Takeshi Obata had only just finished working on Hikaru no Go, when he received the call to say he'd been hired as Death Note's artist.  Working with author Yumi Hotta, the manga ran to 23 volumes and inevitably spawned an anime adaptation.  Including a version dubbed into English.

Now Viz Media has made its Hikaru no Go English dub anime available on-line, as free viewing on its own Neon Alley, plus Hulu.  Previously it could only be legally seen on DVD.

Hikaru no Go tells the story of a Japanese six grader, who finds an old, bloodstained Go board and is possessed by the ghost of an ancient game-master. The phantom Fujiwara-no-Sai cannot rest until he's played the Divine Move.

Much top class competitive playing commences against players who have devoted their entire existence to being the best Go strategist around. Can a mere High School boy beat them all?

This should be of interest to Death Note fans - Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata are teaming up again, and the bare hint from the tag-line implies the plot will be right up our alley.

Well, we all seemed quite taken last time, when it was a human and a shinigami!

The announcement will appear in the next edition of Weekly Shonen Jump, issue 44, due out on September 28th 2015.  It will be followed by a Platinum End première feature the following week, in the October 5th Weekly Shonen Jump No 45.

However, it will be another Shueisha title - Jump Square - wherein the actual serialisation will begin.

Our Death Note creators' brand new manga Platinum End launches on November 4th 2015, dated the Jump SQ December 2015 edition - thus is the way of the world.

I don't know about you, but I'm quite excited about this! Given Ohba's propensity to mess around with angels - vis-a-vis Light's lifting of Lucifer quotations from Paradise Lost and Mello's alignment (made explicit in the recent televised Death Note drama) with the archangel Michael - I feel that the groundwork has already been forged.  And that was quite fabulous.

What are your thoughts on the matter?  Please do leave your comments below in the usual manner, but I'm also going to insert a poll about this.  Mostly because I've only just noticed I've got a pre-coded poll module that I can insert, and I want to find out what it does.

Only tenuously Death Note related, it's all about Bakuman in their creators' world this week.

While we might consider Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata in terms of OUR manga, they have collaborated much more recently than that on the semi-autobiographical Bakuman.

It's a series which chronicles the rise of an author and writer within the manga industry.

The current edition of Weekly Shonen Jump (September 21st 2015) includes the first in a special two-parter prequel to the main Bakuman chapters.

It tells what happened with main characters Moritaka Mashiro - pen name Saikō - and Akito Takagi - later known as Shūjin - before the pair joined forces to produce a wildly popular manga series. Like, you know, Ohba and Obata did in real life with Death Note.

Spanning 23 chapters, the first part of this Bakuman prequel has boosted the manga magazine to a hefty 315 pages!  Featured as an added bonus is a full colour Bakuman centrespread.

The original Bakuman manga ran in Weekly Shonen Jump from 2008-2012.  Those chapters were collected into twenty volumes published by Shueisha, which have sold over 15 million copies worldwide. An anime based upon the story was televised over three seasons, aired in Japanese television between 2010-2013.

Viz Media and Media Blasters reproduced English language versions of the manga and anime respectively, primarily for North American audiences.

A live action Bakuman movie is due to be released on October 3rd 2015, hence the two part prequel beginning in Weekly Shonen Jump this week. It acts as a tie-in special event and incidentally helps boost publicity for the film.

In the story, Muto Ashirogi's third manga is entitled PCP -Kanzen Hanzaitō- (trans. PCP - Perfect Crime Party). Now that fictional manga is due for release as a real world novel.

It will bear Ashirogi's name as the first author, though his co-author Sei Hatsuno (HaruChika) probably did much of the work here.

Another blatant tie-in, the novel will hit bookshelves on October 2nd 2015, one day ahead on the Bakuman movie.

A new live-action Bakuman film means an original soundtrack to accompany it. For fans of Takeshi Obata's art, this is an unexpected avenue in which to discover some.

Obata has created the artwork for the Bakuman CD soundtrack, including that for a CD single Shin Takarajima (pictured above) lifted from the OST. Due to be released in a limited edition format, the song has been recorded by rock band Sakanaction and features in the movie.

A DVD of the Bakuman OST is also scheduled.

This is an old news item, but it's been taking up space in my 'Death Note News stories' folder. Despite only tenuously having anything to do with our story.

Death Note mangaka Takeshi Obata was featured in a Shonen Jump special video, which showed the artists behind four of their most successful series creating their characters from scratch on a pad.

Obata was included, of course, though he opted to draw the main characters from Bakuman rather than those from his earlier run-away success with Death Note.

Takeshi Obata's segment begins at 4.20.  Also featured are Tite Kubo (Bleach), Masahi Kishimoto (Naruto) and Eiichiro Oda (One Piece). 

It was uploaded on July 29th 2013.

Also available on YouTube is a far more leisurely view of Obata drawing a page from Bakuman, back in April 2013.

Filmed in real time, the footage will be of particular interest to those wanting to know what goes into a mangaka's work, maybe to become one themselves.

It takes Takeshi Obata half an hour to ink the previously sketched manga artwork for this page.

It seems wrong in a Death Note blog to skip any examples of Takeshi Obata drawing our characters.  Hence I've found a couple of moments for you.

This footage is from 2012, when Obata attended Lucca Comics and Games in Tuscany. He's beginning to sketch Ryuk. Unfortunately all fan filming and photography was banned, hence this is a very short clip.

We've already featured a clip of Obata drawing Ryuk and L at New York Comic-Con in 2014.  But here it is again.

Death Note News covered Obata's US visit far more extensively at the time. Read more about it:

• Takeshi Obata Talks About Death Note at New York ComicCon 2014
• 'I Struggle to Draw Cute Girls' Takeshi Obata Tells Comic Alliance
• Difficult to Draw Shinigami Should Have Been Kept Simple - Takeshi Obata Interview at CBR
• Death Note Characters - 'Borderline Fully-Fledged Villains' All, According to Obata

For the past three episodes, we've been teased with the notion that a prone, or otherwise blind-to-the-puppet-of-himself, Mello has been out of shot in that room. I suspected he was sitting on one of those chairs.

Near always looks over the head of the puppet, whenever (s)he addresses Mello. His voice is heard, projected without so much as a twitch of Near's lips.

In the second episode it seemed that a shoulder could be glimpsed in the shadows of the fireplace chair alongside Near. Right at the spot where his/her eyes kept being drawn, roughly consistent with where a head might be on the individual seated there.

L addressed Mello directly, as someone external to Near in that same instalment.  He subtly did it again just moments prior to the wide-shot scene above.  Watari approached to say that Near was on the line.  L answered, "I'll call them back."  Implying that there was more than one person to be called back.

However L's delay wasn't being well received at the other end of that line. Focused fully upon Near and his Mello puppet, we were privy to a disturbing exchange.

Mello: He's disrespecting you!
Near: Calm down.
Mello: Hey, call Kira! We can work with Kira to erase L!
Near: We can't do that.
Mello: Help him out.
Near: No.

It's at this point that Near shifted to physically align position with the puppet.

Before both voices sounded simultaneously seeming to confirm that Mello was indeed a separate entity.

Near and Mello: You're so stuck-up, Near.
Near: You talk too much Mello.
Near and Mello: Dummy! Dummy!

The laughter which sounds over the wide shot that follows could be either Near or Mello, or both become one again. We're expecting to see Mello as live action figure sitting in that seat, but the beautiful room is empty beyond Near, his Mello puppet and the Christian iconography in stained glass and huge artwork.

What Near was looking at - in lieu of referring to an actual Mello there - was the canvas depicting the Fall of the Rebel Angels.

Yet two voices were heard and they were both Near.  So yep. That's the major gossip. Near is in fact Mello.  And a whole section of the fandom freezes. While also admitting that it makes for an intriguing storyline.

I know that half of the Mello/Matt fandom are here.  What do you make of it?  Personally I'm quite fascinated. I'm sticking around to see where they go with this, whilst holding out for a real Mello to turn up later in the series.

After all, Near's puppet was based on someone in the manga. It might still be here too.

Elsewhere, there are more mind games being pursued throughout episode 4 of Death Note. 

Item one is a wilful disregard for human life on the part of all three main protagonists.  Four, if we include Near/Mello's avowed compulsion to kill L. 

There's Light scribbling down names a week in advance, so Kira's body count may continue, even as Light himself is under surveillance.  He contemplates the fact that he can only get five names onto his scrap of paper, not with any remorse for murder, nor any avowed sense of justice, but as a personal smoke screen. He's a very different young man from the sobbing one seen in the earlier episodes.  Kira cold and plotting, already consumed by the need to succeed whatever the cost.

There's Misa blithely noting that a cameraman only has a year to live, even as she's smiling and posing for pictures. It doesn't seem to penetrate emotionally at all. She doesn't know him and he appears to be a bit of a creep. Nevertheless, you'd expect a flicker of human feeling at the realisation of his imminent demise.

Later, she's downright gleeful, as she joins spectators at the scene where two criminals lie dead. They've been killed by herself, with her own Death Note, at the urging of Rem. There's none of the angst that beset Light at his first Kira kills playing upon her face. She's even dressed appropriately as the Black Widow incarnate.

Then there's L, dispassionately announcing that he used Mark Dwellton (Ray Penbar) as bait in order to catch Kira - effectively sending him to his death without any back up.  He didn't seem to spot any incongruity in the fact that he 'didn't get around' to asking who Kira was, though Mark/Ray patently knew by now. Yet L did find time to plant a transmitter upon him.

It was more important for L to be the one to find Kira, than it was to catch Kira per se, or save a man's life.

L's mindset paved the way for one of the most thought-provoking sequences within Death Note television show episode four. 

The phenomenon of compliance exists all too easily in real life too - which is how concentration camps are built and harsh laws enacted without much more than a murmur on the streets - and L knows very well how to invoke such behaviour.

Human beings basically want to follow the herd. No matter how heinous the action, most will first look around to see if anyone else is speaking out. We second guess ourselves, if all our peers appear readily accepting of the situation. If someone in authority assures us that it's alright, then it's pretty much game over. We're socially programmed to not only keep silent, but actually join in that which ordinarily we'd call an outrage.

Matsuda protests against L's deadly usage of Ray Penbar for bait. L sneeringly dismisses the condemnation, assured in his personal immunity because Matsuda can't file an official complaint without exposing his real name and face to Kira.

The police officer instantly backs down. Personal safety, the silence of his peers and L's scathing tone reduce his concerns to nothing, despite the clarity of his duty here.

It's the introduction of security cameras, enacting secret surveillance within the homes of police officers which fires Mogi's indignation. "This is a human rights violation!" He rails at L, who merely smirks.  It's the usually upright and morally exact Soichiro who loses sight of all ethical conduct here, reassuring Mogi and ordering his people to follow L's orders.

The compliance is complete, when all officers not only cease their protest, but join in with what they previously found so reprehensible.  It's only several days hence that Mogi has an insight to level at L, "You're the same way (as Kira)!"

Then they're all sent home. L no longer needs to manipulate them into compliance, he was about to switch tactics anyway.

Mind you, that's a philosophy soon twisted in Light's mind through a filter of Kira, until its finally subverted into, "I think Kira, who was born by acquiring this power, is the most blessed person on Earth."

Other techniques of manipulation were middling, such as Watari - acting upon L's orders - broadcasting fake news bulletins about 1500 FBI agents entering Japan to search for Kira.

More yet were downright blatant. Light came on like a bulldozer in manipulating Ryuk by force of apple abstinence into helping him find the surveillance devices in his bedroom.

While the heaviest of all came from Misa and her threatening letter, designed to manipulate Japan's government and its media. She didn't want much, just their open support and assistance for Kira, and L dragged onto television for a public execution. 

Given that the police authorities had already 'lost their nerve', it's probably a blessing for L that its chiefs didn't know his location. Else Misa might have won that round.

Incidentally, did you spot the hidden nod in that scene towards Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata? 

The stricken Chief of Police was called Ogiso Takeshi.  That he shared the same name as Death Note's canon artist was obvious. Less so was the link between Ohba and Ogiso. 

We have to slip back a few centuries and relocate to Africa. There you'll find the biggest Benin dynasties. Firstly the Ogiso, which was succeeded by *drum roll* the Oba.  Different spelling, same pronunciation.  Tenuous?  I think not.

Finally we get the most pervasive theme of all in this TV Death Note episode, that of paranoia. 

Particularly in the sense of that old adage:  'just because you're paranoid, it doesn't mean they're not watching you'.

Light Yagami is downright paranoid from the off. 

Though, to be fair, it's with good reason, what with FBI agents following him, Japanese agents watching his every move at home, Misa stalking him and L turning up at his school to challenge him in front of all his friends. 

He begins the episode with statements like, 'if anything happens to me, Kira's judgements must still go on', thus implying that he believes something might happen to him. He then has a good long paranoid moment in class, trying to guess the identity of the second Kira - is it someone he knows?  It is somebody famous?  It could be anybody!

His paranoia also shows in his behaviour.  Booby-trapping his bedroom door is a big one, though again that actually tipped him off that his room had been entered by professionals. 

By partway through, his self-commentary is coming out with things like, "If I make one false move, (L will) find out." Not the musings of a sane boy, however correct his presumptions transpired to be.

Mind you, he did manage to traverse the potato chip scene without any of the iconic bellowing of his English dub anime counterpart.

Then you get Misa's big moment, wherein Rem warns her that using any Death Note causes its owner to become highly paranoid.  (A new aspect created for this telling of the tale?)  Until now, Misa has appeared relatively intelligent and capable.  Suddenly she's beaming blankly at Rem, asking airily, "What does paranoid mean?"

Before setting out to manipulate Light by triggering his own Death Note incurred paranoia.  It all felt a little jarring from where I was sitting.

Mostly though, Death Note (2015) episode 4 is going to be remembered for its blatant and gratuitous fan-service for the legions within the Light/L fandom.

Until now, Kento Yamazaki taking his shirt off every episode has been the biggest fare on offer for his fans.  Now a good ten minutes was taken up with nothing much beyond Light and L flirting incessantly and posing with little to no clothes on.  There was a whole scene in a communal shower for Kami's sake!

Let's just have a little picture show and let the images speak for themselves.

I rest my case.