Death Note 35
June 14th, 2007 by Shirukii
Holy crap. Matt’s death AND Melodies in the same episode, awesome. My only complaint is that we didn’t actually get to see Mello die, only his corpse postmortem. Oh, and Takada dies too, but no one cares about her.
Episode Rating: 9.5/10
The episode begins with a montage of the days passing by, and then throws us into an extremely vague phone conversation between Takada and Mikami where Takada gives some info to Mikami and Mikami confirms something of importance. Supposedly this is all build up for another one of Light’s “JUST AS PLANNED” schemes, hopefully it’s explained as well as the last.
Shortly after, Near contacts Light to set up the final showdown, he wants to meet face to face. The members of the SPK and Light’s investigation team will all be present at the meeting which is to be held at an abandoned warehouse. This is obviously bait for Light, Near is putting him in a situation where he has the opportunity to eliminate everyone who knows of the death note in one fell swoop.
The meeting is set up for the 28th, the day when Giovanni is cleared of possible influence from the death note and at a time when Mikami’s judgment schedule is at its lowest. The transmission ends and both Near and Light marvel at how they’ve perfectly predicted the other’s movements and how their victory is within sight.
Shortly after the final meeting between Light and Takada, which clears all conditions for Near’s demise, she is kidnapped by Mello and his accomplice. Mello seems to have gotten sick of waiting for Near and wants to end this by his own hands. But things don’t go as he planned, oblivious to the fact that Takada has Kira’s power and knows his name, he reveals his face to her. Locked in the back of a tractor trailer, Takada uses a sheet of the death note hidden in her bra to kill Mello.
Elsewhere, Mello’s accomplice, Matt, is tracked down and cornered in a car chase. As he gets out expecting to be taken into custody for questioning, he is immediately shot under the premise of going against Kira’s will.
After killing Mello, Takada gets a hold of her cell phone and contacts Light, much to everyones surprise. Light quickly deciphers that she has managed to kill Mello, and gives Takada her final instructions, to contact Mikami and judge as many as possible. The team then rushes to the scene, but on the way there Light uses the piece of the death note hidden in his watch to make Takada commit suicide by burning herself and her belongings.
Thoughts
Despite being an excellent episode, it had quite a few plot holes and inconsistencies, mostly surrounding Takada’s kidnapping. The most glaring being Mello’s oversight when confiscating her belongings, he gets rid of her clothes, but isn’t thorough enough that Takada is able to sneak a rather large piece of the death note with her. Even if you can overlook that, how did she manage to hold on to her cell phone of all things!?
And perhaps the most puzzling of all, how did she manage to set herself on fire? By the way the scene was animated, it looks like she poured some sort of accelerant all over the place and then lit it. Are we supposed to believe Mello conveniently left a can of gas and a lighter/matchbook back there, tempting Takada to commit arson?
EDIT* From lainofthewired: “She got her phone by smashing through the window in the trailer, as per the blood around her limbs, possibly using the blanket to soften the blow. And an accelerant/fuel/source of ignition? Do you NOT remember the motorcycle in the trailer? It was RITE DERE! :p”
My observation skills have been rather weak lately D=
Moving on. My confusion over what Near and Light are planning is as strong as ever. I can understand what Near is trying to do by baiting Light and hoping to catch him red handed, but how he’s going to get out of it alive and well is beyond me. As for Light, I still can’t guess what he’s planning, but whatever it is, it seems to be ready to be executed, judging by Mikami and Takada’s conversation. Light also didn’t hesitate to kill of Takada, so his use for her must be over and done with.
I don’t think anything can match the perfection of “JUST AS PLANNED”, but I’m still eager to see what Light’s up to.
Matt’s surprise introduction and quickly following death was quite a shock. Being so late into the series I didn’t think we were going to see him at all. An awesome death sequence though, he took eight bullets and still managed to stand for a few seconds, it’s too bad he only had like…5 lines or dialog.
I guess I should talk a bit about VIZ sending Cease and Desists to Animanda and Kuro Hana as well, seeing as it caused a gigantic shitstorm to erupt through 4chan and the aniblogosphere. Kuro Hana’s response can be read here, it seems like they plan to stop subbing (though I’ve heard rumors they will continue under another name). I’ve been trying to get on Animanda’s site for a while now, it looks like it imploded due to the influx of traffic, I’ll update with their response later.
UPDATE: Animanda has also dropped subbing Death Note. Oh noes!
Personally, I think it’s stupid to issue cease and desists with TWO episodes remaining in the series, VIZ got this license a while back, for maximum damage they should have done this a long time ago. I don’t worry about the subs getting out, someone out there will do it, the demand is far too high for it to be ignored. If everything fails, I’ll bet my life that some kind Anonymous will release an *.ass.
LOL REMeDIES, well played VIZ. Well played.
~ Shirukii ~
13 Responses to “Death Note 35”
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OK question…….who the hell is Matt????.I don’t even remember the guy :P……did he appear in another episode of DN, or was this his debut???? In any case, his death sequence was pretty cool :)…..
I agree with all of the inconsistencies of the episode……especially finding an accelerant……that place was burning like a mo-fo!
Regarding the C & D order from VIZ….I think its actually a smart (albeit annoying) tactic…….to get viewers to buy the DVDs or downlad the episodes at $2 USD a pop :P………
Some anonymous person will make a release or Kuro-Hana will switch servers…
I highly doubt that legal action would be taken….both for reputation reasons, and the fact that fan-subs do not profit from their releases…….It would be hard to proove that the efforts of Kuro-Hana–or other groups–are in some way counter-productive to VIZ sales or threatens their ownership….
Aside from a copyright fine, there is very little VIZ can do……
If anything…… fansubs help the sale of anime :P……Since downloading torrents, I’ve bought two series (Sailor Moon Stars+Elfen Lied) and plan to purchase Haruhi once my credit card has a chance to breathe lol……
The deadline for Kuro-Hana is the 22nd….I should think that we will see next week’s episode, and then wait a week or two for the finale……..
Besides, if people get really antsy, they can just read the last few chapters of the manga lol :)
Quick question… did u link up “Melo” and “dies” on purpose??? O_O
@ Kanon_fan82: Matt is one of Mello’s underlings, I don’t know much about him since he’s more of a presence in the manga. But this was his first formal appearance, he has made cameos in the past, but this is the first time he spoke and was given a name.
I’m not sure if Kuro Hana will release another episode under that name, their post on their website makes it seem like they’ve abandoned that label.
@ Nightingale: Yes, yes I did. There’s a whole bunch of memes that people use to avoid directly spoiling the deaths in Death Note. The ones I know of are: LaDIES, MELODIES and REMeDIES. XD
She got her phone by smashing through the window in the trailer, as per the blood around her limbs, possibly using the blanket to soften the blow.
And an accelerant/fuel/source of ignition? Do you NOT remember the motorcycle in the trailer? It was RITE DERE! :p
@ lainofthewired: Wow, good calls. I completely forgot that the motorcycle was in the cargo box with Takada. I’ll edit the post and credit you, thanks.
With regard to C&D issues in general - I don’t think they do anything but harm. I, and most of my anime-fan friends, buy quite a lot of anime, but only if we’ve seen it all and like it. There are too many shows to buy them all even if I wanted to, so I only buy the ones which appeal to me most. I’ll never buy ‘blind’. Consequently, if a C&D were to stop me seeing the end of a show, it would never find it’s way to my collection. Additionally, these C&D outbursts seem to cause a lot of animosity towards the licensing companies and I think harm their image in the eyes of the fans. This can’t be good for business. For instance, it’s been a long time since I bought a funimation title due to their fun and games. Building a relationship with the fans pays dividends. Case in point would be Bandai’s huge promotion of the Haruhi title. I loved the series and would have bought it regardless, but Bandai did such a good job they made me go out and import the special edition box instead of the ordinary or even thinpak release. Their entertaining ‘viral’ marketing still makes me smile when I see the box.
how is it that mello is driving the truck saying that he had to do something by himself, and when takada writes his name, he ends up dead right by the window where takada smashed through. if it were not for this part, this episode would of been great. also, what did mello really gain by kidnapping takada and why did light kill her? i still love death note though and i gurantee that this show will be illegally subbed until the end!
how did the cellphone got inside the truck? like the blogger said… was that explained on the next episodes or it was mello’s phone?
melodies of life…
Even if she didn’t get the phone by smashing through the window, she could have manipulated Melo’s death to make him throw her the phone or something ^^.
Melo-dies…
Damn, I -so- didn’t figure that out… >
‘Taku, there’s only two more episodes, what is the point of asking it to be stopped. Well, technically, only one, since I’m sure someone can get out episde 36 before June 22nd xD
But yeah, I didn’t really catch onto the cell phone but I totally figured out how she lit the place on fire. I was never expecting Mello to die. It’s all bad luck when you stop from eating the chocolate bar. He should’ve ate it, dammit xD
lol, the brutal truth of Melodies is revealed to all. As for the cell phone, it was indeed Mello’s cell phone. As you can see in one of my screenshots, Takada’s cellphone doesn’t look anything like the one she was using in the truck.
=O Hopey! You’re aliveeee. Did you quit blogging, or did school just get in the way?
Hai, I am alive~desu. Ah, school got in the way. Plus a few other things. I hope to get back into it soon ^^ Glad you’re keeping the DN and Claymore going!!
AH. I also doesnt agree that Mello dies, but remember he’s after Kira. If he joined Raito, they both will create the new world. I’m just pissed that Light fell into Near’s trap. Because I wanted to see how Light create the new world, or at least make another series of Death Note. To show where Light is and the other shinigami that is about to go to the human world.