Near’s Fatal Flaw
Let's see you try and talk your way out of this one...if you can.
Warning: MAJOR SPOILERS for the Death Note anime!
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In Death Note, Near’s fatal flaw is, ironically, in the hands of the correct adults, not a flaw at all. Due to his positioning in the story it’s also not fatal.
Near's hamartia is that he is fundamentally unable to separate the idea that pieces in a game are pieces in a game, and people are people.
We have no indication of this, but the game pieces may even be more real to him than living humans.
This 1:1 connection between how he sees a game and how he sees people is (potentially) dangerous because the detached omnipotence he exerts over the the toys and games we see him playing with is not tempered when dealing with human life.
We might gain more insight into his seemingly cold stare if we were to imagine that human interaction is “less real” to him than game interaction. This is, however, speculation.
As of this writing, all I know about Near's reasoning is "the book also states that Near is distant from people because he is sensitive." (1)
We don't know why, or if this is a result of any negative experiences, which tend to send people into their intellect. He does "show much more emotion and display far more facial expressions in the manga than he does in the anime," (1) though, so the directorial choice to make him near-expressionless in the animé is unknown.
Oddly, this is juxtaposed to Kira’s treatment of people, and one might say if he wasn’t in the care of the school of gifted children, this inability he has may have evolved into something similar to Kira, which is brilliant writing in hindsight.
The way this is an unintentional moral strength is, of course, is when this tendency is used to cut dangerous people down to size.
Rather than balk at the idiosyncrasy, The Japanese Police Force is wise enough to use of this tendency in Near to their own ends and help solve the Kira case.
To Near, the fact that Light is just a run-of-the-mill crazed serial killer isn’t some devastating moral failing on part of Kira, no—he treats it more like a “game mechanic” or “stat” in a game of D&D, with a predictable set of effects on the game. Near is the only character who isn't in love with himself as an arbiter of justice (arbitrarily justifying any of his surrounding actions like many of the cast)—creating a blind spot in the other characters' egos thus allowing their own flaws to play out on large scales. Light is a game piece that is breaking one of the game's rules.
Near is the only character who isn't in love with himself as an arbiter of justice—a form of blindness—creating a blind spot in the other characters' egos for their own flaws to play out on large scales.
Light is just a game piece that represents a logic flaw in one of the game's rules.
In a brilliant reversal, the same objectification Kira levies on other people is then levied on him, eradicating his presupposed self-deification for what it actually is—the delusions of grandeur of a pathetic narcissist.
Think about it. In real life, think of the layers of cynicism and shortsightedness you need to pile on to your worldview to run through this world blind to the myriad solutions available in life and justify mass murder.
So fans of Death Note thinking that it was bad writing that both 1) their fan favorite L couldn’t beat Light and 2) that it makes no sense for Near to beat Light, consider that such blindness in the killer from their flawed worldview gives them giant blind spots that someone like Near can exploit near-flawlessly (pun intended).
Light is thusly cut down to what he really is through the viewer’s potential phantasms and mental gymnastics about the nature of his actions—
Nothing.
Everything--the perfect grades, the materials, the money, the women, the status, the cult following, the praise, and the worship are stripped from him until he is laid bare with the failure of the final organ he does not have.
Even in his supposed moment of triumph, where he proudly declares the infamous line "boku no kachi da (I win)" in Episode 37, this is ironically his moment of greatest weakness.
How?
Light is posessed in this moment. Therefore, he is displaying a form of weakness.
He displays his weakness to the force possessing him by declaring a statment which defeats his own purpose, just like Walter White at the dinner table with Hank.
In a position where he is surrounded by federal-level agents whom go by evidence, why did he say such a self-incriminating line?
His laugh as he admits he is Kira, his eyes red as an animation cue, give the viewer the answer.
He is possessed.
Meaning that, therefore, this entire time he was not strong enough to resist possession.
For all the pomp, circumstance, and portent to godhood—
Yagami Light is nothing.
Warm regards,
Russell Campbell | President & CEO | Empathy Software LLC
Reach Out to the Truth:
PUBLISHED: 20:41 ET 14 October 2024
LAST EDITED: 12:23 ET 27 November 2024