Tetsuro Araki -
Anime
Convention Personality of the Week - November 11, 2007
Artist Takeshi Obata and writer
Tsugumi Ohba created a sensation with the Death Note manga, but it
still took storytelling skill to create the animated version. It's more
than a monster show, it's a story that covers the range of emotions and
what really drives people. Director Tetsuro Araki says Death Note's
success comes because the series is more than just a horror show. Said
Araki, "The biggest thing about Death Note is, yes, it has elements of
horror, but it also has many different kinds of characters," Araki
said. "It isn't confined to one genre, but it overlaps many genres.
Some episodes were comedy, some were horror, some were intellectual -
it brought many different kinds of tastes to Death Note." The
animation's 37 episodes gave Araki the opportunity to carefully pace
the scenes and stories for the best dramatic impact. "Animating Death
Note was very difficult," said Araki. There were many things I tried
when I was working on the project, but some of the approaches were to
make things visually very dramatic - to make gaps between when
something's up or something's down...to have a difference between the
highs and the lows. That's what I focused on."
Artist Takeshi Obata and writer
Tsugumi Ohba created a sensation with the Death Note manga, but it
still took storytelling skill to create the animated version. It's more
than a monster show, it's a story that covers the range of emotions and
what really drives people. Director Tetsuro Araki says Death Note's
success comes because the series is more than just a horror show. Said
Araki, "The biggest thing about Death Note is, yes, it has elements of
horror, but it also has many different kinds of characters," Araki
said. "It isn't confined to one genre, but it overlaps many genres.
Some episodes were comedy, some were horror, some were intellectual -
it brought many different kinds of tastes to Death Note." The
animation's 37 episodes gave Araki the opportunity to carefully pace
the scenes and stories for the best dramatic impact. "Animating Death
Note was very difficult," said Araki. There were many things I tried
when I was working on the project, but some of the approaches were to
make things visually very dramatic - to make gaps between when
something's up or something's down...to have a difference between the
highs and the lows. That's what I focused on."