I don’t dislike it so much from a storytelling view as a thematic one. Light was the draconian society personified, a Thomas Hobbes style Leviathan of a government, in his mind. L was the force that counter-acted this, and in his surreal little quirks and childishness, represented a more chaotic world and the basic innocence and good of humanity. Perhaps this is over-analysis, but I felt it was almost a classical debate between Legalism (Light) and Confucianism (L), especially given the philosophical discussion in the series. When one dies, I guess I considered it a victory for one theory, and thus the end of the series. Your point, about Legalism/general Totalitarianism failing even after it “wins the war” adresses that pretty nicely, and wasn’t something I’d thought of.
[spoiler]And we already know Light’s a bastard when he decided to get into a relationship with Misa, again when he quietly decided to kill L (an innocent), and once more when he put Misa’s life into Rem’s hands.
He was the ultimate schemer when L was there, and simply sloppy in the later years.
Also, it’s interesting to note that Misa gets off scott-free, gets her life saved <i>twice</i> by shinigami, and doesn’t even have to live with the guilt of using the Death Note, even though she killed hundreds of people using it.[/spoiler]
Yeah, it’s too bad that she probably killed herself some time after Light’s death. In the manga, she committed suicide a year later, and in the anime, it shows her all depressed at the end, so she very well may have offed herself later. Definitely not a happy ending for her, at any rate.
Well, she <i>is</i> pretty goth
I saw a lot of Death Note Cos-players when I was in Vancouver back in August…
[SPOILER]Misa had her life shortened in half several times over therefore I wouldn’t say she got off scot free. Her life was destroyed, she just didn’t really realize it. The fact she abandoned the death note and forgot doesn’t eliminate the fact that she lost a lot, as demonstrated by how Rem was really disturbed at how she made the pact a 2nd time.
While Light using Misa was a bastardly thing to do, he didn’t outright betray her. He used her. He betrayed L and his father, leading the latter to his death. I would qualify the sins he commits in the end to be greater than the ones he commits in the earlier parts of the anime. The sins he commits in the earlier part of the anime, you could argue are because he is naive and has a general goal to accomplish: the perfect society. In the end, its all about how that was never the case and we see how truly corrupted he became by all his power and how everything he does is self-serving.[/SPOILER]
[spoiler]Yeah, I agree that lying to his father even on his deathbed and the meta-plot to kill L by sacrificing Rem is pretty bad. Rem knew that Light was a scheming bastard, though, and it’s ironic how she inherited Jealous’ Death Note <i>and</i> love for Misa.
Misa, however, more or less didn’t get her life shortened at all. Her first pact was with Rem, and her second pact was with Ryuk. If Rem dies for her, however, she gives her remaining life to Misa (giving back what she took when she made the deal <i>and</i> adding her own to Misa’s lifeline). The only one who got his lifeline extended was Ryuk, and the only punishment Misa gets is losing Light (and she is kinda stupid for loving him in the first place).[/spoiler]
It isn’t said anywhere that Misa gets her life back if its taken by Rem. That would make no sense either because anyone who ever lost part of their life to a Shinigami should get it back by that logic. As for Ryukh, she still lost at least half of what was left of her life at that point as well, which still sucks badly. She’s definitely not getting that back.
Rem said in the anime that Misa gets added onto her life an amount of time equal to the remaining lifeline of the Shinigami that sacrificed him/herself to save her. Misa’s lifeline is 3/4 what it used to be, since she made that second deal with Ryuk, but whatever life she gave to Rem, she now has back. In addition, since we can assume that Rem still had some time before dying if it wasn’t for her self-sacrifice to save Misa, an extra, unknown amount got added to her 3/4*original lifeline. The exact thing happened when Jealous sacrificed himself for Misa, and his lifeline turned out to be pretty damn long, so it’s extremely probable that Misa actually got extra living time from this.
Is it depressing?
It can be at times. Its mostly suspense though.
It’s like reading one of the less less lighthearted Sherlock Holmes novels (Sign of Four, for example)
It’s a book of mysteries for the characters, but most of it is laid out flat for the readers/viewers.
Gah, I broke down and just read a summary on Wikipedia, though the concept seems pretty cool Going around and purging the world of the corrupt is something I thought would be really cool when I was a kid 
Definitely one of my favourite Anime’s. L is easily my favourite Anime character, with Archer as a distant second. I even find myself sitting and eating like him all too often. XD The series would of been nice if it didn’t go into the Mello/Near saga, though.
Archer from fate/stay Night?
I finally watched the anime and finished it tonight… Light is possibly the most thoroughly evil character I’ve seen in a long while, and the last episode was one of the most awesome and satisfying denouements I’ve probably ever seen. I actually think poetically it’s perfect how the always-cool Light devolves into a madman when his world comes crashing down upon him. And DAMN did it feel good.
Eh, I actually didn’t finish it. When that new character that took L’s place came in it seemed more like the producers grasping at straws than anything else and I lost interest after that. Got close, though.
SPOILER: http://maba.nulani.net/files/swimming.gif
Megalomania is probably the best word for the situation. And the parody pretty much cracks anyone up if they figure out where that is from 
You can watch death note online at Lovely Anime