Loud and over-emotional, Death Note's Misa-Misa appears not to have been blessed with much in the brain department.

Which is a shame, when she's up against the likes of Light, L and Kiyomi Takada and playing a deathly game as Second Kira. Yet she has one up on all of them, not to mention a splattering of NPA police officers and nearly all attendant Wammy House geniuses. Misa Amane survives. Moreover, she's never positively identified as Second Kira; let alone officially arrested, tried and punished for her crimes in mass murderer.

Which is more than Light Yagami manages.

Unlike both him and super-smart Teru Mikami, Misa contrives as well to be missing from the killing line-up in the Yellow Box Warehouse.

Though twice captured by Wammy detectives, and stalked by two others, she also sidesteps being murdered (directly or inadvertently) by them. Which again is more than can be said for top of her class Ms Grace herself, Kiyomi Takada, as well as usual suspects Yagami and Mikami, and their sometime stand-in Kyosuke Higuichi.

Alone of all the Kiras, Misa Amane gets to walk free at the end.

What happens next is all of her own doing, within her own control. Whether that's the dramatic suicide of the anime or the continuing on to world stardom as an actress and model, as per the live-action Death Note movies.

Not so stupid after all then.

Whether its in retribution, career, love, favours or contribution to the Kira case, Misa Amane rarely fails to achieve any goal for which she reaches.

Nobody who ever attacked her survives long enough to gloat in their assault. Her street assailant is taken out by a Death God (Gelus); her family's murderer is initially sentenced through due legal process then killed by Kira while in prison; Soichiro Yagami threatens her with a gun - he doesn't survive a Mafia bullet later on in the tale; her torturous captor L and his carer Watari are both slaughtered by a second shinigami Rem, again on Misa's behalf; Mello and Matt both stalk her, and they are killed within weeks by Kira and/or Kira supporters; while Takada tries to take Misa's man and ends up incinerated in a lorry.

Even Light Yagami, who exploited her constantly for years, finishes the epic crawling in sobbing indignity upon the floor, crying out for Misa in his death throes.

Not all of those were of Misa's doing, nor even at her instigation, but she's certainly left with nobody alive who so much at looked at her with ill intent.

Then you get her career. As anyone who has ever set out with a dream of fame and fortune may attest, it's not easy to achieve stardom, yet Misa Amane is utterly in demand for both acting roles and modelling assignments

In the Death Note live-action movies, Misa Amane's fame is ever-growing. By the fourth, Death Note: Light Up the NEW World - to be released in October 2016 - she is at the top of her career, a Japanese idol with a firm presence in the entertainment industry; a famous name known worldwide as an actress.

During the week that Misa's introduced into Death Note manga and anime, she's on the cover of Eighteen Magazine, apparently a popular journal for the Japanese fashionatas (presumably the youthful ones).

Misa-Misa set out for fame and fortune, and got it. On her terms too, as her demands that she not kiss the main romantic male lead in one of her movies demonstrates.

In fact, as the corporate arc unfolds, Misa's work on that film shoot close by Yotsuba Tower certainly helps with the rescue of Matsuda, then later the capture of Yotsuba Kira himself.

And let's not forget that it was Misa acting unilaterally that managed to force a confession from Higuichi. That was her contribution to the Kira case. No fuss; simply done; back within an hour or two with the evidence that the men had been searching for months to secure.

Not bad for someone supposedly without any wit or two brain cells to rub together.

Nor was that the only moment wherein Misa Amane proves more resourceful and calmly able to get what she wants than all else within the Death Note plot-line.

Half a dozen chapters pass before L narrows down his hunt for Kira to a single major suspect - Light Yagami.

Misa Amane manages the same in about a week and that's only because a few days pass between the broadcast of her tapes and the proposed meeting in Otaka.

Even unto the moment of L's death and, in passing his legacy to his Wammy House successors, through to the end of Death Note - at the staging of the Yellow Box confrontation seven years on - none of the Wammys succeed in positively gaining a confession from Light that he was indeed Kira. Nor the smoking gun evidence that would convict him of the crimes enacted in that persona.

Misa Amane pulled that one off within the same aforementioned week.

Granted she had foreknowledge of the Death Note and the handy boon of shinigami eyes at her disposal; but L and the Wammys had the entire world's political, military, intelligence and law enforcement agencies, plus experts in every field and academic discipline, ready to do their bidding, and/or the Mafia. L could also call upon criminal expertise in the shape of Aiber the Conman and Wedy the top cat burglar.

Misa Amane didn't have any of that. Therefore it was perhaps quid pro quo on such scores.

Moreover, Misa not only located Light, tracked him down to his home and got a confession to being Kira out of him, she did it all without a) Light finding out who she was and b) L knowing of her existence until she began repeatedly to be seen with Light himself.

In fact, we could go as far as to say it was only her association with Light Yagami which put Misa in the frame as Second Kira. But then again, she was only there because she insisted upon being Light's girlfriend and being openly known as such in public. The latter orchestrated entirely by Misa herself in a succession of surprise meetings outside his home, at his university and wherever else she could insert herself into his presence.

Outgunned utterly by his enforced beau, Light had neither choice nor say in the matter.

In this way - however exploitative, unfair and downright psychotic it is - Misa cannot easily be cast aside. She might present herself as utterly dependent upon Light, but in reality, it's the other way around. He cannot act in some quite key situations without her Shinigami eyes; or without the usage of her Death Note and the fact of her ownership of the same.

While ostensibly Light calls all the shots, Misa gets precisely what she requires at any given time.

She wants retribution for the killing of her family, she gets it; she wants to meet Kira, she engineers it; she demands to be Light Yagami's girlfriend, she gives him no choice in the matter; she wants him to move in with her, that occurs circa the beginning of the second arc; she decides it's time to get engaged, and Misa doesn't even bother to consult with Light on that one, she tells Kiyomi Takada first instead.

Financially, Misa was a woman of independent means for years before Light Yagami secured the Kira Task Force position to consider himself the same. She was the one with the money, the prestige, the social standing and the sole occupancy of an apartment. She bought her own furniture, clothes, make-up and every other possession with her own funds, including the phone and its network charges that she presents to Light and pays for on his behalf.

Even when Light gets a job and asks Misa to stop working as per social expectation, she could (and does in the Death Note movies) return to her career at any time.

In most fan imaginings, Misa-Misa is Death Note's very energetic answer to that stalwart of anime character archetypes - the Genki Girl. She shouts, screams, rushes about, glomps, squees and generally acts like the average three year old on a profusion of E numbers. Or, indeed, E.

There's plenty of scenes to throw into the mix in support of this designation. Yet look more closely. Shouldn't that be every scene?

In reality, Misa seems to switch Genki Girl on or off, or applies attributes to a precise level, depending upon the situation and who's watching. She's like someone who's read all about Genki Girl and figured that she can pull it off, so goes for it whenever the persona will cover a multitude of personal sins and/or throw people off the scent of her actual intelligence.

Take for example her meeting the Yagami women, whilst visiting Light at home. There Misa is the epitome of maturity; a demure Japanese lady full of politeness and decorum, give or take the length of her skirt. Yet outside, alone with Light on another occasion, she glomps him with all the enthusiastic screaming passion of the Genki Girl personified, now that his mother isn't watching.

Nor does she bamboozle Yotsuba Kira Hidechi with a steady stream of relentless words. Those she chooses are articulate and leading, with adequate gaps in between for him to speak enough to condemn himself.

Meanwhile, there's absolutely nothing of the motormouth, highly animated and over-emotional Genki Girl in Misa when she's detained by L as suspected Second Kira. To be fair, she's also in a full-body straitjacket, so none of that excessively expressive movement is physically able to be on show.

Yet you get the impression it wouldn't be either.

That prolonged scene in a straitjacket, effectively being tortured into submission by L, tells a lot about Misa Amane's true strength of character.

With his arms handcuffed behind his back, Light plays the game in full knowledge of his Kira-hood for a week, then gives that contextual understanding up. Within three days, he's pleading, begging, demanding to be set free, sure that he's not Kira and adamant that he's going to say so repeatedly.

Meanwhile, Misa Amane remains silent and strapped upright to a board, blind-folded, devoid of human contact beyond an electronic voice communicating through a speaker. Not a single word uttered in condemnation nor defense. Nothing whatever to make it worth her torturers' time in detaining her.

When she eventually does feel herself cracking, she finally does speak, but only to ask Rem to kill her. The words enigmatic without context to those listening on. The remainder of her days tortuously attached in that position in a state of near sensory deprivation would have been passed without knowledge of Kira nor her part in the Death Note killings. Yet she still doesn't say much nor beg as Light Yagami did.

Coming to the conclusion that she's been abducted as per her fame, Misa intelligently attempts to humanise herself and make a deal with her abductor.

L eventually has to let her go for the sake of nothing incriminating being divulged to prove her role as Second Kira, nor to use as evidence against Light. How many others could have withstood so much under torture?  Most in that position would be agreeing, admitting or issuing confessions to all and sundry, just to make the torture stop.

Nobody is suggesting for one instant that Death Note's Misa Amane is some unsung genius (though an interesting case might be made for that). However she certainly isn't the dim-witted, unaware character so many make her out to be.

She has drive, intelligence and self-knowledge enough to ensure that she gets what she wants, through a considered application of the attributes and tools in her personal arsenal. She can definitely identify goals, pinpoint way and devise strategies to achieve them, then action those tactics with usually astounding results.

Mostly Misa is fabulous at keeping herself under the radar by ensuring those around her think she's too stupid to understand much that is happening.

However, she proves time and again that she can read situations - and especially people - with a keen accuracy. She can be cute enough to sexually manipulate the men; childish enough to annoy or delight, but never be taken seriously enough for people not to scheme in her vicinity. She sees more than she ever lets on.

She can charm anyone, and uses that to great effect to get people waiting on her hand and foot.

However, when the occasion calls for it, Misa's intelligence shows all the above to be the veneer of an actress. Probably a psychopathic one at that, but certainly not the Genki Girl that she's studiously manufactured her self-image to be.

Do you agree?

This summer, Viz Media celebrates its 30th birthday firmly entrenched as North America's foremost exporter, and promoter, of Japanese manga and anime.

There will be no big party in the streets by all accounts.  Yet fans can look forward to special offers and goodies given out as a thank you for for thirty years of support. 

However, those deals currently announced are only available to indivduals attending anime conventions across the USA.  Kicking off on July 1st-4th 2016, at the Los Angeles Anime Expo, and continuing throughout the summer and autumn season.  More on all that when we know further.

More to the point, Kelts discusses the effect of such global popularity success on the domestic market in Japan. With its shrinking population population and declining consumerism, the business opportunities at home were always limited.  The injection of worldwide capital turned out to be very timely and very welcome for the overall prosperity of that island nation.

Not bad for a notion mooted by a San Francisco hippy, which turned out to be quite a fabulous one at that.  Happy 30th birthday, Viz Media; the celebrations may run worldwide.

Death Note's anime adaptation ends with the suicide of Misa Amane, Second Kira and one of the most significant driving forces behind the whole broad story.  Without her intervention, much original plot might never have happened, or been changed completely along a different course.  Yet the manga never gave her that big dramatic send off.

She wasn't even witness at the grand finale clash between Light and Near. Her creator Tsugumi Ohba dumped his character in a hotel room and forgot about her, because he self-admittedly couldn't find 'a situation to fit her in'.

It was only by the reappraisal of the manual, in Death Note 13: How to Read, that the author seemed contrite about his choices.  Ohba proffered the opinion that she probably committed suicide. Whilst also confirming that the widely believed interpretation (at the time) of the final manga scenes - that the Kira priestess was Misa reinvented as a cult leader honouring dead Light Yagami - was completely incorrect.

So why does Misa Amane commit suicide according to the mangaka mind that made her?  Because someone 'like Matsuda' 'probably let it slip' that Light was dead.  She had already long since stated - to L no less - that she couldn't contemplate living in a world without Light.  It would be too dark.

Only now does the mangaka get the brainwave that Misa might have ended her own life. Recorded in the transcript of the interview complete with pauses denoting the hesitancy of Tsugumi Ohba as inspiration hits there and then; well after the manga chapters have completed their inaugural run of publication in Weekly Shonen Jump.  He finishes weakly, 'something like that'.

It would probably be easier to accept Tsugumi Ohba's suggestion as canon, if he sounded more sure about it. But all those 'likes' and 'probablys' make it sound like he's making up stuff on the spot to answer a question and wriggle out of abandoning his character to a crowbarred plot ending.  As a dutiful storyteller, he should have found the narrative that included her too.

The poetic juxtaposition of circumstance echoed in her visage and attire. Misa Amane has dressed carefully for her existence's final scene. The actress has manicured her nails, painting them purple; adorning two rings to match in gleaming purple and blue/green. Her make-up is applied to perfection. No random clump of mascara on a rogue eyelash, nor lipstick mostly wiped off before you've even left your own home station, as would happen in reality. Misa-Misa's cosmetic attention has left her face as a canvas covered in a glossy mask, like a doll staring flawless and porcelain back. Not helped by the deadening of all expression in her gaze.

Her clothing is just as carefully chosen and arranged about her person. Black and white dress, with matching headband, and great white ruffles arranged just so. Beneath that topmost article, her hair remains teased into shape, styled without a strand out of place, like every lock was cemented on. Her big, clumpy platform shoes mark the precision of her gait, keeping it of necessity slow, as if she apes the slow, striding pace of the funeral director at her own final send off.

There is something of the Geisha about her, though not a single visual artifice directly apes that of those traditional entertainers. But for the general unreality of the look; woman as walking art. A canvas shell without soul inside, to be adorned for the pleasure and artistry of the thing. Which isn't to paint a disservice to the actual Geisha, who were notably vital. Particularly those with their obi worn around the front.

Misa's telling us that she's already gone.  She's made herself outwardly pretty in order to smash the shell of self to smithereens.  So unflinching and perfectly rendered that she appears not pretty at all, but abnormal. An animated marionette teetering towards the edge of the Uncanny Valley.  We will not like what comes next.  Fortunately for viewers of anime, Death Note doesn't show it. Implied amidst the final credits, we see the sky turn pink and arms outstretched, she leaps. More so in imagination than ink.

So was Tsugumi Ohba right?  Was it for love of Light that Misa Amane makes this horrifically unromantic fatal plunge?  The timing would imply so. 

Misa-Misa suicides on St Valentine's Day 2011.  Choosing February 14th on which to end her life has an obvious resonance for those viewing from the West. A day in which lovers are celebrated makes this unequivocally about Light Yagami.  Fragmented sensibilities exposed therein, echoed in the lyrics that she intones so sweetly en route:

However, we may be forgetting something quite important. Misa Amane is not Western.  She is born and bred Japanese, and Valentine's Day isn't marked in precisely the same way there.

February 14th is the day when Japanese women and girls vie to press their hand-made tezukuri chocolate into the hands and hearts of favoured males. If accepted, the gifter can expect to be the recipient of a small token - usually a white ribbon - on March 14th, aka White Ribbon Day.  Thereon all that remains is the marriage, mortgage, pets, 2.4 children and a lifetime in drudgery to the maintenance of the household.  But first they have to get Christmas out of the way.

It's not Valentine's Day when all romance is sought, elicited and put on show in Japan. It's Christmas Day. This is not a Christian nation.  No-one native to Tokyo is singing hymns to baby Jesus, whilst trying to square that with the pile of presents to be bought and wrapped for the kids and all out.

Instead, they're trying to snag a date.  Christmas in Japan is for couples. It's the more obvious date for Misa's sunset dive into finality.  Which should incur the supposition that this is less about Light than something else. Except for one thing.

Misa Amane was born on Xmas Day and died on Valentine's Day.  She would see that as heartbreakingly romantic, when in reality it's just heartbreaking. Nevertheless, the interconnecting of life and death in those two dates does bespoke a love issue underlying her grisly end.  Plus it's only a fortnight on from the first anniversary of her disappeared  finance's supposed death.  The sadness would naturally push up to peek at such flashpoint dates with that the biggest of all.

More imagery relating to her lost relationship with Light Yagami lies in digging deep into the fine detail of each frame moving her excruciatingly steady towards her final encounter with a far distant pavement.  Putting it all together might entrail the overall picture a little more.

The last time Misa sees and talks to Light is whilst lodged within the Teito Hotel (Hotel Teito, trans. Imperial).  

Prior to the Yellow Box showdown, Near arranges for Hal Lidner and Mogi to forcibly re-home Misa in a reasonably luxurious room there.  While Mogi tells Light that he's there by chose, Misa blithely announces that she is not. Yet she makes no attempt to escape, despite earlier chapters making clear her resourcefulness in such situations.  On the contrary to her spoken words, she seems quite pleased to be there.  Though whether her joyfulness is approval expressed as glee in regard to the appointment of this expensive room or rests fully (or in part) upon another underlying cause, it's never made clear.

During the two day interim just prior, it might be assumed that Light and Misa have conversed via telephone or PC, though such is never show. Then Misa is nominally set free. However, she is given the usage and run of a penthouse suite in the same hotel, and Misa's exuberance now holds no bounds.

Just before Light leaves towards the Yellow Box Warehouse and his eventual, unforeseen death, he speaks with his hyper fiancée against over the telephone. Misa Misa is beside herself with delight; rolling like a toddler around the furnishings.  In fairness, Light does tell her to stay put, while he confidently walks towards degradation and the flooring of his plans of living openly in divinity, recognized as such in all due numinous euphoria. Instead, it is Near's reality which is inserted upon the scene and Light sees eight years of careful elevation dissolve into Nothingness.  Right on the brink, or so he thought, of his Godhead coming into fruition.

Bloodied, raving, insane and disappointed to a deep soul level, Light never once turns to Misa, safely ensconced in the luxury of Teito's top floor apartment.  As far as she's concerned, he simply let her rot there, while he walked away and vanished unutterably from their common law marriage. Eight years plus of near constant cohabitation, de facto conjugation and sometime actual companionship just got thrown away.

Because, for some inexplicable reason Light's wife, mother and sister are never told of his demise.

The rationale is breezed over in the manga/anime as 'security' to safeguard the secrets of a highly classified case. Moreover one which is laced with international ramifications should news of Kira's illegal and ignominious kangaroo court death get out.

Not to mention local/national ones for the officers (and Near) involved, if their part in such proceedings was leaked to the press, public and Amnesty International.  Still fiercely  pro-Kira in those immediate aftermath months, Japan would be unlikely to support such vigilante dealings. Nor should be be forgotten that it disbanded one corrupt police force after World War II, then severely curtailed the liberties of its secondary, replacement force.  There's a cultural twitch regarding abuse of due process by law enforcement officers to be evoked in Japan.  Not a thing to be overlooked as YOLO.

Which means that for fear of the mob (in governments wide-world or on the street), Sayu, Sachiko and Misa have to suffer the unceasing starting and listening at any sound that might be their missing man come home. The inordinate cruelty of never knowing if he lies chained and tortured in some dark hole, or is freely wandering the Earth in rejection of their love.

There's a dark, unbending cruelty there, not lessened by the months its allowed to endure, and made considerably worse by the justifications ditched out by all concerned for such obdurate behaviour.

Meanwhile, whatever else may or may not feature in the mix, Misa's sense of self will be eroding with every passing day of waiting, watching, hoping, imagining, knowing that someone knows something and will let her languish like this in perpetuity - her worth and sanity deemed less than whatever reason underpins such relentlessness in silence.

Also adrift will be her societal connectivity (who can empathize amongst her neighbours and peers?); her yet to be mourned loss of context for a life shared with Light and hitherto built upon dreams, aspirations/goals and actual plans (how can she gain closure and remould a future, when he could walk back in at any moment, or not, and she will never know which until she watches the door and dies a little more inside each time it remains shut); and the deadening of that fundamentally Japanese concept of her personal 'ikigai' (reason to exist?).

All this alone may well account for Misa's descent into despair enough to jump from the roof of that skyscraper.  But there's much more going on besides.

Some of it subtle, existing in the imagery alone.  You see, Teito Hotel actually existed once.  It was built, maintained and used by Allied Forces, foreign diplomats and Western business personnel in the post-WWII forcible reconstruction of Japan.  Its architecture was distinctly American, as was the service, décor, amenities and portable goods to be found inside.  By the order of General MacArthur, the Supreme Commander for/of the Allied Powers, no Japanese clientèle was permitted within. Teito served Western venture capitalists, merchant buyers and global market enterprise agents only.

There was a reason it was called the Imperial. In Japanese.

No wonder Misa was so stunned to be sitting in the Penthouse suite. She must have been sneaked past reception by Near or one of his American personnel, because no-one as Japanese as she could possibly have been there under normal circumstances.  Despite it being in Japan.

When Hotel Teito was finally sold back to Japan - under private ownership subject to the highest bidder - in 1959, the first thing that occurred was the whole edifice being razed to the ground and swept cleanly away.  Hotel Palace with its elegant Japanese designs in architecture, facilities and interiors now stands pointedly upon the spot.

All of this psychological upheaval would take its toll upon the most steadfast mind, but Misa has twice been an owner of a Death Note. Right there in the rules it states that users will feel despair and torment as a result of their writing within those pages.  Misa killed her victims in the hundreds of thousands. It's safe to say she used more than one shinigami notebook and incurred such penalties upon her mentality from all.  It doesn't matter than her memories of mass slaughter are all gone. This isn't a memory.  It's an indelible mark in common to all human Death Note owners.

No amount of anti-depressants, Tai Chi sessions and mindfulness training are going to shift her from a despondency that she cannot trace to source. She kicked over the routes back there when she surrendered her notebook possession and shinigami eyes with it.  Misa cannot even understand why.  She'll never be able to fix it; nor can she know that.

There are other aspects too, seen in literal flashbacks - single frozen images flickering through her mind's eye, visible to the viewer too.  This is Tetsuro Araki edging his bets in blatant disregard for the Death Note rules.  Misa's memories have been washed clean, yet she still recalls numbers and names above people's heads.  

She either retains the ability to view death data upon all things living now - in which case who wouldn't go mad or want to simply make it go away by ending the life of flesh and blood sustaining it?  Or rogue, inexplicable snapshots of horrors have somehow stuck in her memory's cache.  Clues towards knowing that she was once something or someone much more, but that's gone too with no way of knowing what it was nor how to reclaim it, should she want to.

Besmirching his vision, shared by herself, with a growing number of voices raised against him in condemnation. Seeing all they'd accomplished in sacrifice and blood amounting to nothing now the new God is gone, and his dominion with him. Only the void remains now for Misa Amane, perceiving herself in isolation; visions lost in a paradigm of rising crime and wars reinstated; too making people telling her that she was wrong. Though not to her face. They didn't know, nor ever would, what she did or was.

And neither would she.  

As Misa Amane's sole song finished, she stared into the abyss; and it stared back. The last Death Note credits rolled from view and Misa-Misa jumped.

While canon doesn’t linger on Quillsh Wammy on his own, Watari’s existence on itself is implied to occupy a much bigger role than what we actually see.

We are introduced to him as the connection between L and the outside world, and, as the story progresses, we also see Watari is responsible for carrying L’s orders as well as taking care of L himself. We see Watari as the liaison, the butler, the bodyguard and the assistant but we aren’t given a reason to explain this renewed inventor taking on those functions.

We are told, both in the original manga and in the L: The Wammy’s House One-shot, that Quillsh Wammy is a man of wealth.  There is no reason keeping him from paying someone to look after L other than he chose to do it himself. And as we see when L arrives at Wammy’s house, he makes that decision soon after he is introduced to L. That is a choice we are left to explain on our own.

The orphanages weren’t created out of altruism and kindness. When we see one of them, we see a place with barely any furniture and a warden who cares so little for the children he’s responsible for that he doesn’t mind handing over private information he knew could endanger them. It’s not a place for children to grow up happily and safely, neither it is a place for children to be adopted.

After L, the point of, at least, Wammy’s House was to produce a successor and there is no explanation as to why the orphanages were meant to produce something in the first place. In that case, it’s more likely L was what they were looking for and not a random child Watari decided to entertain.

Considering Watari made the decision of establishing several orphanages after World War II, his motivation could’ve been to prevent another war, to find the one mind capable of intervening and putting a stop to such horrors. If L was the answer to the question he was trying to answer with his orphanages, Watari was looking for a kid capable of saying their own methods, their own morals, were just.

In fact, we can go beyond that and consider Watari didn’t change his methods after finding L as much as he was lucky enough to find a child who already did and strongly believed what he wanted the children under his care to do and believe.

Watari forced the children under his care to abide by his own moral inclination despite their own desires but to do so believing in their own deductive skills. They were indoctrinated to believe they, too, could be justice, but only if they were the very best. Personal safety, personal happiness, mental health, physical well-being, etc… were not as important as the good of the majority, but the good of the majority was taught to them as a consequence of their own actions, their own inclinations, their own search for answers.

Not only was Watari morally irresponsible as he allowed L to do as he wished (choosing the cases and methods he pleased under the pretence of representing justice), he was also morally wrong on the orphanage system he created. If he thought the world needed a moral compass that he could provide, he, at least, knew his methods were condemnable enough he should keep them hidden.

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.

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.

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. 

There's always been something a little off about events in the Yellow Box Warehouse, wherein was staged Death Note's climactic scenes.

It's all good drama nontheless.  We get Gevanni's sleight of hand with Death Notes performed like a stage magician's prestige; that breath-taking instant of Light's confession; the chaos and the shooting; a divine madman's soliloquy on the subject of justice; and Near's finest hour in the coldest put-down to ever deaden a burgeoning reality.

Not to mention the revelation of Mell0's final heroism, as martyr to the cause (inadvertently taking Matt with him), being more meaningful than hitherto suspected; and the crawling disbelief of Light, as the Kira veneer is stripped from him and we're all reminded that Ryuk was only ever here for the lulz.

Then death - a flashing ghost of glowing L, if this is the anime over manga - and everyone leaves to resume normality in a world, where the given order has long since been shaken to the core.  Global society now quickly recovering with a haste almost indecent enough to prove Kira right after all. 

And everyone lived happily ever after.

Except they didn't.  Do you know a single Death Note fan who hasn't at least questioned the unfolding narrative in that scene?

Attempting to follow Near's proof and logic from confrontation to conclusion; not only of the moment, but the whole story supposedly unravelling in evidence that leads directly to Light's undignified demise.

I think everyone read or watched it again at least twice.  I've lost count of forum posts with each new fandom victim meandering to say, 'Erm, sorry, but I don't quite get this.'

Thus follows the specific point where they tripped down yawning the plot-holes, now opening up like a minefield across the scene:   What did Mello do again?  How did Near know x, y, z?  Is he psychic or something?  And what the sweet proverbial was up with Mikami's bizarreness in behaviour generally and facial expressions definitely?

Everyone too busy worrying that they were the only one left confused to even touch upon the gore of that arterial blood-burst, so gloried in the anime as Mikami's dramatic turn at self-harm.

You know what I mean.  We've all been there.  Several detailed readings or stop-contemplate-start viewings on, some of us can even convince ourselves that the denunciation is sequential; all points supported with no great leaps of faith; and it all makes sense.  Otherwise we've sat though 37 episodes/108 chapters of story that doesn't deliver at the final crescendo of all that build-up.  Which can't be true, when the tale is widely deemed to be a - perhaps the - classic of the genre; wildly, unabashedly and unceasingly popular on a global scale.

So the doubt creeps in that it's us instead.  We weren't genius enough to fully 'get' it.  It's enough to pretend we did, then run with the points that were discerned and fitted perfectly in place.

The rest is simply fan-fiction.

The problem is our natural propensity to think of Death Note as Light's story.  It's not.  It's Ryuk's.  (Though Tarot Mikami is coming up shortly with an intriguing perspective on the manga also being Matsuda's tale.)    Nevertheless when the epic build up breaks upon Kira's death, and subsequent dissembling into nothingness, it can seem like we went with him.

What follows is way too often dismissed as superlative; an epilogue to bring us all back down to Earth. While mischievously inserting doubt over whether Light really lost, when Kira worshippers still ritually congregate and believe.

But this, not Kira's Curtain, was what it was all leading up to.  Tsugumi Ohba himself said, in How to Read - Death Note 13, that the vision of these scenes in Finis were what caused the spark of inspiration to flow through the rest of the Death Note narrative.  All else he wrote was working back from this, no tacked on arcs post-L, nor leaping into the grave with Light.  For all their game-changing grandeur, they were ultimately merely markers upon the narrative, pointing beyond themselves to now.

Pinging upon the sacred number of Defilements in Buddhism, Finis is chapter 108.  It always would be.  Ohba decided that one early on, and left the one-shot manga to follow unnumbered so not to alter the fact that Death Note has exactly 108 chapters.  You can count them on your Mala Beads, if you want.

So what great facet is revealed to us here?   That Light found divinity in the end?   That the world without him simply returns to previous form:  crime rate rising to pre-Kira levels; all else flowing back as if the last seven years had been erased, with even the same people in the streets, older, yet doing exactly the same things.

Light's endeavours, and even erstwhile existence, rendered meaningless in minute, subtle ways.  Like the return of Yamamoto, last seen in cameo within the earliest Death Note chapters as Light Yagami's friend; now greeting Matsuda as his BFF, and off they go to the pub.  Light's own mother never learning the truth of his loss.  Told lies to cover up the reality as seen and shaped by her son.  His place in the world, philosophy, perspective and pursuits all rendered Mu as his Kira ridden soul.  All else come full circle and moved on like he was never there.

Nor is this the point of Finis.  It just the fine detail in the background driving certain messages home; if we're charitable a coda of candles in the wind.

It's in the foreground that the big reveal is happening, hidden in plain sight through the chattering of a 'Fool' and already dismissed by Ide before we even make the mountain top.

Most readers agreeing, because we're too distracted by Light and all the lovely Easter eggs waving from the scenery.  Plus we already feel like idiots for not quite 'getting' the Near exposee of Light in the Yellow Box Warehouse, and we're damned if we're going to be drawn into another long explanation posited by a traumatized idiot.

Matsuda's always been so easy to dismiss.  Particularly now, when we recently saw his gullibility writ large upon that shattering previous scene. His shock in the great Kira reveal caused such a meltdown that he's probably suffering PTSD or  something now.  Racked with guilt over Soichiro and so many dead; still obviously wrestling with the shock of knowing a third of his life was lived as a lie; his loyalty disabused in the most belittling, gut-wrenching way.

We don't need the ghost of L to whisper, 'Shut up, Matsuda! You idiot!'  Because we're hardly listening anyway.  It's just background noise finally shut down by Ide, tacitly approved by all lost in mourning for our mass murdering megalomaniac and his warped sense of justice.

Now echoed by Ide himself, as he decrees Kira's crimes terrible enough to warrant his summary execution - with an illegally wielded firearm (Matsuda was technically off-duty) and a Death God's intervention, in an out of the way warehouse, without charge, nor trial, judge and jury, and no right of appeal before instant death.  Based upon evidence constructed from a self-confessed SPK sting, plus Near sounding so sure as he blithely divulged bits of the known coupled with conjecture, like it was the only way things could have played out.

His speech, on behalf of the prosecution in this kangaroo court condemnation of Kira, seemed utterly watertight.  Yet Near was still able to reorder his version of events, to encompass the implications of Mello's intent in Takada's abduction, as Hal Lidner testified her impression of the same rather late in the day.  It was an interpretation which cast a different hue upon the timeline, but delivered in confidence nontheless and received likewise from all who heard.  Just as they'd accepted the prior telling too.

Maybe because they, like those bearing witness from our ringside seats in the fourth wall, couldn't truly follow it at the time.

But Near is a genius, so it must be true; and who cares why or how a Mafia man died? While Matt only turned up twelve panels ago, if he'd lived he probably wouldn't have amounted to much.  We hardly knew him, so let him go - collateral damage in a war against a man too rotten to live in this world of safety and security, and justice.

Around this time in proceedings, it's normally behoven for babes or Fools to call out to say that the Emperor wears no clothes; or that in this Orwellian warehouse scenario it's getting difficult to call the pigs from the humans, humans from the pigs, nor tell the rationale of Kira from those arrayed extra-judicially against him.

Unfortunately the Fool Matsuda was in meltdown at the time, being dragged away by his friends; while the only child present was made judge and chief prosecutor at the same time.  Needless to say, he won the day.  Then watched Light Yagami die as a result; howling, without advocacy, nor anyone to ask whether Light was even sane enough at this point to understand what was happening to him. Or take the opportunity to arrest Kira, hold him safe, and learn what he knew about the Afterlife and eternity, and all those other things that philosophers, priests and ordinary people have pondered to distraction over every millennia of human sentience.

Instead all watched too, accepting the sense of prevailing 'rightness' in the air around Near.  Who watched Kira die and kept the Death Notes.

Which was the actual point of the Yellow Box confrontation - to knock out the opposition and clear the decks ready to quietly seize power, when no-one else was looking.   At least it is, if we're running with the gut instinct of Matsuda and some really quite compelling end game theories for Near in Death Note.

One year to the day after the death of Light Yagami, Touta Matsuda still isn't convinced that they were on the right 'side' in the end.  He watches society sink back from fear of Kira into a resurgence of the usual mix of humanity for good or ill living as they will. With the inevitable wave of criminal behaviour surfing in ever higher numbers in their midst, Matsuda's depression deepens.

For those not actually targeted by Kira, these streets had been safer under his horrific regime.

It's an unsettling notion that maybe, after all, they did crucify their Saviour.  Yet sharing his concerns with Ide elicits a most telling reply:

Kira was wrong.  Because that's what they DECIDED by consensus was the case.   Kira has to be wrong, or else there was no purpose attached to the sacrifice of those serving on the anti-Kira Task Force, nor who lost their lives in other parties in his opposition.  

Condemn Light Yagami's worldview, and his prospective Godhood with it, and survivors like Matsuda, Ide, Aizawa, Mogi and Near with his group all become war heroes.  Able to feel pride in their past endeavours and self-respect for themselves.  Their fallen - Soichiro, Ukita, L, Watari, Raye Penbar, Mello, Matt et al - become martyrs in a noble cause.  The Glorious Dead of cenotaphs, remembered with honour and distinction.

Support Kira in memory and all that fails.  Each become betrayers, of a friend and comrade, perhaps of a Messiah.  Maybe even the destroyers of humanity itself; thieves of a genuine Utopian dream.

It was decided Kira was not right, because otherwise they wouldn't be able to grasp what they were fighting for in that bitter, seven year war.  And madness beckons that way.

For all that its generally ignored, or blatantly rejected within the panels of the Death Note manga, Matsuda's theory isn't that off the wall. It's nestling comfortably in the realms of actual possibility.

Whilst recalling that this was the chapter planned from the start - following  one that was almost called Black Curtain (a Japanese euphemism for someone orchestrating events behind the scenes) - and that Tsugumi Ohba blatantly said that 'Near cheats', let's recap.  These were the points of plot that Touta Matsuda was pondering:

However, we never do find out.  Matsuda manages to convince Ide to at least intimidate some parts of his theory have been heard, and taken seriously.  For a moment, the older man steps into Touta Matsuda's reality and that kind of affirmation was all the young officer needed for comfort in his unsolvable, unsettling theorizing.

A touch of grace and we see the old Fool back.  Matsuda grinning with a friend, too busy chatting, making plans to visit a bar tonight, to properly hear a word Near has to say anymore.  The final word in Death Note - before the ritual coda of Kira cultists - is Near's admonishment to Matsuda, "Listen carefully!"

Maybe because Near knows that he might need Matsuda one day to stop him too, if only the Fool would pay attention.   But for now he's distracted, laughing and moved on, Near got away with killing for personal gain.  But surely that's understandable?  Just ask Kira.

It may be the tenth anniversary of its initial publication, yet manga editions of Death Note sales remain evergreen in the US, Canada and Mexico. 

In fact, this far down the line, Death Note manga volumes are still one of the Top 10 best-selling titles within the c0ntinent for the genre.  It pretty much seems lodged there; camped in all perpetuity.

That's according to ICv2 - the North American pop culture news magazine for retailers - reporting in the April 4th 2016 issue of Publishers Weekly.

While Death Note may lack the current mega-sales of latest releases like Attack on Titan, Tokyo Ghoul and One-Punch Man, that's because they are new and trending fashionably. But that's more than made up for by the steady drip-drip of continued Death Note manga editions purchased throughout the last decade.

It even survived well during the overall manga slump in North America, which saw the trade in Japanese titles fall from a high of $210m in 2007 to a mere $65m by 2012.  The market had bounced back up to $75m by 2014 - mostly on the back of Tokyo Ghoul and One-Punch Man - with early figures suggesting that North American manga sales rose by another 13% again during 2015.

Yet even during the down days in manga consumerism, interest in Death Note there never really wavered.  ICv2 stated that it, along with Dragon Ball, went on 'selling well'.

So why should Death Note stand out so much amid all the rest?  ICv2 CEO Milton Griepp has an answer for that too.  "I think it all comes down to quality," He said, comparing Ohba and Obata's epic manga with iconic graphic novels of the West, like Alan Moore's Watchman or Batman: The Killing Joke. "Death Note is a good series."

And sometimes it really is as simple as that.

This is a quick question emerging from out in the wild. A Death Note News reader wishes to pick your collective brains and whistle down your networks with this query - has Death Note ever been translated into Irish Gaelic?

I know it's never been done officially, but there may be fan-made dubs of the anime or scanlations of the manga by Irish Death Note fans somewhere.  We've both had a look on-line (she much more thoroughly than I), yet to no avail.

Does such a thing as Death Note Irish versions exist?  If so, could you please point her in the right direction.

Thanks in advance!  My apologies...

Go raibh míle maith agat roimh ré, mo bhráithre álainn na hÉireann.

So why is a kanji, that is usually read as “tsuki” on its own, pronounced with a very English sounding “raito”, or “Light”? Simple answer: because Ohba-sensei told us that’s how it’s to be pronounced.

Complex answer: a naming phenomenon exists in Japan, utilising kanji that looks cool, in order to write names that would typically be written a different, more common way.

It is not so strange for parents to want their children to have unique names, nor for manga authors to name their characters using these conventions. It enables them to give their main characters names that are not used in other manga. Ohba-sensei chose the kanji that means moon to represent a new meaning of “light”, stretching the meaning of the original just enough to still be understood.

This explains why Light Yagami's name is sometimes read as Tsuki Yagami and/or Raito Yagami too.  After all, we're being asked to render a common word in kanji in an uncommon way.

Then - back when Death Note was first released - and now - with each new person picking up the tale - every Japanese reader would assume that Ohba-sensei intended his protagonist to be called Yagami Tsuki. They have no reason not to, until Light himself explains in the manga how to pronounce his name.  That doesn't happen until, I believe, chapter twelve.

During his encounter with Naomi Misora, Light goes to great lengths to spell out precisely how his kanji is meant to be read.  It seems a little strange in context; too long-winded an explanation over a simple name pronunciation.  Particularly in conversation with a lady whom Light is about to kill, concerning kanji that she can't even see written down.

But this was the way that Ohba-sensei got to tell his manga's readers too how to say his main character's name. En masse the whole fledging Death Note fandom suddenly had to teach themselves not to say Yagami Tsuki (or Yagami Raito) as assumed, but the now familiar Yagami Light.  Some still got it wrong - misunderstanding the correction as being from Tsuki to Raito - like in the panels above, produced by an unofficial early translator of Death Note manga chapters into English.

All proving how unusual it is for a Japanese schoolboy to be called Light, spelled as tsuki kanji and pronounced raito.  So uncommon and strange that some readers still opt for what the kanji is more obviously telling them, hence all three names continue to be prevalent throughout the fandom and even the rarest of them - Tsuki Yagami - may still be heard.

It may be that Ohba-sensei waited so long before (literally) spelling out how he wanted Light's name to be known, because the author hadn't quite decided the issue for himself.

Not until Death Note 13: How to Read was more insight divulged on the subject.  In the interview with Tsugumi Ohba, it's stated that he struggled with Light's name, unable to settle upon the right one.  Then his editor suggested 'Yagami' and it sparked enough inspiration in the writer that he went on a quest to find the kanji.

Reading between the lines, it's quite possible to imagine Ohba-sensei merely enjoying the duality of 'star', 'moon' and 'light' inherent in his protagonist's Kanji.  Then, as the story grew and the characterisation became more fixed, future scenes might flash eradescent through a storyteller's mind.  As yet unformed, but filling him with glee enough to shift away from that lack of concern into a sudden conviction that it should be Light, not Raito, nor Tsuki, that readers saw in that Kanji.

The writer had found the right name for Death Note's central character. Now he just needed the manga reading public to switch tracks with him, and that last scene would be beautifully full of symbolism.

Yet he kept the moon there too - in the first pages and penultimate ones too, as evidenced by the twin images shown at the top of this article; in situ bookmarking hundreds of pages across 108 chapters.  The Yagami Tsuki people were able to feel validated in stubbornly retaining that original presumed moniker for their character.

But then turn the page and that light upon the worshipper's face could just as easily be cast from a star.  At least metaphorically, with the star of hope. There's a nod to the editor's name registry book and the dual meaning of the star-light Kanji found inside.  The moment when Ohba-sensei could breathe life into his creation; for no persona lives on the page, until its name is known.

And again, turn a page to the manga's final word - a simple candle and its glow burning bright.  No celestial being this, nothing so divine.  Just Light, casting shadows, and the nothingness beyond.  Great final scene.  Good name.

So you think you've read (and probably own) every book about Death Note? Check out our store, you might be surprised.

We certainly have been.  During a whole weekend of hunting down errant manga and other literary Death Note works, there were tomes we'd never heard of, let alone read.

And coming from a gang of such Death Note obsessives, that's quite saying something.

For example, did you know about L: File Number 15?  A canon book of short Death Note cartoons created by Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata.  Half of our team did not.

Or what about Notes of Reasoning, the Chinese novel by Zao An Xia Tian? Which may or not not be a canon work taking the Death Note universe and adapting it to a Chinese setting.  Or it may be an elaborate and published piece of fan-fiction.  We don't know. None of us speak Chinese.

How about the hardback special editions of Death Note manga that exist out there in the English language?  Some of those even took us by surprise, missing our radar entirely.

As you may have surmised, this weekend has been a time of skipping interesting things and putting our nose to the grind of finding, collating, formatting and arranging  Death Note books everywhere, in various languages, across the board of genres.

All now beautifully arrayed in the Death Note News book shop.

It's worth nipping inside, if only to discover what you may have missing from your own library collection.  But also to purchase a volume or two to help with the costs of running this website.  Enjoy!  And if you buy, thank you.

In addition the anime/movie Death Note store has been tidied up, hence will be easier to open, load and navigate.  While the music merchandise has had one or two updates too.

When it seems a new Kira has emerged from the ether, former SPK agents Hal Lidner and Anthony Rester approach Near to see what he's going to do about it. After all, he is the new L now and everyone knows that L takes on Kira.  Or does he? 

Well, yeah, as long as he accepts that his opponent really is Kira.  If not, then why take a Fool's Journey along the same old pathway, as directed by an imitator. Near's already taken those steps and learned those lessons. He's already in possession of that world.  As underscored and illustrated throughout this one-shot Death Note manga sequel by use of tarot imagery.

L's successor - now L - quite literally occupies The World in tarot.  He's created a whole world from the cards!

As Matsuda makes clear before we even glimpse Near, the current L is in a position of considerable power in this new post-Kira world.  Especially as regards understanding and information. 

The story takes place nine years after Light Yagami received a Death Note from the Shinigami Ryuk, and three years since his serial killing persona Kira was killed by the same. All of which was not only orchestrated and witnessed by Near, but he also obtained custody of said Death Note AND calls the shots on what details enter the public sphere.  There is some intelligence known for certain only to Near - like the whereabouts/Fate of that deadly notebook - which he expects others simply to take his word on trust.

Near not only has the keenest overview of this world as far as Kira concerns it, but he is able to determine all future aspects of Kira within it.  Light Yagami might once have thought himself God of This New World. But in reality, it turned out to be Near.

He and/or the Death Note creators - Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata - choose to express that with use of the tarot, tarot cards and the Fool's Journey through the Major Arcana (though the latter is largely implied).   And by 'Near's world in tarot cards', I mean that quite explicitly.

When Hal Lidner and Anthony Rester enter Near's hub, it's to find themselves confronted by a wall of cards.  Superimposed against a view of the city, representing the world outside.

We see this urban sprawl first. It's a telescoping within from tower, as context and location, to room as specific spot wherein lurks the current L. But it also emphasizes the fact that we're seeing their environment/territory/universe.  At its centre, there's Near; architect and creator of the cityscape in cards.

In truth, these could be any old cards (though the minor arcana in tarot is the four suits of playing cards anyway).  However, it's made overt in the next clutch of panels that Near chose tarot with which to build his card tower's massive expanse.

After underscoring again that that Near knows everything (the panel after this states that he's 100% certain that a Death Note is involved in the latest killing spree by one labelled Kira via those denizens of the world wide web), he goes on to prioritize in importance the safety of his 'tarot card tower'.

The world he's constructed in the wake of the previous Kira tops that being introduced by this new one.

I have repeatedly used 'The World' in conjunction with Near in this Death Note manga special. This is no accidental over-usage of the words. The World is the last card of the tarot's major arcana. It's the final trump to play.  It's what there is to play for.

The World's meaning is to return to the beginning but, as the poet says, see it again for the first time.  Those in control of The World, or in a World state, recognize the signs for an environment in which they originally tramped through in all ignorance. Only this time they have the overview; experience from lesson's learned and teachers along the way; and incorporate within their own personalities the archetypes enacted by the previous arcana.

To enter The World is to complete the circle, thus finish the story.  Typically, the possessor of The World will ape the stance of The Fool from card zero. Only instead of blithely heading straight towards an unseen cliff-edge, they will note the abyss before them, smile knowingly and step right over it.  Then they fly.

It achieves a bird's eye view of everything below in manageable, surmountable, graspable miniature. All they survey, they know.  The World is their oyster; it belongs to them entirely.

Thus is Near situated here.  Warning Lidner and Rester not to 'knock over his tarot card tower' - The World he holds; built of all he mastered in the journey towards its construction - because that would indicate a brand, new world for the making.  But first, he has to double check.  Only then can he soar over his cliff-edge in complete (intellectual) ownership of all he surveys.

It has to be assumed that Near understands the symbolism and archetypes inherent in the tarot. At least, insofar as that's all we ever see from his decks, those of the major arcana.  Assuming that he hasn't just got a pack arranged precisely beside him at all times, then Near is seen picking a card at random in order to begin his contemplation of L.

As his Wammy predecessor on the original Kira case, L may be viewed as the original Fool.  The first one to undertake this journey, which Near then inherited. Therefore all cards in the tarot would pertain to L.

And to Near too, upon the same journey.  He and L together may take an overview through the way-makers and ponder the states learned, mastered and/or understood.  His insight isn't into one specific point, but them all.  If Near knew less about the tarot, then he might have opted for a single card, one which he knew intimately and/or triggered the pensive subject.

Moreover, because he inherited this case from L the original Fool, it's to L's mindset Near must return to identify the start.  There to recognize it most fully when it's viewed again from the end.  'What would L do?' pretty much delineates the boundaries of this quest; the rules of the game, determining failure or success; and what Near must consider most important of all in concluding the same right now.

If you like, L drew the lines in the sand to begin the battle.  Now Near has to return to where that was, in order to draw a line under the Kira case, so to end it.

It may be of interest to contemplate the other cards spread out around Near's Death (Light Yagami) and Fool (C-Kira) cards.  They don't actually seem all that random, when placed in conjunction with Near's known history; and the card he surveyed whilst holding the L puppet aloft might be surmised. 

First there's Strength, which is pretty much what it says on the packet.  That's the sheer endurance and brute force intellect required to survive The Wammy House for Gifted and Talented Orphans.  Followed by The Priestess - the inspiration for entering the quest, or reason to be upon that great Fool's Journey - aka Roger telling Near and Mello that L was dead and Kira was reigning unchecked. 

Both are already on the floor by the time Near picks out a card to contemplate with L.  Later panels show that to be The Hermit - the isolated light in the darkness, which both Near and Mello would have represented at that time.  In short, Near's own instance of inheriting L's Fool's quest, and bringing himself up to speed in following the clues rippling out from L's investigation. 

This is followed by The Star, which could be summarized as 'hope', i.e. when Near sourced the means to fully integrate himself into the Kira case.  Then Death - Kira - and The Fool - C-Kira. 

It could be that Near is merely hunting through a tarot deck looking for the two that will illustrate his mind-set and direct his musing, discarding all others along the way.  Or it could be that he's spelling out the story thus far, in order to reach his conclusion.  Revisiting major markers on his own journey to this moment, so to recognize the reality of the situation in which he now finds himself.

Seeing The World for the cliff-edge it is, thus finding the courage to soar above it.

It is the prerogative of the enlightened Fool, at the end of their Journey, with all their lessons learned, situations enacted and archetypal states fully realised to return to the beginning and see it again with its truths revealed.  The Wise Fool in possession of The World gets to soar beyond with a smile on their faces, enjoying a bird's eye view of all the components which make up reality. 

In mastery of their dominion, those claiming The World in tarot cards may even dictate its reality to others (though such elevated, returning Fools in symbolic reality generally feel no need to; displays of power play like that not only appear trifling but meaningless too in the face of other Fools and other realities). 

Thus Near finishes his contemplation of The World by opting out of it.  But not before he's seen pronouncing his conclusion through an overview of everything, as represented by a whole wall of tarot cards, each carrying their own component towards the whole picture.

Viewed close up, Near seems to be symbolically revisiting a similar point on his own 'true' journey; contrasting this apparently easy conclusion with one which wasn't so simple to conclude.  Compare this frame with Near's previous derogation of Light Yagami's Kira.

Then we pull away for the long shot and know that Near truly has returned to the beginning and seen it for the first time. That he really has seen and accepted his truth in The World; that he is no mere successor to L, but L himself.  With the power to disdain lesser distractions that would teach him nothing new; to reject imprisonment inside an arena begun and delineated by some other Fool; to step away from The World, over the cliff top, and into new journeys bespoke to himself.

The Hermit's illumination, with Mello in hand (literally) to spark the courage for chaotic dismantlement, quickly escalated into Near knowing to pull down his own tarot card tower, and build the whole thing anew.  After all, Near now owned The World.

Incidentally, this gets quite poignant when you realise whom Near is addressing here.  That speech bubble for his unseen partner in discussion is L.  It's the style used whenever L speaks through a monitor - over a television screen or computer - alongside a letter upon a white background. Throughout this Death Note One-Shot Special, that was Near himself speaking publicly as L.

Or put another way, this is Nate River conversing with Near right at the point when he mentally and emotionally accepts that he is L.  When he steps free of The World as delineated by L. Lawliet and embarks upon new worlds of his own discovery, and journeys of his own destiny.

A final world compares the images of Near from the beginning and end of this Death Note One-Shot Special. The front cover artwork depicts him still very much a successor to L, continuing the ways of his idol until completion of that particular journey.  Near's own voice is overtly silenced, subsumed beneath a finger-puppet of L. Himself acting entirely as L's proxy.

We travel through the story, witnessing Near's final leap from Wammy heir to the L Code to one actually in possession of it, mentally as well as physically.  There is no Lawliet by the final depiction of Near, in the manga's closing artwork.  Though Near now looks more like L than ever before, and sits confidentially beneath a shining tag proclaiming the same - backwards, forwards and in black and white.

In terms of tarot, there are characteristics in the former which suggest that of The Sun tarot card.  Blazing far more keenly than The Hermit ever could, The Sun indicates those seeing their own being, environment and all anew.  They aren't necessarily illuminated, but ARE the illumination.  "Who are you?", asked The Fool of the Sun.  "I am you." The Sun replied.

It's the final stage before Judgement calls and, beyond that, The World.

There are fewer indicators that the last piece of artwork in Death Note's canon series depicts Near as archetype of The World.  Nor can we totally dismiss it.  There are no symbol creatures in each corner, but that central topmost circle could pass for a globe, and Near himself - L-esque as he appears - could arguably be perched with his back against a cliff-top; or at least the dark unknown.

Nevertheless it's a stretch, so we'll leave this here.

Meanwhile, over on Twitter, no mention was made until Christmas Day proper, when someone still at work Tweeted, '¡Oficial! El TPB de #HitGirl llega en enero y #DeathNote regresa a México en febrero de 2016 ¡#FelizNavidadATodos!'   (Another general translation - 'It's official!  The TPB (trade paperback - or manga, to the likes of you and me) of Hit Girl is coming in January and Death Note returns to Mexico in February 2016.  Merry Christmas all!')

Then continued on earning their overtime in reTweeting the excitement of Death Note fans in reaction to it all.

To their credit, Panini staff didn't ignore such pointed queries, spending the Christmas period addressing comments amassing Facebook and Twitter.  The policy of no competing reprints was only ever a 'short or medium term' one, and Death Note is their most requested manga volume set in Mexico.  That latter reasoning repeated time and time again.

Its very popularity means that Panini Comics Mexico can make an exception for Death Note.  It's only a short manga series, already concluded and extremely well known.  No hassle really to reproduce and market.  It's all for the fans. The fans want it.  We're just here to deliver, was the general essence of Panini's response across the board.

So you see, nothing to do with the potential of a nice little earner later in 2016, when the franchise explodes under the glitz and frenzy of a Hollywood movie set to propel Death Note's popularity into the stratosphere.  In theory. It's Mexican manga collection coming out now is just a big coincidence; rewarding fans with what they want for Christmas.

Panini Comic Mexico's manga Death Note volumes will be on sale in February 2016, priced at MXN 75,00 each.