From You’re Next to The Guest to last year’s long-rumored Blair Witch sequel, Adam Wingard is a director who knows a thing or two about getting under the skin of his audience with edge-of-your-seat thrillers.
That blistering hot streak will continue later this year through Death Note, the Netflix adaptation of Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata’s celebrated manga series. Not unlike Ghost in the Shell before it, Death Note has drawn criticism for its decision to cast Nat Wolff (The Fault in Our Stars) as lead protagonist Light Turner, not to mention relocating its deeply Japanese story to Seattle, America.
However that may be, Death Note is fast approaching its late-August premiere, and sure enough, Netflix is beginning to fire up the marketing machine. It begins with the release of a stark, monochrome new poster featuring Willem Dafoe’s Ryuk, an otherworldly being able to pull the strings behind Light and the titular piece of parchment. Also on board for the mystical supernatural drama are Margaret Qualley (The Nice Guys) as Mia Sutton, Lakeith Stanfield (Straight Outta Compton) as the world-famous detective known as “L”, Paul Nakauchi as Watari, and Shea Whigham as James Turner.
Adam Wingard will summon Death Note onto Netflix in time for August 25th. Beyond that, Wingard is also attached to direct Godzilla Vs. Kong for Legendary and Warner Bros., which will pit the legendary beasts against one another in 2020.
Death Note follows a high school student who comes across a supernatural notebook, realizing it holds within it a great power; if the owner inscribes someone’s name into it while picturing their face, he or she will die. Intoxicated with his new godlike abilities, the young man begins to kill those he deems unworthy of life.