born. Could it be, possibley by some unknown loophole that by Kira's actions, so many died; could it give him a second life as a death god or reincarnation. Still, to support your argument, they know Kira's true identeity and it would be wird if a corps came back to life once in the ground. No... I belevie, the power to form a second seasion would be with the Death Book it self, after all, do death gods even know all the rules? That could be the very twist that could bring the series back. Thats as far as I got, and am clueless on how they would pull it off.

Any one else have some consepts to pull off a second seasion or exspand on some of my comments, then please post.

[wingdarkness]

@baltostar - Don't know about the whole DeathGod birth thing, but as amazing as DN's characters were, DeathNote as a concept is bigger than this cast...I'll answer your request though...

Any one else have some consepts to pull off a second seasion or exspand on some of my comments, then please post.

Why does it even have to include Light? The DN's have been around seemingly since the beginning of time..I think a great potential story would be to flip the script and have the next series take place in like the 1930's; a prequel (film it even more noir style than DN1--That detective story in the Animatrix short for an example of what I mean)...Maybe the "mantle of L" has been around for decades...Maybe the first "L" can take on a "Kira" from that time period...

The show would obviously be on a smaller scale, but I mean some of the best episodes of DN dealt with Light just killing one person (Ray Penber, his fiancee')...You don't have to kill a million people in one episode to make a good detective story..Maybe the 1930's Kira makes Hitler commit suicide^^...But seriously I think you can take a more contained story alot of different directions...If you don't like the idea of an L connection from the past you can just have a noir styled "Sam Spade" (Normal city detective) try to figure out who "Kira" is ...

[Echoes]

The whole issue of whether shinigami are actually born, or how they come into existence is one that I believe has been left unanswered. It was never discussed, and no one has ever mentioned any way to create new ones. I, like many others, had a gut feeling that Light might've become a shinigami after he passed on, and that this was the essence of the death note's power, the price you had to pay for using it, so to speak. That turned out to be a fluke, so we are left wondering.
It seems very unlikely that shinigami do not come into existence every so often, though. Their lifespan, though they can basically life forever if they want to, is finite. In addition to this, they can die from the same causes Rem and Jealous did. Though this has never been shown directly, shinigami can also be killed if they disobey the laws uphold by the shinigami "king", who will inflict painful and/or lethal punishments upon the sinners, depending on their crime.

Even if we presume these occurrences are extremely rare, the shinigami population would eventually reach zero if they're subject to long enough periods of time. Shinigami would also have to have come into existence pretty recently, since their only means of extending their lifetime is taking the lives of humans beings. (Sort of debatable, since we do not know how long their original lifespans are)

I'm willing to bet it has something to do with the shinigami king, perhaps he's able to summon or produce death gods, or something along those lines. This is merely speculation on my part, based on the small amount of information available, of course.

Moving on to the possibility of a second season. The possibility is there, but I don't have any high expectations. All of the characters that made the show interesting are dead, so they would have to basically start from scratch. Although the show is already supernatural in nature, I'd hate to see them introduce something like resurrections or magic abilities, I just don't think it'd go well with the show.
So what ideas are we left with for a second season? Since we'd either have to see an entire new cast, or a completely new story with the remaining characters, I believe we would be better off hoping for a spin-off than another season.

If we assume that someone some villain got a hold of the death note, and they'd have to look for him the same way the searched for Light in this season, I don't think it would be very interesting. Without the "I'm purging the world of evil" attitude, the death note in itself isn't that interesting. We all remember the Yotsuba arc, sure it was interesting to see him on a power-trip, but that alone won't make the show.

The idea of a prequel, as mentioned above, though plausible, would pose some questions. If an earlier "L" fought an earlier Kira, we'd have to presume from the start that he never won, since L was obviously oblivious to the existence of death notes. Without the note, it would be impossible to ever convict anyone of a murder, they'd have no evidence, after all. If the script was ingenious, I suppose they'd be able to whip up something, but I still doubt it.

Death Note has been immensely successful, though, so there's always a possibility. I would like to see a second season, or even a spin-off, even though I know it won't be as good as the first was.

[baltostar]

More ideas to consider:

I beleive there are very few death gods; This would mean they are deminnishing, assumming there were many more long ago. The death gods (the chariters interacted with) didn't seem to know that two of there own died and there might have been someting in the anime that showed the death god relm, but it didn't seem like they were doing much. They could posibly do a seasion of the creation of the death note, do we yet know all the rules, do the death gods even know them.

I mentioned the idea on how are death gods born, but how are death notes created and what happends when a BOOK GETS FULL? If each death god has two books(one to drop and one persional), then if a book gets full, how do they get another, or is there life span unable to exspand, because they lack room to add names.

There could be more power in the books then were are lead to beleive. If you think of the books as a living death god, then the death god's book is the book itself and it only lacks a vesial to Feed It. When a name is writen in the death god's book, the remaining life span of the person get's added to the life span of the death god. However, when someone writes a name in the Death Note, the person dies and we don't relly know what happens the there remaining life span. We know that the death god doesn't get it, because he exsplains that he gets the life from writing names in his book. So, possiby, the death note is living and gaining life from the names written, and assuming that the death note is potential for a death god, a blank slate for personality. The book could learn, or exsorb personality traits of the user, and sence Kira was the main holder of the book (the death god only followed kira) the posiblity of Kira being reborn (I agree that brining him back from the death probly wouldn't work) and becomming a death god from the book....

I was interupted 4 times whell trying to write this and have lost my train of thought, i think i made some points or a diffrent way at looking at the topic. I am good at the "What if" side of things, it makes me good at testing story plots and campain settings.

Any furether comments, please post.

[Echoes]

Ryuuku stated pretty clearly that humans cannot gain any lifespan from killing people at all, and while he's been known to keep a secret or two, he never actually lies to Light about any rules. I believe he would been honest about this, had it been the case. That of course, leaves the possibility of Ryuuku not knowing anything about it alltogether, but there is really no reason to assume that it's so.
The combined rules of "All humans will eventually die" and "What awaits humans after death is nothingness" would also leave one to assume it is not the case.

About the notes getting full, there's a simple answer to that; they can't. One of the rules states that: "The death note can never run out of pages."
How this is possible is not mentioned, but you can rest assured, the note's capacity is infinite.

[baltostar]

Originally Posted by Echoes

About the notes getting full, there's a simple answer to that; they can't. One of the rules states that: "The death note can never run out of pages."
How this is possible is not mentioned, but you can rest assured, the note's capacity is infinite.

Didn't remember that point, and it puts an end to my idea.

Originally Posted by Echoes

Ryuuku stated pretty clearly that humans cannot gain any lifespan from killing people at all

This is true, i was jest spectulating on wath happens to the lifespan's because they don't go to the human or death god.

[Echoes]

I suppose it's just wasted, the whole idea of lifespan is pretty complicated to being with. A pre-determined lifespan seems very weird, and I'm not completely comfortable with the idea yet, nor do I completely understand it. For example, does suicide affect the lifespan? Is that calculated when you see someone's lifespan? After all, it's just a date of death, so it should work. When I even mention Misa, it gets even more complicated, since she's supposed to have the lifespan of 2 shinigami (even a conservative estimate would indicate hundreds of years), yet she killed herself like a year later. Leads me to assume suicide is an exception or something, which wouldn't make much sense.

I'm pretty clueless on the subject.

[baltostar]

I beleive that the death god gets the "Remaining lifespan" or someting when the name is writen in his book. Howerver, if Kira was about to die because of the gun shot, does it mean that the death god gets the and extra 10-30min life span he would have lived with the bullet wounds? It doesn't seem very affective. The death god should jest write the name of young people to get full life spans for him self.

[Echoes]

Yes, under normal circumstances the shinigami will get the remaining lifespan, if they write the name in their own death note. There's no doubt about that.

It is heavily suggested that Light would not have died from the wounds, Ryuuku mentions in his monologue that he doesn't want to wait for him to die in prison, so he's fulfilling his part of the deal now. That particular death, however, was not something he did to expand his own lifespan, he did it because that's the deal made between the shinigami and the first person to gain ownership of the notebook. Had Light had 15 seconds left of his life, Ryuuku still would have done it, just for the record.

[eru_panda]

This may seem off your topic, but it is death note. i just found the most beautiful song, viva la vida-by coldplay, and i searched death note with it.
This AMV made me cry so much.http://youtube.com/watch?v=HbOWaGwL-_4

This anime moved me so much, I can never let go of it. I'm so sad that it ended, and I'm always wishing for more.

[eru_panda]

Originally Posted by Echoes

I too would have preferred an ending with Light walking away victorious, especially since L's victory was no longer an option, and Near was just unappealing in every way. This if, however, far from how the plot ended.
If you've read the manga, you'll know that the last chapter contained a sort of a aftermath to the events in the anime. The fact that everyone was still alive at that point should be sufficient evidence to suggest that Light did indeed perish, and did not become a shinigami.

Wait, didn't he become a shinigami? Because based on this video I came across the other day, (watch it before reading below......)

http://youtube.com/watch?v=lg5LVtnLWC8

rumors are that the shinigami that was looking for Ryuk was Light.

[Echoes]

Originally Posted by eru_panda

Wait, didn't he become a shinigami? Because based on this video I came across the other day, (watch it before reading below......)

http://youtube.com/watch?v=lg5LVtnLWC8

rumors are that the shinigami that was looking for Ryuk was Light.

The video you provided is part of the Death Note TV special that aired after the series. My post, the one you quoted, was written before the TV Special was available, and if I recall correctly before it even aired, and is thus based solely on the conclusion of the TV series.

As for Light becoming a shinigami in the Death Note TV Special, I've heard compelling arguments against this, but have not kept up with any recent discussion, so this might be outdated as well.

[Endrance]

It would be interesting if Light ended up in the shinigami world and explainable seeing that whoever uses the note cant go to heaven or hell...they might as well end up in the shinigami world

[kk2extreme]

it seems more shinigamis are starting to journey to the human world, both in the manga and anime (final conclusion), it seems that ruuyk started this trend. Would there be a sequeal soon? if so, i hope the next shinigami find a man that as intellegent as Light and L, if not surpass them. But it would be very hard to top them though.

Good thing that Light provides a good show for Ryuuk, or else he wont start telling story to the other shinigamis.

As for light being in the shinigami world, i believe what ruuyk said is that human has no soul to begin with

Spoiler for beginning of the story:

when ruuyk laugh at the making up stories of him taking Light's soul

, therefore the death note users know the truth, but not the others (therefore, there are no heaven or hell to begin with), so if one die, he/she simply return to ash.