Though critics largely trashed it (its Rotten score isn’t pretty), the Netflix Original Death Note has recently been described as a huge success for the mighty streaming service, so much so that a sequel is now officially in the works.

Adapted from the wildly successful manga by Tsugumi Ohba & Takeshi Obata, and following on from the equally popular Japanese film series, the 2017 US version was helmed by genre favourite Adam Wingard (The Guest), starred former Nickelodeon star Nat Wolff, The Leftovers’ Margaret Qualley, the brilliant Lakeith Stanfield (Get Out), and even boasted Willem Dafoe’s distinctive vocals as the voice of the demonic death god, Ryuk. For those unfamiliar, the basic premise sees a young man named Light coming into the possession of a mysterious book. Write a name in the book, picture that person as you do so, and Ryuk will see to it that they are toast. But, naturally, there’s a price to be paid for such magicks. It’s classic wish fulfilment stuff (whose name would you write?) and a whole heap of fun (at least this writer thought so!), so we urge anybody reading who may have been put off by poor word of mouth to fire up the Netflix and seek it out.

There’s no word currently as to whether any of the above will return, but considering how much story the first tried to cram in to its runtime, and how much was ultimately left over, we certainly hope Netflix had the foresight to sign everybody for multiple films. Given he’s on Godzilla vs. Kong duties, we can probably rule out Wingard’s return as he gears up for that creature feature’s 2020 drop. That, and we can’t imagine he had that great a time watching Death Note be savaged upon its release. That kind of reception would sour the thickest skinned of filmmakers. Only the screenwriter has been locked down at present, with relative newcomer Greg Russo (his only credits are the upcoming reboots of Mortal Kombat and Resident Evil) currently hammering away on the sequel.

As always, more as Death Note 2 takes form…

Source: THR