Death Note (デスノート, Desu Nōto) - is a Japanese manga series created by writer Tsugumi Ohba and illustrator Takeshi Obata. The series centers on Light Yagami, a high school student who discovers a supernatural notebook dropped on Earth by Ryuk, a shinigami ("death god"), that allows Light to kill anyone by writing the victim's name in the notebook. The user must also know the face of the victim to prevent anyone with the same name from being harmed. The story follows Light's attempt to create and rule a world cleansed of evil using the notebook, and the complex conflict between him and his opponents.

Question number 6: Who Created the Death Notes?

Question number 6: Who Created the Death Notes?

Answer:
Blah dee blah, another "humans become Shinigami when they die". More "Shinigami exist to regulate the human population". This is actually a very poorly set up argument and I don't really follow, but the basic idea is that the Shinigami King is the only Shinigami who wasn't at one point a human, so he made the Death Notes (err, but after humans invented notebooks, after the human/Shinigami covenant dealio in the previous question?). He picks his Shinigami from humans who kill, because they can, err, regulate the human race population. Again, Death Notes exist to find humans who will kill with it and thus become Shinigami. I don't have much to say besides, blah. I'll believe that the Shinigami King might have been the one who created the Death Notes, possibly, but the author is basically saying that all Shinigami were once human murderers. This seems to contradict characters like Rem, who, though will kill humans to sustain their own lives, are compassionate and view murder as despicable.

Question 4: How Long have the Death Notes Existed?

Question 4: How Long have the Death Notes Existed?

Answer:
"There must have been some sort of system predating the written word that allowed humans to become shinigami, one that didn't involve writing in a notebook. It follows that there has been a covenant between humans and shinigami since long, long ago, but it's only relatively recently that it has taken on the form of a notebook."

I say, really? and roll my bleeding eyes. Once upon a time, according to Mr. Kazuhisa Fujie, the Shinigami and humans had a covenant (the word makes me think Bible, lol). And when humans invented the notebook, Shinigami thought that was just totally super fabulous and designed the Death Note after them.

Question number 3: What is the purpose of the Death Note?

Question number 3: What is the purpose of the Death Note?

Answer:
The book states that the Death Note was specifically designed for humans. Whereas it is an interesting argument that there are so many very particular How to Use rules concerning what happens when a Death Note drops in the human world, the author says that the purpose of the Death Note is obviously, a mechanism to find humans who will become Shinigami upon their deaths. I'll expand on the Light-becomes-a-Shinigami bit later, but it should be brought forward that there's just not a real connection, only as assumption as far as the theory about the Death Note being designed for human use goes. Shinigami are, roughly speaking, humanoid. They (sort of) have hands and eyes and, presumably, brains. The author argues that the Death Note relies on human language, but the fact of the matter is, we could call Shinigami leeches. They leech off of human existence, they are our predators. They need human life to live, so I don't think it's particularly odd that they adapt into using notebooks and pens and writing human names in human languages. The original Death Note rules were probably written by the Shinigami King, and he not only mandated rules about humans using the Death Note, but about Shinigami as well. It's a dual relationship but there's no canon bridge between why there are human rules and the creation of Shinigami.

Question One: What is the purpose of a Shinigami?

Question One: What is the purpose of a Shinigami?

Answer:
"In the world of Death Note, besides the human world, Heaven and Hell, there is also a Shinigami world..."

See, in the world of Death Note, Heaven and Hell don't exist at all. The book's statement irks me. It has nothing to do with personal religious/spiritual belief, we're talking about the canon of a particular series. In that canon, there is only MU after death. Ryuk is pretty blatant about Heaven and Hell being creations of human imagination in chapter 107 of the manga. ("[Light], you really are something. I thought all humans seriously believed in heaven and hell... There is no Heaven or Hell.").

Now, going further, this first question/answer goes on to explain the author's supposed purpose of the Shinigami. The author tries to build an argument, using that grand word "implies" and states that a Shinigami's existence has a direct purpose in the human world. Despite the fact, and the author even admits that Shinigami show no interest whatsoever in the human race, the author claims that long ago Shinigami used to kill criminally-inclined humans for, I kid you not, population control.

"..The Shinigami must take life cautiously. Also, a human likely to kill many other humans would be a more logical target, so as to keep the human race alive and plentiful for the Shinigami. Thus.... [they] serve the pupose of helping to perpetuate the human race."

Then it contradicts itself in the next paragraph, saying that yeah, nowadays Shinigami don't play their proper role in the human world, and that's explains the human population explosion and its corresponding strain on Earth's environment and natural resources. So basically, the fact that Shinigami don't do shit now is the cause of all of our modern day world problems. Uh, how fascinating, but this is canon how...?

"Death Note: Fatally Fun Facts"

Death Note: Fatally Fun Facts

I'm sure a lot of you have heard of this unofficial Death Note guidebook, Death Note: Fatally Fun Facts. I first saw it months ago at the bookstore, and, intrigued, I picked it up and glanced through it. It only took a few minutes for me to get irritated and shove it back on the shelf, coming to the easy decision that I'd never waste my money on it. But, lo and behold, I ended up getting it for my birthday. So, thinking I ought to be fair, I found the time to actually read it, and took a highlighter to things that stuck out at me.

In an effort to discourage everyone from voluntarily discarding precious seconds of their lives, I began to type up some things that terminate any credibility this book has.

I think the main problem I have with this book is its consistent presentation of fan theories as factual Death Note canon. It quotes the original manga and How to Read 13 as its source material, but it often distorts, leaves out, or just gets facts wrong. Admittedly, I also have a lot of personal disagreement with what the book presents, but opinions aside, I can fairly state that this book doesn't rely on canon fact, it relies purely on the author's interpretation.