Went to see L, Change the WorLd tonight. I was surprised only about 15 people were in the theater to see the movie, considering Death Note, and Death Note 2: The Last Name both nearly sold out when I went to see them. Perhaps most people just bought tickets to tomorrow nights show since it's dubbed where as tonight's was a subbed showing.
The projectionist had a bit of a problem getting the movie started. Apparently these Fathom events are streamed to the theater via Dish Network HD, and the projectionist couldn't figure out how to get the movie started. Every time he hit play it just showed the Dish Network logo, and to see if it was working right started Beer Wars at one point. Eventually he or she figured out they should of started the playback about 30 minutes earlier and needed to fast forward through the upcoming Fathom Events loop that was supposed to be showing during that 30 minutes prior to start time.
Review after the jump and it contain massive spoilers.
As most of you reading this probably know L, Change the WorLd chronicles L's last 23 days on Earth after writing his own name in the Death Note in order to prove Light Yagami was Kira in the previous Death Note movie. The movie opens prior to L leaving for Japan to begin work on the Kira case and does a quick recap for people who might not of seen the previous film. We also learn that during L's investigation of the Kira case a Japan a small village in Thailand is destroyed by the US military to contain a highly contagious virus. A young boy from the village who is somehow immune to the virus is helped to escape by F, who tells the boy to find a phone and call Watari, who is dead by the time the boy makes the phone call. So L brings the boy out why F wanted him to contact Watari.
Meanwhile, a virus sample is sent to a doctor in Japan for analysis. The doctor creates a vaccine, but fearing what would happen if it fell into the hands of the people who created the virus, whom he suspects works in that very lab, sends his daughter to contact Watari with a sample of the virus and a clue to it's antidote. The daughter, Maki, returns to the lab to retrieve her stuffed bear just in time to witness her father commit suicide by injecting the virus into himself to prevent it from falling into the bad guys hands. The bad guys leader, Dr. Kujo, just happens to be K, and Maki's father's assistant. Maki quickly leaves the lab to try and find Watari.
Meanwhile, Kujo contacts L telling him someone killed Maki's father and stole the virus. L magnifies a a reflection behind Kujo's video message and sees a a bad guy that F warned L about via a message left with the boy. Maki finds L and tells him about her father and gives him the vial containing the virus. When Kujo arrives at L's Maki sees her on the surveillance camera, and goes to confront her. In order to try and kill Kujo, Maki injects herself with the virus. L intervenes and takes Maki and the boy away from there with the help of a suddenly appearing FBI agent, who was sent to try and get the Death Note from L.
L, Maki, and the boy make it to a colleague of Maki's father whom L believes can create an antidote before the virus in Maki's system becomes active. Luckily at this point Maki's low blood sugar has prevented the virus from becoming active and infecting all of Japan.
After discovering a vaccine thanks to the MK proteins in the boys system, Maki decides to try once again to kill Kujo and runs off and contacts her alone. Kujo captures Maki, and decides to fly her to the US where the virus will spread, and begin K's plan to wipe out human life to save the Earth.
This leads to a big showdown with L leaping onto a movie airplane with a bag full of antidote. L is able to save all but two of the bad guys thanks to them being to weak to do anything because of the virus that had become active infecting them. L, having only two days left, takes the boy to Watari's orphanage. There he gives the boy a toy robot and a name, Near. L then walks off into the sunset thinking how he would like to have more time in this world.
This movie was excellent. Of the three live action Death Note movies this one is defiantly the best. L Change the WorLd is a very action oriented film, where the other two focused on L and Light's battle of wills with very little action. Kenichi Matsuyama, did another excellent job as L. This time he had to play a different kind of L from the previous film, an L that is out of his element. L is used to working behind the scenes, having others do the dirty work, but this time L is forced to take matters into his own hands while protecting two children. Mayuko Fukuda, played Maki, and during the behind the scenes segment after film she said this was her first film. She did a wonderful job, and a very believable job of portraying a young girl grief stricken by the lose of her father that she is willing to kill the person who did it. Fukuda, probably has a very good career ahead of her.
Images from
Preston Toh's Blog
My Reviewer
Animekon
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