My first thought was 'Oh! Come on! It's so much more than that!', shortly followed by 'Mmm, ok, it's a fair cop.'  I don't even think that she was dismissing Death Note as being particularly crap. The very fact that it factored into her piece shows that it's worthy of comparison with a story that she obviously enjoys. Moreover, it sets Death Note up as the benchmark by which the rest of the genre is judged.

One of the reasons why Death Note so captured my imagination was the 'social thriller' aspect. The notion that power is usually seen as such a distant thing, particularly by teenage schoolboys, coupled with a sudden presentment of absolute power and what happens next, that's what drew me in. The fact that we weren't given a black and white notion of right and wrong was another biggie. So much was left for the reader to determine for themselves.

Those initial dilemmas faced by Light put me in mind of something that Mark Twain said. I haven't got the exact quotation at hand, but the paraphrase is - if we knew for certain that there were no consequences, which of us wouldn't kill? 

I like to think the answer is 'most of us', but then situations and circumstances float through your mind. And if you had a Death Note in your grasp, wouldn't you scribble down a name or two?  If you thought you could avert a war, or end abuse, or... suddenly the list extends into increasingly greyer areas.

That's the appeal of Death Note, to play out our darker fantasies against a what if and maybe world.

Then suddenly it's all about this:

But that's thrilling too!  The clash between Light and L (then Near/Mello/Matt and L) belongs in that category where we also find Sherlock and John Watson. It's about a meeting of minds, clues sought and found, red herrings thrown, geniuses trying to thwart each other at every turn.

Which isn't quite the same story as when it began, is it?

I'm not sure that we have the like of the Wammy kids in real life. At least, I hope we don't, because that institution looked like serious exploitation of vulnerable children to me.  In fact, now it's ALL about the power play! The thing that attracted me to this scenario - the Mark Twain stance on ethics by peer pressure - is no longer part of the plot.

There ARE consequences for Kira. They come in the shape of the Wammy kids with whomever else each side chooses to drag along. As pretty much everyone states time and time again, it's all about winning the competition and solving the puzzle. Matters of morality seem to slip away entirely by the close of the first arc.

So maybe Ms Ekens is right, along with whomever she's quoting. Death Note is a 'power fantasy in social thriller's clothing', and we can only assume that it was Tsugumi Ohba's fantasy, in which we all merely came along for the ride.

What do you think?

Lancaster Public Library, in Lancaster County, PA, has just announced a series of open discussions on the 'Best Books You Never Read' - and Death Note made the grade.

The manga is up there with works by William Shakespeare, Jonathan Swift, Agatha Christie, John Milton, JD Salinger and... wow! You're discussing Abelard and Heloise! If I wasn't half way across the world, I'd be joining you.

The Death Note Open Book Discussion will take place on September 17th 2014, at 4pm. The venue is Ephrata Public Library, in Ephrata.  Insofar as I can ascertain, it's a free event, though it is geared towards 13-18 year olds.

If anyone does attend, could you please point out that they've spelt Ohba wrong? Thanks!

It's been a while since I last opened the Death Note manga. I know the story intimately, so there's usually no need. But recently I thought it might be nice to see if all is quite how I remembered it.

It wasn't.

In the very first pages, I spotted something which I've missed every single time I've read Death Note. The Shinigami Ryuk may have been more deeply involved in initiating events than I'd previously suspected.

I've always read that as the fourth wall intruding. The unseen narrator foreshadowing events to come. But what if it isn't?  What if these are actually Ryuk's thoughts, and he's kicked off a proper bit of Fated destiny between Light Yagami and L?  (Presuming, of course, that those two gentlemen are the aforementioned 'chosen ones'.)

Until now, the story of Death Note seemed much more random than that. Ryuk's role largely involving dropping a spare notebook, then turning up five days later to act as an observer. He couldn't predict ahead of time who would pick up the Death Note and whether they would use it. There had certainly been no hint that he'd brought L into the frame.

However, we know very well that the Death Note can be used to control actions. What if Ryuk had written in his own notebook the following words:

'The number one student in Japan will find the Death Note and the number one detective in the world will be involved in the case.' 

He could even have written in the deaths of all concerned, as he has the Shinigami eyes and knows when the fatal moments will occur.  All he had to do was fill in a few details.

What do you think?  Did Ryuk select Light and L specifically as his 'two chosen ones', thus driving the entire story arc?  Or are we merely reading the fourth wall narrator foreshadowing events there?

Norma Editorial has announced a brand new run of the Death Note manga in Spanish.

The first two tankoubon volumes will be released for the XX Salón del Manga de Barcelona in October, with the remaining ten coming out monthly thereon.

It's already been announced that Takeshi Obata will be at the convention, so he'll be on hand to sign a few!

Also greatly rumored is the fact that How to Read (Death Note 13) will also be released at the same time, along with Another Note and L: Change the World. Spanish translations for all three have been promised since 2009 - and nearly made it for the last Salón - but time constraints have always seen them moved further down the priority queue.

Hopefully the presence of Mr Obata has shifted them right back up it again for our Spanish brethren!

Definitely on the cards are translations of another manga illustrated by Takeshi Obata.  The first two volumes of Blue Dragon will be available at the comic con, with the rest again following monthly.

Manga artist Makoto Niwano took the young Obata under his wing, mentoring him and allowing him some practical hands on experience under his guidance. It was probably on works like The Momotaroh, which was being published around that time.

By 1989, the executives at Shonen Jump felt that Takeshi's art had matured enough to give him his big break. That came with Takeshi Obata's debut series Cyborg Jii-chan G, which he both wrote and illustrated.

That was followed by Arabian Majin Boukentan Lamp (1991), Rikijin Densetsu (1993) and Ayatsuri Sakon (1995). Each of those had their own writer, Takeshi supplied only the artwork.

His name was really made in 1998, when Takeshi teamed up with Yumi Hotta for the wildly successful Hikaru no Go.

The coming of age tale earned Takeshi and Yumi a joint Shogakukan Manga Award in 1999 - one of the genre's most prestigious accolades.

Takeshi Obata's fame, whilst working Hikaru no Go, was such that he was one of the artists chosen to contribute to Adidas Manga Fever - an anthology of stories created to mark the FIFA World Cup 2002.
In addition Shueisha asked him to contribute the artwork for its manga Hajime.

In 2003, Obata and Hotta took home the Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize's Creative Award for their manga series. It must have seemed that nothing in Takeshi Obata's career could ever top thatmoment.

And that was when he was approached to illustrate Death Note.

I think it's pretty safe to assume that this has been the highest point of an already soaring career to date. It assured world wide celebrity for the artist and, amongst other things, spawned this blog. It also saw Takeshi nominated for the 2008 Eisner Award for Best Artist (comic/manga industry's equivalent to the Oscars), but he unfortunately lost out to Chris Ware for Acme Novelty Library #18. (Who?)

In addition to the main manga serialization of Death Note, Takeshi Obata also provided the cover artwork for its spin-off novels: Another Note and L Save the World. But we won't hold that against him.

Since Death Note, he's never been out of work. There was
Blue Dragon: Ral Ω Grado (2006), Hello Baby (2007), Urooboe Uroboros! (2008), Otter No 11 (2010) and now All You Need Is Kill (2014). 

In the middle of all that, he teamed up again with his Death Note co-creator Tsugumi Ohba to produced their how-to-be-a-manga-writer-and-artist guidebook disguised as a manga story - Bakuman. It debuted in 2008 and, though its never received anything like the attention of Death Note, it's been fairly well read.

And that's about it! It turns out that there wasn't much to learn behind the art after all, unless anyone else here has any facts or gossip that they want to share. In the meantime, here is Takeshi Obata doing what he does best.

Lucky Death Note fans in Japan will be able to buy the re-issued manga from today.

Shueisha have published these versions to tie in with the 10th Anniversary of Death Note first appearing in Shonen Jump. But other than the the novelty value, there's nothing much to recommend it.

The story told is precisely the same as other editions of the Death Note manga. There are no new chapters nor tweaks in the original story.

However, each volume - which will be released monthly - will come with a bespoke character card.

They'll add up to seven overall. When placed side by side, those cards create a long mini-poster. The same effect will be achieved by lining up the front covers of the manga volumes too.

In addition, these volumes are available in eBook form, as well as the usual paper editions.

Anyone tempted?

It's Friday, so let's indulge in some serious wishful thinking.

We all have our favourite characters from Death Note, and our wish that certain plot-lines could have played out differently. But what if you could do something about it, and make that canon?

Moreover, what if it was up to you what official Death Note products were released? How would you jump, if you could suddenly direct the whole franchise?

Imagine for a moment that you notice a strange notebook lying in your path. You pick it up and read the rules. Whatever is written in the Wish List Note will happen in reality within the Death Note franchise.

Always wanted an edition of the manga that retells the whole tale from the point of view of L?  No problem! One quick scribbling inside your book (with all due pauses to eat potato chips) and Tsugami Obha is about to ring the publishers with a great new idea. Takeshi Obata is independently sketching ideas for how it might look.

Got your heart set on a live action movie, which follows the second arc precisely? Scribble... scribble... scribble... It's going to happen!

Really desire an official range of cupcakes, each with a different character's picture on top? Write down the details in your Wish List Note and it shall be so.

Go on, use your imagination.  How would you use the Wish List Note to become the God/Goddess of this New Death Note Franchise World?

Now the dust appears to have finally settled on the Death Note bonanza, I thought it would be useful to have a quick check through all that was on offer.

Death Note's 10th Anniversary was celebrated, with much hype, on March 3rd 2014. The fandom received the following goodies and event notifications:

• Death Note Real Escape Game. This is what the much-vaunted website counted down towards. But it's only available in two Japanese cities.
• Online Mini-Story. Playing out over Facebook and on the website, this was just a promotional event for the above. It didn't affect the canon.
• Reissue of the Death Note Manga. 10th Anniversary editions of all seven volumes will be in the shops on March 18th 2014.
• Digital Death Note Manga. Two online (and downloadable) versions of the full story are available. One is in full colour from start to finish.
• Death Note Facebook page launched. This social networking portal is in Japanese. It keeps folk abreast of all new developments in the Death Note franchise.
• Smartphone App for Death Note fans. Play the Real Escape Game on the move.
• Death Note as a Musical Stageshow. Now Kira et all really will be all singing and dancing.

There was quite a lot there, particularly for fans in Death Note's home country Japan.  Yet I can't help concluding that there was a lot of fuss over really not very much at all.

What do you think?

I'm not going to lie. This is the most exciting up-date for me so far.

All of the Death Note manga have been officially digitalized and free previews placed online. We get to see the Jump Comic volumes in a choice of two formats: as published, or in full colour.

FULL COLOUR! That doesn't mean a few pages at the beginning and the end. That means every single solitary panel of each and every page.  Colourings just got canon.

Which further means that after nearly a decade of the entire Death Note fandom depicting Matt with red hair and green eyes, he's just officially become a brunette. With a red and black striped shirt.

As yet, the digital editions of the Death Note manga are only in Japanese. But that's never taken very long to sort out. Plus, let's face it, we've all got enough copies by now in our own languages, that the teams of scanlation angels hardly need to rush themselves on our account.

Anyone going to rush to get their cyber paws on these versions?  I'm counting myself as a yes there.

What scenes and/or characters are you most looking forward to seeing in colour?  And Matt fans (of which we are legion, expect us), will you be altering ten years of mental images to match his now canon black hair?

For the record, no, I am not going through ten fan-fiction novels to change his tresses. Feel free to copy them onto your own computers and run through with an editing program, if you really wish that to conform to canon. (We all ignored the anime sludge-green-brown hair colouring anyway.)

In probably the most widely foreseen up-date of the day, Shueisha has announced a reissuing of Death Note manga in 10th anniversary editions.

Whole new legions of Death Note fans will be created (and decade old ones persuaded to part with their money to maintain their collections) with the same story told over seven volumes.

As an added incentive, the books will include limited edition goodies like a 'Kira Card' (similar to that of L in How To Read Volume 13), and apparently a composite pull out poster too.

Readers will have to purchase all seven volumes in order to complete their montage poster of Death Note characters.

To my mind, this is highly unnecessary given that we've already got the original Death Note manga, plus the Black Editions, plus the limited edition reissues which came out with the collectors' items figures... need I go on?

But if you're tempted anyway, the first two 10th Anniversary Edition Death Note manga volumes will be in Japanese stores on March 18th 2014.

No doubt they will then swiftly be translated into every other language, shortly to be on international bookshelves too.

By now the whole Death Note fandom is agog at the notion that something new is coming. But what is it?

The first hint was posted in Shueisha's Jump Remix of the Death Note manga. In the fifth edition, an advertisement was posted on the underside of the fly cover. It stated that there was a 'special project' coming soon to mark Death Note's 10th Anniversary.

That was followed up quite sharply by the appearance of an intriguing website.

The site displayed a countdown towards March 3rd 2014 - the same date heralded in the manga advert as the launch date of the 'special project'. The Death Note website featured a familiar black notebook, with the legend warning us that ' 'If you touch this note, your memory will revive''.

Naturally every Death Note fan in the known universe touched it. It would take more than the cautionary tale exhibited by Raito Yagami to see us off.

Yet all we got for our troubles was an image of Ryuk flashing into view. All...

Mmm... so what it's all about?  The main buzz on the internet seems to be that a new edition of the original manga will be issued. But that's been done several times during the intervening ten years. It's already happening with the Jump Remix right now.

Others have guessed that the Death Note anime will be remade. Does it really warrant that? The extant one isn't very old, and it's hardly dated. It's just about perfect as it is.

Could it be a new story being written as we muse in anxious anticipation? Perhaps a stand-alone tale updating us on the fortunes of those left alive, or following through on ambiguous clues that Light himself is now a shinigami. Maybe even a whole follow on series, wherein another person picks up a Death Note and Near scrambles a squad to hunt that new Kira down.

Or another live action movie following another tangent not covered in canon?

The most potentially disappointing scenario I've heard is that it's merely a countdown to an official announcement of Death Note the Musical. But we already know about that. It wouldn't be any surprise at all.

How about you? Have you any major guesses that haven't already been covered here? There's surely little that it could be!