What bugs me about the utter failure of the Netflix Death Note movie is that it's gonna be seen as a vindication of those who felt it was wrong to make an American set adaptation in the first place. I stand by my conviction that a Western re-imagining of Death Note is necessary, as well as that in a Western setting Light should be White because being privileged is vital to his character. What the Netflix movie screwed up is that it ignored his privilege.
You see, I'm gonna suggest something really controversial. I think the greatest logical weakness of the original story of Death Note is that it's set in Japan. Japan's crime rate is actually way to low to make sense as a place for Light's particular frustrations to fester.
I know that is potentially a very offensive thing for a Western Anime fan who's never been to Japan and can't speak Japanese to say. But maybe we should view it as problematic how often Western Anime critics want to view every single detail of every Anime in the context of what's inherently Japanese about it, when really I'm pretty sure every country has lots of writers who would like for their writing to resonate universally and transcend their native cultural context.
Noir is my favorite Anime, and as such one I've often pointed to as one that could make a good Live Action adaptation (though I've also come to feel it might be pointless to adapt since there is nothing I'm willing to change). But at least one time I expressed that, someone responded with "Noir could only be done in Live Action well if it's made in Japan". This confused me since Noir ISN'T EVEN SET IN JAPAN. It sets foot in Japan only in the very first episode. If you want to express some frustration at Americans messing with Anime in the context of this show then say France should make it, because it's mostly set in France and is inspired by French films like La Femme Nikita and Leon. And a French Dub already exists, so if it's as good as the English one then you already have the dialogue written for you. Kirika is ethnically Japanese, but due to her amnesia plot point nothing about her ever reflects being a product of Japan. But make no mistake I would never tolerate her being white washed in an adaptation, that's because it's precisely Asians living in the west who need more representation.
With Your Name (which J. J. Abrams expressed a desire to adapt) I understand the arguments for it being inherently Japanese when it comes to how it uses Shinto. But I once read someone saying it's "about the cultural divide between Urban and Rural Japan", as if there is no way that could be recreated in an American version. I shouldn't need to explain why that sentiment expresses an utter ignorance of America.
Back on topic. The first thing Death Note's existence reflects about modern Japan is how influenced it's become by western media. When you get right down to it, it's basically another literary descendant of Holmes vs Moriarty and Gregory Temple vs John Devil, but with a supernatural twist, and even that aspect is by no means a proper representation of the Shinto view of death and the afterlife, the word Shinigami may be Japanese but the concept is a foreign import.
Mother's Basement described Death Note as being about Japan's harsh stance on crime. The thing is, that only works if Light is an allegory for Japan itself, and really he isn't written like an allegorical character at all. Light makes most sense as a deconstruction of American characters like The Punisher and Charles Bronson in Death Wish, characters who appeal to an American attitude that we have so much crime because we're not being harsh enough on it. An attitude that at first seems inherently Conservative, but it manifests on the Left in things like calls for Hate Crime legislation.
And of course these American characters tend to be White, because Americans who feel that way tend to be White. Because when they get their way it's minority communities who suffer, they know full well the police are hardly playing with kid gloves. And that is why Light as an ethnic Minority in America would never make sense to me.
Heck the show itself seems aware of how unlikely Japan is as a setting for all of this since everyone was shocked at the Law Enforcement gathering when L said he thinks Kira is in Japan. You can argue that shock is mostly him narrowing it down to one country at all and not picking the most obvious one, America, but that still backs up my point. (In an American's setting you can create that same shocking narrow down to knowing which State.)
I've seen people say you couldn't set the Near and Mello arc in America because then the CIA's involvement wouldn't be a political controversy. Do these people not know that the CIA isn't supposed to operate domestically?
Now lots of Anime feature literary archetypes and conventions that are western in origin in-spite of being set in Japan. But few are as easy for me to imagine being moved to another country as Death Note. So little time is actually spent at Light's school life that the particulars of why Japanese High School is different never show up. Nothing annoys me more then when people act like Misa can only work in Japan, celebrity worship is absolutely a thing in America.
Frankly the only thing that would be difficult to keep word for word in an American setting is Chief Yagami refusing to carry a gun when he's no longer officially a Cop due to it being illegal. But even then you could explain it by saying he's a Democrat.
Yes I said Word for Word, I genuinely feel that the English Dub Script of the Death Note anime shares Shakespeare's ability to work word for word in multiple settings.
Light never once even at an early transitional phase says he's interested in cleaning up Japan. It was always The World.
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