After the properly abysmal first effort by Netflix to adapt Death Note into a western live action movie, the streamer announced it was coming back for round two with the fan-favorite Tsugumi Ohba-penned story back in June. This time in the form of a live action TV series.
There may be some solace to take from the fact that this time around, Death Note might be in better and safer hands – with Halia Abdel-Meguid of Upside Down Pictures tapped to write and executive produce the series.
Upside Down Pictures is the Duffer brothers’ production company, which came about as a result of Matt and Ross Duffer’s astronomic success with Stranger Things. Naturally, the production house has a pre-conceived reputation for delivering extremely high quality television, so there’s perhaps some assurance that Abdel-Meguid isn’t taking this challenge lightly.
According to Deadline, Abdel-Meguid is a long-time fan of the Death Note property and is a fluent Japanese speaker who lived in Tokyo for a period of her life. While that doesn’t automatically qualify someone to adapt a cherished anime, it does offer up some semblance of comfort.
Apprehension for Netflix taking another spin at Death Note is not unwarranted, with the 2017 film adaptation by the streaming service being absolutely reviled by both critics and fans. Its critic score on Rotten Tomatoes sits at 37%, and audiences hated it even more with a 23% score.
The film did do one thing right, in our view, which was the casting of Willem Dafoe as Ryuk, the Shinigami who owns the notebook Light finds in the human world. If there’s one role that should be reprised from an otherwise awful film, it’s Dafoe’s.
Regardless, after being burnt badly by Netflix’s previous effort, we’ll be approaching the Death Note series with extreme caution. We’re clearly very passionate about the source material, which ranked in our top ten best dark fantasy anime.