The only thing I didn't like about this was that they killed L off.
I wish, at the very least, they had waited until the very end to do that and that Light would have told L he was right all along. As it was I thought the end of L was really depressing with him rubbing Light's feet to "atone for his sins" even though Light never even considered showing him any mercy.
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I suggest you take a look at the live action. It is definitely nowhere near as good as the anime, but it is interesting to see a different approach to the story, and an alternate ending that might "feel" a little closer to what you wish.
It doesn't have any character development, though, but if you already watched the anime, this shouldn't represent a problem. =)
Now that I've finished it, I'm even more convinced that killing L was a mistake. L was easily the most interesting character in the whole show aside form (or maybe even more than) Light. They were two sides of the same coin and should have battled to the end.
The bigger problem with killing L, though, was that it forced them to introduce a number of new characters that did not have time to develop or really become interesting. Near and Mellow are never more than bad imitations of L, Mikami is off-brand Light (delete!), the SKB characters are filler.
It was still a great series all the way through. But it's a shame to see such an interesting character killed off too soon.
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I think killing L off was a fantastic idea.
You didn't expect it in the middle of the series and it came as a shock. It was such a huge moment because of how it came about.
The problem is the replacement was too similar without being as interesting.
The sub par replacement and lack of interesting relationship between L and his foe is where the killing of L to cause a decline, not the choice of killing L.
I agree that replacing L with Near wasnt the best idea, but it still worked out great, i thought.
Also, about the second thing you said, i think its meant to be like that to show how heartless Light is.