Deathnote
I just recently finished an anime series called "Death Note".
***SPOILER ALERT: For those whom are spoiler adverse, I will be outlining the first episode below. Skip to the asterisks of you can't deal with that.***
Death Note is about a brilliant young Japanese high school student, Light Yagami, whom accidentally discovers a supernatural notebook dropped by a Japanese "death god", called a Shinigami, named Ryuk. The notebook enables the user to kill anyone whom's real name and face the user knows.
Eventually, Light gives into the temptation to test the death note and so tries to use it to defuse a hostage situation he was watching live on TV. When the hostage taker suddenly dies of a heart attack, Light realizes the potential of the death note and so decides to use it to punish criminals and create a world free from crime. Ryuk reveals himself to Light at this time and explains that he dropped the death note because he was bored in the shinigami realm.
Within a few weeks people begin to notice that the death rate of imprisoned criminals has increased dramatically. They also notice that most of the deaths are from heart attacks. The people of Japan, and the world, start to suspect a person is behind it and give this person the name Kira, a word derived from the Japanese pronunciation of the English word "killer". Websites sprout up asking Kira to kill people who have somehow wronged the posters.
At this point the world governments become concerned about Kira and a special detective, known only as "L" is brought in to solve the crime. L is extremely smart and has solved every case he's worked on. He's also extremely elusive working only through a mysterious man known as Watari and communicating exclusively through a computer that scrambles his voice and hides his face. L agrees to work on the case and reveals to the world governments that he already has a good idea of where Kira is located.
Light is watching TV when L makes a worldwide broadcast. L, sitting at a desk with his name on a placard, directly addresses Kira and says that killing criminals is wrong. Light is infuriated by this and decides that anyone opposing his quest to make a world free from crime deserves to die. To that effect he writes L's name in his death note and the man on the TV immediately dies of a heart attack.
After which the real L, through his voice scrambler and displaying only the letter L on the screen, informs Kira that he has just been tricked. The man he killed was a death row inmate. He also informs Kira that the broadcast wasn't worldwide as it had initially claimed, rather it was broadcast only in Light's home town. L then promises to bring Kira to justice.
*******************************************************************************************************************************************************************
Thus the rest of the series revolves around a battle of wits between Light Yagami and L, and what a battle it is! The plot is fascinating, very well thought out, executed brilliantly and genuinely interesting. In fact the plot was my favorite part of Death Note. It wasn't over your head, but it was not entirely passive either. At times some thinking was required to keep up. Many times seemingly minor actions or objects affect the course of the plot in logical, though unexpected, ways.
The plot wasn't the only strong point however. Light and L are compelling characters. Light in particular is very interesting, in most ways he is the villain of the series, however he never really feels entirely evil. Just extremely committed to his vision of a world without crime. In many ways he is more of an anti-hero than a villain. Light and L are intellectual equals and their game of wits brings out their personalities very well. Aside from the main characters there are many minor characters and none of them seemed flat. They all felt like real life people who had real life concerns, dreams and burdens.
The show is very dark at times however, though what can you expect from a show with death in the name? Overall I would recommend it. Especially if you already like anime and don't mind having to read subtitles. Even if anime or subtitles is new to you in general I would recommend it if you like a good plot with interesting characters. Its available to watch for free on Hulu and is fairly short, consisting of only one season of less than forty (half hour long) episodes.