I really liked what the movie did with Light. I can understand people maybe being annoyed at how different he was from the original but I think in the end Iiked how the movie version ended up. I felt Light became too much of a cariacature in the anime, its far too easy to make your antagonist an intelligent guy with a severe God complex and towards the end I found him to be almost ridiculous. I like in the movie we see him start off completely normal and slowly begin to become twisted, yet never reach the ridiculous meglomaniac ways of the anime. So yeah, I like his movie-verse character better.

I also liked the way Naomi was handled. You called her ‘brain dead’ but I didn’t see that at all. She knew he was Kira, she just had to prove it and I didn’t see any moment where she came across stupid. I believe they changed Raye’s name to Iwamatsu because he was Japanese, unlike the Ameican Raye Penbar. Light and L’s relationship was a little lacking I agree, but it was never to awful proportions.

I personally love Tatsuya as an actor (he was fantastic in Battle Royale) and think he played Light well enough, not great but far from awful. I also didn’t really care that he didn’t come across as the typical bishounen Pretty Boy. L was pretty much spot on IMO and I have absolutely no complaints with him. Misa’s actress was good too I felt and looked the part (sticking a blonde wig on a Japanese actress would’ve looked completely stupid, plus this is Live-Action, you’ll never find someone who looks exactly like them and can act). I would’ve preferred if she had a little more of the ditzy-ness the original Misa had but she still came across cheery enough and I think if Toda had played Misa too dumb she would have continually pissed me off.

The CGI was good enough, assuming they were trying to give the Shinigamis the ‘anime feel’. As for the overall story I probably preferred it to the original. It cut the frankly horrible Near and Mello section, added a 3rd Kira who I preferred over the anime’s other Kiras, gave L the win and showed a better transition of normal Light to Kira.

All in all I think this is the best Live Action Death Note that could be done. Sorry for the long, kinda ranty post btw!

I disagree with everything that you said, I started watching the first movie and couldn’t bare it, I abandoned any hope that it might improve and actually entertain me. The IMDB rating for it just completely baffles me as the movie is a total flop and makes the anime look bad. The anime is a masterpiece and will always remain one of my all time favourites.

Ah, but could they act better? Yes, hell yes! Hobos could act better than the LA actors in this movie, and if the only criteria is being hot and looking like the characters, bingo, instant L/Light. It didn’t seem to be important to this movie that the characters could act, or look like the source material, so it’s an instant win if the movie was cast solely with random hot people.

P.S. Thanks!!!