Death Note Black Edition, Vol. 2 (2)

Death Note Black Edition II is another two-volume collection of Death Note. The 12 tankōbon volumes are collected in six Black Editions, each 400 pages long. In it, L and Kira finally meet. L asks Light/Kira to help him in the investigation of Kira, and Light of course does. All of this is complicated by a second Kira who appears on the scene, and she has the power of the Shinigami eyes, meaning that by looking at someone's face, she can tell that person's name and when that person is supposed to die. Of course, with the Death Note, she can change all that.With brilliant art and brilliant writing, Death Note is everything you want in a manga. The pages are quite wordy, and it took me at least three or four hours to get through all 400 pages, but I enjoyed it thoroughly. The logic of the series reminds me of Hunter x Hunter, only more limited in scope because of the nature of the story. The narration is omniscient, showing the thoughts of both L and Kira, both of whom overthink everything. It isn't easy writing about two brilliant teenagers, but Takeshi Obata does it brilliantly. ****3/4

Very perfect and also have nice sounds.

It was a really good book at a decent price

This was a gift for my cousin and she loves it soo much

great series and the book itself looks good and is good to hold

I liked it.

The manga is excellent, no question, however this review is regarding the quality of the book itself.I've taken parts from my review of the first volume and compared them here (1st Volume review is in quotes "")."Design:The Black Editions appear just as they should, they feature a basic cover with a headshot of one of the major characters unique to each book (Light, Ryuk, L, Misa, Mello, and Near in that order), and eschew the original spine design which each featured a different shinigami that most often did not play a role in the story (exceptions being 1 Ryuk, 4 Gelus, 5 Rem, and 9 Sidoh). The books are stripped of their extraneous content including ads, Shonen Jump subscription cards, "Last Time on Death Note...", and "In The Next Volume..." pages leaving only Death Note to keep your attention. The overall design is nothing but appropriately ominous leaving sparce white text on a black field reminicent of the Death Notes themselves, even the edges of the pages are black, easily setting the books apart from anything else on your shelf."The second volume breaks the no-ads mold by squeezing in a much unneeded page advertising the 12-volume boxset and dvd collection. Beyond that the design is unchanged."Content:The primary feature is that the Black Editions serve as two-packs, each of the 6 containing two of the original 12 books of content. The books are also about 1 inch taller and 3/4ths of an inch deeper, this means the original pages are printed larger and in higher quality. The opening pages that were inked in color for Shonen Jump are back in color now, having been grayscaled in the original release. A couple art pages have been added, however these come at the cost of the original books' front cover art which do not make reappearances, even as art pages. The art on the original back covers do make reappearances, having always been art pages to bookend each chapter, however these are not in color."My complaint about the missing cover art is addressed in the second volume where at the end of the book, it features the original first four cover images. I'm glad to see the cover art again, though I do wish it was in color, but mostly I'm puzzled by the approach. Why not just have one page in every black edition showing off both covers of the books it contains? I would never have decided to release the cover art in batches of four every other volume, that doesn't make any friggen' sense."Material:The higher quality paper is nothing to write home about as the difference is slight, however it's worth noting that the quality is significantly better than some similar rereleases such as Naruto's 3-in-1 omnbuses which cram 3 books together with very thin paper. The biggest drawback to this rerelease is surely it's cover material. The covers feature the same matte finish that appeared on the original books (unlike the glossy covers on Naruto) and consequently fingerprints and nail scratches are much more visible, especially considering the covers predominantly black. In addition to this, it's obvious that the inking process that was used to render the edges of the pages black was done with the cover on. Because of this, ink stains are visible all along the outer edges of the front and back cover. These may not be immediately noticeable at a glance, but if there is a silver lining to this, it's that the books should handle age very well. The page edges will not appear to yellow under a layer of black ink and inevitable damage to the cover will blend in with the ink stains. If the end result is a great book that resembles a battered old tome, the venture will have been a success. Ultimately however, the choice to ink the page edges was poor. It looks more like a block than a Death Note, and it would qualify no less for the title of "Black Edition" without it."Surely my biggest dissapointment came here. I've gone to see some of the Black Edition copies as sold on shelves and noticed that many of them didn't have the bothersome ink stains on them. When I received my copy through Amazon however, I realized it was worse than before. Instead of a thin streak of ink along the edges of the book, both the front and back had 2-3 thumb-size smears across them. I have no idea what went through the manufacturer's head when they decided to pull this crap, but suffice it to say, in the light, your book might not look so new.I'm tempted to score this lower due to the inconsistent damage appearing on these books, but the new art, returning cover art, and general quality of the book's content dissuades me. My only wish is that they made all of these books cleanly and without obvious printing errors. Beyond that...Judgment:All things considered, the Black Editions present a streamlined and convenient re-packaging of the original books, and lose little in the process. I would have liked to see the original cover art and the all of the originally colored art pages return in full color, but the larger pages and two-in-one format are more than fair compensation. The ink inconsistent damage is a definite sticking point, but it certainly warrants the unqiue title of "Black Edition" and if nothing else will certainly provoke more than one "What are you reading?" questions, to which you will always have a good answer.