The Boy Who Cornered God | Death Note Analysis

[Music] in country to country and sea across shining sea whether it is raining or the sun is shining down brightly evil is taking place somewhere in the world broad daylight and pitch black night what makes a good criminal and a good detective what splashes and swirls around inside someone's head as they chest piece their way move people willingly or not move them knowingly or not and trap the object of their desire into a corner that they formulated how do you cage an animal that behaves hyper aware like they are also trying to cage you a self-awareness and level of thought that's almost superhuman the iconic first half of death note is a game of two great egos two rival justices and a game to leave the greater mind clutching at a silver chalice that's not what happens though instead a game rewarding the more sociopathic takes place the more cruel a game of who can tune out the white noise in their head disregarding or leaving behind emotions in a sunk cost game of ego to avoid losing because they both hate to lose spoilers obviously death notes characters are partially so engaging because of the emotional scenes and reactions that are often left to interpretation even reading the manga and watching the anime adaptation a handful of different times it is clear that key moments are meant to be introspective and cue to the viewer to decide if the emotion happening was real or not still i'm going to use all the context we've been given to in this video show how elle's human element doomed his tragic fate and how that same element was then turned on light in a race to see who could disconnect more from the boy who cornered god so let's get a little emotional and first look at l l lolliet is mostly emotionless with an exception of the occasional disappointment over mostly non-concerning issues he rarely has any outburst of emotion only showing once in the entire run of death note the terror of the initial idea that shinigami could exist this terror doesn't come from a fear of death or the supernatural or the danger on his own life or others even instead it comes from the realization that he may be investing into the equivalent of an unsolvable math equation this is important as we go on learned later l is an orphan who only really had watari as his close companion rarely getting to know or feeling connected to anyone it's fair to say that l is a lonely person but since he acknowledges this himself he debatably uses his real feelings to try and put light on the spot he repeatedly mentions that light may be his first friend the first person to think like him or understand him but it's always partially left up in the air how much this is exactly him just trying to expose light and how much his feelings are real the level at which he cares for him even l probably wasn't able to sort his feelings out to their entirety to relate to someone and yet see them as a threat another thing to note is that their belief of justice initially seems to come from a similar initial place although the method and extremity divide them strongly during the yotzuba arc l is willing to let innocent people die via the death note in order to confirm the death note's power and usage operating in a utilitarian fashion with a few more innocent people dying he could confirm the possibility and stop more future deaths light initially thinks that a world without criminals and bad people will make the whole of society happier slowly warping into an ego that anyone who opposes him is a criminal to god a bad person who prevents the oncoming new world before yotsuba and after light's attainment is the only notable point in the story where elle's emotions take the lead it is his demotivation after wasting over 60 days detaining light and misa he found no solution his confidence stutters for a moment with the idea that he could have indeed actually after all this time finally been wrong about something all the money all the time the lives of the people who passed away while he was working they weren't reaching their conclusion members of the task force left the police and the public others were losing confidence in him and him being only known for and needed for based on his title as the unbeatable detective is surely a huge weight to bear after so long without any sort of real substantial headway next to add more context and contrast for what will eventually be my main point is the comparison with light light's descent really parallels if not resorts far past similar character arcs like in breaking bad as we see that light before the death note wasn't exactly a violent or abusive person he mostly just seemed bored and uninterested in most things an attractive honor student that all girls fawn over once again once he loses his memories he shows an actual genuine worry that kyra could be out there in the world and his detainment is a waste that the longer he remains unable to help more people and the longer the attention is placed on him the more people will die and he's genuinely worried about that it's not an act he shows genuine conflict and sadness when l lies to him to tell him that the criminals have stopped dying while he was detained and seems really meek and changed from the light that we've come to know through the rest of the series constantly analyzing every smile expression and outbreak when we see elle's death light screams out in terror before looking down at elle with a sinister smile conveying clearly that that same sense of warmth that elle may have felt to some extent toward light was cold on the other side while elle felt a strange closeness a fondness toward the rivalry of that who he thought was kira light felt no such sadness retroactively in elle's passing i respect maybe sure but no remorse the only time i think there's any genuine hesitance on light's part that could not be played as a potential stunt is when he nervously shakes and comes to terms with how he may have to kill his own younger sister to maintain the death note security other than being in a mostly private situation which lends credence to it being genuine he also seems visibly frustrated taking it out on misa really for no reason at the time because of this this is the last true objective glimmer of care toward anyone that light shows that can't be argued as a possible double play or blatant manipulation until the horror he feels toward his own ending failure before the death of his father he even considers killing misa in cold blood to avoid the possibility that melo has the shinigami eyes and could track him down this plot point is entirely absent from much of the anime as the post-l story took the last half of the manga in only one third of the anime's run time this obviously led to a much simpler run-through of the story leaving many people over the years to write off the later writing because of this i will be taking character consideration both from the anime and from the manga since it wasn't so harshly abridged and was given the proper time to breathe that it needed it's clear to me that light's willingness to strip away his emotions to buy into his ego so much and actively kill those who loved him show that his strength over l wasn't necessarily a good trait and it also wasn't him being a smarter person but ridding himself of some of the basic aspects that make someone act human the care for others the self-introspection the ability to question himself to second guess this is actually confirmed enough by the author himself who has gone record to say that l is both smarter than light and near however light and near have a trait that set them for the advantage these parts of themselves that they have detached elle publicized this fight with kira and in a way ended up contributing to the deification of kira not only by light but by the public as well two men driven by a hate to lose a personal ego and a want to flaunt victory alongside their similar but divided ideals and methods of justice the human element the emotionality was ultimately what led to elle's greatest weakness the pinpoint that light abused to obtain victory so how do you fight that nate river is often misquoted that him and mello worked together to defeat elle and that is how they surpassed him but anybody who watched or read the series and paid any attention knows that that is false he states that together they surpassed l not that they worked together to surpass him and this is an important distinction the last thing mello wanted was to work with nir he was aware of the cold calculating opposite of himself the sit back and set traps approach technically they did work together without contact near the end though and this was because mello realized what he had to do to catch kira and melo realized that no matter what he did near was always sitting back accounting for it moving him like a chess piece using his actions to better build his own plan melo realized that as long as he was participating in the capture of kira nir had already accounted for any action that he might take that's because in a way mellow and near represent polar opposite aspects of what represent a whole person near is the logic the math mello is the emotionality and the ego elle died due to his emotionality forming a small weakness against kira and notably melo also dies being the emotional aspect being the ego so near and mello could surpass l not because they together possess more brain power or because they actively work together but because mello operating as an element of chaos keeps kira on his toes allowing nir to stay at a safe distance focus on being the human computer he is and wait for the right checkmate to fall when light eventually does take that single misstep all things considered near is the least emotional character in the series but it's more than just being apathetic or aloof similar to l he gets irritated and disappointed by small inconveniences but bigger inconveniences often register the same or a similar response from him the closest thing to determining the feeling of near i have is when one of his agents realizes and states to him that in trailing mikami if he breaks into the locker room it could mean his own death and with that clear fear near essentially tells him yes you could likely die if you're not comfortable with that we'll send another agent which i think shows some level of respect or concern to the people following him but even with that he mentions that he'll have someone else do it at the end of the day his plan will go on it may delay the marching forward but it will not move backward the thing that ultimately gives near the advantage against light however is that while l and light contained their own justice own ego and l just cared a bit more about the people around him near possesses little to none of that the series makes no attempt to be subtle near sees this entire situation as a game a fun albeit serious strategy game between two players only difference is while the world is the playing ground the world is not their stage nir never intends to share the existence of the death note he doesn't intend to tell anybody that l caught kira he doesn't intend to make any sort of public victory instead he wishes to just have kira eventually stop working and fade into the past there is no ego in it he even openly considers himself to not be as great as al all he cares about is winning the game for once we see something far rarer between two parties in a story not two rival justices but one justice versus somebody who is acting amorally to justice with the person apathetic claiming victory and preventing the murder of many people storytelling-wise they even end up framing near in the final moments with a classic villain mantra as he states that light in him are really no different they both believe what they decide as moral to be righteous but while one has ego to kill countless people in order to try and change the world to his beliefs the other acknowledges that it's all that that is someone with an ego a chimp with a machine gun nir never saw kira as anything special while elle helped build light's ego as a god nate only saw a serial killer nothing more and nothing less in a way the things that near lacked of l allowed him to drive his ship more steady and the things that light had near had more clearly and that's what made me realize that near wasn't as much of a successor to l the character as he was to light he had all of the strength of light without the ego and the vanity the delusions of grandeur just this and their ideals separated them really and that's why near while not light's most technically powerful adversary was the most potent for him specifically in my eyes that's how just a boy managed against cornering not a god but another criminal a big thanks to my patrons whizbang 2093 sachikomine the smallpox 116 frill neck lizard cj sam lloyd jose ramirez joshua mozart dropped and all of my other patrons as well as my supporters on twitch who are by far the reason that this is even sustainable for me if you want to help please consider patroning or even just stopping by one of my streams and i hope to see you all soon [Music] you

Channel: Hiding in Public

Views: 308,472

Rating: 4.9677129 out of 5

Keywords: Death Note, Death Note Analysis, Death Note Review, Light Yagami, Death Note Character Analysis, anime analysis, death note review, L Lawliet, Near and Mello, Near Analysis, Death Note Manga, Death note Manga vs Anime, death note near, nate river, L vs Near, near vs mello, lights death, video essay, L death note, how smart is l, death note analysis, deathnote

Id: vT8KC6gl9IQ

Length: 13min 48sec (828 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 05 2020