I've been obligated to watch this anime ever since and I finally got to it yesterday. In brief, it's good so far! If you're unfamiliar with Death Note, it’s an anime about a notebook that kills people when you write their name in it. It's somewhat reserved for more slightly mature audiences. Come on though, as if the first episode is enough to judge for a first impression. Our character here, Light/Kira is of course, fucking crazy. In which he mercilessly kills tons of people who are criminals, prisoners or ex-convicts with the notebook, just within the first five episodes. It's because he wants to cleanse Japan (and the world someday) of all the "evil" people so he can become a god. Yeah, he's your typical psycho, but in a different way. Having a story involve a somewhat ordinary object that kills people is not something that hasn't been done before (The Ring for example) but that's alright as long as you make it work. So after I'm done watching this maybe I'll cue in to some of the live action stuff they have.

Considering the anime topic, here's something odd for you. I discovered that their is an anime version of Romeo and Juliet while looking for Death Note episodes on Stage6. It's properly "anime-tized" of course. The flying horse/dragon thing is a dead give away for that.