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Mello and Matt Fan-Fiction It Matters Series Collected in Omnibus eBook Editions... and Indexed!

1/6/2016

5 Comments

 
MRSJeevas It Matters Series Vol 1 chronological omnibus Mello and Matt
It Matters: Complete Series Vol 1 by Matti (aka MRSJeevas)
- Download the free eBook (totally free of charge)
- Use software like Calibre to switch the ePub into the format of your choice

This is directed towards the Mell0/Matt fandom.  The rest of you just talk amongst yourselves for a while.

How would you like every novel, drabble, short story and scrap from the Matti!Universe tidied chronologically into omnibus editions?  And how would you like it if those tales - full and partial - were all properly indexed?

Matti knows that you would, because she's been repeatedly asked for something of the ilk by various readers of her fan-fiction over the years. Though the index part is a bit of a bonus.

The impetus for finally doing this thing came when those on the He Moves Me Differently (The Fan-Fiction of MRSJeevas) forum decided to read every tale in order, following the internal timeline to see how it all panned out as a whole.

Feel free to join them there.

Tipped off, Matti quietly opened Sigil and began work.  The first volume was completed from scratch, including much hands on imperative tatting and learning via ALL of the mistakes, that the thing might receive that cross-referenced index.

Stephen Gevanni surely didn't do so well, when he spent a night copying a Death Note from start to finish. At least he didn't have to teach himself forgery first!

The free eBook It Matters: Complete Series Vol 1 covers every tale right up until the end of the '90s.  Some have never been made public before, having languished with their existence forgotten and unknown. 

Vol 2 will be 2000-2009;  Vol 3 - 2010-the present day.  Eventually the plan is to amalgamate that trilogy into one big, hefty, totally indexed cyber-tome that could figuratively batter binary to death.

You're welcome.
5 Comments

Mello and Misa Make Top Five Most Stylish Anime Characters According to Yahoo

27/5/2016

5 Comments

 
Misa Amane featuring in a Yahoo stylish anime characters article
Writing a fashion feature for Yahoo Style this week, Zalora considered the whole of anime past and present to produce the most fabulously attired characters in them.

The resultant '5 Anime Characters Whose Style We Want to Steal' (Yahoo, Zalora, May 23rd 2016) included no less than TWO dramatis personae from Death Note anime!  Complete with tips on how to replicate their look.

While Misa Amane topped the feature as the character selected to star in the banner, she came in a mere fourth anime-wide for overall fashion sense.  Beating her hands down was that self-confessed 'best dresser who died like a dog' Mihael Keehl, aka Mello.
Mello scored the number two spot - which should be a cause for triumph given the competition, but seems sadly par for the course for poor Mihael Keehl.  The old world's perennial runner-up.

Only it wasn't Near at number one this time.  Pipping all others to gain the accolade as most sought after anime look for viewers was Uta from Tokyo Ghoul.

The writer had this to say about Death Note Mello's fashion style:
If there is anyone who can accessorize a chocolate bar, it is definitely Death Note’s teenage delinquent, Mello.

Covered from head to toe in a faux leather vest, frayed latex pants and leather gloves, Mello is not afraid to sport religious jewellery despite being a member of an organized crime gang.

Clearly inspired by Johnny Depp’s Willy Wonka, Mello’s perfect golden bob stays in place even on his worst days.
~ Zalora, Yahoo Style, May 23rd 2016

Zalora had this to say about emulating Mello's look:
How to adopt this look:  If you have long flowing tresses, this look can still work for you!

Find a faux black blouse, but be sure to wear bottoms that are not frayed at the edges. While sporting shiny leather pants might cause your legs to melt due to sunny Singapore’s humid climate, you can replace this with bottoms of any other colour, or of another material.

If a top is nowhere to be found, a black faux leather dress is always an option.
~ Zalora, Yahoo Style, May 23rd 2016
Stylish anime character Mello from Death Note
Sound about right to you?   Or do you disagree with the Yahoo writer's judgement on Top Five fashionable anime characters and/or what has been written about them?  Who would you have chosen?  And what would you have said in justification of those choices?

Read more at the original posting, including why Misa made number four and how you can copy her style too.

Posted during

Misa Misa month
Read More
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Feedback on the Matsuda's Theory Correction

27/5/2016

4 Comments

 
The reader survey held recently on Death Note News also pointed to another issue:  speculation and fact can get blurred when the theoretical is being reported alongside actual news stories.

An example was given regarding an article on Matsuda's Theory, wherein a reader had commented to state that the theory wasn't possible in one regard. Yet the piece itself was never updated to indicate this.  It has been now:
Death Note News amendment screenshot
Passage inserted into Death Note News article before Matsuda's Theory about Mello
The point in a more general sense has been taken on board and our writers are going to try to highlight precisely what is fact and what is musing personally upon a facet of Death Note canon and its wider universe.

Hopefully this satisfies the querent at this time.
4 Comments

Death Note News Editor Feedback on our Reader Survey and Other Updates

9/5/2016

2 Comments

 
Many thanks to all who took the time to voice their thoughts on Death Note News' Month of... feature. In addition to airing viewpoints on various items relating to the running of the site, and how we deliver content to you, via the completion of last month's reader survey.

All comments have now been read. Some whilst blushing and feeling suddenly very coy; others forming a cringing addendum to our discussion agenda and/or directly onto a lengthening To Do list.  All were very helpful and wonderfully appreciated upon receipt.

There were a few pointers requiring acknowledgement, answers, action or announcements, including the results of who will be featured at the centre of future Death Note Month of... events. I'm here to bring you fully into the loop.

Known Issues, Omissions and Pointers for the Death Note News Website

Death Note Mello and Matt
First the problematic parts, or things to be actioned here, to get them out the way:
  • Feedly RSS reader isn't picking up news articles very well - Matti to look into it;
  • Death Note TV drama analyses were never finished - another one for Matti;
  • Articles on Death Note News should clearly differentiate between canon fact/fanon speculation, particularly those submitted for Month of... features, which tend towards the theoretical - added to agenda for editorial meeting;
  • Comment on the Matsuda theory article proved canonically impossible the one re Near controlling Mello via a Death Note. The article should be altered, or a note added within the write-up, to reflect this - Orangepunch to do;
  • Not clear in the FAQ how one might join the Death Note News team - answer below, plus Matti to add to the FAQ.

Hopefully we didn't miss any and you're happy with the actions!  Please do leave a comment below, if you have views to add to anything highlighted above, or spot something which didn't make the list.

How to Join the Death Note News Team

Contact the Death Note News Team
Ask.  We're always good for welcoming new writers, or other talented folk, into our team.  If it's a regular column that you wish to pursue, then hunt down Matti to discuss what you have in mind.  Either way, our contact page has a plethora of ways to contact us.  In this instance, an email (via the form) is probably best.

Whatever Happened to Those Voice Actor Interviews We Were Promised?

Everything has been collated, tidied up, formatted and emailed to the requisite Death Note actors.  Each acknowledged receipt of the questions and indicated their intent to answer as many as possible.
  • Brad Swaile has since sent his apologies for the delay. Life has suddenly become very busy for him, and there ARE rather a lot of questions that were asked.  He does still plan to return his answers eventually.  Until then it's a patience Padawain moment.
  • Sergio Zamora was full of enthusiasm and beginning to work through them last we checked.  We're slightly afraid that we've overwhelmed him along the way. No reason to believe that we won't get his responses back sooner or later.
  • Kim Hasper is currently exchanging emails with our German language translator, Jo Coburn. Unfortunately he MAY have to drop out.
  • Vincent Tong is a complete sweetheart, who gave up an hour of his life to answer questions asked by us on your behalf.  We have it in the bag.  Well, hard-drive.  It could go up right now, if only the sole Death Note News team-member with any skill in video editing would stop getting ill and edit the video instead.  We hold out hope that it will happen sometime this week. Poor love recorded it weeks ago, while the monthly focus was still upon his character Touta Matsuda! Sorry, Vincent.
Vincent Tong interview for Death Note News

The lovely smile of Vincent Tong, all unknowing that he'd be waiting over a month for Death Note News to actually feature his interview!
In short, we're confident that all (but possibly one) remain winging their respective ways to us and will be made public quickly thereon.

Results of the Reader Survey Regarding the Month of... Feature

Death Note L Reading TV drama
We're already three days late with Month of Misa.  Nine, if you count the original intention for it to begin on the first of May and continue through to its end.

However, it appears from the responses given in the reader survey that none of you are too worried about things like that.

You'd rather have well-written articles with every contributor's work included, than any strict adherence to the dates.

You also almost unanimously fed back that one topic per month is perfect; running them bimonthly not at all a welcome suggestion (mostly because momentum would be lost); and you're happy with how we're choosing the subject of each focus thus far.

That said, there were some great ideas thrown into the mix too.  One person thought it might be nice to choose the topics a month or two in advance via readers' poll.
Another individual thought having a 'what if' month would be interesting, as in 'what would have happened to the characters if Light Yagami hadn't received his Death Note, thus the Kira case never occurred?'   I have to say that my imagination has been running overtime in pondering, since reading it posed there.  But could we pull off a whole month of it?   Probably.  Maybe another format would work better.  It's one of those added to the staff agenda for mulling over.

Nearly all of you indicated that yes, you would like to see a Month of... focus being the forthcoming Death Note movie, released at the end of October 2016.  Of those, one person voted for November to be the ideal month.  The rest of you didn't mind, as long as it happens.

All excepting the single respondent who said no full stop to that and indeed everything about the Month of... events.  He/she really didn't like it and wished it would go away.  Your views have been read and noted.  Thank you for them.  Unfortunately, you were outvoted by your peers.

Everything in, it was overwhelmingly positive and extremely helpful.   Even the person who hated the feature told us nicely!  And we were really pleased with the wide array of places where people are finding Death Note News. Particularly as one source was apparently the Archangel Mello pointing this way with his fiery sword.

As for the one who asked if being in the Mello/Matt fandom counts - YES!  Yes, it does.  Most important part of the whole Death Note fandom Mello and Matt.  Though I might be biased, given what I write.

Forthcoming Characters to be Featured in Death Note News Month of... Focus

Lots of fabulous suggestions here.  We had Mello, Beyond Birthday, Mikami, Sayu, ALL live-action tellings together, L, Shingami (collectively), Naomi Misora, the LABB murders, and the movie thumbs up for a month closer to the release date.

We've decided to start with the one garnering the most votes in that survey.  Admittedly to the mild surprise of all here, though we're game for everything. Bring it on!   Therefore I can announce that June and July look like this, with more made public when we've finished tatting with the list:
Month of Naomi Misora on Death Note News

Coming June 2016

Ms Misora not only received the most votes overall, but she also managed to beat Beyond Birthday by a single point. Hence the surprise.  Then again she does make quite a habit of thwarting of poor BB at the last minute!
Go Naomi!  You won your month, fair and square.
Death Note News Mikami Month

Coming July 2016

Mr Mikami's high rating in the straw poll of suggestions was less surprising. We already hold in waiting two pieces of content about him, submitted by different readers, both long before he'd even been considered for a Month of... feature!
By tomorrow, we should have their submission and questionnaire pages up and ready.  In the meantime, do feel free to send in things using generic tools for contributing content, or mentally amending questions pertaining to another character asked of Death Note fans writing, creating art or donning cosplay.

Also by tomorrow, we should actually start Death Note News' Month of Misa Amane.  Three items in already.  Get a head start on the crowds by chucking in any relevant content now.
2 Comments

Death Note Tarot Tales V: Kira's Magician Versus the Wammy's Magi - Divine Wisdom and Poetic Justice in Death Note

8/5/2016

1 Comment

 

Every epic journey must begin
with a step upon its routes, roads and Ryuk directed by-ways.

Every great destiny must have a destination.

Explored against
the back-drop of Death Note,
the Major Arcana Tarot cards
feature the realm of The Magician

~ written by our guide into
all things esoteric
Tarot Mikami

Death Note Tarot Tales on Death Note News
Welcome seekers after sama, kana and qi!  You won't be the first to want to reverse your life's fortunes; otherwise embrace words to change the world; take steps to transform yourself into a hero; divert humanity away from its current perverse course; perfect its core that all may sing together - refraining from discordance, aligned in peace and harmony; gain insight into the working of the universe; realize your dreams; reach for the stars; sail across the cosmos and converse with the divine; enchant and charm Kannon at the gates of wisdom; seize manna from the Gods; invoke matter from the kether; traverse the mysteries and become God of this New World.

It's not unknown.

But no matter what foolish idea inflames your passion and ignites your will.  Before you take your first steps onto the path of making it real, you will need some guidance.  Sound the intro, maestro!  And enter The Magician.

The Many Roles of the Tarot Magician

The Magician Tarot Card
The second card of the Major Arcana starts the story proper.  It stands at number one, as The Fool is zero.  Without meeting or becoming The Magician, the Fool is merely a broiling mess of notions, running around like a headless chicken with no direction in which to pursue them. 

If nothing else, the Magician is a doorkeeper - providing access to another (or the wider) world, opening a gateway onto an appropriate path, or acting as a way-marker signing the route to take.  Usually this role contextualizes the bigger picture and sets out the destination.  The Wise Man is concerned with destiny.  Though the advice should be taken indiscriminately.

The Magician isn't necessarily on your side.  The guidance given or the way forward illuminated might be a service provided in all innocence and altruism. Nevertheless, he/she has an agenda of their own and the knowledge to manipulate others too. 

They may play a dual role - making Mafia profits sky-rocket, whilst diverting its resources into capturing a Death Note - and could as easily be trickster instead of consigliere. 

Or a charlatan.  This all-knowing being may present themselves as God, then turn out to merely be a man and a murderer at that.  Worse still, a serial killer implicating you in the guise of the great detective L. 

But the differentiation isn't always that clear cut either.  Nothing so black and white.

The Magician juggles many roles, generally playing all the same time; multi-tasking meaning depending upon who is being addressed.  One person's terrorist being another's freedom fighter and all that, while the manipulation might be to save yourself from yourself, or to aid a greater cause.

Either way, The Magician will certainly give our hero something to ponder and a route (or twelve) to take next.  There's the potential for destiny-laden adventure and opportunities lessons to be learned here, if only never to be that gullible again.

The Meaning of Magician in the Major Arcana

Christians are most familiar with The Magician as the Magi - Three Wise Men in modern versions of the Bible; twelve Pharisee priests in the closest we have to the original - who visited the newborn Christ with gifts. 

For everyone else, the name has largely denigrated to the level of sleight-of-hand illusionists and tricksters on stage, or grown fantastical in figures from stage or literature like Gandalf, Merlin and Obi-Wan Kenobi.

It used to mean so much more.  The hints of it permeate our lexicon.  We glimpse their greatness in words sharing the same root, like magnate, mega, magnitude, magnus, magus and majesty.  That last also containing a hint of their skill as spokespeople, mediators, lecturers, teachers and orators - 'gest', as in 'jester', 'gesticulate', 'gesture' and the 'gist' of a story.  It comes from Middle English 'to recite a tale', originating in Latin 'geste' or 'gesta' 'to perform deeds; to act'.  By the time it hit 13th century France, 'geste' meant to 'narrate an heroic tale'.

Stories could (and often still do) command the will of a people.  Which is why governments today are so keen to pressure the press into toeing the party line.  In Medieval Italy and France, which is where our earliest extant tarot cards were made, the majesty of magicians led to them adjudicating in delicate matters, acting as counsellors or speaking on behalf of less learned individuals.

The Magicians as magisters, in fact, or magistrates.  That 'gist' sometimes turning into its other form of 'iurare' to bring us to jury, and conjurer; or 'joculate' as joker or juggler.  Wise counsellor or trickster indeed.  Furthermore, the French word grammairien referred to 'learned men; magicians', whose ability to know the power and perfect usage of words gave us 'grammar'.

But akin to magician is also master, maestro, mahatma, maharaji, maharishi, yogi, guru, the one who knows.  The Japanese would call them dai-sensai, or O-sensai, doshi, Rōshi, or know them as sifi.  In addition to great wisdom and skill, The Magician brings into play the tools that the Fool might need t0 embark upon their journey.
Major Arcana Magician card
In ancient Persia, the Magos were the learned members of the priestly caste, adept at astrology.  They could give you the overview of your life and destiny, as it was written in the stars, taking in the knowledge of what constellation was on the ascendency or ruling within a certain house. It was up to you what you did with that information and how you let it guide your lives.

Over the centuries, their spiritual descendants have been known as the adepts in a variety of other fortune-telling, mind expanding, soul perfecting or perception enhancing skills.  For example, those magnificent seekers delving into the Kabbalah/Cabala/Qabala as scholars, scryers, practitioners, occultists, alchemists, diviners, philosophers, Hermetic code-breakers and ceremonial magicians.

Enlightened beings who know The Way and what it might mean for you.  But if it's shared - and done so entirely, selectively or else strewn with misinformation - and how that translates into relevancy for your own life's destiny, only a Fool can know in passing through the realm of the Magi.

The Magi In All Their Guises: Major Arcana Death Note's The Magician Card

Death Note: The Magician Tarot Card
Tarot Magician Death Note Rules
Death Note Enlightenment The Magican
The Death Note itself can be seen as falling right into the realm of The Magician.  In fact, it's practically the Three Magi represented here in the notebook, as its role is considered in relation to Light Yagami.

Firstly Light has to find the shinigami's notebook, which serves the dual purpose of opening his eyes to the existence of a world beyond his own and highlighting its possibilities. Hitherto unconsidered (or disbelieved) realities are presented as a pathway upon which to forge his own destiny.  It's the Tarot Magician as gatekeeper, signpost and luminary of higher knowledge.

However, its also the Trickster, or Charlatan, insofar as the falling Death Note serves Ryuk's agenda first and foremost. Its presence on Earth is set to alleviate the shinigami's boredom.  Light will pick it up and, primarily believing it an elaborate prank, use it to the detriment of his own future.  Not only will it curse his living years, but condemn his eternal being into the dissolution of Mu.  This ultimate destination for Death Note users means that a destiny is foisted upon Light Yagami, manipulated by ignorance and curiosity into foolishly using it without fully translating all of the rules beforehand.

The Death Note wasn't on his side, nor against him.  It's an item; a thing without judgement nor partiality.  It serves an agenda encapsulated by itself.  ('I am that I am' is the So'ham Sanskrit manta; also viewed as the Word of God in Christian mysticism; or 'As above, so below; so below, as above' in Hermetic teachings.  All very much part of The Magician's inner knowledge, and here beautifully descriptive of the Death Note too.)

Secondly, Light actually reads the rules written inside the Death Note.  Here the shinigami notebook becomes The Magician as a teacher; illuminating the arcane knowledge needed to utilize this supernatural tool.  The rules themselves inspire possible ways in which Light may now traverse in order to fulfil his projected destiny.

Even more dramatically comes that third moment of the notebook of death as The Magician in Death Note.  That's when the touch of it allows Light's mind to access his memories, previously locked away through rejection of the artefact.  Perhaps it's not quite what the ancient Magos would view as accessing the higher self, but it serves the same purpose within the storyline.  In an instant, Light Yagami's ignorance is dissolved, when the doors of perception are well and truly opened upon his past.  His destination now reached, just as planned.

The Magician as Death Note's Gatekeepers and Arbiters of Destiny

Ryuk as The Magician Death Note Tarot
Ryuk is another obvious contender for The Magician's Death Note tarot representative.  His appearance directs the plot in a myriad of ways, not least because it clarifies Light Yagami's overview and destiny.

Just like his notebook, the shinigami confirms the existence of previously unknown layers to reality, broadening Light's horizons and information base. 

Ryuk stands as guide and gatekeeper to the shinigami realm.  Not only can he speak for and translate the Gods, he is one.

Whilst denying Light access to any such services, unless the whim of the moment takes him.  Because he can.

The shinigami also acts as arbiter of knowledge concerning eternity and deals available to human users of Death Notes, which he does deign to share.  Albeit selective in his choice of snippets to pass on, and deliberately obtuse in the timing of all such communication.

It's too amusing for him not to cause maximum frustration in thus trolling his human Death Note user. 

Which all fits in completely with the reason for him being there, performing his role as Earthly sage and sometime mentor. Openly not on anyone's side - but that of his own amusement - Ryuk is the Trickster Mage personified. 

His entire performance is dedicated to his own agenda, aligning with those of others only where each party's motives/tactics run in tandem. Or he's persuaded that the potential for entertainment is strong.

The Death God is, after all, quite bored and he's here to alleviate said tedium. Everything that occurs must factor that in first, as top priority, because it's certainly the only reason Ryuk is acting in any capacity right now.

L's Messenger Mage Watari: Herald, Spokesperson and Point of Contact

Tarot Death Note Watari as The Magician

As gatekeeper to L, Watari's intervention at the Interpol meeting is pure Magician territory.

Not only does it alert all present to the avenue of inquiry now opening up due to the detective's interest in the Kira case, but it allows Matsuda - thus us too - to discover L's existence in the first place.

Thus the Fool takes the first step out of innocence, ignorance and a lack of context for the world.

For the veteran law enforcement agents there, Watari represents destiny in a very practical sense.  They don't need to discuss the way forward in their investigation now, because L is involved.   He IS the way forward; an option for the situation to be passed up to a higher authority. 

(Sneak preview for a later major arcana card - The Hierophant describes L for those with knowledge and experience of his work.)

For Soichiro and Matsuda, Watari's position is doorkeeper to destiny in a much more ethereal way.

To one it will prove downright Fateful, while the other will reach the proposed destination (catching Kira) changed beyond recall.

Destiny's Magister: Roger Ruvie, The Wammy House Ringmaster Tolls Part Two

Roger Ruvie as the Magician in Death Note tarot
One day, Wammy House warden Roger Ruvie will be Watari too.  His role will encapsulate The Magician in just the same way as Quillsh Wammy, as described above.

Nevertheless, in that Fateful moment imaged as tarot arcana (left), Roger already illustrates several aspects of The Magican card.  Each face or facet exhibited simultaneously.

For a start, he's a messenger, delivering the news that the children's idol and surrogate father are both dead.  Divining correctly the information received from a transmission's ending.  Liaison, wisdom, enlightenment, all wrapped up in that single act.

He's doing so as Wammy's House administrator - which has its root in 'ministry/minister' and from there becomes entrenched in symbolism linked with The Magician.  Minister meaning to 'act on behalf of a higher authority', hence a minister of the state in politics or the church (it literally meant 'priest' in Medieval Latin). It gets its secretarial sense from the French, where it became 'servant; overseer; watcher; manager'.

But may also relate to inspiration of a more tuneful note, hence minstrel and musician are both cognitive words. Each obviously pertaining to The Fool, yet The Magician too, as the latter can be former in receipt of self-awareness, context or knowledge, thus driving their own actions.

It all becomes much more blatant, when another cognate is brought into the mix - magistrate or magister.  One who directs or adjudicates; making decisions; laying down the law.

Roger is authorized to tell a twelve and fourteen year old that their idolized foster sibling and beloved guardian are dead. Yet nothing of sentimentality here. His job is to collect children from around the world, bring them to The Wammy House and train them as potential successors to L.

His results are majestic. After coldly dismissing Mello's emotional outburst, the first question asked was which of them was chosen as heir. No querying the fact that kids are about to be sent into an arena which killed two adults, one purportedly the world's most genius detective.  No options considered.

This Wammy Ringmaster magisterially sends both kids to fight round two; their destination seeming less destined than Fated, with such news extolled like passing bells, louder than ever tonight.

Mello the Consigliere: Death Note Mafia Mage with a Dual Agenda

Mello exemplifies The Magician with a dual agenda, while acting as consigliere within the Mafia family headed by Rod Ross.

It's similar to the previously examined outlook of that other magnate Ryuk, but Mello's motivational duality holds some important differences.

The Magician acts by manipulating an individual's lack of essential knowledge or wisdom.  However this doesn't necessary occur every time, only when it suits our canny counsellor's alternate agenda to do so.

Sometimes the concerns will align for both advisor and their directed individual; sometimes not. Regardless, the interests of the latter do not factor into the guidance given by this Mage - whether in counsellor mode, or as councillor representing their client's views and speech to others.

Consigliere (or consigliori) - Mello's position in the Mafia - meant both by the way.  Though technically describing solely the counsel given to the Don, consiglieri (in manga and in life) also fulfil many other roles ruled by The Magician.  Including, but not limited to, mediating in conflict; liaising on the Don's behalf with important contacts and/or authority figures (judges, police etc.); and keeper/archivist of secrets for the entire Family's, so to retain an overview and warn if trouble may be caused, for example, by a capo acting rashly through ignorance of matters concerning another.

Mello seems to be a good consigliere.  At one point Rod Ross is moved to comment that the genius teen has never been wrong in any decision made since joining their Family.

However, no-one should lose sight of reality. Mello was just using the Mafia to achieve his own goals.  

The wisdom imparted by Mello as consigliere causes Rod Ross's profits to sky-rocket.  Yet those and all other available resources are soon diverted into serving Mello's ambition to secure a Death Note. 

After Mello achieves his goal, thus placing a shinigami notebook in the hands of his Mafia family, all agendas probably fell in line, shared and indivisible. For a moment, indeed it seemed to Ross et al that they had absolute power.

And then, in the next moment, they ended up dead.  Mello using the lives of the last ones standing to make good his own escape.
Mafia Mello Death Note Magician

Sakura TV as the Charlatan: Showmanship Masquerading as Wisdom

Death Note Tarot The Magician Sakura TV Charlatan
When Sakura TV appoints itself as the voice of Kira, it's an attempt to appear as The Divinely Ordained or Enlightened Magician.  

As studio boss and anchor-man, Demegawa's overall aim is to trick unsuspecting individuals into believing the station has some conferred higher knowledge. Therefore attempting to gain the same trust or power given to The Magician.

Or in this case, boost ratings.

The Magician can well act as spokesperson for the people/individuals in dealings with authority, or magistrate dilemmas and/or direct juries.  They can certainly translate the divine for those less versed in the sacred mysteries.  However, its beholden upon us all to beware false prophets.

In its more negative (or domineering/pompous) aspect, our spokesperson Mage might not say what we wished them to convey.  

Think politicians declaiming sentiments which make us cringe or cry, all in our name; or the journalist who twists your words, yet 'quotes' you all the same, in pursuit of a sensational story bearing no relation to what actually occurs; or the parent/guardian/teacher expressing their own views as if they were automatically shared by yourself, ignoring or over-riding any attempt at dissent.

While Kira may experience Sakura TV's antics (in the persona of Demegawa) as the above, every other viewer is watching a charlatan or mountebank in action.  A pseudo-priest or trickster mantis preying upon the gullibility of their television audience turned congregation.

On the flip side, even the False Magician may inadvertently act as teacher.  The lesson today from Sakura being not to believe everything you hear on TV.  

(Particularly when tabled as a Trump; donkey imagery warns us off, as seen below The Magician's board in some ancient tarot decks.  Mistake the babbling showmanship of this charlatan for wisdom, and your only sure destiny is to be made feel like an ass.)

Kiyomi Takada: Enlightened Divine Messenger of Death Note

I don't remember who said it, but the quotation snagged in my mind.

Someone was told that David Icke - the footballer turned commentator and write - was now telling all and sundry that he was the Son of God.  There was a pause in which the informant gleefully awaited  the witty put-down that was sure to follow concerning the subject of their gossip.

"Well?" The other slowly asked.  "Has anyone checked if he is?"

And therein lies the rub.  How does one verify such a claim?  And if we can't, then how do we know for sure whether they're a mounteback babbling lies, or insane, or someone Cassandra cursed to be disbelieved in all the divine truth they tell?

The Magi would know.   It tends to be them. Whether reading the portents in divination; searching arcane knowledge to uncover higher truths; or acting as intermediaries between the Gods and us, as the priestly caste or ministering on career paths.

Just occasionally, we get the real thing.  Magos aglow with the numen nod - enchanters, prophets, seers, the chosen and invokers; attuned to the Great Music and entrancing with utterances lifted from source; merely mediums through which the universe flows.

Or television anchor woman/newscaster, who just happens to be the right person, at the right time, with a matching warped sense of morality and all the right contacts to be the Messiah. 

The divine intermediary aspect of The Magician is represented quite literally by Death Note's Kiyomi Takada, twofold.

She performs her role as Messenger of the God(s) in that Takada is the actual, publicly appointed spokesperson for Kira; while also being the conduit that allows both Kiras - Light Yagami and Teru Mikami - to communicate in open conversation.

No charlatan this.  Blessed Takada performs with gravitas; notably refined before this even began.  Now perceived by the ever-growing faithful as gentle, radiant, the real thing and absolutely full of grace. Buying into and believing all Light says; mind mired and amazed beyond all rationality. 

But then it was always thus:
Death Note Tarot The Magician Takada
Quem Deus perdere vult, dementat prius; quem di diligunt, adolescens moritu.
Those the Gods will destroy, they first make mad; and whom the Gods love dies young.

Le Bateleur Matsuda: Sleight of Hand Illusionist in Death Note

The Magician Matsuda - Death Note's Le Bateleur
Le Bateleur is the aspect of The Magician most familiar to us in the modern world; give or take a few fantasy movie mages, and their counterpart skills offered as an option for gamers.

This is the stage magician; the conjurer; the sleight-of-hand trickster; the illusionist; the abracadabra, now you see it, now you don't, bateleur drawing in crowds and thrilling them with misdirection, misinformation, smoke and mirrors distraction, before delivering all enrapt and gasping with awe to that climatic moment of The Prestige.

Le Bateleur - and its cognates Il Bagatto, El Bagatella, Bateleuse - refers to this tarot figure's stick, rod or, ta-daaaa, wand.

This aspect of The Magician appears throughout the Death Note series. There's even a whole chapter, in Death Note 13: How to Read, devoted to explaining all of the tricks inserted into the storyline by Tsugumi Ohba.

The Death Note Magician tarot card we've chosen to depict Il Bagatto in action features Matsuda faking his own death.  Before a stunned crowd of Yotsuba corporate executives, he pulls off The Prestige in garnering their belief that the dressed up Aiber far below on the ground is Matsuda's mangled corpse.  Meanwhile, Touta sits safely on a mattress a mere one floor below.

However, we could just as easily picked any of the dozens of scenarios, whereby Death Note's conjurers wash over truth with a new reality, attested by witnesses swearing on oath that they watched throughout.

Like when Light becomes aware he is being watched by surveillance cameras. He quickly acts to manipulate the evidence by a tricky sleight-of-hand illusion.

To the onlooker, it would appear as though he was only studying, while taking those potato chips and eating them. The reality being that Kira was killing criminals with a piece of the Death Note hidden, alongside a miniature TV, inside the chip bag.

Even L was fooled by that one.

So what's your favourite showing for the tarot Death Note Bagatella?   Just to check that you kept observing, through all there was to see.

The Three Wise Men (Wam-Magi?)

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In the time of Watari, after Kira was born in Japan, wise men from the Wammy's House in Winchester came to Kanto, asking, "Where is the murderer who has been born God of the New World? For we observed his kill count at its rising, and have come to take him down."

When Takimura heard this, he was frightened and all world leaders with him; and calling together all the Kira Task Force and NPA public relations officers, he inquired of them when the Kira was to be arrested. They told him, "In the Yellow Box Warehouse; for so it has been written by Near: 'And you, Takimura, in the land of Japan, are by no means going to know a thing about it, because Mello would have got you killed by then.'"

Then US President David Hoope secretly called - via Watari - for the wise men and begged each in turn to stop threatening to control him into doing worse than Kira, whenever any of them get hold of a Death Note. Then he sent them to Kanto, saying, "Go and search diligently for Kira; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage."

When they had heard the POTUS, they got him killed and replaced with George Sairas; and there, ahead of them, went the star Misa Amane that they had seen rising as Second Kira, until she stopped because L had her tortured. When they saw that the Japanese idol had started begging to have her life ended, they were overwhelmed with joy.

On entering the Warehouse, they saw the megalomaniac with Mikami his worshipper; and Near knelt down (the other two forced to too, as they were now dead and puppets). Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of cake, Transformers, and chocolate.

And having painted a vivid picture for Ryuk warning of a future bound to a Death Note now stuck in Near's vault - while Light languished in a prison for the criminally insane for life - Near successfully manipulated the Death God into taking out Light before returning to the shinigami realm.  Then the Three Wise Wammys left for their own country, where verily two returned to the toy box and Near took L's Code for himself.  And probably Mello's too.
Hold on!  One missing from this listing of The Wam-Magi as read from the Book of God's New World: 

Bored out of his mind, Il Matto stayed put in Winchester, playing SuperMario and thanking the Gods of the Internet that Kira never came with cyber-terrorism on-line.  Else he'd never have been able to get away with hiding behind his lazy, mad, wise Fool routine; playing Tetris instead of getting himself killed in someone else's war.  So wise he only ever ranked third and remained forever Il Matto.  He probably wouldn't have amounted to much anyway.  Beep, beep, lulwut, nub?
Matt Death Note Il Matto tarot
Ok, I've stopped now.
As if by Magic - More Death Note Tarot Tales

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Month of Death Note Wammy
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Watari Letters: Death Note Canon Alphabet of Wammy Kids: L-Z

5/5/2016

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"Watari, from now on you must safeguard the world with the other Letters."
~ L, L: Change the World, p 17

Welcome back to our ABC list of known canon Wammy kids alongside the letter to which they were (or most probably were) assigned.

The Wammy House for Gifted and Talented Orphans is the intriguing institution which features so prominently in Death Note, or at least its alumni form the centrepiece of the war against Kira. 

Each genius child raised there is afforded a bespoke education, side-stepping the normal system of classrooms, with professors, researchers and other experts in their field brought in for one-to-one demonstrations and tutorials.

Graduates get to enter The Wammy Foundation, a shadowy organisation founded by the man who raised them - their childhood benefactor and adulthood allocator of a single Letter which meant so much - Quillsh Wammy, aka Watari.

This alphabet of Letters from Wammy's House investigates the ethos and histories of each recipient for clues as to the character and motives of Wammy himself.
Death Note The Wammy's House gatepost sign

Death Note Wammy Letters' Alphabet Pt 2 - L-Z

Read the first part: Wammy Alphabet A-K
Watari, also known as Quillsh Wammy, had used the enormous earnings from the patents of his many inventions to establish the Wammy Foundation, an organization dedicated to building orphanages around the world.

Among them, one orphanage took in highly intelligent children from around the world without regard to nationality, race or gender and provided them with a specialized education. The orphanage was called Wammy's House.

There was no formal school or academic departments at Wammy's. Instead university professors, researchers and top specialists in their fields from around the world were invited to give individual instruction to the children according to their abilities and potential.
~ L: Change the World, p13
Death Note Wammy's House refectory
Near in the library Wammy's House Death Note
Death Note Mello and other Wammy House kids dining

L - Wammy Kid The Last One, or The Lost One - True Name L Lawliet*

* This is the name that features upon a collectors' card fitted as a bonus gift inside the back fly-page of manga manual Death Note 13: How to Read.  It's also the name recorded in a Death Note, as seen in the Japanese live-action films.

However, in the novel Another Note: The Los Angeles BB Murder Cases, narrator Mello wrote that L was in possession of well over 3,500 names and pseudonyms to hide his personal identity.  Mello postulated the theory that even L didn't know his own true name any longer.

... the name L was, for him, just one of many. He never had any direct connection to that identity, he never thought of himself as L... L had a real name that nobody knew, and nobody will ever know, but a name which only he knew never defined him. I sometimes wonder if L himself ever knew exactly which name was written in the Death Note, which name it was that killed him.
~ Another Note, p43-44
L with his name in a Death Note
Though M (presumably Mello again) subsequently contradicted himself one book on - in the novelization of the movie L: Change the World - when he casually informed the reader that only L and Watari knew his real name.  Thus able to facilitate the key plot-line underpinning this variant of the story, wherein L won his war against Kira effectively by committing suicide via Death Note.

However, this was an alternate universe to that recounted in the manga and anime, wherein M as Mihael Keehl's Mello never existed, begging the question as to who is writing this novel now.  Unless it's Maki, grown a little older and brought furthermore into the Wammy House loop.  The fourth generation Wammy to be assigned that code-letter M, in lieu of poor, lost Mello, omitted unmade and erased from the record for this telling.

Anyway, onto the plot.

Death Note's almighty L
He wielded incredible power, was able to mobilize every investigative bureau in the entire world, and was applauded generously for his efforts.
~ Another Note, p10.

Young L in Wammy's House
L is the one about whom the whole of Wammy's House, its founder, staff and children, plus its attendant Foundation revolves.  He was the first of those genius orphans afforded special attention, a tailored education and a letter to use as his name and his calling code.

By accident, precedent or design, he set the standard whereby all other Wammy kids are measured.  They are supposed to be precisely him and if they best him, they get his code.

But that's highly unlikely to occur.

As Beyond Birthday found out, beating him is one thing; it's quite another to persuade Wammy to relinquish his obvious favourite, so to divert resources and his personal support towards a more worthily ranked ward.

That was a pattern which began on day one, when Wammy brought the tiny orphan L into Wammy's House and left him with his peers in the ornately stained glass windowed main hall.

The other children rushed to give him a hug - cute, new, big-eyed boy and all - but that panicked L. He was only about eight years old, but managed anyway to beat up and floor boys and girls much bigger than himself.
Instead of reprimanding him and ensuring that he apologized to the kids and teens groaning against the floorboards all around, Mr Wammy thought this rather fabulous.  Presumably the other orphans were shortly deprived of familiarity, friends and home by being relocated to sister establishments in the chain of Wammy Orphanages. Meanwhile, L got his own room, a computer and plenty of cooing fuss.

L managed to redeem his anti-social behaviour - if such was needed in Wammy's eyes - by perusing stock markets and advising the old man on what to buy and when to sell.  In that way, the profits poured right in.  That was the year that the eight year old took on the Winchester Mad Bomber and averted World War III.
Marking the moment when Wammy vowed to accept L's every decision and support him wherever possible.

From now on, the child, not the adult was ostensibly calling the shots; Watari would make good each hefty choice and passing whim spoken aloud by the eight year old.

Nor apparently was there any disapproval expressed for the dodgier demands, let alone censure or out and out refusal to comply.  Watari just did it, trusting that L was clever and would be right.  (Giving him just enough rope hang himself? Or truly in perfect trust of the child's truth and sense in all things?)

Therefore leading to a situation - so a canon Omake tells us, authored by Tsugumi Ohba and drawn by Takeshi Obata - wherein the adult L cannot dress himself, or attend to his own ablutions, without Wammy assisting with the fundamentals.  L seen now as so intelligent that he's become downright infantile.

An absent-minded genius trope too far, or some manner of control/avenging the loss thereof/kicking back against too much of the same, or someone severely upon the autistic spectrum?  Frankly it's way too tempting to assume the former, though the other options have their resonance in all other of L's famous ticks, quirks, eccentricities and prolific sweet consumption.

The latter also keenly enabled by Quillsh Wammy in butler (more like carer at this point) mode. Along with a pop, pseudo-scientific rationale that such quantities of sugary things are needful in order to keep L's brain whizzing along.
Wammy dressing L in Death Note
Being handed such freedom on a plate, with adults to order about too, would be heady stuff for any child.  Pair it with extreme wealth and the ear of world leaders and suddenly even societal boundaries are non-existent.  The possibilities are limitless, with even torture, killing and the ordering of a condemned man onto live television for his execution are not only on the table, but Watari's logistical and sniping skills will ensure all continues quite smoothly.

With a seeming lack of constriction akin to a juvenile Roman Emperor, it's little wonder that L emerges into the Death Note story with a personality self-confessedly childish, but also spoiled and cruel.
Death Note L and the Kira Task Force meet
However, a thick layer of covert constrictions hide just beneath the surface for the detective.  He's been told from childhood two things - there are those in the world out to kill him; and world peace hinges upon his living in a state of constant, active and demonstrable investigations.
While the world leaders should make efforts to ensure the safety of all the finest minds... the current societal systems do not allow for this, and L believed he had no choice but to protect his mind under his own power...  For a detective of L's ability, self-preservation and the preservation of world peace were one and the same.
~ Another Note, p 69
Ergo, his life is in danger, but he can't stop to save himself without imperilling the world. Not that most of the potential killers with him in their sights are that far from home.
Depending upon whether Beyond Birthday ever met L or not, it was either now or five years later - when L was thirteen - that The Wammy House for Gifted and Talented Orphans was established with Roger Ruvie at the helm.   Employed by Wammy not as warden per se, but as a trained psychiatrist there to gather parentless, genius kids from around the globe, and to reshape them - body, personality and mind; self-identity changed as standard - into clones of L.

In a rare moment of introspection, L saw clearly what manner of man he considered himself to be - both inspiring and imbibing the Wammy ethos, as the one most influenced by its engineer.  Amongst them all, L had the most direct, one-to-one contact with Quillsh Wammy, who set up the system and let it evolve that way.  The current crop of Wammy orphans gathered together to learn what their privileged, pressurized upbringing was urging them to become.

L laid it on the line in his famous 'monster' speech.  To be L was to embrace the monstrous. Just like him.
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There are many types of monsters in this world, monsters who will not show themselves and who cause trouble. Monsters who abduct children, monsters who devour dreams, monsters who suck blood, and monsters who always tell lies. Lying monsters are a real nuisance. They are much more cunning than other monsters. They pose as humans, even though they have no understanding of the human heart. They eat, even though they've never experienced hunger. They study even though they have no interest in academics. They seek friendship even though they do not know how to love. If I were to encounter such a monster, I would likely be eaten by it because, in truth, I am that monster.
~ L, Death Note Relight: L's Successors
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Driven home in the hearts and minds of his back-up foster siblings, over whose lives L is able to exert absolute control.  Wammy, L and Ruvie colluding with potentially sociopathic abandon, in what can only be deemed 'experimental' upbringings for those children subjected in generational waves to that institution.  No soaring IQ necessary to foresee tragic results in such child-raising methodologies, centring around rehumanisation at its core.

From suicide to serial killing through to the attempted pathogenic extinction of the human race, via joining the Mafia and martyrdom, Wammy kids answered their psyche's refashioning en masse.
... just as the greatest of detectives makes the greatest of criminals, a specialist in investigation is also a specialist in murder. From this perspective, this was nothing but a detective war. Beyond Birthday challenged L. And L accepted the challenge.

To put it bluntly, the Los Angeles BB Murder Cases were nothing but an internal struggle, a civil war within hour home, sweet home - Wammy's House.
~ Another Note, p106
Even Naomi Misora knew what had happened to detectives falsely identifying themselves as L, and B was from Wammy's House, so he knew better than anyone - so this choice suggests the strength of his decision. He never once intended to survive.
~ Another Note, p160
... it would certainly seem odd if (K), who was threatening the President posing as L, asked him why the US hadn't moved to kill L.
~ L: Change the World (novel), p140
In the end, it didn't matter how many Wammy kids strove to murder L.  He beat them there too.  No matter which version of Death Note is consulted, L kills himself.  His suicide is either openly stated, as per the live-action movies, with him writing his own name in a shinigami's notebook to beat Kira; or else it's so subtle as to be barely acknowledged, hidden beneath an overlong stare at Light Yagami, circa Kira's 'just as planned' exclamation of victory.

That L had worked it out is confirmed conversely by his statement of the precise opposite.  He dully enunciates that Light is not Kira, and should in fact be the next L.  The mystery was solved; the game was over.    Though to admit so was to lose the fun.  The clash of minds that had begun with a challenge to Light Yagami, which was answered in kind.  Without it, L could foresee the futile vastness of his life without that battle enriching all.

Already depressed, L said nothing, just concurred with the sentiment of Light's innocence.

It prolonged their cerebral sparring a little while longer, but it would kill L soon, as he well knew.  It seemed worth the cost in the banishment of tedium and onset of fascination alone.  Just to see what Light would do next, and to end the life that kept L trapped - 'a reclusive sociopath' - in Wammy's world of responsibility, self-protection and unceasing investigations. Now doomed to tedium post-Kira, plus the unsolvable crime because he would never catch Kira. He'd already let him go.

L's manga suicide was his silence.  A final act of justice (belatedly) for his Wammy House brethren was in taking Quillsh Wammy with him.

M - Wammy Kid Mello - Mihael Keehl

I'm always number two… no matter how hard I try…
Mello, Death Note manga, chapter 61 (Number Two)
It's not just the notebook I'm after. I wanna eliminate my competition. I will be the best. I don't care what it takes. I'll beat Near by any means necessary.
~ Mello, Death Note anime, episode 27
In Another Note, Mello calls Wammy's House 'home, sweet home' and describes it as the place 'which raised me until I was fifteen'. (p11)

Between real time scenes from the manga (Zero) and anime (Renewal), plus flashback scenes from Near's memory in Death Note Relight: L's Successor's (and the one-shot manga), we have a fair bit insight into Mello's experience and behaviour during that time at Wammy's House.

Just as you'd except from a teenager who left the institution to join the Mafia, young Mello is shown to be a bully at while he was still there.

We see him kicking a football into another child's face. On another occasion, he's clutching another boy's hair and pulling his head down, whilst walking up the corridor.

He even attacks Roger, bunching fistfuls of the warden's lapels and half dragging him across a desk, in response to news of L's death.

None of this is reprimanded.  There's no adult response at all from the first incident. In the second, Roger merely captures Mello's hand and holds it whilst untangling his victim's hair. No words are spoken about it.

During his lunge at Roger, all the older man can summon up is a vague, world-weary 'Mello', uttered like a sigh.  Imagine behaving like that with your own parent or guardian, would you have received the same lack of passion in their reaction?  

But apparently this is the Wammy's way and Mello is perfectly at liberty to use violence, intimidation and fear as part of his life strategy.
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It's also semi-rewarded, insofar as the goals of the institution are concerned.  L names Mello as one of his chief candidates for succession due to 'a nasty look in his eyes' rather than anything related to grades.  While Roger follows up both latter acts of aggression with encouragement and/or expectation that the fourteen year old before him take the deceased L's position in the world, at least jointly with Near (a twelve year old).

Can we say child soldiers?

The bullying isn't all. We also view Mello as a Wammy boy apparently isolated amidst his peers.  During L's 'monster' speech, Mello stands alone, away from the children excitedly grouped before the laptop through which L chats with them.

When he hears about L's death, Mello's mind flashes back to a moment in receipt of grades (pictured right). All of the other kids are flocking to read Near's paper and see his mark. Mello is left lonely and anxious reading his own.  He also apparently studied alone, as the following panel demonstrates.

Probably because he's the Wammy House bully and this is the best that his foster siblings can do in their own defence and/or revenge.

Not all of them though.  Near was quite happy to work with Mello, when their warden Roger suggested it, regardless of the look of utter horror twisting Mello's expression at the same time.  Later on, Matt appeared from the peer-group at the Wammy House to partner Mello in the final hunt for Kira.  So two people at least could have been, or were, Mello's friends there.  That said, even bullies have confederates and/or a gang.

Mello goes for the biggest and the best (or worst, depending on how we're phrasing it) gang after leaving Wammy's - the Mafia.  Wherein his admittance was assured despite his lack of Sicilian ethnicity (which kept Al Capone out); his posh Winchester/English accent; his youth; and his effeminate attire.  All this was over-ridden by his demonstrable intelligence and the fact that he brought, as an entrance present, the head of a Mafia Don whom even Kira couldn't touch.

How literally should we take that 'bringing the head' tidbit?  Are we actually talking the decapitated article in a box?  Or information thereon?  An alternative translation states it in the plural - 'the heads of Mafia dons, who even Kira couldn't touch'.  Maybe this is the source of those skulls, with which the teenage Mafia era Mello likes to surround himself.

Nor is this the worst that Mello feels justified in ordering during those days.  He arranges for the abduction of Japanese police chief Takimura, followed by the same for Sayu Yagami, both as bargaining chips to be exchanged for the Death Note in Japanese police custody.  Takimura is killed by Kira in a pre-emptive move; Sayu is left catatonic with trauma. 

No end of Mafia associates are killed, or pressured into giving up half of their lives to acquire shinigami eyes.  Drug routes established.  The President of the United States of American coerced into suicide in order to prevent Mello using the Death Note to force his hand. Like making him launch nuclear bombs around the world, thus causing World War Three.  The theft of a missile.  All but three of the SPK massacred as a test of the Death Note, falling around Near, probably as a show of strength for his benefit.

Therein lies the rub.  It's all about Near, ergo all about Wammy's House, not really about Kira or Rod Ross's prestige and profits at all.  When the pair finally confront each other face to face, the background fades to exhibit instead the stained glass windows from the institution which raised them, and continues to cast its pall over their lives right now.
Near and Mello Wammy House stained glass  Death Note
For Near and Mello, the battle to become L is all. Both are willing to pull out extremities in action, thought and deed to secure the prize Wammy and Roger left dangling for them.  Ultimately, Mello will give up his life simply to make it onto the final score-sheet as joint first, once he realizes that the end is nigh and he'll be second in perpetuity.

N - Wammy Kid Near - Nate River

Death Note SPK blood
I've wanted to make him taste his own pathetic failure with all my heart.
~ Near, Death Note manga, chapter 90
Don't worry, Commander Rester, making assumptions is part of any investigation. If we're wrong, all it'll cost is an apology.
~ Near, Death Note anime, episode 30
Giovanni: If there are shinigami, I might die, right?
Near: Yes.
Giovanni: ...
Near: If you are scared, I'll ask Lester to go.
Lester: ...
~ Death Note anime
Of all the Wammys - with the possible exception of Beyond Birthday and his peer, the institution's first child suicidee A - Near seems to have taken the directive to become L's clone most keenly to heart.

He never met his idol, so any physical emulation of his idol was accidental, or an inadvertent consequence of both boys being raised within the same system.  This didn't matter. The purposes for which reprogramming children to match the prototype was deemed necessary didn't involve B-like cosplay antics.  Before Kira, no-one outside the Wammy Foundation met with L face-to-face, therefore would be hard pushed to identify him in a line-up.  There was a brief interlude with Naomi Misora, immediately prior to the Kira case, but L never actually introduced himself.  Perceptive Naomi guessed anyway, but she had the huge clue before her of Beyond Birthday making an indelible impression whilst copying L in costume, aspect and stance.

Near's task was much more insidiously wrought than just dressing up would have been. He sought to think like L. Submerge his own personality beneath a persona modelled upon that of his predecessor, as Near believed him to be based on this own observations and insights gleaned from L's electronic address to the fourth generation Wammy wards en masse.  Near didn't even ask him any questions. They never had a conversation.
Near thinking of what L would do
Near, thinking of what L would do Death Note
Scant enough hints around which to mould a credible likeness in continuation of the L Code.  Especially when it has to be enough to to fool world leaders, and high-ranking contacts - networked to no known degree in the past - drawn randomly world-wide from government, military, legal/law enforcement, intelligence, secret services and other offices. Plus those within the private sector, researchers, consultants and experts in fields raising across the academe.

With whom did L share a confidence?  Who did he know? Detest? Exchange now impenetrable dialogue in language encroached in private in-jokes?  All of which Near must know in order to pull this off, or else his failure is outright and absolute.  'Just a loser' in all he worked hard and aspired to be - surviving his nearest rivals; out-ranking the rest - the only source of meaning for his life.  He was told.  And equally raised to fear, as catastrophic on a global scale,  being exposed as a fake L, alongside the real L's death now leaked.

World War III would start.  Only the actual Lawliet held its inception in abeyance.  Crimes rates everywhere would soar, in figures projected to make the upward surge post-Kira seem like an insignificant bump beside the inevitable spike post-L.
Death Note Near subsumed by L
Near must have spent an inordinate amount of brainpower and time pondering all L was or seemed to be; imagining his world-view and thought processes; researching by whatever means may come every snippet of information truly known about his idol; deducing what triggered every known pattern in behaviour, decision-making and everything else besides.

Then Near would have to expend yet more energy, resources and concentration in seemingly endless hours perfecting his carbon copy role-playing of the same.

Allowing another man's self in totality to imprint as a mask over Near's psyche.  To suppress his own as worth much less than this prototype soul; as he alone won the right to exhibit L in de facto possession.

Yet some part of Near's genius must be twitching rebellion in a dark, cerebral recess.  As early as twelve months prior - to the day - Near espouses rhetoric about how he (in union with Mello) surpassed L. However, it's spoken hesitantly, with many pauses for reflection in its delivery during Near's final confrontation with Kira in the Yellow Box warehouse.  Nor does his conclusion appear to have lodged inside his own mind, beyond a theoretical concept to mess with Light's mind.
A year later, Near's faded from his own world; withdrawing into isolation as a hermit obsessively constructing a whole city out of tarot cards, paranoid about the fragility of his finely balanced reality.  One draught of wind or an unwary boot upon Rester's foot might bring whole sections of the edifice down.  Near's obvious depression surely a consequence of his attempt to obliterate his distinct and natural self, in lieu of fulfilling his Wammy given destiny to become L. Lawliet.

All of this after several years in pursuit of Kira - as the L defined arena in which his prototype Code's pretenders must battle to the death for the right to claim it as their own. Not to mention that it followed on top of a childhood raised in the Wammy House, with its petty rivalries, academic expectations, competitive rankings and presumed early exposure to graphic evidence from crime scenes, as part of the endemic brainwashing forging a strong desire to become L, should a back-up be required.

It takes a retracing of his steps back to the start for Near to even grasp the issue.  The return sparked by circumstance - a prospective new Kira appearing on the scene - coupled with the urgent messages forged in his own subconscious - Near's arranging for all previously present to reassemble in the Yellow Box warehouse on the first anniversary of Light Yagami's denunciation and death.  Another confrontation in the offing, this time with a crime syndicate dealing in drugs.

That hardly seems worth the while of a Wammy kid, except that it puts altered realities in Near's frame of introspection.
Death Note's Hal Lidner tells Near he doesn't have to be L
In the midst of that mix, experienced after twelve months spent dissembling, something had to give. It seems to begin with the sequence shown in the panel above, whereby Hal Lidner affirms to Near that he doesn't need to become L.  'L is L, you are you,' Lidner tells him and Near is momentarily at a loss for words to say in response.  He mentally assesses her wisdom in taking such a perspective and is forced to conclude that she is quite correct.

I wonder if it's deliberate or coincidental that Hal's further comment - 'we can handle it our own way' - apes Mello's upon leaving the Wammy House - 'I will find my own way'.  Near would have heard such echoes of sentiment anyway.

Later in the conversation, Hal says quite pointed that Near is trying to think as L would think.  Near, who had just accidentally knocked over a section of his tarot card city, asks the pair to leave.  He telling adds that they shouldn't topple his towers on the way out.  In tarot, The Tower is a card of necessary destruction in the major arcana.  It wipes away the old that the new might flourish.
What we then see from Near is a breakthrough moment of self-awareness, in the most literal sense.

At first Near appears dwarfed by the spectre of L.  We're still in the same location, but his own world torn down to facilitate a new configuration of tarot card towers.

Each one spells out the single initial L.  Near's own figure is almost completely lost amongst them. 

Meanwhile Rester speaks from a monitor above, peering down like God Himself, or an Orwellian 1984 style Big Brother.  The message he has to convey could have been uttered by Wammy.  It certainly encapsulates the Zeitgeist of Wammy's House -  the methodology can be as awry as it needs to be in order to solve the puzzle.  The method justifies the means.

Near meekly replies that he'll embody L, doing only what it would be natural for L to do.

He goes on to broadcast globally in L's name, with a speech that includes elements from the only one he ever personally heard L declaim.  Near addresses the 'new Kira' situation with utter disdain, stating that he won't be getting involved, because it doesn't interest him.  Just as L told the Wammy kids in Near's own hearing that he chose his cases solely if they piqued his interest.
Death Note manga Rest talks to Near over L towers in tarot cards
However, Near's concluding statement in the L speech was a denunciation that was never heard from Lawliet's mouth, nor anything akin to it.  But it mirrored entirely that famously enunciated by Near to the first Kira - 'You abominable murderer'.  It was Near's personality emerging in full strength t0 wipe away the vestiges of Lawliet. 

This time, when Rester repeats Hal's assertion that Near is L, Near does not hesitate to concur.  We get the wide view and see that the Towers of L aren't so much zones of intimidation.  It's Near demonstrating full well his altered world view.  He doesn't have to be Lawliet, because he's Near.
Near  as L in the Death Note one shot manga
All of this is a far cry from the Death Note anime, which simply skips over the issues Near endures post-Kira.  Or the Death Note movies, which only features Near in the third film (L: Change the World).  There he's a very young child when L dies, delivered to Wammy's House as L's final act of salvation before the detective dies.  It will be a long time, if ever, that Near will have to take on L's mantle in that alternative timeline.

Or you can opt for the timeline altered once more in the novelization of L: Change the World, which omits the Thai boy entirely, to reinstate a more commonly rendered Near in cameo as the end.  Only this one doesn't have self-identity issues, nor any compulsion not to tell the US President that L is dead, and he is now L.  This telling establishes L as a team effort rather than investigated in one figurehead, albeit one with the same initial as the overall group.  Here Near comes across as Puckish, in fact almost angelic. 
"Mr. President, this is L... The L organization has captured L-prime and recovered the Death Note. We will eliminate L-prime with the notebook. You can confirm the body in one hour at the Kira Headquarters in Japan."
~ Near, L: Change the World, p186
"By the way, Mr President, would you mind if also issued you a threat?... You will ensure a future where children can go on smiling. Will you promise us that? If you should break that promise, we will not hesitate to use the Death Note."
~ Near, L: Change the World, p187
Well, angelic only if we recall that Lucifer was also an archangel; that Gabriel's horn topples city walls; that Samael was an Angel of Death and Destruction; and that Michael wielded a fiery sword to wage war on God's behalf.  Near stating that he'll murder a man, then destroy the Death Note in one breath, followed by a threat to kill the President via it, sometime in perpetuity, seems nothing next to all that.  Even if he did get caught in a lie from his own tongue within seconds of stating it.
Near in Death Note TV drama
Then you get the Near characterisation - the latest incarnation at the time of writing - wherein the Puckishness and violence have come utterly to the fore.  Though in this case it's stated that Near has dual personalities and it's the Mello persona sharing their body who has the capacity to kill.

None of which strays too far from previous canon, nor the attributes with which Near was originally created by Tsugumi Ohba.

Even in the manga, Near has no problem causing the death of others - or else placing them in potentially fatal peril - if it assists him in solving the puzzle.  Thus Kira is led to Mello's Mafia family hide-out; dollar notes worth $10m are dropped on a square in Manhattan causing a stampede; Gevanni is despatched to recover a Death Note's pages, despite instant death if Near's deduction is wrong; and Near psychologically shifts Ryuk into a position whereby the shinigami is keen to kill Light Yagami ASAP.
If Matsuda's theory is correct, then Near went much further than what was less than subtly implied in the pages of the manga.  The new L was a serial killer, whose victims could well have included Mello, and whose continued possession of the Death Note AND the L Code makes him a dangerously all-powerful influence upon the modern world's movers and shakers.

Just as he learned at Wammy's House.

O - Wammy Letter Not Assigned in Canon

We don't currently have a canon assignation for the Wammy group letter O, just the usual known candidates: Matt and Linda, plus Wammy House created and raised L clone Ryūzaki (from Death Note: Light Up the New World).

P - Wammy Kid Pseudonym and True Name Unknown

Wammy letter P is known in canon only through being shown on L's call/mailing list in the movie L: Change the World. 

These are the individuals who make up the Wammy Members' Group to whom L breaks the bad news via email that Watari is dead.  The Wammy House crest, their knowledge of Mr Wammy (and the fact that they'd care about his death) and that they are all designated with single initials renders it certain that they are active members of the Wammy Foundation.

Though we know nothing about P, it can be guessed through the precedent of the rest that he/she is probably a detective, scientist or excelling in the arts.  Aizawa and Matsuda reported in the manga that most Wammy alumni fit into those three categories, and the known alumni have followed suit so far.

Of course, there's nothing stopping these letters also possibilities for being assigned to the like of Matt and Linda, though the timeline makes it unlikely to be Ryūzaki's letter. 
L Change the World Wammy letters on L's screen

Q - Wammy Kid Pseudonym and True Name Unknown; Unless Strong Probability: Q - Wammy Kid Matt - True Name Mail Jeevas

The hacking defence system, developed by Wammy's House's Q and given to him by his personal friend Watari, had identified the perpetrator who had cleverly routed through several servers all over the world on its way into the lab's system.  "Accessed from inside the lab..."
~ L: Change the World, p31
After sending one email, he deleted all his files using the emergency system created by Q.
~ L: Change the World, p32
Wammy Letter Q mentioned in L Change the World
Q's letter is seen in the call list of Wammy's kids glimpsed briefly upon L's screen during the movie L: Change the World (see P). 

Unlike most on the list, this individual is also mentioned in the novelization of the same, where it's revealed that (s)he is some kind of computing genius.

For this reason, Wammy's Q is most likely the letter assigned to Matt, aka Mail Jeevas, named in canon as the third ranked Wammy kid of the fourth generation (i.e. next in line for L's succession after Near and Mello).
It is a truth universally known and recognized throughout the Death Note fandom that Matt is good with computers.  On his Death Note Wiki page, where cited facts tend to be cross-referenced back to source, we're told '(Matt's) specialty is technology, and he is tasked by Mello to monitor the activities of Misa, Mogi and Aizawa.'  The information is devoid of citation.

Matt's geek prowess in computing and 1337 cyber skills are implied in canon. Nevertheless it may surprise most to realise nothing in manga, manual, anime or elsewhere explicitly states anything of the sort.  Unless we're missing some reference somewhere, Matt's technological genius is pure fanon.

What we are told - or shown - by Death Note's creators Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata is that Matt likes video games.  He's rarely seen without a PSP or Nintendo DS in hand, and/or other consoles trailing in the background, unless he's driving a car, wielding a gun, watching Kira over the road through a camera or chatting to Mello over his phone about Misa, boredom and the unchanging nature of brick walls. 

However, there are quite often computers in the vicinity too.  Multiples thereof.   Whole reasons in fact why fanon latches onto this notion that Matt is Wammy's technological genius, not least because of the sheer amount that surrounds him at every (woefully scant) view we get.
Picture
It may have seemed that all (Matt) did was play video games, but his existence itself was important (laughs).
~ Tsugumi Ohba, How to Read: Death Note 13 p 69
His character concept was a young man who loves video games and doesn't really care much about the world.
~ Takeshi Obata, How to Read: Death Note 13, p136
Picture
Death Note Matt inspecting computer as a child
Picture
Monitoring multiple screens, (Matt's) cockiness leads him to make a few mistakes.
~ How to Read: Death Note 13, p27
Whether the case is made for Matt being Q or not, he's likely to be the figure behind a Wammy letter.  This correlation between implied official/widely accepted fanon facets of Matt with those known about Q is as close as canon has come to assigning him a letter thus far.

A major insight into the mores of Watari is afforded us through the added information about Q .  The Wammy House computing adept has created at least two highly useful programs.  They  belong to him/her - unless the geek's own Hacker Ethic has seen them released as freeware online - and could be patented for personal profit outside the Wammy Foundation orbit. 

Yet they have not.  Moreover, Watari feels warranted passing those scripts onto a personal friend as a gift.

There could be quite innocent and laudable reasons for this, or it could be that all those high flying skills possessed by Wammy letters are never quite their own to utilize.  Their gained wealth and honours fly straight into the Wammy coffers to be used as a common treasury for all within the House and its Foundation.   Fuel for fan-fiction writers anyway.

As for Matt himself, he's yet another letter coming from the Wammy House into that deathly battle against Kira.  After assisting Mello in some surveillance work in the USA, Matt flew with him to Japan.  There he further helped out, this time firing a CS gun from the driver's seat of a red muscle car, creating a smokescreen to facilitate the abduction of Kiyomi Takada.

Matt was killed shortly afterwards, when cornered by Kira supporters and shot dead.   He was nineteen years old.

R - Wammy Kid Pseudonym and True Name Unknown

Wammy Letters R, I, E, K, V, T on L's screen in L Change the World
R is amongst those Wammy Letters known only from a glimpse of L's computer monitor in the movie L: Change the World.

Those listed there were on the Wammy Members' Group. Each identified by just a single initial, alongside the Wammy House crest. Most were e-mailed by L that he might alert them to the death of Watari.

Only there's something different about B, R, V and T to all those mentioned from this source previously.  They weren't in receipt of the missive, and their letters were blocked out grey with a line voiding the box to select them.

The implication is that these are Wammy kids who are no longer alive.  A kind of confirmation coming in the inclusion of B there, assuming that this movie exists in the same timeline as the novel Another Note: The Los Angeles Murder Cases.

Beyond Birthday would indeed be dead this close to the end of Kira's reign. He was killed on January 21st 2004 of a heart-attack probably during one of Kira's purges of international prison populations.

S - Wammy Letter Not Assigned in Canon

To date, there is no known Wammy Letter S in canon, which isn't to say that one doesn't exist.  The usual candidates apply here too.

T - Wammy Kid Pseudonym and True Name Unknown

T is known only from his/her entry on L's call/mailing list in L: Change the World live-action movie. However the initial is faded out to grey, implying that T is dead (see R.)

U - Wammy Letter Not Assigned in Canon

There is no Wammy U letter assigned in any canon source to date.

V - Wammy Kid Pseudonym and True Name Unknown

Another included on L's Wammy Members' Group mailing list in the film L: Change the World. V's initial is greyed out, it's owner presumed dead.

W - Wammy Letter for Watari - Quillsh Wammy Himself

Death Note's Watari with L icon
It's difficult to know the motive for Quillsh Wammy in creating The Wammy House for Gifted and Talented Orphans in Winchester.  Mostly in manga, anime, novels and live-action adaptations of Death Note, the altruism is played up in the persona of L's handler (as Tsugumi Ohba described him).

But the Death Note author also stated that Wammy cultivated those kids as detectives 'for fun'.

Even if Wammy's orphanage and the lettered foundation to follow were established for the best of reasons, gathering genius children from across the globe - for the most part relocating them to another country - then stripping them of their names and other indicators of self-identity robs all concerned of their birthright.  Held up to the light of the UN's Rights of the Child (international law) and Wammy's House is shown sadly lacking for all its wonderful provision.

That document was certainly ratified in England, where Winchester is situated.  Some government officials, and those in the local authority too, must be turning quite a large blind eye, or else Hampshire Social Services would be traipsing all over the premises.  Closing it down too because, for all its bright and glorious intentions, Wammy's House is an illegal concern by universally declared human rights laws.

Obviously those politicians in Winchester, Westminster and in the offices of other world leaders too consider it expedient to let the institution continue existing - taking the Stalinesque position that the ends justify the means - but that's by the by.  The question here is what Wammy himself thinks he's up to, and how he's squared it with his conscience (if, of course, he knows his operation to be criminally negligent and cares about that).
The hints from the manga are inconclusive to bordering upon the disturbing.

We never hear Wammy's own thoughts on what he's established, just catch an undercurrent of Aizawa's unease, as he reports back to Light what he find in Winchester.

Plus How to Read: Death Note 13's note on Roger Ruvie, that he was employed to collect children internationally and bring them to Wammy's House to train as L's successor.  Watari employed him to do that.  He pays his wages too.

The anime continues on along the same theme, adding nothing directly from Wammy's mouth, but providing us with snap-shot flashes of the orphanage with sobbing infants and bullying in the corridors.

Not to mention the strange spectacle of Roger telling Mello and Near (aged 14 and 12 respectively) that they now have to take L's place in the struggle against a mass murderer of global proportions.
Aizawa and Matsuda report back to Light about Wammy's House
And incidentally, their guardian is dead, along with their idol.  The one they were raised to emulate to the point of becoming in a very literal sense.

Its director's cut movie length double bill - Relight - adds the darkest element yet in L's 'monster' speech, as recalled by Near.  Whatever else anyone thought the Wammy Foundation to be, L was in it for the lulz.  Apparently.   Then Mello, as narrator in Another Note, takes the matter of Watari's motives and the institution's reality plummeting to whole new levels of criminal insanity and horror.  Herein, Quillsh Wammy emerges as a mad inventor, dehumanising children to the level of machines, psychologically repackaging them as carbon copies of his prototype child. Then placing them on a conveyor belt onto martyrdom or becoming L mark 2.

Thereafter, things lighten up considerably.  Wammy suddenly transforms into a kindly benefactor, personally concerned in realising the potential in each of his wards, coupled with a genuine zest to save the world - or change it, as the movies and their novelisation strangely phrases it.
Death Note L Change the World L and Watari
Though this overtly compassionate soul doesn't stop L, to all extents and purposes, committing suicide by writing his own name in a Death Note; F dying with a smile on his face in Thailand; and K building a biological contagion to wipe out all humanity.  All directly or by proxy sent into the situations that killed or unhinged them by Wammy himself or one of his assistants at Wammy HQ.

Not one of them elicited a word of censure or damage limitation from their guardian either; nothing of consolation nor urging them to put their own safety and well-being above the perils of the case.

F's death 'couldn't be helped' (L: Change the World movie). K was never approached with the key information that she'd been assigned and kept not only her letter, but Watari's own esteem (L: Change the World novel, p 176-177). While sight of L's name in that Death Note almost prompted words in reaction from the man who'd raised him and continued to be a constant presence catering to his every whim.  But Wammy stopped himself speaking 'and closed his eyes to contain  his feelings' (ibid, p 16).

For that matter, though L was on the trail of Beyond Birthday enough to contact and advise Naomi Misora, Watari did not take the first available flight to Los Angeles in an attempt to calm his wayward, suicidal ward.  With all L's considerable sway upon the movers and shakers of most nations - the USA topmost on the list - no apparent intervention was made on behalf of the badly burned Beyond Birthday. He was left to languish in a LA prison, until Kira killed him.  (Nor then had the Wammy Foundation ensured his anonymity regarding face and name, as Near did for Mello. B lost and thus was excluded from the fold.

It's unlikely to be an appalled father figure washing his hands of the 'back-up'.  Watari covers up or fixes the carnage from no end of criminal acts, up to and including murder, as enacted by his other wards.  Like Near/Mello, in the Death Note TV drama (2015), phoning to announce that he's just killed Yudagawa.  Wammy's reaction being to retrieve Near from the scene, arrange the clear up and cake.  Near's favourite at that.
Death Note television drama.  Watari brings cake for Near and L
Finally back to the manga's original story and timeline, wherein Watari, firmly entrenched in the perils at the front line of the Kira case, never once thought to phone home to tell Roger, "You know, this might be too dangerous for the kids. Plus they've got the onset of puberty looming on the horizon, which is going to play havoc with their thought processes and deductive reasoning.  If anything happens to me and L, be sure and keep Near and Mello safe indoors, eh?"

Instead, he doesn't even deign to indicate a name for L's successor - news which every child there spends every second of their existence in conditioned striving to become - partially because he knew L had already named Light (more important information for the cohort in Winchester, perchance?), and also because Wammy's own death was so sudden.

Yet surely this ultra-efficient man had made provision?  Given his wealth, responsibilities and current condition in risk of sudden death by Kira, it seems the most obvious rolling course of action for the Wammy House founder and father figure.

The only insight we get to the mindset of Quillsh Wammy, in regard to the ridiculously short life expectancy of those in his care, comes from his musing in response to the fait accompli of L's suicide  - deferred by twenty-three days as per the extremities of the Death Note's limitations.  In the knowledge that L would have contemplated every move available to himself before acting thus to checkmate Kira, a conclusion is reached - 'this was the choice L had made. How could Watari object?' (L: Change the World (novel), p17)

How could he not?  When each tragic loss to the Wammy House cohort, met without comment, reaffirms the normality/inevitability/expectancy of such choices made, his objections should be paramount.  Especially as L - with his own demise fixed and irreversible - instantly acted as though a burden had been lifted from his shoulders.  A burden that the novel later articulates as,
... L did not and could not forget the face of thousands of victims... The chronically rounded shoulders, the inevitable dark circles, the eccentric tastes - L suppressed the pain of being a champion of justice, but the evidence of the pain was molded into his very body.  L tore out his hair and howled at the sky, unleashing the agony inside his soul.
~ L: Change the World (novel), p151
It's a life that Watari chose for his favourite ward to live, when the boy was way too young to know what it could possibly entail.  A whole Foundation was constructed around facilitating and perpetuating it, complete with staff-members tasked with replicating L upon the raw matter and vulnerable psyche of a steady procession of living children.  The majority of whom L, at just twenty-seven years old, has already out-lived.

His guardian, mentor and carer Wammy hasn't left his side in over twenty-one years.  Two decades of reaffirming to L that what he's doing is necessary and the only thing he could be doing.  Acting like this is normal and right.  Intimating that L perhaps owes him something for this relentless support and companionship, with so much time, wealth and world peace tied up in the detective going on as before; his burden bending his shoulders and adding dark pits around his eyes.
L looked up suddenly... with the worried expression of a child.  "Watari, have I fulfilled you expectations?"  Watari answered with his usual serene smile and uttered one simple unerring word:  "Fully."
- L: Change the World, p188

X - Wammy Kid Pseudonym and True Name Unknown; Y - Wammy Kid Pseudonym and True Name Unknown; and Z - Wammy Kid Pseudonym and True Name Unknown

... I heard from L: the story of the detective war between the three greatest detectives, all solving that infamous bio-terror case, with guest appearances from the last of the alphabet, the first X to the first Z from Wammy's House.
~ Another Note, p170
X, Y and Z were all Wammy House children who assisted L, as he battled for supremacy over the original Eraldo Coil and Danuve.

Emerging victorious, L wasn't content to merely take the top spot in investigative global ranking.  He took their detective codes too, hereafter able to call himself by their names; as evidenced in the battle against Kira, when he announced to the task force that he was in fact all three detectives now.  Aiber was able to pose as Coil, in L's stead, when the Yotsuba Group hired the supposed 2nd placed detective in order to investigate the first.

Yet none of this explains what happened to X, Y and Z afterwards.  Mello never tells us in Another Note; nothing more beyond that snippet quoted above.   Nor do they turn up in the B case, or the fight against Kira which follows on.

Then again, that quotation can be read another way and perhaps they weren't assisting L at all, despite their Wammy House credentials.  It seems unlikely that one or two WERE the original Coil and Danuve, challenging L for the chance not to be his backup nor copy.  That would place them centre-stage, not cameos.

But nothing there says that they weren't the instigators of the bio-terror case under investigation.  After all, it wouldn't be the first time that something like that was spawned from the dark corridors of the Wammy House to be unleashed upon the world.

In which case, all precedent says they're now tucked up safely inside their laboratories within the confines of the orphanage, welcomed home with an attitude akin to respect and a jolly well done.  But for the fact that none of the trio factor upon L's calling screen in L: Change the World - plus Mello refers to all as 'the first' of their names in Another Note.

The implication being that these three Wammy kids no longer exist, even within the institution out of public view.  Moreover, those who supplanted them in their allocated initials potentially were lost too.  That is if we're taking all Death Note stories as one amalgamated canon, even where their time-lines clash.

The Wammy Alphabet of Death Note Letters

Entire list of Wammy letters colour coded according to status
Those names greyed out are already dead by the end of all iterations of the Death Note canon.  Those inverted represent Letters whose allocation is currently unknown.  Leaving just D, E, G, H, K, N and P still alive.

However, this is just one run through from all known canon data.  We have indubitably got a mix-match of generations here.  A, B, X, Y and Z are known to have been amongst the first.  M and N were definitely fourth.  L, H and W held their letters throughout.  K's letter survived at least two generations in its allocation.  It has to be assumed that for a letter to be reassigned (four times for four generation of alphabets filled and started again), the previous recipient is dead.

How many Wammy kids must have died then, for the latest as semblance of Wammy Letters to exist?   A vague straw-poll based on the configuration seen above suggests that, of the overall proportion, 73.1% are dead.

It may be presumed that Ryūzaki, Linda and those nameless Wammy kids in the background of flashback scenes all bore an initial apiece. A single letter displayed upon a white screen when they called - stark black  in an Old English font, in lieu of a real name.

And where were J, X, Y and Z on L's calling screen in L: Change the World?  A possible 4-7 more dead or disappeared.  J to a burning ship in the middle of a pixel ocean; the latter three implied dead by Mello's comment 'the first to hold those letters'.

And of the remainder, one planned to destroy all humanity but was brought back into the Wammy fold.  Not before K had already killed thousands, obliterating whole villages along the way.  While, if Matsuda's theory was right, another is a secret serial killer in possession of a Death Note's great power, in addition to holding the L title that every one of Wammy's children coveted.

As L's successor, N beat them all to what amounts - in practicality, wealth and influence alike - to world domination.

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Watari's Indoctrination of Wammy Kids in Death Note (Analysis by Lua Cruz)

4/5/2016

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There is little to no question about the unethical basis of the system behind Wammy’s House.


We are shown a place with barely any adult supervision in which the children are allowed to be aggressive or behave however they please, with a warden who seems to care very little for the children under his care to the point of simply letting one of them walk out and expecting another to do the same.

Not only that but the house itself seems to have almost no furniture.

In the story, it may not seem so odd since, by the time we are introduced to Wammy’s House, we are aware it isn’t just a common orphanage housing children. But that only makes the existence of such place even more disturbing.
Wammy's House Roger with Mello and Near
Here is at least one house for gifted children, assumed to be orphans, who are raised in an unfriendly and competitive environment for no other reason other than Quillsh Wammy thought this was an important thing to do. Those children are taught their skills should be directed to a very specific goal: becoming L. L is a detective so the point of collecting those children is to groom them into becoming detectives. More than that, they are trained to be confident in their own reasoning, their own methods of doing what they enjoy.

If the children are taught to find a hobby and to find their own way of achieving the goals of said hobby, can we talk about indoctrination in Wammy’s House? Considering John White’s definition that indoctrination takes place if the intention of the teacher is to make it so that “(t)he child should believe that ‘p’ is true, in a such way that nothing will shake this belief” (White 1972a, 119 and 1973, 179), it could be said the point behind Wammy’s is to make sure the children believe their goal is worth everything.

If they want to solve a case, anything they do to accomplish that (be it breaking the law or putting themselves at risk or indirectly getting people killed or cheating) is worth it. Their conclusion is absolute to the point their actions are justified as if they are justice.
L - Justice will prevail - Death Note
It’s important to point out that they are not acting for the sake of justice or in the name of justice. They act as if them themselves are the embodiment of justice.

In this sense, they can do no wrong because their actions are just, they are right because they are their actions.

For example, to sacrifice the Mafia in order to get a chance to capture Kira was a selfish action; Mello wasn’t acting in the name of justice. And it was because it was a selfish decision considering his own goals that he acts as if he is justice. Those lives are worth less than capturing this criminal.

This is an educational system Watari established for a reason canon doesn’t explore. Why would he want to indoctrinate children to believe their own conclusions and decisions, even when perceived as selfish ones, were right not only to themselves but to the world?

None of the Wammy’s kids wonder if Kira could possibly be right as we see Matsuda doing. They know he is a criminal; they know they have to stop him.

If we consider they are meant to solve crimes, it could be Watari actually had an altruistic goal in mind such as world peace. But there is no interference from him in the direction those children take, and, in fact, quite a few ex-Wammy’s kids are willing to become criminals in order to achieve a goal or prove a point.
Mello joins the Mafia, K joins a bio-terrorist group, B becomes a serial killer, L himself admits to being a criminal by current laws and is willing to use torture against Misa. Letting them do as they pleased, confident on their own skills and conclusions, seemed to be a pretty chaotic project.

As it is, Watari died before his experiment was complete and we only have bits and pieces of it to try and make sense of his project. But why was it important to Watari to create a group of people with that level of confidence in their own reasoning? Why was it important to let them loose in the world with no guidance or direction?

Article by Lua Cruz

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Join a Pinterest Community Group for Wammy and Wammy's House!

15/4/2016

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Death Note Wammy Pinterest board run by Death Note News.
A whole group of us are already pinning our Wammy's House and Mr Wammy related items of interest over on Pinterest.  You can too!
We have a community Pinterest Board for Death Note's Wammy cohort, which anyone may join and contribute what they will.

It's part of a whole collection of character or other subject specific boards created and maintained by Death Note News.

So click away on the follow button, wait for your invitation to be added to the board - prompt us with a comment here* containing your Pinterest name if you want to hurry us up with that, though we will try to be quick with the Wammy additions during this Month of event - then pin, pin, pin all you've got on Watari and his wards.

And once you're in, feel free too to invite your friends along. All our members can add other pinners to the group. That's what community is all about!
* If you wish to be added to other boards too, then list those in your comment as well.  There are so many of you that these things otherwise go in bursts and starts!
Follow Death Note News's board Mr Wammy and Wammy's House on Pinterest.
Latest pins on our Watari Pinterest Community Board
Do you have a group, forum, community, fan-club or other website dedicated to Watari, Wammy's House or anything connected with the Wammys?  Let us know via our submission page and we'll big it up for you during this Month of Watari on Death Note News.  Help us get the community connected with like-minded members of the same fandom!

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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

Watari Death Note anime
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

Taurus
Born on May 1st, astrologically Quillsh Wammy is Taurus
Rooster
Wammy's birth date of May 1st 1933 (manga) also factors into Shēngxiào. He is a Rooster in the Chinese Zodiac
Rat
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
Blood Type B
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.
Wammy A
A
- Name Unknown

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

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

Appears only as character in
a DS Death Note game.
(L: The Prologue to Death Note)
Picture
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)
Wammy kid Matt (Mail Jeevas) Death Note
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)
Wammy R
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)
Wammy kid V
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)
Wammy Z
Z
- Name Unknown
Assisted L in the Detective Wars bio-terror case.
(Another Note: The Los Angeles BB Murder Cases)
Beyond Birthday - Death Note
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)
Wammy kid F (Kazuki Namioka)
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)
Kimiko Kujo 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)
Near Death Note
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)
Wammy P
P
- Name Unknown
Shown on L's call/mailing list
(L: Change the World)
Ryūzaki Wammy kid Death Note 2016
Letter Unknown
- Ryūzaki

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

Assisted L in the Detective Wars bio-terror case.
(Another Note: The Los Angeles BB Murder Cases)
Death Note Relight: Wammy kids
Random Wammy kids
as seen in Death Note: Relight (above)
and Death Note manga (left)
Wammy D
D
- Name Unknown

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

Shown on L's call/mailing list
(L: Change the World)
Wammy L Death Note
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.
Linda Death Note
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)
Picture
Q
- Name Unknown
Shown on L's call/mailing list
(L: Change the World)
Wammy kid T
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)
Wammy Y
Y
- Name Unknown
Assisted L in the Detective Wars bio-terror case.
(Another Note: The Los Angeles BB Murder Cases)
Wammy children Death Note manga
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

Watari Death Note manga

Quillsh Wammy Death Note manga
Watari Death Note anime

Quillsh Wammy Death Note anime
Wammy Death Note DS game

Quillsh Wammy Death Note Nintendo game
Watari Death Note Relight

Quillsh Wammy Death Note: Relight


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Near's Cheating as Canon Truth Revealed Through Matsuda's Death Note Theory

3/4/2016

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Death Note Manga Near and Light
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.

So - Run it by Us Again - How Did Death Note End?!  I Think We Missed a Bit...

Near L Mask Death Note
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.

Death Note Doesn't End at the Yellow Box

Shinigami Realm post-Kira Death Note
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.
Kira worshippers torch procession

Matsuda's Theory is Not a Coda; It's the Final Piece in the Jigsaw Puzzle

Matsuda's theory Death Note
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.

No Black and White in Light and Near - Matsuda Muses Upon Morality Post-Kira

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:
Death Note Matsuda and Ide - For What We Were Fighting
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.
There's another point unsettling Matsuda, prickling at his conscience - just because they all decided (at the time and since) to stand against Light Yagami, why should that make them automatically pro-Near?

It's like there's only two sides about which to align oneself, and if one is demonstrably evil/insane/wrong, then the other by default is good/reasonable/right.

The entire Task Force appears to view Near as L's true successor, completely, absolutely and with all due trust.  Their resources are placed at the Wammy boy's command.

Yet to Matsuda's mind, Near never earned that.  Moreover, there are a string of worrisome - potentially catastrophic - concerns which were never fully answered.  They could well be swapping one egotistical and manipulative serial killer for another; making the same mistakes all over again.  Unfortunately no-one appears ready nor willing to hear him out.
Death Note Matsuda doesn't wanna work with L (Near)

Does Tota Matsuda's Theory Reveal Death Note Truths as its Grand Manga Finale?

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:

Near Played Mello like a Puppet

Before indulging in speculation about this part of Matsuda's Theory re Mello, please read what Death Note News reader Dominic Miller has to comment below.  He has effectively disproved its veracity, as Near didn't have Mikami's notebook in time for this sequence of events to be feasible.
Death Note Matsuda's Theory that Near Puppeteered Mello into death
Death Note Mello bowed in manga
  • Was Near conveying misinformation to Mello via Hal Lidner, psychologically edging his foster brother into acting just as Near willed.  A pawn in his game after all.

Alternatively, as alumni of the same orphanage, Near might be expected to know Mello's real name, while also having a good mental picture of his face.  Mello's move certainly benefited Near, while obviously having dire consequences for Mello himself.  

  • Did Near write the name of his Wammy rival into the notebook captured from Mikami?

Thus eliminating a challenger to his own glory right on the eve of Near's win over Kira, whilst also taking out the dangerous Takada, setting up Mikami, providing evidence that Light is Kira to throw into play AND testing possible conjecture of Near's own in the validity of his real/fake Death Note. 

Five strikes in one foul swoop, if this one was true and Near really did manipulate Mello into his own martyrdom.  (With an option on Matt too. Near had the means and that eliminated the next in line after Mello, once the second's heart was broken and finally, decisively he could be burned out of this deadly game of L's Succession.)

If Mello's abduction of Takada was orchestrated by Near via a Death Note, it would explain some of the more bizarre aspects and imagery surrounding Mello at this time.

For a start, the moment of possession would have come when Hal and Mello spoke on the line. She passes on Near's specific message, "Soon he'll bring things to a conclusion directly."  And Mello answers, "He's going to make him write our names in the notebook directly."  Just as Hal said, he knew.

The blond Wammy teen sits on a darkened throne, forearms draped across his thighs and hands dangling; head bowed listlessly beneath a cascading curtain of hair.  Like a puppet awaiting his strings to be pulled; on a floor decked as a chessboard; surrounded by mannequins, aping the debris from a battle-field; and a white dust-cover behind him draped as an awaiting winding sheet or shroud.

If Mello's actions from now on are controlled by his puppet-master Near, then it accounts for his uncharacteristic lapse in judgement in the back of the truck.  When Takada - known to use the Death Note and likely to have a snippet of it upon her person - is allowed to retain her underwear, and is even afforded a blanket for the sake of decency.

All the privacy she needed to extract the weapon to kill Mihael Keehl on Near's behalf.  Just as planned.

Near Controlled and Killed Mikami

  • Near was in possession of Teru Mikami's name, facial image and a Death Note prior to the meeting in the Yellow Box warehouse.  Did he write Mikami's name in there, directing the lawyer's actions in the days leading up to, during and after their denunciation of Kira?

  • Mikami died mysteriously in prison ten days after the Yellow Box confrontation.  His passing went without remark by those who should have been asking questions concerning its convenience in tying up loose ends for all on the Kira case.  Did Near kill Mikami by writing the fatality into a Death Note?
I'm not going to tackle this key aspect of Matsuda's theory about Near in the Death Note ending, because quite frankly Casuistor and Teruzuki have already done and completely owned that.  Convinced me anyway.

Read their take on the matter over on Tumblr:

                 Matsuda’s Theory about Near’s Victory

Matsuda's Death Note theory - Near controlled Mikami

Death Note Near burning shinigami notebooks
Death Note worst homicide weapon in history

All ur Death Notes Belong 2 Near

  • Why was Near sole allowed custody of all shinigami notebooks remaining in the human world?

Near stated that Ryuk confirmed two false rules, with one of them being the burning of a Death God's notebook will causally kill its destroyer.  Near then burned all of his accumulated Death Notes, in order to keep them from being used by any future Kira pretender.

However, no-one else was present for that conversation with the shinigami. Though they all heard it heralded in discussion within the Yellow Box Warehouse. 

  • Moreover, nor did anyone witness Near's Bonfire of the Death Notes.  Therefore how can anyone be so sure that he hasn't got them still?

If Near possesses just one Death God's notebook, then he's currently an extremely powerful force to be reckoned with upon the world stage.  He's had ample opportunity to assess its possibilities and to know its limitations.  He's had Light, Misa, Mikami, Mello and a host of others test it out for him.

He has already used it to control the actions of others, supposing that Matsuda's theory is correct; and has killed several times for personal gain and achievement by cheating.

Nobody knows that he has it.  He's not orchestrating a crusade as Light attempted to do.  He's just got access to a remarkable level of personal power and influence, the eternal company of a Death God to discuss what's previously not been met in his philosophy. 

Near's under the radar because nobody thought to check that he really did incinerate those books.  A strange oversight to be made by police officers entrenched for years on this case.

Why is Near Staging a Reunion on the First Anniversary of Kira's Death?

  • Now, on the anniversary of that traumatic confrontation with Kira, why is Near:
  1. chasing a drugs cartel into the very same location;
  2. preparing to confront them actually in the Yellow Box Warehouse;
  3. and calling upon those there last time to join him in situ once again?

Ide initially sees nothing strange in this.  Aizawa agreed to send the staff.  No immediate word from Mogi, though the assumption is compliance.

Only Matsuda wonders what game the Wammy boy is playing now.  Though in this, at least, he does appear to persuade Ide that something strange is going on - a connection to what went before; what was previously arranged.
Death Note's Near assembles a Yellow Box reunion on Kira's Death Anniversary
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!"
Last panel in Death Note
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.

Posted as Part of

Death Note Matsuda Month
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Taylor Swift Cosplaying Mello?  Dubious Death Note Nod at the 2016 Grammys

23/3/2016

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It's been pointed out to us that Taylor Swift was sporting a Death Note Mello hair-do at the 58th Annual Grammy Music Awards last month.  Take a look, see what you think:
2016 Grammys: Taylor Swift Death Note Mello hair-style
Mello Death Note anime
Death Note Mello
Death Note: Taylor Swift Mello hair-style Grammy Awards 2016
I don't know.  It wouldn't be the first time that Taylor Swift's Death Note fan credentials have been highlighted.  But on this occasion it does all seem a little tenuous!
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What Happened to The Redeemer Series? (Guest Post by Maru-Light)

15/2/2016

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Redeemer Cover Art by Arrowchild (DeviantART)

The Redeemer Series was a nearly 5-book long, epic tome of a Death Note fanfic series written by Maru-Light and Andariel (under the combined avatar cocoacoveredgods).

It focused on the premise that the Yellowbox Warehouse was essentially the pinnacle of L's 6-year long offensive against Kira, who believed L to be dead, when he really wasn’t.

Over the course of thousands of pages, the drama of Death Note’s protagonists (including Mello and Matt, Misa, Near, etc.) post-canon rolled out in a sordid tale replete with angst, erotica, violence, and horror.

It spanned at least five years of solid writing and regular posting, from the first book Redeemer, through its sequels: To Be or Not to Be, Our Time is Running Out, Sins of the Father and I’m Not Okay.

It gained a loyal audience on Adult Fanfiction.net, and an equally loyal audience on DeviantArt where its authors also cosplayed and promoted it. It seemed to be endeavoring to continue through two more solidly planned novels: End of Days and Chasing the Dragon.

But then suddenly, there was a twist.

And now all the books of the series, save the first (Redeemer)—are gone.

So what happened?

As one of its two authors, please allow me to tell you the story of Redeemer’s creation and subsequent disappearance.
Image: Redeemer cover art by Arrowchild

Success of the Redeemer Series - Death Note Fan-Fic by Maru-Light & Andariel

The Redeemer Series began as a private passion project between myself and Andariel (Anda-Chan on DA) as we were entering into our own romantic relationship back in 2008. (We’re now engaged, living together and wedding planning).

We were cosplaying often as Light and Mello back then (and later L, B and Matt) and writing together became part of our raison d'etre. It was a full package deal, the writing feeding the cosplay and vise versa. We had a habit of telling our fellow DN friends about this huge fic we were working on, and they began asking us to read it, so after some thought we eventually relented and put Redeemer up on AFF.

From there the series seemed to generate an audience on its own. We rarely promoted The Redeemer Series much outside of our own DeviantArt accounts, and later, our own forum; but on the rare occasion I sought it out online to see if it had some presence, I often came across it on various Death Note fic rec lists, and even a listing on TV Tropes.com. (LOL)

It was fantastic to suddenly have an audience that didn’t just invest in reading our story, but reviewed and even joined our forum to chat all things Redeemer Series. We had fabulous artists doing fan art, we had an active Character Ask section, we were embroiled in discussion every day about the Death Note of our fic world, and we made some truly great and supportive friends (several of whom are still with us.)

So really, what happened?

Writing on The Redeemer Series Begins to Break Down

Later on we had some of our nearest and dearest readers tell us that they could pinpoint just where the series started to fall apart. At some point in the fourth book, Sins of the Father, around the quarter mark, long after we reached what we felt was an apex in the finale of To Be or Not to Be and then cruised through a very alternative continuation supported largely by OCs in Our Time is Running Out, we started to lose momentum. 

We’d been writing about Death Note for five years. However, we were two writers (in my case a life-long writer) who sought to have real-world careers in writing, but were beginning to realize that we were spending all of our time writing about someone else’s work. It was fun, it was engaging, we loved it while it lasted, but we were beginning to long for something more and we weren’t getting any younger.

It wasn’t an immediate revelation. It came slowly as we pounded the keyboard to push through Sins of the Father. After all, we had two more huge books planned. We had enormous story arcs to cover! The nature of Kira’s God-ness was going to be explored in epic proportions! We were heading toward the End of Days!

Instead, what we were actually heading toward was the end of the Redeemer Series.

The Restrictions of Redeemer

As co-authors, our method of writing was to often volley paragraphs back and forth at each other to propel the story along, and then before upload, I would comb through chapters, as the principle editor, to make sure everything was fluid and had a cohesive voice.

I started noticing, that in scenes involving more canon contexts, the writing began to get painfully repetitive, plots were stalling, we were echoing literal sentences back and forth at each other. I remember distinctly, one sex scene we were working on sounded so painfully done before, that we literally tore it out and fought to write it with entirely new dynamics so it wasn’t boring.

And that was it. We’d grown bored.

The only things that seemed to pique our interests were no longer the sex scenes, or the drama between the Death Note characters, but the original concepts we’d steadily been bringing in over time.  Stories of madness and asylums and insane serial killers.

We whisked L off at one point and set him on a modern Sherlock Holmesian plotline by himself in Edinburgh, and it was the most enjoyable part of the book for me to write (and has since been reworked as the opening chapters of the original series.) I had inspiration again, I had drive, I didn’t want to return to the previous Death Note arcs.

I wanted to be free.

I wasn’t the only one. Anda had tired of everything. Getting her to pitch in on the books was like pulling teeth, when previously it had been so exciting and so fun.

It was time for a change.

But neither of us wanted to accept that the series had come to its natural end. Too much work had gone into it. Too much love and sweat and tears. Too many years and hours. Hours and hours and hours. So we came to a compromise.
Redeemer Fan Art: '...le beau petit garcon...' by Arrowchild (DeviantART)

'...le beau petit garcon...' Redeemer Series
fan-art by Arrowchild,
featuring Beyond Birthday and Mello
We were going to write a spinoff called I’m Not Okay (we were having a love affair with My Chemical Romance at the time). The spinoff centered on one of our OCs (his name was Adonais back then) with the Death Note characters as a peripheral presence. The idea was to tell Adonais’ origin story as a flashback novel, and lead into Sins, where he’d been coexisting as a Wammy’s student with the likes of L and Light. It was supposed to be a break for us, a way to get out and play with something new, and hopefully return to the Redeemer Series with renewed vigor. That was our plan.

But what happened was not according to plan.

Backlash of Death Note Redeemer Series Readers

Not long ago, we came across a blog post somewhere, belaboring our ‘underhandedness’ of ‘tricking’ our readers to read a book about an OC with promises of Death Note and then not delivering. “If they wanted to stop writing Death Note, just come clean and tell us, don’t trick us into reading about your OC.” That was the complaint, or something to that effect.

Let me say, it wasn’t that simple. If it was, we could have saved ourselves a lot of angst. After all, we weren’t lying to our readers; we were lying to ourselves.

Frankly, we weren’t ready to let go. It was a lesson we learned the hard way, writing I’m Not Okay. The more we wrote, the more that book began to do what it wanted apart from Death Note, but we kept trying to force the enduring intent that we were going to bring it all back around to the Redeemer Series. Slowly, our audience started to drop off, frustration began to show in reviews. The longer names like Kira and L and Mello were absent from the text, the less people stayed with us, and the more that happened, the more we began to wonder at what point did we have to accept the truth: that we’d moved on.

The readers that remained and invested honestly in our burgeoning original tale, weathered our indecisiveness, but started to agree that we needed to break it off. Not Okay was becoming its own thing, and to proceed without letting the book organically grow as itself, was proving a hindrance to the work and to our efforts. And clearly it was pissing off the people still holding out for L and Light to make an appearance.

So we decided to call it, and we removed I’m Not Okay from AFF and put the Redeemer Series on indefinite hiatus.

The Redeemer Series Transforms into The Breaking Across Devotion Series

Breaking Across Devotion - CocoaCoveredGods forum
We squirrelled our new work off to our private forum where some of our long-term readers were keen to beta. From there, Pandora’s box syndrome kicked in and we realized there was a huge untapped OC cast with untapped potential just waiting to move in on our little story and blow it wide open.

Because all of this siphoned down from The Redeemer Series, there were initially some similarities between concepts we'd been exploring beyond canon when it came to characters like Beyond and L particularly. Those similarities eventually diluted until we can really just shout out to their original incarnates like a sentimental homage. 

However, as we planned the world of our new original universe, we realized there were still elements we'd incorporated in To Be and its compatriots that we wanted to explore and adapt. We began to pull some of these concepts back in, revisiting ideas we had for the Redeemer Series with new eyes as we constructed a world, while removed from Death Note, was not necessarily removed from our signature subjects.

Our explorations of madness and the asylum culture, our crazed characters who often speak in sing-song~ Our off-beat, anarchist, angst-ridden, pretty boys. That’s who we are as writers, and that’s what we have been building into our new work--The Breaking Across Devotion Series. Literally a tale about rock stars and serial killers. I’m not even kidding.

We made every attempt to spread the word about why the Redeemer books were coming down, but our reach is none too wide these days, and I know there are a great many readers out there who are angry and disappointed. Trust me, I get it and I’m sorry.

The Redeemer Series had a great long run. We had a lot of fun writing it, we had an amazing experience with the audience it garnered. We’re grateful and we thank you guys who latched on to it and enjoyed it so much. Redeemer itself is still public on AFF and won’t be going anywhere. It is undeniably, a Death Note fanfic.

However, I am going to echo what I’ve said repeatedly in statements about the series’ removal: that if you so happen to have downloaded copies of the novels, you are free to keep them for you own reading pleasure. Just please do not share them online, or post them for download, and please do not plagiarize them (have some humanity, I beg you).

Anda and I are hard at work on The Breaking Across Devotion Series (BAD for short) and are very active on our new forum, CocoaCoveredGods.

Anyone is free to join if they want to get in touch with us, want to ask us anything about Redeemer, or want to check out what still exists of the Redeemer Series content regarding the removed books, Character Asks, fan art, etc. And yes, there’s even a thread where we speak to the unsolved mysteries of the series and where future plans were heading, so what was left unfinished can at least have some closure. (Was Matt ever going to die as predicted? Short answer: no.)

We’re also open to betas of the new series. Since we’re planning to publish, it’s not open membership, but if you're interested, come over and let us get to know you, get to know us, and we’ll be more than happy to consider you as a beta. Chances are, if you enjoyed the Redeemer Series, what we’re doing now will be right up your alley. It’s just as dark, and twisted and saturated in atmosphere as books like To Be, Our Time and Sins were.

Death Note: Redeemer Kira cosplay by Maru-Light
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Death Note Movie Makers Gearing Up for Filming

6/2/2016

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We have two Death Note films coming this year.  The proof is in the Tweeting.
(Incidentally the actual date for Japan's Death Note 2016 movie release is September 13th 2016, according to IMDb.)

Japanese movie Death Note 2016 starts filming

'Death Note 2016 begins! Thank you' reads this Tweet
from the official Japanese Warner Bros account
on January 6th 2016 - presumably referring to filming
Meanwhile, over on the official Death Note 2016 website:
Death Note 2016 lead actors
 The recently announced stars of Death Note 2016 - Sōsuke Ikematsu, Masahiro Higashide and Masaki Suda - have been commenting on their new roles.

Masahiro, who is playing Death Note researcher and investigator Tsukuru Mishima, notes that he's grown up knowing this story.  Therefore it's difficult not to be influenced by what has gone before; nor to avoid the pressure in getting it right.

He views the latest story as a three-way, intertwined battle between geniuses. He is enjoying making the movie and hopes that we enjoy watching it, including those discovering the story for the first time now.

'New L' Sōsuke - aka Ryūzaki - is also feeling the pressure: to live up to the legacy left by Ken'ichi Matsuyama in the earlier movies. He feels excited about filming and notes that every day the cast are directed in exceeding the standard of the day before.

This new Death Note story, he feels, contains the central message that human beings are weak and foolish creatures.

Masaki equally remembers when he was in the audience watching earlier Death Note live-action films. That makes it all the more thrilling to be starring in one now.

He sees in his own legacy a hint of Mello and Near in the original manga, insofar as his cyber-terrorist Kira worshipper character Yūgi Shion - plus the parts played by the other two - represent the successors, heirs or children of Light and L.  This is the movie equivalent of a Death Note second arc.

He hopes that their 'second half' story will surpass expectations laid down by the first wave of Japanese live-action Death Note movies ten years ago.

Personally they would have had my (tentative) vote straight out, if they'd just HAD Mello in one of these live-action movies.  And I don't mean disguised as a young schoolgirl.  We're all looking at you, L: Change the World and Maki.
Reading Death Note Adam Wingard Director

US live action Death Note director Adam Wingard,
re-reading the Black Edition,
as per his Tweet on December 10th 2015
Adam followed his with this Tweet, also dated December 10th 2015:
Death Note director Adam Wingard Black Edition luggage Tweet Dec 10th 2015
Death Note Black Edition I
Death Note Black Edition II
The complete Black Edition Death Note, as read by Adam Wingard,
is available in our Death Note Books and Manga Store

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On This Day in Death Note: January 26th 2010

26/1/2016

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Picture
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A Metrosexual Tribute to David Bowie by Mello

11/1/2016

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The Bowie-esque metrosexuality of Death Note Mello
Too young to have known the impact of Bowie in the 1970s, I can only imagine. It must have been immense. By the time the ripples reached me - in the early noughties, thirty years on - they still sounded as a sonic boom, even then retaining power enough to rock my world. Representing one less battle for me to win, because he'd already owned it on our behalf and done it with aplomb.

Bowie brought colour to a monochrome world. Without him, all would have remained painted black for me, in counterpoint to my rival's white.  Splitting our idol's hues into two; dividing them one apiece. Like they were all that existed in the rainbow prism of a fabulous spectrum.

I wore red for Bowie. I wore feathers, leather, mascara and kohl. I wore whatever I Goddamned liked, because he made it possible for all men to do so without sacrificing one iota of masculinity. Whether we traced it back to source or not, it was Bowie who took male beauty into a cosmetic artform and gave us the glitz and glamour previously only available to ladies.

If he could do that in working men's clubs, I could do it in the Mafia. He made Metrosexual sexy. He made self-pride alright. He made it so no-one could say a blasted thing about it and not seem silly in the saying.

All this while gay men were still being beaten by police in raids on shady bars. All of this out in the open, where conversations could be had over dinner-tables watching Bowie on TV.  All giving courage to countless legions of gay and bisexual individual, and those who saw gender in its glorious fluidity, and those who simply didn't care a damn.

As writer Mark Simpson - 'daddy' of the Metrosexual - put it back in 1994, “(David Bowie) gaily refused to conform to 'masculine' expectations and provocatively appropriated ‘feminine’ styles, fashions, cosmetics and sensualities – anything that would make him look and feel fabulous, and piss off 1970s dads. He understood perfectly that the world was an increasingly visual culture and sired the New Romantics, who went on to invent the 21st Century.

“The glamorous seeds he sowed back in the Seventies have borne strange and wonderful bisensual fruit, enjoyed by everyone, regardless of gender or orientation.”

There is no 'feminine' anymore. No 'masculine'; no 'androgyny'; no 'unisex'; not after Bowie. There is just us and what we will be. Each of us with the potential to be heroes, rebels, leper messiahs or stardust, but mostly the potential to be whatever we want to be. He blurred boundaries until there were none, only that which we set ourselves. He normalised the weird; domiciled aliens; made diversity the new normal.

Moreover, Bowie taught generations since that it's ok to reinvent yourself, and reinvention does not have to mean losing one atom of that self.

You may know me as Mello, 'the best dresser who died like a dog'. But it was a Diamond Dog, with a fabulous wardrobe made possible by the prior bravery of Bowie. We can be heroes, he told us, and we were.

RIP the legend that was David Bowie (1947-2016)

* Death Note Mello's David Bowie tribute written with perhaps a little help from MRSJeevas
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