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The Death Note movie is surprisingly good! I mean, it's still super-campy, and the Yagami family is still ludicrously unrealistic (or, I dunno, maybe it's just my family that doesn't sit around the dinner table talking about how proud we are to be related to each other), but it is coherently plotted, if perhaps a bit slow in the middle. I was surprised to find that Shiori was pretty okay. It helps that movie Light is so different from manga Light; I don't think I could see manga Light with an actual girlfriend he actually seemed to care about.

As for the dubbing, it was really pretty well-done. Not perfect. It definitely took some getting used to. But reasonably decent, with one exception: L's voice actor was FANTASTIC. Seriously, he was this bright shining star in the movie. Not bad-looking, either, from what I saw in the post-credits extra content. It's too bad L doesn't make an appearance until the last half-hour or so.

Romy and I were wondering on the way to the theater what the turnout was going to be like. Honestly, it could have been just us, or a sold-out show, and I wouldn't have been surprised either way. As it happened, there were maybe a hundred people there--not a full house, but hardly empty. Lots of Hot Topic kids. We got there early enough to get seats in the preferred back row, although the ones underneath the projector were already taken. There were a bunch of people sitting in the lobby when we came in, one of whom, I swear, was a Misa cosplayer who we think was looking at every pair of people that came in and loudly deciding which one was Mello and which one was Matt. Romy and I weren't sure what she concluded about us, because I was trying to walk past her as quickly as possible without making eye contact.

Most of the weird fannish behavior we saw was all right, though. There were a couple Lights, a couple Misas (I think; they had the hair right, but it's kind of hard to tell with those Hot Topic kids), and one L who kept hugging the people around her and sat in her chair funny. I didn't notice whether she actually sat like that for the entire movie, though. I was a little concerned about the people a couple rows ahead of us, whom we could hear talking before the movie about what they were going to squeal when L made his appearance, but the only thing anybody did during the movie that made me cringe was near the end, when the person who had been planning to squeal at L ( spoiler ). So, a bit of fanbrattiness, but not as much as I thought there might be, considering the number of teenagers there.

On the drive back to Romy's apartment, we decided that I was probably Mello, and she was probably Matt. She's the one with the glasses, so.

So I'm pretty sure the reason I haven't had a single fandom-related dream for the past fifteen years or so can be explained by the idea that they were all building up to the superepic dream I had last night! Which, naturally, was a Harry Potter/Death Note crossover and nobody-died-AU. And I was a pretty sweet self-insert. I am not making this up.

( dream! )

Today was productive.

1. I got a haircut and highlights, which I normally wouldn't do for myself, but it was a Christmas gift from my parents, so.

2. I saw a friend who, until she tells me what she would prefer to be called here, shall be known as R, and got her into Death Note. WOOHOO! Somebody else to bore silly with tinhatty diatribes on L and Light's Big Gay Love! We watched the first seven episodes of anime, and I left the first few volumes of manga with her. Must remember to make sure she sees episode 15. "YAGAMI-KUN!!! Konnichiwa," will NEVER NOT be funny FRIGGIN HYSTERICAL OMG I just watched it again to make sure I had the right episode number and it is making me laugh until I CRY over here.

Also, I got her somewhat into FMA. Mostly I seem to have convinced her that I'm pretty much a nutcase who entertains delusions of marrying Hawkeye on the astral plane. If the shoe fits, you know? BUT she is interested, so I left the first few volumes of that with her, too. FMA is just so good; I'm so happy to be getting it some potential new fans. It makes rewatching the first two episodes, which totally could have been called "Much Ado About Dead Birds: Parts I and II," completely worth it.

3. I wrote up my first LJ post of 2008. Excuse me for being lazy.

Ummm. Just so I can have some content in this post, here, have some ramblings on which Hogwarts Houses I think Phoenix Wright characters would have been Sorted into. (I did one for Death Note characters, too. They were all in Slytherin.)

( Ramblins )

Naturally, the temptation to make Death Note Miis was too great, and I kind of went nuts. Of course, this started weeks ago, when I first got my Wii. But it wasn't until tonight that I actually took the initiative to dig out my camera.

( Yeah, I took pictures of the TV screen--L, Light, Misa, Near, Mello, and Matt )

But that is not all!

( L and Light playing Wii Tennis )

Crossposted to death_eyes.

What am I supposed to do with this?

The new Death Note opening (apparently)

And, just for the hell of it, the new ending

It's like, oh look something new, and then you are all like, oh, weird, and you think, maybe it will get less weird, and then you are all like, oh look it is not getting less weird, and then you are like, hey I see some people that I am excited to be seeing here, and then you realize that you kind of care about that but that you also care about WHAT TEH HELL is this opening and then you are like um I kind of want a beer after watching that but it is time to go to class now

The fight scene in the new episode of Death Note was insufficiently awesome. And they call themselves shonen. They should be ashamed. I did like how one would throw a punch and then the chain would send them both flying, though; I never noticed that reading the manga.


The end of the new episode of SVU made me aww. Also, I barely recognized Cary Elwes! I was so amused to see his name on TV.com's page for the episode, right after I'd finally managed to place his voice.

I've just watched episode 12 of Death Note, and the people who draw and animate Light and L are fired. On the other hand, the thing with Jealous was like three million times sadder and more touching than in the manga. I think it was his voice. Also, Rem was simultaneously stoic and highly expressive in this episode, which really impressed me.

L is more afraid of shinigami than I previously realized. Like seriously, I was all, "wait a minute, are we skipping ahead or something?"

Another opinion I hold: Light continues to spend far too much time talking and far too little being naked onscreen.

Hey, while I'm at it, I'm going to tell y'all about the OST. ( What I think of the OST )

THE TIMESTAMP SAYS IT'S STILL HALLOWEEN. I CAN STILL REFER TO OCTOBER 31st AS TODAY. RLY.

That being said...

You ever notice how holidays are great time capsules? It's kind of cool how much easier it is to remember ordinary things because of the day they happened.

Fifteen years ago today, it started blizzarding in the late morning in the Twin Cities area of Minnesota, and didn't stop until it was time to go trick-or-treating. My four-year-old brother flushed the nose to my clown costume down the toilet, so all the pictures of me sitting in a snowdrift dressed as a clown show my nose painted yellow instead.

Ten years and one week ago today, our 11-year-old cat Earl died of complications from feline diabetes.

Nine years ago today, I went trick-or-treating for the last time with a big group of friends in Minneapolis. I don't remember what I was, though.

Four years ago today, I spent the evening in the library taking a calculus test. I could hear people outside having fun. It sucked.

One year ago today, I left Halloween dinner early with a huge headache and went home to lie down in the dark. Since I was the only one home all evening, the apartment stayed dark and that pretty much negated any chance of having to break out the bag of Snickers bars I'd bought in case of trick-or-treaters. I was forced--FORCED--to eat them all by myself. (Not all at once though.)

Tonight, I dressed as a Target team member and worked in Toys, which I thought wouldn't be so bad because, you know, I figured there wouldn't be as many kids coming in tonight. They'd be otherwise occupied, and all. But it sucked, and I spent pretty much all night covering for other people, and for God's sake what the hell was the girl in Electronics DOING that was keeping her on her breaks so long, and the whole evening I kept trying to get a chance to take a bathroom break because I'd just HAD to go to Caribou before work and try a Campfire Mocha (which is an excellent drink, by the way; I highly recommend it) but NOOOOO, so I was grumpy. It was kind of novel seeing every one of the team leads in one spot, though--they all came at closing time to set up all the Christmas stuff in Seasonal. So tomorrow it'll be all Christmasy-like and stuff.

ETA: According to the comm archive, yesterday and today have been the highest-traffic days in death_eyes's history. I wonder why that could be. Why can't two dozen people draw fanart for my birthday?

Well, as you know from my post last night, Death Note 106 is out, and the wank on the TOWNL forums (that's a locked board, but it has open membership, IIRC) is the thickest it's been since, uh, three chapters ago. The post in death_eyes made it to clairvoyant_wank, but the commenters there have got nothing on the nutbars at the TOWNL forums.

( How it went down )

Oh, one more thing that I'd like to say outside the cut. When people express a desire to see Light create Kira's perfect world, it's frightening. I'm frightened. I know it's not real, and there is no death note, and Light doesn't even exist, but the idea that people think that what Light's doing is okay bothers me a lot. The Death Note world is just way too similar to the real world for it not to feel a little too close to home.

And now that I've said that, ( have you ever thought about how Light's handling this Evil Overlord thing? )