News about Death Note

L Theme Park Attraction! Universal Studios Japan Join with Weekly Shonen Jump to Bring Death Note to the Tourists

10/5/2016

A theme park in Osaka will be taking day-trippers into the Death Note universe with L right alongside to ensure no-one gets themselves killed.

Because he was always so good at that...

Universal Jump Summer marks a collaboration between Weekly Shonen Jump and Universal Studios Japan. Running throughout the summer months of 2016 at the latter's tourist attraction, the event will bring to life major characters from manga and anime.

That includes Death Note detective L, who'll be recruiting rookie investigators (that'll be you) to accompany him through a role-playing, puzzle-solving, live action game entitled Death Note: The Escape. It will be built on the back of other Death Note themed Real Escape games, that have been running in cities around the world to mark the manga's 10th anniversary.

Additionally, the theme park will regularly host theatrical performances featuring another stalwart of the genre. One Piece Premier Show 2016 tells a story especially written for the event.

Unfortunately, visitors to Universal Studios Japan will have to pay extra to enjoy either of these anime-based attractions. However, their general admission price allows for free access to the third one - Dragon Ball Z: The Real 4-D. Not too much further information there, other than our hero Goku will be fighting the evil Frieza.

Yeah, whatever. Our lot will be with L, taking on the truly nefarious designs inherent in a locked door. And if you don't think that's dangerous, then you seriously never read Another Note. Hold on. Ok, so our guide looks like L. Fine. But someone must have double-checked his jam eating propensity.

Haven't they?

Enjoy going beyond in the Universal Jump Summer 2016 Death Note Real Escape event.

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Watari Letters: Death Note Canon Alphabet of Wammy Kids: A-K

28/4/2016

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Quillsh Wammy, the genius inventor who founded Wammy's House... looking at L's incredible talents from
the perspective of an inventor - of course he wanted to make a copy, of course he wanted to create a backup.
Anyone would feel the same.
~ Mello, Another Note, p104

Little is known about Quillsh Wammy the man, nor what he truly intended for the children in his care. Though intriguing clues litter the canon sources with enough material to keep the fan-fiction writers going for an age. Often, if you can't see the thing itself, then observing the ripple effect provides a proxy view enough to hazard a guess at what lies beyond.

What remains mysterious about the benefactor of that strange chain of orphanages established in Death Note manga, anime, novels, movies, TV drama and games, might just show in the Fate of orphans raised within their alpha home - The Wammy House for Gifted and Talented Orphans.

Wammy takes L to Wammy's House, Winchester

Each child within the Wammy system assigned a single letter. A calling code. Something by which they could identify each other, if no other code-name was available.

Genius minds afforded specialised training; then sent out into the world, apparently to change it. Though what precisely that means never is quite explained, beyond a vague pandering to the word justice.

As defined by the Wammys, especially L.

More often leaving the House to engage in petty rivalry and combat with each other; and woe betide any who get in their way - for to destroy the world is just another way to change it.

... what if they could copy (L)? What if they could make a backup?
That was us.
L's children, gathered from all corners of the world.
Children gathered together, never told each other's names....
~ Another Note, p105

List of Wammy House Letters Discussed in General Terms

We cannot reconstruct the whole canon alphabet of Death Note letters, even via our current ploy below of amalgamating disparate versions as if they were one cohesive and extant source. However, it's not bad how few Wammy letters exist without a known correspondence or link in any canon Death Note universe.

There's just a handful assigned without furnishing the fandom with clues pertaining to the person here represented. Even then they may be discussed in general terms, applicable across the board. Not least the assumption might be made that someone raised or based at Wammy's House in Winchester was, is or will be in possession of the code required to utilize all that this letter represents.

Not anonymity in public communication - no matter how much it's used for that, such usage is just a bonus - but access to The Wammy Foundation, its administration, resources and infrastructure.

Doors don't open because someone sat in GIMP messing around with Cloister fonts and single letters centred in Old English. If they did then I'd be L by now. Government offices allow access to restricted lines; military manoeuvres are initiated by request; Interpol meetings are infiltrated; and intelligence agencies are directed or else willing to share classified information, because that Wammy letter alphabet gets used set within a certain context.

Further codewords or numbers may allow verification of its user's authenticity.

B infiltrates Yotsuba corporation; N elicits the US President's help; F directs a child into calling Watari to get lifted from Thailand.

A call from a Death Note Letter to Wammy Headquarters (i.e. the Winchester orphanage in which they were raised) could summon the word spoken into an ear, heavies, intel or finance to oil passage into a myriad of locations, ways, clubs or meetings, as necessary to solve the mystery at hand.

It could rescue that clever detective from dangerous places, or let him/her secure whatever was uncovered that now needs safeguarding. Sensitivity in no questions asked, efficient fixing; unlimited funds able to be wired wherever a masked voice asks for such to be. Plus so much more besides.

It's not each iconic initial that's key in those calls. It's the apparently boundless support and open doors that such icons represent.

Wammy's Foundation has an incredible reach throughout the planet and into the hidden powerhouses unknown to most. Where global movers and shakers meet with their identities gleaned incrementally on a need to know basis. Where influence is strong and disagreements could potentially cause or avert World War III. Yet none more able to direct the flow of world affairs than Quillsh Wammy himself.

The many powerful faces of Wammy

Death of Quillsh Wammy reported in Death Note

Then if all else fails, those clever and dangerous Wammy Letters - living so far beyond any laws to proscribe their actions - probably know where to find and press the requisite levers to get blockages removed.

No doubt such reminders prompt the machinery of co-operation into instant, unfettered movement by any given government and their agencies, accompanied by renewed guarantees that this status quo will remain so indefinitely. Uttered upon expensive, elite lips belonging to those who know they can keep their promises.

Just as Mello did in the Death Note manga, compelling an American President into acting in accordance with that Mafioso Wammy's will. Threatening to use a Death Note to gain US compliance anyway, with its President's actions subject to unstoppable remote control, until his inevitable death a few days on.

That wasn't the Mafia man talking, however close the sentiment might seem. It was the Wammy speaking as Mello this time. Another day it could have been L or Near, as also happened in canon, outlined as dialogue in the novel L: Change the World. And THAT has to be how they were raised for President Hoope seemed to expect it. Evidently he's dealt with Mr Wammy and his alumni many times before.

Death Note US President David Hoope suicide manga chapter 70 Tremble

Wammy Letters seemingly above the law: (Clockwise l-r) Televised death of Lind L Taylor (L); NYC stampede for $10m (N); Misa Amane tortured (L); US President David Hoope driven to suicide (M); NPA President Takimura abducted and tortured (M); lethal pathogen unleashed onto colleague, then the world (K).

Which makes you wonder what else we can see in the stories of the rest; to illuminate the inner workings of Quillsh Wammy's mind and the processes underpinning the ways in which his Winchester institution is run.

A great man, as Matsuda once said, or the monstrous child-thief - as he's intimated to be by L, Mello, B and Near's testimonies? Hinted in separate instances, dotted about various canon sources - Watari brainwashing proto-detectives, from kids raised in his care, to enter into deadly games of rivalry and puzzle-solving, all for fun.

More of those children's stories might provide some insight into the manner of this man, whom even Tsugumi Ohba his creator called 'terrible'.

Death Note Wammy Letters Alphabet

Death Note Mello and Near wait to see who will be L

The designation of a letter in Wammy's alphabet held a special significance for those who graduated Wammy's House. It signified that they were charged with changing the world. There were only twenty-six letters to exist every generation, and these young people were part of an illustrious list of past letters who had time and again been instrumental in saving the world from catastrophe. Above all, the designation signified Watari's trust.
~ L: Change the World (novel), p 176-177

Watari's Character? He's a guy who cultivates detectives for fun. That's kind of terrible, isn't it? (laughs)
~ Tsugumi Ohba, Death Note author, How to Read: Death Note 13 p 60

A - Wammy Kid Pseudonym and True Name Unknown

... even for a genius like Watari, creating a fake L was easier said than done... I hardly need to tell you what it was like when Wammy's House was first founded, when he was still experimenting. The first child, A, was unable to handle the pressure of living up to L and took his own life...
~ Another Note, p105

When Quillsh Wammy determined that he needed to 'copy' or 'back up' L, he chose a live child to mould into aping his prototype model.

Imagine that for just a moment - someone, anyone, being taken into strange premises and told that all you are and were no longer matters. You have no name, or purpose beyond becoming somebody else. Not in the military we-will-make-you-action-man sense, nor in any manner of self-improvement, like going off to university, or training to run a marathon. This isn't even the refining of a Swiss finishing school.

This is taking a presumably orphan child and stripping him of all form of self-identity. Not a name to call himself, just a letter. No personality traits that can't also be found in L. No lesser intelligence than what that incredibly once-in-a-lifetime type genius mind than attain. Telling a boy that everything about himself is so worthless that nothing will do but to reject it all and become the clone of another boy deemed more valuable.

And they wonder why he committed suicide.

B - Wammy Kid Beyond Birthday - True Name Unknown

... the second child, Beyond Birthday, was brilliant and deviant. B stood for Backup...
As long as there was L, B would never be L. As
long as the original existed, the copy was always a copy.
~ Another Note, p105

That B had been a candidate to succeed L, and that the pressure of that had driven him off track... Beyond Birthday's quest to surpass L. It mattered more to him than his own life. Perhaps he was less intent than desperate. Nobody could have stopped him.
~ Another Note, p171

After attempting to imprint L's whole being cookie cutter style upon poor A's flayed psyche, Quillsh Wammy then turned his attention onto a second child for experimentation. He was seeking the same result. He got it.

By which is meant that Watari's zest to 'copy' L drove another orphan in his care to conclude that the only way out was suicide.

Only Beyond Birthday didn't attempt his own end with the supposed quiet lack of drama that beset the tragedy of A. (At least Mello didn't deem it worth gossiping about the fine detail later.) B opted for self-slaughter in perhaps the most dramatic, loud and all encompassing manner he could stage manage. Downright theatrical in fact, in that he performed it in costume, caked in thick make-up, complete with props. Assuming a role in scenes orchestrated and arranged by himself.

The part that Wammy had always wanted him to play. Indivisible from L; a carbon copy. Albeit with a few heart-breaking, pointed and rather grisly differences in the reality that played out. Not least that Beyond knew that L could count on the support of Wammy's House, and he could not.

... he had always disguised himself with heavy make-up while he was with Misora, and he had never left a picture behind.
~ Another Note, p162

He knew that the moment he took action Wammy's House and Watari would alert L, so he did not even bother trying to stop them.
~ Another Note, p159

Our mental image of B - repeated endlessly in fan-art and fiction - depicts him fixed in cosplaying L. Cosmetics to recreate the sleep deprived pallor, hunched over in walking and folded, knees up in sitting.

There's no telling whether the crawling on all fours isn't just a parody of L's burden bent back, nor if the jam eaten with his fingers straight from the jar might not be a clown-like standing for L's endless array of sweet confectionery. He even quotes L's habitual lines, about how hot beverages brimmed into slush with sugar boost his energy and awaken his brain, while sitting in that famous stance raises his mental faculties by 40%.

Beyond Birthday copies L, just as Mr Wammy demanded of him, but only to break him in a desperate challenge - choosing death in order to commit an unsolvable crime. Viewing serial killing and his own horrifically agonizing mode of ending himself as reasonable prices to pay if he ultimately got to beat L. It didn't matter that B wouldn't be there to see it happen. The victory was all.

Well, in theory, give or take Naomi Misora being more intelligent than any Wammy credited those outside the institution as having any right to be.

Hence B ended up terribly mutilated, surviving in the knowledge that L's proxy - a civilian! - had bested him even when he threw in such extremes. Serving a life sentence inside an LA prison for the murders of three people pretty much used as props to destroy L's mind, pride and reputation. Until Kira killed Beyond randomly (so it's implied) during one of his Death Note purges of evil-doers inside.

Nor do we see any evidence that Watari intervened, though with his connections it's probable that Beyond could have been released into Wammy's House custody. There's not even a hint that those who drove B into such desperation and madness so much as visited him behind bars. Then he was dead before Mello moved into the same city.

Wammy's experimentation went on.

Beyond Birthday and L: L is After Beyond Birthday

C - Wammy Letter Not Assigned in Canon

Although nothing is known about this individual at the present time, it doesn't necessarily follow that we do not know them. Some characters associated with Wammy's House never had their call code letters made public. This covers Matt, Linda and Ryūzaki from the forthcoming movie too.

D - Wammy Kid Pseudonym and True Name Unknown

L's Wammy Group mail from L Change the World

D is known only from an entry within the Wammy Members' Group Mail, glimpsed upon L's computer screen in the live-action movie L: Change the World.

However, it might be surmised that D has been in possession of his or her letter for quite some time, as those listed aren't alphabetical and D is at the top.

That may be a false premise nevertheless, as L himself only appears halfway down the list and he was the first Wammy in possession of a letter.

L doesn't hesitate in sending the communication to D, nor indeed anyone else on the list, with the exception of K who gives him pause. For all else, its implied that they are trusted, worthy recipients with no bad blood between themselves and the Watari Foundation, as represented here by L.

Beyond that, nothing else is known. Nor is every letter displayed, as the scrollbar alongside the list of Wammy letters hints at more unseen before the camera drifts away to focus upon the e-mail's sender instead.

E - Wammy Kid Pseudonym and True Name Unknown

E is another Wammy letter assignation known only from L's mailing group in L: Change the World. (See above)

F - Wammy Kid F1225 - True Name Unknown

Wammy letter F is known to us entirely from the movie L: Change the World. He doesn't even turn up in the book of the same name. In the movie, he is portrayed by actor Kakuzi Namioka. Wammy F's character name in the credits is displayed as エフ Romanised as Efu.

We first see F peering through the slats into a rural home in Bangnum Village, Thailand. He is observing a whole population stricken by some unknown pathogen, all dying horribly and in agony with sores, blisters and frothing mouths. It appears to have been quite a sudden onset with a 100% mortality rate, and the scientists have just turned up to investigate.

They are exempt in theory from contagion, clad from head to foot in bright yellow protective clothing. They speak with American accents and seem unsympathetic to the suffering of victims all around them. Moreover, brutal in their dehumanising pronouns - 'deal with that', one says, indicating a man nearby. Another pushes a mother surrounded by four dead children roughly away from him.

F flees. There is no explanation as to why he was there. Nor why he's so certain of his immunity from contracting the unspecified pathogen, that he's willing to risk exposure to it.

The only clues come from a future scene, wherein we're told he was working undercover for the Watari Foundation near Bangnum Village, and that the biometers aren't responding. Though whether that fact pertains to F's presence isn't clear from the context. He was certainly there 'in the line of duty'.

However, he's presumably on some kind of Wammy House directed rescue mission, as the child waiting at the location F flees to - in the ruins of ancient architecture just beyond the village - is Near. Though evidently Thai, Near does not appear native to Bangum. "This village is over for us." F tells the child, interrupting him mid-mathematical flow, with formulae chalked all over the mossy stone walls.

They have perhaps gained sanctuary there with Near seemingly unperturbed by events. Abandoning his calculus without fear nor apparent regard for the destruction down below, in order to join F in flight via the older Wammy's Land Rover.

The instructions F gives to the boy focus upon how to contact Watari. This transpires into a moment of sheer delight and wonder for Team Wammy Death Note fans everywhere - F gives us the Watari phone number: 0105928147218. Whereupon we are directed to tell them F1225 told us to ring it.

So, has anyone done so yet? To whom does it connect? Are they very sick of random people calling from all over the world, demanding to speak with Watari?

"Watari will protect you," F informs his young charge, wearing an ethereal kind of smile as he says so. The future Near, it has to be said, surveys him right back with the world's most dubious expression over a long, drawn out stare. Already too clever for his own good, that one.

But a look which surely seems like presentiment when, in the next instant, an American military helicopter arises from the bushland track behind them and starts shooting holes from the road in front.

F steps on the accelerator of the Land Rover he has weaving all over this Thai dustroad-turned-Formula-1-racetrack. Yet a close look at him reveals the sudden appearance of lesions on the side of this face. Not so immune to disease after all, though Near is in the clear and remains so. F knows that he's personally not going to survive this flight through the bushes, thus in a poignant moment takes the necklace bearing his Watari letter F from around his neck and places it around Near's instead.

F bequeaths his necklace to Near - L Change the World

L Change the World Wammy F wishing Near luck

Back behind the wheel, with an expression of sheer determination, F hurtles along the road in his Land Rover, leading the military away from the spot where he abandoned Near. But he knows he can't out-drive them. He has to have known he was due to die as soon as he couldn't shake them off before.

This race away from Near is deliberate though. Himself less important than the child left behind, despite F's presumably high intelligence and top class education rendering him a supposed benefit to the whole world as a Wammy letter. Surely more so in that horrible choice between himself and an untutored youngster with much potential. Because whatever Near is, or may become, right now the boy is an unknown quantity.

Yet somebody somewhere within the Watari Foundation judged it worth risking F's life to send him into that dangerous situation in order to extract the kid. By his actions, F certainly concurs.

The helicopter descends before the Land Rover, blocking all egress. F stops the vehicle and surveys in horror what waits ahead. There's momentary horror and fright for F. Not ready to die. Then he is, eyes closing and a tiny smile touching the corner of his lips. Like this is acceptable.

We watch the Watari prodigy F die by proxy - a close up on the missile emerging from the helicopter's launcher, then a long shot of Near witnessing the blast from around the corner, expressionless and wearing F's letter necklace. Another Wammy kid dead. Another left knowing from the onset what the far future has in store for him, though also still lost in the immediate sense.

What's interesting about F's reaction to all of this is that undying faith in Wammy and the Watari Foundation. Adamant to the end that Watari protects his wards, a sentiment spoken even as the patently unprotected F remains trapped in an environment rife with pestilence and bombs.

He's not going to survive this, yet surely it was Watari - or a representative thereof - who sent him there. Nevertheless, F will ensure another child follows in his footsteps and smiles as he dies. Some inner conviction sated in the certainty that his premature demise was worth it.

Perhaps the ethos wherein this genius Wammy House orphan was raised. One we'll return to time and again in the biographies of Wammy kids. Dulce et decorum est pro Watari mori...

G - Wammy Kid Pseudonym and True Name Unknown

The Wammy letter G is another whose canon existence consists solely of an entry on L's email list in the movie L: Change the World. (See D.)

H - Wammy Headquarters Letters - Roger Ruvie (presumed)

Wammy Letter H may be seen representing Wammy Headquarters in a scene from the live-action movie L: Change the World.

That this is also The Wammy's House may be determined by comparing the avatar crest accompanying the moniker Wammy Headquarters with the same already displayed on Watari's desktop underneath the call alert.

As warden of Wammy's House, it must be assumed that Roger Ruvie is the individual in receipt of this letter. The H reflecting that element of his job description that involves liaison between Watari and the rest of his wards - HQ rather than headmaster.

This would explain why Roger Ruvie sticks around as overseer of an orphanage, when his pet hate (according to How to Read: Death Note 13) is 'children'.

It also chimes nicely with the warden's role within the original manga and anime Death Note stories. He was the recipient of L's alert pertaining to the detective's own death.

Moreover, Roger was the one to inform Near and Mello of the same, and would have been the one told if Watari/L had chosen which of them was to succeed their idol. Roger also felt able to make a suggestion regarding the succession himself - the futile interjection that the pair should work together.

In short, Roger had long since been the nexus for internal Watari Foundation communication. The manga has him eventually becoming Watari, when Near takes the Letter to continue as that detective code.

Death Note's H calls W: Wammy HQ (Roger Ruvie) mails Watari

We see more of what Roger's position at The Wammy's House - Wammy Headquarters - constitutes in this same scene. Following immediately on from the death of F, Roger calls Wammy to inform him of their ward's death. Though cut off, his text communication is curt, emotionless and to the point.

This isn't a telegram, yet it seems like Roger goes out of his way to conserve characters in his abrasive wording. F's death is afforded equal precedence to HQ's report about the biometers being out of commission. His main concern seems to be who to send out there next. No waxing lyrical in commiseration and regard for a young man killed, whom both must have known intimately, as a boy raised by themselves and for whom responsibility did not stop in adulthood, as he remained one of their lettered agents.

It's a similar pattern of feeling - or lack thereof - as seen in the manga, whereby Roger's first act upon hearing the news of L and Wammy's demise is to call in Mello and Near, thus to settle the succession. No question that such a continuation must occur.

Nor apparently did he race after Mello, when the boy announced his attention to leave home and work alone in catching Kira. This is a fourteen year old stepping out into a frigid December night, in a barely adequate jacket, yet his guardian did not shift in his recall.

Back to F and the news of his death. It's never clarified who alerted Roger to that particular tragedy, though we do get to see Wammy and L react to the same. Wammy's look of sadness and shock tips off L, who gently enquires if it is bad news? His guardian answers in hushed tones that F was killed in Thailand. There follows a pensive moment, wherein the old man sadly states, 'It was in the line of duty, so it couldn't be helped but...'

But what? The sentiment is never answered verbally, nor addressed by the creator of this system at all. The contemplative silence draws out for both with the sentence never actually finished. Left lingering in the air as simply that - something which couldn't be helped - while H's missive remains on the screen focused upon who to send in next.

The answer to F's death comes in reality from L's actions. This is the final piece of information to push the detective into writing his own name into Misa's Death Note, thus effectively committing suicide. Why? 'To take control over my own Fate is the only way to outwit Death.'

Roger tells Mello and Near about L's death

A reaction echoed in part by Mello's own reaction to the compulsion to take L's place jointly with Near, as Roger's major consideration upon the loss of L. No doubt feeling similar pressure to surrender all say in his future to those willing to sacrifice it, Mello - like L - had the knee-jerk reaction of yanking control of his own destiny back from Wammy HQ.

"I'll do it my own way!" He bellowed in retort, a fourteen year old leaving the sanctuary of his childhood home in the dead of winter.

The only facet not being questioned by anyone was why two boys (Near not even a teenager) suddenly had the burden of stopping a global killer. Children asked to assume such responsibility as duty, in lieu of, say, any of the world's governments, military, secret services, not to mention their associated law enforcement or intelligence agencies.

Neither did L feel able to just walk away. At least in the minds of themselves, as nurtured in Wammy's home by Watari and Ruvie, this was their inevitable duty. As unfortunate as any death might be in the line of such duty, it couldn't be helped. An ethos surely carried by the warden, as Roger swapped his letter H (Wammy Headquarters) for a W (Watari in his turn).

I - Wammy Letter Not Assigned in Canon

Though again there are candidates, as Matt and Linda remain unassigned letters in canon too. Ditto Ryūzaki, who will appear in Death Note: Light Up the New World in October 2016, and has already been named an alumni of Wammy's House.

J - Wammy Kid Pseudonym Unknown - True Name Jeffrey Miller

The Wammy kid known as J is an elusive quantity.

In fact, we're not even 100% certain that he was Watari raised, trained and assigned a letter. The only clue to that is his name - the letter J - as given in the only canon source in which he turns up.

J is a character in the Konami DS game L: The Prologue to Death Note: Spiralling Trap, which was released in Japan on February 8th 2007. It's never been translated into any other languages nor made available anywhere else across the globe.

Game-play is text based problem solving, wherein you are a rookie FBI agent knocked unconscious to awaken in a locked room. Your environment is booby-trapped with explosives, with antagonists presumably out there primed to set them off.

However help is at hand in the shape of a communication device and L at the other end. The detective will advise on solving puzzles to open the doors, as long as he's adequately provided with sweets, cakes and other confectionery. You will eventually traverse all of those dangerous rooms in order to encounter the baddies.

Enter J. Apparently another Wammy kid turned murderous in pursuit of L. Now ready to engage you in a boss fight.

Antagonists in L: Prologue to Death Note

Screenshot from L The Prologue to Death Note featuring J

The image (left) is a screenshot from the trailer for L: The Prologue to Death Note (above), which features around the 1 minute 46 mark.

As the game was only issued in Japanese, with no English transcript to be found on-line, it's difficult to analyse the dialogue for further clues to J's identity, motivation or the influence upon him from his supposed Wammy House education. Beyond what might be surmised by the fact that he's attempting to blow L up.

Though he is wearing a lab coat, hence probably falls within the science spectrum of Wammy alumni specialities.

All that can be said additionally (until our Japanese translators turn up and, of course, assuming any of them have actually played this game) is that our last glimpse of J seems to be aboard a stricken cruise ship, which L has just caused to explode extensively right across its middle section. Presumably then J is now lost, presumed drowned or else caught in the ensuing inferno.

About par for the course for a Wammy kid.

K - Wammy Kid Keep Your Way - Dr Kimiko Kujo

"Please understand, Watari. This is the only way I believe I can change the world," she said, as much to convince herself.
L: Change the World, p 121

On the subject of serial killing Wammy kids, they don't get more potentially destructive than Watari's own destroyer of worlds - K.

Perhaps Kali might have been a better pseudonym for this lady, rather than the poignant sobriquet Keep Your Way afforded to her by Mr Wammy himself.

She certainly seemed convinced that the only way to change the world was to wipe the human race from the face of the planet.

In true mad scientist mode, when we first caught up with K - real name Dr Kimiko Kujo - she was busy cultivating a swift-acting, 100% fatal pathogen in readiness to unleash upon all hated humanity.

Her story forms the central backdrop of L: Change the World - movie and book both - with L spending his last twenty days on Earth in a bid to halt her crazy antics in a laboratory.

The premature release of her deadly virus upon test subjects in Thailand had already led directly to the demise of another Wammy letter - F. She would have taken out Near too, before he even made it to Wammy's House, had the wonder-boy's natural immunity not kept him safe from contagion.

"Dr Kujo, is your time at Wammy's House perhaps a cause of your despair toward mankind?"
"You knew?"
"One can always tell a Wammy's student, even if they do change their face and hide their past," L said.
L and K, L: Change the World, p175-176

So what went so badly wrong with this one that global genocide seemed the only answer?

Surely even Roger couldn't have been so tactless that her natural response was to sequence a virus to push her own species into extinction. Though granted, it would have constituted one method of stopping Kira, which was what most of her peers were concerning themselves with at the time.

It transpires that K's role within the Wammy Foundation had been to '(mobilize) the law enforcement agencies of the world'. During an operation, she had successfully rescued a child held hostage by terrorists, only to discover that had been her adversary's plan all along. The kid was a suicide bomber, who detonated the charges as soon as they were in the other camp.

After witnessing the 'many casualties', K ran from the scene never to return. It wasn't the failure of the operation per se that was the problem, but the notion that she had betrayed Watari's trust in her capabilities as a Wammy letter.

Nothing to do with the power and influence that comes with that designation either. It was the personal censure invested within Wammy the man that she most feared evoking. He'd brought her out of herself and believed in her abilities following the death of her parents. He'd been kind and caring, with a warm smile and sage advice, making K feel like she counted, even amongst all the rest of the clever, little Wammys around her.

She couldn't stand to see his face again, knowing that she'd let him down. That he'd be disappointed in her. It was that personal for the Wammy kids raised to become Letters within the Wammy Foundation. Away from Wammy's House and the man at its helm, K's 'soul had grown darker than the world around it'.

A darkness that she couldn't hope to assuage without the total destruction of humankind, wiped from the Earth in order to save the planet.

Not that K had any cause to worry. As L informed the dangerous Dr Kujo - once he'd located her at the centre of the pathogen outbreak - blowing up her team wasn't any deterrent for her beloved Mr Wammy. He'd assigned his letter K to her anyway, coded with the last message he'd conveyed to Kimiko Kujo before her flight from the Wammy fold - Keep Your Way.

Astute words in retrospect, though perhaps Watari should have clarified a 'way' amongst the sane options open to her.

Moreover, L continued - breaking her heart in knowing this only now - "Even after you left Wammy's, Watari refused to give that designation to anyone else." Awwww! If only she'd grasped that Wammy still loved her, K wouldn't have had to turn Thailand into the vast killing fields of her unleashing viral mass murder.

As it was, L promised that she could resume her place at Wammy's House, letter intact, even now, after whole populations lay dead. What was a little genocidal slaughter amongst Watari's kids? When they stood to ensure justice would prevail and the world could be changed. K vowed to do so, returning to Winchester just as soon as her life sentence was done in prison.

No doubt Watari - whomever that was likely to be forthwith - would soon intervene and get that time served down to, say, a week. After all, foiled architect of humanity's extinction aside, Kimiko remains a Wammy kid, in receipt of the letter K.

Read On: Alphabet of Wammy Letters L-Z

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Death Note Profile: Who is Quillsh Wammy?

8/4/2016

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Mr Wammy (Shunji Fujimura) - Death Note live-action movies (Japan)

Mr Wammy as played by Shunji Fujimura
in live-action Death Note films

Watari - aka Quillsh Wammy - is L's 'handler' in Death Note. He is also the founder of the Wammy chain of orphanages, including The Wammy House for Gifted and Talented Orphans.

Also known as Wammy's House, this was the institution which raised L, Near, Mello, Matt, Beyond Birthday, Linda et al. It is located in Winchester, England.

We first meet Mr Wammy under his guise as Watari, an anonymous figure clad from head to toe in a black leather trench coat complete with Fedora hat. He infiltrated a meeting of Interpol, wherein representatives of the world's law enforcement agencies had convened to discuss the Kira case. Watari was carrying a laptop from which emerged the electronic voice of L to address them all.

Later, as the Kira Task Force are invited to meet L and vetted by the same, Watari appears again, this time in the suited guise of his actual self - Quillsh Wammy, benefactor of the Wammy Group chain of orphanages and the man who trained L to become a detective.

He now facilitates his ward in his work solving crimes, acting as a handler, spokesperson or kind of butler. Noted mostly for organizing logistics of manoeuvres ordered by L; transferring the funds to pay for the same; and bringing copious amounts of cakes, sweets and other sugary things for L to consume whilst puzzling over his cases.

Elsewhere, it transpires that Wammy is a crack marksmanship, as well as highly skilled in espionage. He made his considerable wealth as an inventor.

Killed in the line of duty, during the fight against Kira, Quillsh Wammy is remembered as a 'great man' by members of the Task Force, lauded as the same by newspaper obituaries around the world.

Yet there is a darkness that hides beneath the surface of this seemingly amenable, altruistic man. As author Tsugumi Ohba put it, 'He's a guy who cultivates detectives for fun. That's kind of terrible, isn't it?' (How to Read: Death Note 13, pg 27). Well, in anybody's language, that's child trafficking and rendition, at the very least.

The Names of Quillsh Wammy

Death Note's Watari is alternatively known as:

キルシュ・ワイミー
Quillsh Wammy
Quillish Wammy
Kirushu Waimī
Kirsch-Waimi
Mr Wammy

ワタリ
Watari
W
渡
真名
Wye Me

Originally, Ohba meant to call this character Shadow, as in L's shadow - a moniker with more than one inferred meaning, which fan-fiction writers would have had great fun exploring. However Death Note's editor pooh-poohed the name, telling Ohba, 'No, no! Anything but that!' Hence the author coming up with Watari, which he explained meant 'handler' in Japanese.

Watari's Vital Statistics

Hair Colour:
Grey

Height:
5' 7" (170.18cm)

Eye Colour:
Blue

Weight:
8 stone (112lbs; 50.8kg)

Occupation:
Inventor; L spokesperson; benefactor of orphanages; collector of orphans; educator

Relationship Status:
Unknown, presumed single

Key Dates for Watari

May 1st 1933:

Quillsh Wammy born

Manga

May 1st 1936:

Quillsh Wammy born

Anime

November 5th 2004:

Quillsh Wammy killed

Manga

November 5th 2007:

Quillsh Wammy killed

Anime

The Auguries of Quillsh Wammy

Born on May 1st, astrologically Quillsh Wammy is Taurus

Wammy's birth date of May 1st 1933 (manga) also factors into Shēngxiào. He is a Rooster in the Chinese Zodiac

However, the time-slip of the anime would have him born in 1936 instead. That means that now in the Chinese Zodiac Watari is a Rat

How to Read: Death Note 13 reveals that Quillsh Wammy's blood group is B

A Versatile Fixer - The Personality of Quillsh Wammy

Death Note 13: How to Read gives us an insight into the character of Quillsh Wammy, at least insofar as his author saw him.

The older man scores highly for versatility, talent, initiative/willingness to act, motivation and emotional strength. Not far behind are his only slightly lesser scores for creativity, social skills and intelligence. That he doesn't reach the topmost figure for creativity is a little surprising, given that Wammy made his fortune as an inventor. The ultimate creator, one might think, this side of actual divinity.

We do get a hint of the kind of things that Wammy invented, when he turns up in the Death Note manga with belts containing panic buttons. Not exactly Bond's Q, but in the ballpark.

As befits a man whose wealth and life has become devoted to raising children, his pet hate is 'dirty rooms'. Presumably plenty of those at Wammy's House. I can't quite see the like of Beyond Birthday, Mello and Near running around with a duster.

This is an attribute taken to extreme levels in the Death Note TV drama, wherein guests are sprayed with disinfection at the door. The interior of L's headquarters is kept pristine in its cleanliness, with Watari hurrying in to exchange L's shirt should a mere splash of food stain hit upon it. In most tellings of the Death Note story, it's also inferred that Wammy is a fabulous cook. At least there doesn't seem to be any travelling caterer providing all that confectionery for L that his handler regularly delivers.

Though it's nowhere stated that Wammy is an Englishman, it's implied in the location of his main orphanage for the training of gifted and talented orphans - Winchester, in England. A further clue is given in his most favourite thing in the world - Earl Grey tea.

It's never truly explained how Watari managed to become such a crack marksman either. His sharp-shooting is such that, in the Death Note manga and anime alike, he's able to fire a bullet which blasts a gun from the hand of Yotsuba's Kyosuke Higuchi, far below him on the ground. Wammy himself hovering over the scene in a helicopter at the time.

Nor do we learn where Quillsh Wammy acquired such skill in espionage, though he puts that to good use in Death Note, infiltrating various organizations to gain or deliver information. Not least a gathering of Interpol.

Nevertheless he passed on all this knowledge, and the thinking/morality behind it, to the children in his care. Maybe more clues to Watari's character reside in those he raised - how they turned out and what became of them.

Complete List of Wammy Kids in Death Note Canon

Genius children taken from wherever they lived around the world and installed in Wammy's House, Winchester. Here their 'special talents' were cultivated with a top class education, whereupon they were sent back out into the world to put those skills into practice. All of these individuals were nurtured by Wammy - or at least had their upbringing and training overseen remotely by him, as warden Roger Ruvie took orders from above.

A
- Name Unknown
Committed suicide at Wammy's House
(Another Note: The Los Angeles BB Murder Case)

E
- Name Unknown
Shown on L's call/mailing list
(L: Change the World)

J
- Name Unknown
Appears only as character in
a DS Death Note game.
(L: The Prologue to Death Note)

M
- Mello (Mihael Keehl)
Joined the Mafia in a bid to catch Kira and succeed to the L title before Near did. When unsuccessful, he gave his life to help Near defeat Kira.
(Death Note manga/anime)

Letter Unknown
- Matt (Mail Jeevas)
Third ranked Wammy kid at the time of L's death. Matt ultimately stepped into the Kira case at the behest of Mello. He was gunned down and killed by Kira supporters.
(Death Note manga/anime)

R
- Name Unknown
Shown on L's call/mailing list. However the name is faded out to grey, implying that R is dead. (B's is the same hue.)
(L: Change the World)

V
- Name Unknown
Shown on L's call/mailing list. However the name is faded out to grey, implying that V is dead. (B's is the same hue.)
(L: Change the World)

Z
- Name Unknown
Assisted L in the Detective Wars bio-terror case.
(Another Note: The Los Angeles BB Murder Cases)

B
- Beyond Birthday
Tried to lure L out with a series of grisly murders in Los Angeles; impersonated L for Naomi Misora, before setting fire to himself in a failed suicide attempt; imprisoned in LA, where he suffered a heart-attack and died (presumably killed by Kira) on January 21st 2004.
(Another Note: The Los Angeles BB Murder Cases)

F
- Name unknown
Rescued Near from a remote village, where all were dying in a deliberate epidemic, and sent him to L. F was killed in Thailand when a US helicopter shoots down his trunk. However F was already infected with a deadly virus.
(L: Change the World)

K
- Kimiko Kujo
Scientist - unleashed a deadly virus in her own bid to 'change the world' by wiping out its human population.
(L: Change the World)

N
- Near (Nate River)
Mathematical genius, who de facto succeeded L at age twelve, when the latter was killed by Rem/Kira. With clues provided by Mello's martyrdom to the cause, Near was able to finally defeat Kira in the name of himself, Mello and L, ergo Wammy's House.
(Death Note manga/anime)

P
- Name Unknown
Shown on L's call/mailing list
(L: Change the World)

Letter Unknown
- Ryūzaki
Cloned from L's DNA and raised at Wammy's House as L's true successor.
(Death Note 2016)

X
- Name Unknown
Assisted L in the Detective Wars bio-terror case.
(Another Note: The Los Angeles BB Murder Cases)

Random Wammy kids
as seen in Death Note: Relight (above)
and Death Note manga (left)

D
- Name Unknown
Shown on L's call/mailing list
(L: Change the World)

G
- Name Unknown
Shown on L's call/mailing list
(L: Change the World)

L
- L Lawliet
Apparently the prototype 'special talent' Wammy orphan, for whom all the rest were raised as back-ups or successors.

At eight years old, L could beat up the other orphans in Wammy's House. He also discovered the delight in solving true crime cases, and thwarted the Winchester Mad Bomber. Beyond that he made his name as not only the world's greatest detective but, under pseudonyms, the 2nd and 3rd ranked too.

He was killed during the Kira case.

Letter Unknown
- Linda
Became a successful artist. During the Kira case, she drew images of Near and Mello for the Japanese Task Force.
(Death Note manga/anime)

Q
- Name Unknown
Shown on L's call/mailing list
(L: Change the World)

T
- Name Unknown
Shown on L's call/mailing list. However the name is faded out to grey, implying that T is dead. (B's is the same hue.)
(L: Change the World)

Y
- Name Unknown
Assisted L in the Detective Wars bio-terror case.
(Another Note: The Los Angeles BB Murder Cases)

Each skilled Wammy kid set loose on the world was assigned a letter by Watari. In L: Change the World, it's stated that this only occurs with the greatest, most intelligent of the Wammy's House outcrop. Kujo is according stunned to belatedly realise that she was afforded the letter K.

Dotted across various adaptations of canon, we've practically got the entire alphabet in Wammy Letters. With Watari himself indicated by the Letter W, only H, I, O, S and U are missing. However, some known Wammy alumni never divulge their letters. We don't, for example, know which Matt was assigned, despite him being third in the Wammy House rankings. Nor yet do we know which letter Ryūzaki will take in the forthcoming movie Death Note 2016, assuming that he takes one at all.

Meanwhile, by the end of the manga/anime Death Note stories, Near interchangeably uses both N and L. The latter earned post-Kira. Thus giving an insight into the fact that letters can be taken from their peers by successful rivals/successors from the same Institution. This is a system that Wammy himself must have set up.

Along with a code of ethics that apparently accounts for serial killers, abductors, biomedical scientists bent on mass destruction and the propensity of Wammy graduates to think it proper to die - or be killed - for want of a puzzle's solution.

The Faces of Watari

Quillsh Wammy Death Note manga

Quillsh Wammy Death Note anime

Quillsh Wammy Death Note Nintendo game

Quillsh Wammy Death Note: Relight

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Quillsh Wammy Death Note live-action movies

Quillsh Wammy Death Note TV drama

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Death Note 2016: New Pics of Ryūzaki Released from Live-Action Movie

1/4/2016

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Affording an intriguing glimpse into the persona of Ryūzaki (Sousuke Ikematsu), two more picture stills
have been made public from the filming of Japanese live-action movie Death Note 2016.

2016 Death Note Ryūzaki (Sousuke Ikematsu)

Sousuke Ikematsu as Ryūzaki in Death Note 2016 live action movie

We already knew that Sousuke Ikematsu's character Ryūzaki was created genetically from the DNA left behind by L for this purpose during his own lifetime. (The scientists here are straining at the bit to discuss that titbit in due course!) Today's information adds just that Ryūzaki was raised at Wammy's House.

It seems the regime there went a step further even than the scenario warned by Beyond Birthday (and Mello) in Another Note. The notion of a 'back-up' not so much a brainwashed boy, as an actual clone.

So did they keep DNA of them all? Will the next baby squalling from a test-tube be Mello or Matt?

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TV Death Note Episode 7: Babble, Beyond & Paradise Lost - One Notebook to Bind Them All

26/8/2015

3 Comments

Near Watch is pretty much concluded. After episode 7 of television's Death Note drama, it's undoubtedly proved to be Mello Watch too. Though the jury is still out on Matt there as well.

Finally! Death Note live action Mello on our screens! Man and puppet!

We so called it. Back in my review of the very first episode of Death Note's TV drama, I wrote:

Is Near hearing voices? Are we witnessing a schizophrenic future L? Or is (s)he merely dissociating him/herself from the dodgier thoughts passing through consideration?
- Death Note News: Review of TV Death Note Episode 1

Watching and piecing together the clues from week to week, my SO and I have increasingly been talking about Near with Multiple Personality Disorder (though I understand that psychologists would prefer us to discuss this as Near's Dissociative Identity Disorder, because they renamed it again).

By episode seven, all speculation was confirmed as fact. We saw Near's persona physically switch into Mello. We witnessed a re-emerging Near beg Mello, "Don't come out."

Death Note's Near begs Mello not to come out

Thus paving the way for a million future Death Note memes on the subject of Mello coming out.

Death Note's Babel in the Tower: Multiple Voices Seeking to be Heard at the Same Time

There was a hint, in the scenes immediately prior to the great reveal, that split identities - or the divisive babble of too many voices simultaneously sounding - was going to factor into this story.

Our clue was in the pseudonym taken by Near: Babel.

Yotsuba Group discuss Babel in Death Note 2015

With all the Judeo-Christian imagery surrounding Near in this series, it's not too difficult to guess from whence they lifted this new moniker. Genesis 11:1-9 tells - within a Biblical context- the story of the City of Babel.

Its people decided to build a tower, those top reaches would allow them to climb into Heaven itself. God wasn't best pleased about this imminent invasion of human beings, so set out to thwart them.

Until then, everyone on Earth had been united. They spoke just one language and all understood each other. God did a bit of smiting, or cursing, whatever you call it, whereby their mother tongue suddenly splintered into all the various languages heard around the globe, then and since.

Hence Babel being the root of babble. Multiple voices. No-one able to understand the other.

Additionally, God 'scattered them abroad', so that none were congregated in the city anymore, but its population exiled all over the planet. The people divided from one into many.

And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language...
- Genesis 11:6

Oh look! Near and Mello are one! And possibly Matt makes three, though the evidence is tenuous and not yet confirmed by canon. But they can be - and are about to be - separate entities. Just like the people of Babel.

Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the Lord scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.
- Genesis 11:7

Plus it doesn't hurt that Babel looks a bit like Babe L, as befits L's successor or, as Near is described in the TV adaptation of Death Note, 'consultant'.

Nor does the Babel imagery end there.

Kiras Meeting in the Yotsuba Tower of Babel

The whole Yotsuba group could be seen as acting akin to the citizens of that Biblical city. They band together at the top of a Tower and, as a kind of collective Kira, they seek to steal for themselves that which habitually belongs to deity. Be that access into Heaven, or writing in a Shinigami's notebook.

Yotsuba Group's website prominently features their tower

The Yotsuba arc continues running parallel to the Tower of Babel tale, insofar as God (well, Light Yagami shorn of his Kira memories) sets out to divide and conquer them, thus snatching back divine power as his sole preserve.

Light doesn't change the Yotsuba executives' language. Despite the nice touch in 'Babel' (aka Near/Mello) asking for 'hush money'.

However L and Babel succeed in causing divisions amongst the group's mindset. When they are no longer working in accord, nor even in the same room, its a simple matter to confound their pseudo-divine plan.

Another Note: Beyond Birthday's Near Nod in Death Note (2015) Episode Seven

Of course, when we first saw that giant B appear upon the screen, none of us were thinking of Mello, Near, Babel nor anyone else inserted into the show.

In the Death Note universe, an Old English font letter B signifies L's original back-up: Beyond Birthday.

I thought we were jamming with L's second. We were, but not in the way that elicited so many gasps from those watching from my house.

Watari: There are three people known as the greatest detectives in the world. L, Eraldo Coil, and Marie Deneuve. Babel is ranked after the three of them.

Makimura: The fourth, then?

L: No, Coil and Deneuve are both me. So Babel is actually the second. Quite the troublesome one.
- Death Note Episode 7 (2015)

We were so being trolled by the writers of this television version of Death Note. Despite the fact that most of us, after our initial shock at seeing Beyond's B, had spent the rest of its occurrences assuming that Yotsuba's detective was Near.

The only major mystery being whether we were hearing Near or Mello, as the dominant personality at the time.

Yet when L introduced B as his second, Beyond's cameo suddenly felt like a distinct possibility again.

It was now common knowledge that the three great post war detectives, L, Eraldo Coil and Danuve were all actually the same person... L engaged in a war with the real Eraldo Coil, and the real Danuve, and emerged victorious, claiming their detective codes... in addition, L possessed many other detective codes... at least three digits worth.
- Mello, Another Note by Nisioisin, p43

He was B.
The second child in Wammy's House.
"If only I could see the death of the world," Beyond Birthday murmured, on August 19th at 6am, just as he woke up.
- Mello, Another Note by Nisioisin, p 95

NB This episode of television's Death Note drama was aired on August 16th 2015. The 19th was a Wednesday.

Beyond Birthday was L's
antagonist in the novel
Death Note: Another Note

He was B. B stood for Backup. For Babel - the second... OMG! Was Death Note's Beyond Birthday in this show after all?!!

I mean, how fabulous would that have been?!

The first child, A, was unable to handle the pressure of living up to L and took his own life, and the second child, Beyond Birthday, was brilliant and deviant.
B stood for Backup.
But B tried to surpass L, not become him.
Mello, Another Note by Nisiosin, p105

Alas, no. Near has not only merged with Mello, but absorbed Beyond Birthday's background too. It remains to be seen whether this includes his jam-loving, murderous self, as a separate persona.

However in that 'I know all about it. Deep down inside, you think you're better than L' line from episode two, we've already seen Mello accuse Near of something more commonly attributed to Beyond. Did 'deep down inside' hold a more significance than hitherto realised?

Dissociative Identity Disorder in Death Note

Ok, I'll call it - Near IS Beyond Birthday! And that's not all.

A could have been the original individual - the first child - whose personality fragmented into the rest, and is now lost beneath them all. Near is so named, as the persona most closely resembling A. Or its an acronym: Near Enough A's Replica.

I tell you, Matt's in there too. Probably Linda and all the Letters from L: Change the World as well. Given enough time, scope and energy, Near's going to turn out to be a walking Wammy's House; all Watari Letters contained within a single form.

Which probably accounts for the outstanding cleverness overall.

A Double Wammy in Death Note's Multiple Personality Plot Twists?

We should never forget the key point about Beyond Birthday - he looked like L. Enough to fool Naomi Misora into thinking she was dealing with the same man. Practically clones, L and Beyond, physically at least.

Beyond Birthday with Naomi Misora on the fly sheet of Another Note.
A version depicting Beyond Birthday close up adorns the German translation book-cover.

Have we yet discounted the hypothesis given in an earlier blog entry - that it's L with the multiple personalities? Near et al live solely within his head; with an option on Watari additionally being a dissociated fragment of L's own self.

It would explain why the detective's insistence upon a sterile home environment faded whenever he went outside to play tennis or watch Ichigo Berry in concert. That wasn't L. It was Mello or somebody wearing L's face.

Less L changing the world, than the world triggering a change in L.

Moreover, L's Dissociative Identity Disorder would fix an anomaly which has been niggling me since the very first episode. (I am a Death Note fan-fiction writer, finding plot-holes to credibly fill is what breathes life into our tales.) How could Wammy's House alter architecturally, depending upon whether L or Near sit on that staircase?

L and Watari at Wammy's House - Death Note Episode 1

Wammy's House: Watari opens the door, while L waits on the stairs

Wammy's House with Near and Mello in Death Note TV drama

Wammy's House: Near on the stairs, The Fall of the Rebel Angels replaces L's door

Maybe there is no Wammy's House in the physical world. It exists as a mind palace inside the psyche of a genius detective, acting as the gateway through which dissociated selves become dominant. No accident therefore why it appears as a hallway - the only room ever glimpsed in that house - devoid of creature comforts, stark and stripped, even when highly decorated. Its main purpose being as a place to leave or be received.

Its secondary purpose to be where personae stand by, acting as consultants in the near consciousness. Communicating fully with the self on public display, seeing upon their screens what that worldly self views with their own eyes.

L calls Near a bit of a personal consultant

L explains Near's relationship to himself. Watari had labelled them 'acquaintances'.

Which is why L and Near's respective monitors once displayed the same page of Kira suspects; why L was able to hear Mello speaking, though the camera showed that Near's lips were not moving. They were still in the House at that point. L discerned Mello coming to the fore within his own mind.

Hence the terrified look then, and the horror on L's face, when Watari informed him that Near had left the House.

Watari acts as a kind of internal gatekeeper, or an external carer, able to inform L when personae become dominant without his knowing that time had been missed.

Watari was telling him that he'd been usurped by Near. That Near had been dominant, while L unknowingly and unwittingly was shut down, losing time through being stashed somewhere within the unseen chambers of Wammy's House.

Worse still, that Near could act as a conduit, or else has a twin, a counterpoint to his own behaviour - so close in morality to L, that the latter doesn't always mind him coming to the fore - which can too easily flip to control them both. It might be Mello playing maverick with their case-load, and it's impossible to predict his moves or count on tracking them down later.

They couldn't even trust that he was always on their side, working with L and Near, rather than Kira.

Death Note's Near dismisses L's worries about Mello

Is that a Mafia-esque big, black chair, foreshadowing away, looming in the background? Last seen in the manga Rod Ross's LA penthouse suite.

They could lose the game simply because Mello played by different rules, or entered into another game entirely. And what would it cost, if Beyond Birthday was ever to wake to discern the death of the world from a Wammy House hallway window?

Oh! There's so much fun to be had speculating on the possibilities inherent in this new Death Note storyline! But I'd better return to what is, and not what might potentially be.

Creation of a Successor - L and Near's Michelangelo Moment in Death Note (2015)

As primary player in opposition to Kira, L demonstrated his ability to consider the whole team in episode seven of Death Note TV drama. If he was forced to forfeit his position, then it would be beneficial to assign a successor.

That way Kira wouldn't gain too much ground, while struggles for dominance divided and conquered those who might stand in his way.

L has already foreseen that his baton could soon need to be passed on. He cryptically tagged Near, placing him on stand-by as his choice for successor.

The way he did so owed a debt in imagery to Michelangelo's The Creation of Adam. Wherein God reaches out to touch Adam, gifting the spark of life to one made in His own image.

Death Note's Near takes L's jigsaw piece

Or, as L did it in Death Note (2015), gifting a jigsaw piece to the one who thinks most closely to himself.

All on the off-chance that L should (metaphorically of course) fatally place his own wrong piece in the battle against Kira. Then it would fall to his successor - 'It could be you, Near' - to finish the puzzle, and the war.

Near caught the implication loud and clear, with an expression further seeing significance in L leaving the scene, as soon as his piece was conveyed. It was a gesture laden with pathos. Inherently implying that L expected to die.

Though naturally Mello was looking in the opposite direction, when all consideration of L's successor pointed due Near.

He was probably too busy noticing that their surroundings still looked like a Mafia penthouse in Los Angeles.

Nor had it been explained, other than the room wasn't in Wammy's House ("You don't have to go back to the house?" L asked Near not two minutes previously). The furnishings weren't even remotely like those in the hotel, wherein we last saw Near lodged and within the depths of which L had his own hide-out.

Perhaps it would have been too blatant had they gone instead for the zebra striped suite from the other Mafia digs in the desert.

Though it begs the question that, if I'm right about where this scene takes place, then why are Near and L there?

Unless I'm also right in my wilder speculation that this room doesn't exist in the real world. It's L visiting a secondary self inside a place located inside his own psyche.

And that jigsaw piece passing hands is L acknowledging that he's losing his position as dominant personality amidst a multitude of others.

How this scene is more commonly seen

Light Changes L's Mind: Death Note Winners

Actually, we did watch L's mind wilfully changing, or at least his mindset concerning how winning and losing would be judged in this clash between himself and Kira.

In L's world-view, the challenge has been issued with Light as his opponent, regardless of how they spent episode seven double teaming against an external interloper. The Yotsuba group, headed by Higuchi as the current Death Note owning Kira, were never serious challengers in L's book. They existed as an opportunity to gather clues and ammunition for the proper battle of wills with Light.

But to play an effective game, both sides need to know the rules. Otherwise how could anyone be declared champion? It would be a hollow victory without the loser knowing themselves to be beaten.

Thus the conditions for winning were set out by Light and agreed by L.

Even if we learn how he kills people, if a comrade dies that's losing, in my opinion.
- Light Yagami, Death Note (2015), episode 7

A game-changing moment, which saw L immediately switching tactics to take down the Yotsuba group and its Kira with ease. But for him, this contained a fatal flaw.

A Fatal Flaw for L in new Death Note Drama

Death Note's L observing that Light thinks like Kira

Light couldn't have known that he spoke for Kira too.

But no matter that. L had already observed that Light and Kira's minds worked along the same lines. Light's thoughts would probably fit in with Kira's plans too. Their dual outlook aligning in this duel.

Nor was Light necessarily aware that his definition of winning was meaningful for L.

It was Kira who entered into the battle of wills with the detective, not Light. If he felt the challenge, then it was in reaction to L's actions now. His memories of the previous cerebral duelling had been wiped.

If L's pride hadn't been so intent upon recognition as the winner, then he wouldn't have altered his game-plan. Perhaps the outcome might have been different. As it was, allowing Light to influence strategy had immediate consequences.

He touched the Death Note. His memories flooded back. Himself as Kira returned. Just as planned.

Paradise Lost and Kira - Myself am Hell

There have always been shades of Milton's Paradise Lost running as an undercurrent through Death Note.

One day, I shall write a whole blog comparing the two, demonstrating how significantly Kira quotes Satan from Milton's epic verse.

To my mind, one of those moments comes in Light's classic line, 'I am Kira'. I can't help thinking of Satan in Paradise Lost screaming out, 'Myself am Hell!'

It's not word for word - nor even close - but their proclamations hold the same feeling for me. Not least because both are spoken as each anti-hero assumes their role by mentally and emotionally accepting its inevitability. Each against a background of isolation, as all relationships become merely instruments through which power may be gained or retained.

Light the bringer of L?

If this Death Note live action drama continues along tradition lines, then we can see another link between Milton's Satan and TV's Kira.

Each are now poised to duel with an avenging second. Be it Satan's clash with the Archangel Michael (Champion of El), or Kira's confrontation with Mello, aka Mihael Keehl (Champion of L).

The latter already long since viewed in kinship to St Michael. Ensured by Near's constant visual references to Giordano's The Fall of the Rebel Angels - showing Michael taking down Satan - whenever Mello's potential in play came to the fore.

Plus the obvious parallel in which Satan was Heaven's Light-Bringer, and Kira was Light. Ignorance is bliss they say. Light hated Kira. His own paradise lost in the knowledge that he is Kira.

The Return of the King: Kira Finds his Precious

However it wasn't Milton, but Tolkien brought to mind in Masataka Kubota's performance as a re-emerging Kira.

Watching this Kira clutch his Death Note prompted me to write 'Gollum' on my pad, then circle it several times as the sequence progressed. I really did expect him to start hissing, 'My Precious!'

Eat your heart out Andy Serkis! Kira has his Precious back!

The television adaptation of Death Note has pinged off Tolkien's Middle Earth saga several times already.

Not until Death Note 2015 have we heard that the notebook alters personalities to the bad. That using it invokes paranoia and feelings of dread, not to mention causing agony for those writing names. These are traits more commonly associated with the One Ring to Bind Them All in Tolkien's universe.

The emergence of a secondary personality - split from the owner's primary persona and seemingly built to serve the artefact - is another facet found in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Most notably in Gollum, whose conversations with his other self might have also inspired Mio Yuki's portrayal of Near and Mello in open discussion.

That Gollum with the Ring appears physically transformed is echoed in how TV Death Note's Kira can be discerned, distinct from Light, changed utterly.

In Death Note's Dark Prism Light Splits

Light Yagami denies being Kira

Light was actually being truthful then, when he emphatically told L that he wasn't Kira. At least in this version of Death Note.

There was none of that in the original manga Death Note, nor its anime, nor even the previous Japanese live-action adaptations. In all of those variants, Kira seemed less Light Yagami's split personality and more an alternative name for the same individual.

Light's nick-name, if you like.

Accepted and assumed during a period when Light's psyche stretched to embrace ownership of the Death Note. A label therefore for his supposed megalomania and increasingly apparent descent into madness. But still fundamentally a single self.

Only by integrating Tolkienesque themes, do we witness Light and Kira separated, as dissociated identities and possibly an emerging secondary self entirely.

By implication, the Death Note dividing his very soul.

Kira Identified in Split Personalities

Let's just say this: you will feel the fear and pain known only to humans who've used the notebook. And when it's your time to die, it will fall on me to write your name in my death note. Be warned any human who's used a death note can neither go to heaven nor hell for eternity... That's all.
- Ryuk, Death Note Anime, Episode 1

Maybe this soul-split is why those who use the Death Note are condemned to Mu when they die?

Complete souls are required to enter Heaven or Hell, at least as such things are understood by shinigami. Personae fragmenting from the same being dilutes the core identity enough that their passport into the afterlife is denied. With nowhere to go, they are lost to the void and formless. Nothingness ensues.

Moreover, this might explain why Death Note owners are identifiable by the lack of a name and date above their heads. It could be that shinigami eyes are confounded by the data being multiplied, as more than one person is present inside that head.

If so, then this has obvious implications for Near and Mello too.

How does one view the name and days of a puppet, or two in one personae?

Not least because shinigami eyes are twice used to read Mihael Keehl above Mello's head in the canon rendering. What will happen during those scenes in the story? Can Mello still be killed, as one self amongst multiples?

If so, how does that affect Near? Will he die too? Or will he seem to make like a gamer or a cat with apparently numerous lives to risk in battling Kira?

If not, then how might Kira react to the discovery that some - to all practical extent and purpose - possess immunity from the Death Note's deadly reach. And L's successors are amongst their number.

A new twist beckons, as the insertion of split personalities creates diverging plot-lines. It will be interesting to see how this pans out as the story progresses.

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