Psygnius wrote:Refering to angelx03's last post: I haven't seen that far into the TV series, but I've read all of the manga.
Spoilerish speculation
I haven't watched many episodes of the anime so far, but it sounds a lot like the manga. Anyone else have trouble relating to the main characters? They're not human at all. Humans make mistakes. With these guys, even when they finally make a mistake they've already thought of a triple redundancy plan to handle it. Or they make up one on the spot. Geniuses can do that in Go (or Chess), but not in a game with human pieces that each have their own life and quirks that don't go according to plan. The entire story is too contrived and perfect, led by characters more perfect than the worst Mary Sue you ever read.If so, then I think the author has a very bad idea of what autism is like. Idiot savants aren't intellectually superior - they memorize things, may be good with computers and stationary systems - they can't handle changing systems and rapid thought about possibilities and choice. No plotting, no problem solving, none of the rapid fire far-out ideas L and Near come up with. They'd also have trouble speaking. L had a lot of quirks, but he delivered his lines just as fast and with complex grammar as Raito ever did. Even the mildest cases of autism (in people I've met IRL) come with speach problems. They're slow. Even the ones who can do the human calculator trick have trouble actually delivering the number - there's a delay between the thought happening and finding the words to communicate it to others. That's one of the reasons fake movies like Rain Man have the autistic savants repeat themselves a lot - they have to deliver lines and react fast because it's a movie, so they pretend the characters can react faster if they use phrases already on the tip of their tongue.
Nah. I don't think there's a mental deficiency in any of the L line. I think they've just been isolated from normal society and encouraged to act on any eccentric impulses they get - as long as it stimulates their already rapid thought process. The 'school' really pounded that idea into me. They pick them up as children, orphans you can bet, raise them as wierdos, and make them so alienated from "normal" people that they'll never even regret hiding themselves from the world - because they were raised to be happier that way. Then again, I don't like the Near/Mello part of the manga because the L-clones were way too contrived and obvious replacements. I think the author went out on a limb by making a whole school of people as strange as L - like being an eccentric genius means they all have the exact same habits (sweets, insomnia, sitting position, etc). There's more chance of Near being like L because he idolized and mimicked him, than of them both suffering from the same brain defect that made them geniuses with quirky behavior.
I think L's reaction to that bit in the manga was an exageration on his part because he had an audience at the time. [At least I *think* he did...I remember Raito being there for most of the Kira2 to Kira1 tape messeges arc...] He reacted like a little kid being told Santa is real. No one as naive as that could ever remain suspicious of Raito as long as L does. He's always playing his actions and dialogue to get the biggest reaction out of Raito (or whoever he's "playing to" at the time). You can't take anything he does on face value.
So why is this story so addictive? It's annoying. I'll watch the anime and gripe about the perfectness in every plot device, and then rush to watch the next episode. That's just wrong. >.<
