A commentary on Death Note and the duality of justice and morality.
I recently started rewatching Death Note (the anime, not the garbage Netflix live-action) as research for a novel I’m working on. It remains one of the most compelling explorations of justice and the nature of evil.
The story follows Light Yagami, an exceptionally intelligent high school senior who stumbles upon a notebook dropped by a God of Death. If he writes someone’s name in it, that person dies.
Unlike many antiheroes, Light has no tragic backstory. His father is an esteemed Chief of Police, he is popular, and he is the valedictorian of his class. Yet, when given the power to kill, he swiftly embraces it, seeing himself as a god destined to rid the world of criminals and create a utopia free of corruption. His vision is not one of blind destruction but of calculated reform through fear—erasing the very possibility of crime. But as the series progresses, his morality erodes, and the line between justice and tyranny dissolves. What begins as righteous judgment warps into an obsession with power. He no longer punishes only criminals but anyone who threatens his reign, his idealism giving way to megalomania.
Standing in direct opposition to Light is L, the world’s greatest detective. L represents institutional justice which can be imperfect but governed by due process. He does not believe any one person should wield the power to decide life and death, no matter how noble their intentions. To him, Light is no different from the criminals he executes. After all, most killers believe their actions serve a higher purpose. This moral tension is what makes Death Note so gripping as a result forcing us to confront an ideological clash without offering a safe middle ground.
Who, in the end, is more dangerous?
I found myself rooting for Light. His intelligence and unwavering belief in his vision make him an undeniably fascinating character. But his story also raises unsettling questions: Can true justice exist without absolute power? And if so, who decides? Light’s god-like stance mirrors mythology—where deities demand sacrifices for the greater good. But gods, unlike humans, are not bound by morality.
Justice, in its purest form, is a complex and elusive concept. If we say murder is wrong, then isn’t all murder wrong? And what gives any individual the right to judge without considering the circumstances? Some kill in self-defence. Some steal out of desperation, pushed to crime by systemic injustices. Others act under the grip of mental illness. The reality of crime is not always as simple as Light’s black-and-white vision.
Even in our world, justice is a shifting construct. In the West, due process is often upheld as the gold standard, with trials determining guilt and punishment. Yet, the system is flawed—some of the guilty escape, and some punishments feel disproportionately lenient. Public outrage frequently erupts over judicial decisions deemed too forgiving, particularly in cases of sexual violence or child exploitation.
Conversely, many Eastern legal systems lean toward harsher, more immediate punishments, sometimes shaped by cultural or political factors. In some nations, even adultery is considered a punishable crime. The definition of justice is not universal—it bends under the weight of history, culture, and power.
At its core, Death Note distils this philosophical divide. Light believes that fear alone can eliminate crime, while L insists on the rule of law. Their conflict is not just one of strategy but of fundamental worldviews—idealism versus pragmatism, control versus freedom. And yet, both characters are deeply methodical, rarely acting on impulse. Light plays a meticulous game of chess to evade capture, his greatest fear being not just losing power but losing control over the world he seeks to reshape.
But control is fleeting.
In the end, Light loses. Though his reign drastically reduced global crime, he is still judged as being in the wrong. He shows no remorse. His idealism, and perhaps more crucially, his ego, drown out any self-reflection. His downfall was inevitable.
And yet, part of me was disappointed.
Perhaps it’s because we experience the story largely through his perspective. His world begins to materialize—his rule, however ruthless, seems to work. But history has taught us that such utopias are fragile illusions. Even gods fall from grace. Civilizations inevitably push back against authoritarian rule, whether legal or divine. Fear can suppress rebellion for a time, but not forever.
In a way, Light was proven right. His actions created a ‘better’ world—at least, by the numbers. Even society, over time, began to accept his rule. But as history teaches us, “better” never means better for everyone. Utopias always teeter on the edge of dystopia because moral cracks in the system are inevitable. Many stories explore this theme, from Divergent to Black Mirror.
If justice is upheld only through fear, is it truly justice at all?
And if, as Shakespeare suggested, hell is empty, perhaps it’s because we’ve built it here ourselves.
Flirting in Space 
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