Death Note Filler: None, Plus Two Recap Specials
The 37-episode series has no filler. Outside the series, the only recap material is the two Relight specials, Visions of a God and L's Successors. How much each adds, according to ANN's reviewers.
Death Note has no filler. The 37-episode television series is one continuous adaptation, and its only recap material is the two Relight specials that aired after it: Visions of a God in 2007 and L's Successors in 2008. Both are condensed retellings with a few new scenes, so you can skip them without missing any of the story.
How this list was checked
ANN's encyclopedia lists the series at 37 episodes, broadcast from October 3, 2006 to June 27, 2007, and files the two Relight specials separately. We read ANN's reviews of both specials and the series DVD reviews we could find (volumes 1, 3, 5, 6 and 7). None of them labels a television episode filler, and we found no other editorial source that does. The nearest is Casey Brienza's review of the fifth DVD (episodes 17 to 20), which says the Yotsuba executives "exist primarily as filler material" and that two episodes developing Aizawa and Matsuda are "not strictly necessary." She ties that DVD to "the weakest of the manga's subplots," so it is a judgment on the story, not a filler label. We have not compared each episode with the manga ourselves.
| Special | Status | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Relight: Visions of a God | Recap, with a few new minutes | A 130-minute special that aired on August 31, 2007, per ANN. Theron Martin's ANN review explains that it edits "26 episodes of content down into roughly two hours," and that "the few minutes of new scenes" keep to the series' standards. T Strife, reviewing the director's cut for ANN, found its promised view of events through a Shinigami's eyes was "no more than lip-service." Martin's review, Strife's review |
| Relight 2: L's Successors | Recap, with about 20 new minutes | A 93-minute special that aired on August 22, 2008, per ANN. Jacob Chapman's ANN review credits it with "20 minutes of great new material" but calls it "largely just a recap movie," and notes that Mello's arc with the mafia "has been completely removed." Chapman's review |
Are the specials worth watching?
After the series, possibly; instead of it, no. Martin wrote that those familiar with the series "expecting a completely fresh perspective will be disappointed." Chapman thought the second special handled the late story better in condensed form, then concluded that "the uninitiated should always just turn to the original series." The new scenes are the reason to watch either one, and they are short.
The closest thing to a recap in the series
Martin's review of DVD volumes 7 and 8, which cover episodes 25 to 32, describes the series "drifting through a mostly recap episode" before its time jump. He does not give its number, and it sits inside the main run rather than outside it, so it is not a filler episode in the usual sense. On a straight watch, there is nothing in the 37 episodes to skip.
The Death Note watch order places the specials and the live-action versions, and the manga is the original version of the story. The ending explainer is spoiler-marked.