Death Note To Be Adapted Into Hollywood Film

Monday, May. 4 2009 | Author: Nopy

Earlier this week Variety reported that the popular series “Death Note” may be adapted into a Hollywood film by Warner Bros. For those of you who aren’t familiar with Death Note, it was a widely popular manga which was adapted into an anime and 2 Japanese live-action films, all of which turned out very successful.

The original story revolves around a student named Light Yagami who one day finds a notebook on the ground labelled “Death Note”. Inside, he finds instructions that explain that the Death Note is a special book that has the power to kill anyone if you write down their real name and picture their face in your mind. After testing the Death Note’s powers, Light decides to use it to rid the world of all evil and corrupt people, leaving behind only those he judges to be worthy. With criminals around the world suddenly meeting their demise, the police suspect that this isn’t just coincidence and hire the world’s top detective, whose alias is the letter “L”. Light and L face off in the rest of the series as Light tries to uncover L’s real name to escape suspicion, and L tries to figure out how a killer can kill with just a name and image.

It’s not every day that an anime gets adapted into a Hollywood film. In fact, the only two movies from anime that I can think of are Speed Racer and Dragonball Evolution, both of which didn’t do so well in theatres. Other anime titles that are being adapted into Hollywood films include Akira, The Last Airbender (which is actually an anime-like cartoon), Ghost In The Shell, and possible Full Metal Panic. Seeing how poorly Speed Racer and Dragonball Evolution turned out, it’s questionable whether a Death Note movie will be any better. I guess we’ll just have to wait for a few more anime movies to come out before we get our hopes up with Death Note.

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Category: Anime, Movies
Tags: Death Note, Warner Bros

13 Responses for "Death Note To Be Adapted Into Hollywood Film"

JKLS

May 4th, 2009 at 4:08 pm
1

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
YIUS

May 4th, 2009 at 4:09 pm
2

Stop prostituting anime. Stop. Really.
TKO

May 5th, 2009 at 1:14 am
3

I read somewhere that their remaking Cowboy Bebop starring Keanu Reeves. Zac Efron is suppose to star in Death Note, lol.
Nopy

May 5th, 2009 at 11:51 am
4

@TKO: Yep, those are the rumours, but I’m not sure if they’ve been confirmed yet.
VMaN

May 5th, 2009 at 3:42 pm
5

I’ve never heard any rumors of a Full Metal Panic live-action…

Cowboy Bebop is definitely confirmed by like….20000 news sources.

And from what I heard, the Avatar live-action was put on indefinite hold.
Jeff

May 5th, 2009 at 4:13 pm
6

Dunno, I think it could be good. Hollywood can be quite good with crime drama type thrillers.

Speed racer and especially DBZ, involve some seriously cartoon elements that are very, very hard to carry over into real actor land. However, in DN the hardest thing they’ll have to contend with are the Death Gods — which shouldn’t really even be that hard with the state of creepy 3d stuff these days.

I’d look forward to it.
Cait

May 11th, 2009 at 9:30 pm
7

What?! They’ve already made 3 live action films in Japan! I’ve heard this “rumor” before. I doubt it’s legitimacy. Zac Effron as the lead, yeah? Old meme.
Charlotte

June 15th, 2009 at 8:36 am
8

If Zac Effron plays lead hell will swallow the world and armeggedon will begin. He’s a musical guy, he is alright at comedy, but even his face appearing in the film will turn the psycholoical twisted horror of death note, that we all know and love, into a feel good movie. It’s just not possible for him to pull it off.
Apart from that i think they’d do okay if they stuck more to the manga than going off and doin there own thing. The only reason dragon ball evalution didn’t go well is because they turned the lovely tiny goku who knew nothing into a highschool karate geek. As for speed racer, never heard of it.
Apart from Zac efron, my worst fear of what they can do to death note is make ryuk look more normal than he is.
chanelrevy

July 31st, 2009 at 11:12 am
9

I refuse to go watch it!!!
WTF! Can’t they leave it alone??? Who the hell will play Light, L, Misa, Mello, Near, Matt etc….
Zac Efron as Light…
Picture that scene where Light went all psycho when Lind L. Taylor appeared on TV then replace it with Zac.
And the Shinigami’s? Who will do Ryuk’s voice? John Cleese?
Fail. No. Bad Idea.
They are going to make a complete ass of the franchise…(Unless they use some of the original actors such as L’s guy <>)
:3
WTH

August 4th, 2009 at 11:51 pm
10

damnit hollywood!!! stop making anime so commercial!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Jamy

August 4th, 2009 at 11:56 pm
11

Zac Efron can’t play Light, it’s not freaking possible!!! Light’s chin is sharper than Zac’s and their eye colours are different, even if they give him contacts he still can’t play Light cus he’s Japanese for god’s sake!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Vi

August 8th, 2009 at 11:51 am
12

They are getting Zac Efron to play Light? Him again? NO, I will NOT tolerate it! Next they’ll be getting Rob Pattinson to play L… shoot me
Jamie

October 20th, 2009 at 10:08 pm
13

omg seriously this is what i found:
name changes
Light Yagami
- name changed now: light reynolds.
Misa Amane
- name changed now: misa parker.
they are making it all american!!!! so the rumor that Zac Efron maybe true.. either way i’m not watching it.. i have all 3 japanese movies and thats goo enough for me. i do admit tho, i am looking forward to akira unless they pull the same BS.