Examples of Fandom-Specific Plot for Death Note.
A No Recent Examples rule applies to this trope. Examples shouldn't be added until one month after release, to avoid any knee-jerk reactions and allow time for fanfic to be written.
- Death Note fanfiction not only has its two overwhelmingly popular pairings of L/Light and Matt/Mello, but also predictable storylines of just how they get together, despite Light being a (possibly reformed) megalomaniacal Serial-Killer Killer and Mello (potentially) being a mafia crime boss.. L and Light frequently fall in love during the Yotsuba arc, often with special attention paid to the anime-only rooftop rain scene and averting the canon outcome of the 13-day test.
- Matt/Mello fanfics often include a teen romance (perhaps unconsummated) in Wammy's House, Matt's heartbreak over Mello leaving to join the Mafia, which he usually copes with by using drugs and alcohol, having empty sex with numerous partners, and self-harming, and then later include angst over either Matt's death, Mello's death, both, or if their canon fates are avoided, their near-brushes with death. If the fanfic is non-angsty, Matt/Mello often appears as a secondary couple in a Ship Mates fanfic along with L/Light, with all four working as detectives together and getting along surprisingly well, despite Light being a (possibly reformed) serial killer.
- The most common type of Death Note fic is Light and L's kinky chain adventures during the Yotsuba arc.
- Light complains about L eating so much sugar and not letting him sleep. L complains about the time Light spends on personal hygiene.
- Light and L forget that they are working on a high profile murder case and are paranoid neurotics and go to the movies / beach / mall / candy store / other fun place for no good reason, or "because it's what Kira would do."
- Light forgets that he's on a righteous crusade to eliminate evil and because of the power of true love gives up the notebook to be with L.
- Mr. Yagami gets mad at L or Light for sleeping together.
- Sometimes L/Light and Matsuda/Sayu are Ship Mates which leads to much banter and teasing.
- Rape Hurt/Comfort Fic. Light gets raped and L comforts him. L gets raped or just hurt/traumatized by Beyond Birthday and Light kills Beyond and comforts L... ...OR L gets raped or just hurt/traumatized by Light and Beyond kills Light and comforts L.
- Misa is a hateful bitch and tries to kill L and/or Light.
- For the rare het fic: Misa is a stupid puppet that does whatever Light tells her.
- Light is an abusive ass, Misa falls in love with L, and Misa or more commonly Rem cuts a deal with L.
- Mello gets into a fight with Matt about lack of chocolate or ignoring him in favor of his video games.
- Beyond Birthday arrives to rape/dismember/kill L, Light, Mello, Near or whatever Woobie of choice.
- Light becomes a Shinigami. He's often much prettier than canon Shinigami and this is also an excuse for WingFic.
- L becomes a Shinigami.
- Light develops Dissociative Identity Disorder. Two subplots from this setup:
- Light is committed to Bedlam House (often by L at capture) but he's being abused there so L has to save him.
- Kira is actually a seperate entity, some sort of Enemy Within spirit-demon-thingy. Though if L and/or Light try to get rid of him he may become an Enemy Without.
- Fix Fic: Rewrite the show so that Light never picked up the notebook.
- Another character picked up the notebook instead of Light. A common choice is what L himself would do if he came into possession of the notebook.
- Light is raised at Wammy's House.
- Secretly Light always looked up to L and he was his role-model growing up.
- L's Back Story is finally revealed. It's very dark and tragic.
- Light's Back Story is examined and he's often given a Freudian Excuse.
- Ghost Shipping with L.
- Ensemble Dark Horse Matt saves the day.
- Mello lied about having no interest in Sayu. Sayu is raped by the mafia guys. Or Mello saves her to rape her himself.
- Then there's the High School AU of course where L and the Wammy's kids are a big happy family and the Kiras are troubled, outcast Emo kids.
- Matt and Mello (sometimes with Near, L, and Light) do teenager-y stuff.
- As the psychological warfare continues to escalate the characters challenge each other to a game of Truth or Dare or Spin the Bottle or Strip Poker or Ten Minutes in the Closet.
- L spontaneously gives the taskforce a day off to get some alone time with Light.
- L watches Light masturbating on the security cameras.
- For Continuation Fic, Matsuda is either a) very guilty about shooting Light, b) becomes the next Kira, c) hooks up with Sayu or d) all of the above.
- The Distant Sequel starring an OC that is Light and Misa's kid. Expect L to have a kid too and Generation Xerox of most of the characters.
- Expect fics about unwritten rules of the notebook such as, say, enabling men to get pregnant.
- Fix Fic: A character is brought back to life with the death eraser.
- Peggy Sue is common with plot points going much the same way as canon despite a character's forknowledge of events.
- Mello and Near (sometimes with Matt and Linda) work together against Kira.
- Mikami becomes Light's insane stalker and someone, usually L, has to save him.
- For the epilogue Misa is easily talked out of killing herself so that shipping may commence—usually with Matsuda or Sayu.
- Mikami carried a backup page for the final confrontation.
- Light comforts poor little orphan B and L and Watari are evil bastards abusing and experimenting on children.
- Have characters meet earlier on and develop friendly relations and so the story becomes radically different.
- A crossover character derails the plot.
- L and Light team-up against an eviler, incredibly brutal OC Kira. The OC will often be 1) so brutal in his/her methods that it makes Light ill to show how much more eviler s/he is 2) a graduate of Wammy's House.
- Assassin and mafia AUs are common.
- Light stupidly gloats giving away his plans so L catches him easily and hooks up with Misa or an OC.
- For Continuation Fic: Sayu discovers where her brother hid the real notebook, becomes the next Kira, and avenges him.
- The AU where Misa is doing her modeling work and L becomes her creepy boss.
- The AU where Light is a male model and L is his creepy boss.
- One or more characters is actually a sexy vampire. Or a sexy werewolf. Or a sexy demon. Or a sexy whatever. The important part is that they can't be killed with the Death Note and sex ensues.
- The AU where the Yagami family lost all their money so Light has to go work for the wealthy Lawliet family in order to support his little sister...
- Mello is the son of a mob boss.
- L takes a break from his regularly scheduled investigating to act all Emo and Wangsty and to remind the readers that he is just a poor little orphan boy.
- The Shinigami King delivers some sort of Deus ex Machina that spares character(s) of choice.
- One or more characters are turned into a Cat Boy.
- The Misa or Mikami focused angst-fest where Light has them killed once they've outlived their usefulness.
- The Kira's Victory AU where Light is so grateful to Misa/Takada/Mikami/follower of choice that sex ensues.
- Rem invoked some unknown or little-used Shinigami loophole in order to spite Light so that L is still alive.
- Fluff where Light hangs out with his little sister and gets a Pet the Dog moment.
- There are other kinds of Notes and have the appropriate kind of god or spirit haunting them—The Life Note, The Debu Note (Fat Note), the Love Note, the Sex Note, the Yaoi Note, the Math Note, the Study Note, etc.
- Ryuk makes Light his Sex Slave.
- For Continuation Fic: An OC picks up the notebook and decides to continue Kira's work.
- The Code Geass Crossover, Lelouch vs Light. Expect the entire Royal Family bar the Vi Britannia kids to be Death Noted in the first 4 chapters.
- That portal network that connects the human world with the Shinigami world is a Common Crossover method. It apparently works for Time Travel and dimensional travel as well.
- The Shinigami King is actually the Master of Death.
- Reincarnation Romance.
- Light is caught as Kira and L fakes Light's execution in order to save him. Light may or may not be aware of L's plans but more often than not L will not mention his plan to rescue him for extra angst or L being dick or "so that Light's reactions would look genuine."
- Mello experiences Gayngst over his attraction to and/or relationship with Matt (or just boys in general) vs. his religious beliefs.
- An OC is reincarnated as Sayu.
- Kira (usually Light) wins and rules the world however the author sees fit. This sometimes includes Light killing off people the author personally dislikes.
- Many years after Kira wins, it's up to a couple (usually teenage) OCs to end his reign once and for all. Due to the far-future nature of this fic expect lots of Worldbuilding (with mixed results).
