The story of Death Note, overall, in both the manga as well as the anime adaptation, is a giant battle of wits between Light Yagami, and L. At many points, it feels reminiscent of watching an elaborate chess match play out in 109 Chapters (including the Epilogue), and 37 episodes.
One character is continuously trying to outdo the other, getting a step ahead. But every time one feels like they’re gaining ground on the other, they realize their opponent is already making moves to counter them.
If you’re not familiar with the premise of Death Note – a high school student, Light Yagami, finds a Shinigami (god of death) note book – called a Death Note – and begins using it to eliminate the criminals of the world. L, a world renown and mysterious detective, is brought into the mix to try to find Light’s killer alter ego – known as Kira – and bring him to justice. Full of twists and turns, there’s a lot from the manga that’s brought perfectly into the anime. But there are some minor differences, and a few major differences, that manga readers notice when watching the show.
Death Note: Tone and Atmosphere
There are some things that come across differently solely because of differences in presentation. Written things rely on the readers to give voices to characters, as we go panel to panel, page to page. But in the anime, they have the ability to add depth to a scene with music, voice acting, sound effects. The animation adds a lot to the story as well, giving more to scenes that had limitations otherwise and colors where the manga only had black and white. So more tones that evoke horror can be brought through, and scenes that didn’t come across as creepy in the manga are chilling in the anime.
With this, we can hear things like the voice modification that L uses to speak from his hideout, feel the emotion in voices, etc. But this is a difference most adaptations can capture.
Death Note Ending
Obviously, you may want to skip ahead if you don’t want the ending spoiled for either the manga or the anime. But this is one of the most notable differences overall – the ending was changed. It wasn’t anything too massive: instead of Light dying in the room after begging Ryuk to help, only for Ryuk to kill him, Light escapes after Mikami causes a distraction. He makes it a decent distance away before the same results – Ryuk writes Light’s name in his own death note. His body is later found.
Death Note: Light Yagami
Had I not read the manga and then immediately watched the show, I may not have noticed, but there is something a bit more hateful and unhinged about the Light that we get in the anime. In the manga, Light seems bored with being the perfect son. He laughs off the death note initially. In the anime, Light seems to resent everyone, and is almost fearful of the death note initially.
The intensity of Light as he gets further into his role as Kira. The duality of Light and Kira, and the mentality of Light in general, feels more explored through the manga.
Additional Death Note Scenes
As far as I noticed, there were a few Death Notes scenes that were added in that weren’t in the manga, to my recollection. The first was a scene with Misa, where she looks like a doll almost, in some fantasy scenario in her mind. Walking down the street, singing to herself, during her return to killing as Kira.
The second Death Note scene that stuck out to me was moments before the death of L. A scene between L and Light plays out on the rooftop in the rain. When the two come back inside to dry off, L offers to dry Light’s feet. For a moment, it’s almost a religious image – L at the feet of “God”, as Kira calls himself. Then Light tries to dry L’s hair, before L says “You and I will be parting ways, soon.”
But along with this, there are scenes that feel like they’re extended. For example, we see more of the killings play out that may have only been reports of deaths in the manga. Instead, we get mini scenes of criminals collapsing and dying sprinkled in to give us a better grasp on how much Kira is actually doing to bring his new world.
Finally, there is a scene with L coming to Watari’s orphanage that wasn’t originally in the manga.
Death Note: Less Explanation
Another minor change that I nearly missed: some minor rules were not explained. Whether they didn’t go into depth, or skipped it entirely, there were some rules to using the death note that weren’t really covered, and I only really noticed it when my niece asked me a question while watching. For example, you can’t control someone and make them commit a terrorist attack or mass murder.
Another explanation left out – the fact that L can fight. This seems out of his nature in the anime, but he still tosses Light around when they get into small skirmishes. But in the manga he explains he was trained by one of the agents. His name and the complexities involving it, his alias’s, and the detectives he defeated to become the best detective were all left out, for the most part.
Along with this, as we watched L die in the anime, they didn’t leave in his thoughts as the entire scene plays out. We see a moment of realization as Light smiles at the dying L. In the manga, however, we know L realized it sooner than this.
Overall, the Death Note anime and manga are fairly close to each other, but the differences are there for those that know where to look. I’m sure there are even more things I missed about it if I reread and watched it all again. But as far as adaptations go, Death Note is a fairly solid anime.
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