Analyzing Evil: Light Yagami From Death Note

Hello everyone and welcome to the one hundred twelfth episode of Analyzing Evil! Our feature villains for this video is Light Yagami from Death Note. I hope you enjoy, and thanks for watching. If you have any feedback or questions feel free to let me know below!

The songs in this video are from an album called Call to the Deep by Kurotokage.

#anime #manga #deathnote

[livingbreathinghuman]

“If we catch Kira, he is evil. If he wins and rules the world, then he is justice.“ sums up Light's character pretty well...

[dragon_princess]

“Light killed the criminals but did nothing to change why the crimes happen in the first place” is just a perfect part of the analysis

[MasbyzeAllTopicsFiction]

I think Ryuk had it the right with his reply to Light's plan of killing all bad people... he said "then you'll be the last evil person alive". Something along those lines

[eli]

I think the action of killing two men traumatized Light so much he kinda dissociated from his old self and turned into Kira. In the manga, he said at the beggining that when he started killing criminals, he couldn't sleep and lost weight. I also think at the ending, when we see Light running past his old self, he finally stopped dissociating and finally realized what he had done.

[Ava]

I don’t know man. The way Light killed Naomi seemed pretty evil. Like he intentionally twisted the knife he put in her back as hard as he could.

[timetogetrealreborn]

I never noticed it, but in the start of the series Light's eyes are colored light brown. After the death of L they start to become dark brown almost red like. I do believe this symbolize that Light is truly fully gone by the end of the show. Kira is barley hiding himself at this point even Near sees it. Which is why I think his eye color slowly changes to present that fact. He's also drawn to look more cruel and menacing constantly looking at people with glaring devious stares. By that point I feel like he lost all his morals.

[TheImmortalAvenger]

I would say that Light for me went past the point firmly into evil when he killed Naomi.

He didn’t even do it because she was evil, but to simply avoid being incarcerated. That and the INCREDIBLY cruel way he did it, by making her both kill herself and in a way so she would never be found, even telling her he was Kira just before the effect kicked in just so he could see the realization on her face.

After that he had gone past the point of no return to redemption for me.

As Near put it, Light became “…nothing more than a crazy serial killer.”

Edit: HOLY CRAP, 1K likes!? Thank you all so much for this and thanks to The Vile Eye for posting content like this!

[GentlemensClubHolyEdition]

I genuinely believe light cared about being "the God of this new world" more than actually creating that world

[amenbrother]

The way he kills Naomi Misora proves to me that Light was evil: he reveals his identity to her and offers her the chance to call his father, but she can't do anything, she HAS to go and kill herself, and Light revels in this power, he MOCKS her.
If he truly used those powers for what he believed was for the good of mankind, he would have been sad about getting rid of her and wished he'd found another way.
And that's not the only time either; every time he has or thinks he has the advantage, he gets absolutely overwhelmed with narcissistic ecstasy, thinking to himself "I won!".
He did not do the things he did for the greater good, he did it for himself.

[alexinator-hhfe]

I love that Death Note is still discussed years later. This show really had an impact. And the mental and ideological battle between Light and L was always a sight to see. I think Light did get a nice sense of satisfaction every time he outsmarted someone because it was a step towards creating a better world, in his eyes. I also think he respected his father and that him dropping the pen as he was dying was him letting go of Kira and embracing Light. He also both hated and respected L for giving him a challenge and cornering him so much, to the point that he was disgusted when Near wore that L mask because he didn't think Near was worthy of it.

[SaiScribbles]

Light WAS doing it for his own satisfaction. After a week he was already declaring himself "the god of the new world".

[TheJude]

Light absolutely had a bloodlust and killed to satiate it. Him killing Lind L Tailor in the 2nd episode in a move of pure ego when L was nowhere near catching him proves it.

[arcturus]

A small detail that was omitted, Light did check if the people he killed weren't innocent and he even avoided killing those who expressed remorse or had understandable circumstances. This was picked up by both L and Light when Light gave up the Death Note because the MO didn't match the previous Kira aka Light's targets. In fact Light notices that the previous Kira's targets were much closer to his ideal.

[Phantomx]

Light may have done evil things but he was really good at eating potato chips.

[Slayerzilla]

I think the big difference between Adrian Veidt and Light Yagami is that Adrian performed all of his evil acts in a completely dispassionate manner while Light clearly reveled in the cruelty of his.

[KyleLyre]

Light is easily one of the best morally obscured characters ever, but his one glaring flaw is that he is so focused on what things appear to be versus how they actually are. He looks at society and sees a violent world of chaos and strife without seeing the same freedom that built the world he's in. And the world he creates is very objectively a hellscape. People may not be committing nearly as much crime, but only because they live in fear of a far more profound danger. How peaceful is it to be in a quiet room only because the guy with the gun told you to stop talking?

[masterchief]

You didn't mention that light was clearly sadistic, especially when he was taunting naomi moments before her death and in the manga he was contemplating about killing his family so he wouldn't be caught...

[code.c.]

3:47 The period during which Light loses his memories is more insightful than you give it credit for. In addition to displaying a totally different personality of Light's, full of genuine compassion and empathy, and devoid of the usury that defines his actions as Kira, his participation in the investigation in earnest clearly indicates a moral disagreement with Kira.
Light only agrees with Kira's ideals insofar as he's the one in control of them. He doesn't "trust" anyone else with this power to pass proper moral judgement, since (because everyone's moral compasses are slightly different from one another) he could never fully agree with the judgements passed by others, which to him constitutes an abuse of the Death Note. He only relies on other Kiras as means to an end, always meant to be disposed of once he no longer needed them. Yet, the history of judgement on criminals that Light is faced with as an investigator is Light's own. Meaning that, if he genuinely believed in what he was doing as Kira on a moral level, he would find every individual killing of Kira's to be justified and thus not take issue with it. But that's not what we see. And this is proof that Light the innocent schoolboy is operating on a totally different moral compass than he does as Kira.
This all points to the idea that Light allowed the power of the notebook to corrupt him and turn him into a megalomaniac, fighting for the sake of a world that he only believes will be just with *him*, and no one else, at the top. The fact that he refuses the deal for the Shinigami Eyes in order to, according to himself, "reign as the god of the world for a long time, " should be proof enough that his intentions in this regard are entirely selfish.

[SlipperyTeaTime]

Let’s not forget that Light was contemplating on wether or not to kill his sister because he would’ve lost the notebook

[hobbyist]

Few things not addressed in this vid:

Light became Kira partly because he was bored and curious.
If you want to see non-Kira Light’s personality (to judge if he’s naturally a narcissist, for example), there’s literally a whole arc in the story dedicated to that.

I will mention, thank you for finally mentioning the ‘no doubt he killed many falsely accused people’ point. Far too few Death Note fans even consider this point.