Multi-subject Musings

[splinteredstar]

1.  Iz snowing, so I don't have musical rehearsal tonight. I am both relieved and worried. We start performing in a week and a half. We haven't made any props or practiced cues. Eep.

2. Spent most of today working on the outline for that novel I swear I'm going to finish and my friends refuse to stop poking me until I do. My inspiration goes in phases - I'm coming off of a fanfiction kick and will now work on original stuffs. After I  finish those drabbles.

3.   As I think about it, I realize more and more that Death Note is a study in irony. The main character is the villain, and he's very charismatic and passionate and a very likable character. He's much more human than L. He's fighting for justice and  the weak - but doing so by becoming a tyrant. He's covered in Messianic symbolism - but he wants to save the world by destroying it. His enemy is the only other person anything like him, his so called first friend, callous and selfish and childish. The three most brilliant detectives in the world are an antisocial sugar addict who cares little about his causes and refuses to wear socks. The second most prolific murderer is a bouncy model with no thoughts outside her boyfriend. The first most prolific is the straight-A son of a chief investigator, who always believes in his son's innocence. The man who would become god dies in a forgotten old warehouse with none but his enemies even knowing who he was, dying for a justice that in the end, means nothing at all.

Now that I've realized that, I feel better about some of the elements I was uncomfortable with. It's supposed to be unsettling (Which it is. I identify with Light far to easily.) It's supposed to be off-balance. It's okay for it to be backwards, because it's supposed to be backwards.



That clears a lot up in my head, at least.

S 

Comments

[serria.livejournal.com]

I agree that Death Note is really ironic. Well, first just think - if someone told you the bare minimum plot, how would you stereotype the characters? It's ironic that the vigilante is the disciplined, well-behaved straight-A son of law-enforcement chief. The second "vigilante" is a ditzy model who is passioned by her appreciation for Kira. And then the antagonist, the great detective L, is socially inept and as weird as it gets, licking ice cream cones and panda cookies. Take those three, and picture them dancing around in a circle because they are friends (from episode... 18? 19?). As cute and innocent as they outwardly are, they are capable of being vicious, they are capable of killing each other and in fact, their goal is to do it. Not to mention the irony of justice, which everyone was fighting truth and nail for, doesn't exist but in the minds of individuals. "Death is equal".

Death Note sure makes you think, doesn't it?

[starsplinter.livejournal.com]

Indeed it does. That's part of why I love it so.

I will be honest, though...in parts the ironic symbolism goes a bit overboard. In Ep. 25...God, the foot drying scene. On the one hand, anyone who even glanced at the Gospels or the story of Jesus' life probably got the symbolism. On the other...Ra, that's so blatant it shouldn't be called subtext.

The irony is part of the reason this series is so awesome. The author knows what people expect and does the opposite.

I'll ramble about how I identify with Light and how reading about him has made me figure some things out in my own philosophy another day.


S