Death Note is about a high school genius, named Light Yagami, who finds a notebook that allows the user to kill anyone they wish (as long as the user has the person's name and face in mind) by writing their name in the notebook. Light decides to use this power to kill anyone he deems criminal or unworthy of life. Light's continuous killings eventually attract the attention of the genius detective who is only known as L (L doesn't show his face or reveal any information about himself for most of the show). Light figures in order to be completely safe, he needs to eliminate L. The show then becomes a clever game of cat and mouse between two masterminds and it's incredible. You never know exactly what the other is going to do and you don't know if L will capture Light or if Light will kill L. It's absolutely riveting and this is the fantastic part of the show. The second half of the show sucks, for lack of a better word. Without spoiling anything here are the main problems: 1: Some new characters are introduced and none of them are likable. 2: The clever cat and mouse formula gets lost somewhere and the show loses interest. And 3: The ending is wrong, bad, stupid, and I don't like it.You'll see what I mean when you get there. So, Death Note is only good. It could have fantastic, but the second half of the show happened and it became simply a good show. If you only want the good parts watch episodes 1-26. Skip 27-37.