200 Interesting Anime Facts You Didn't Know

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Another Death Note themed manga exists.

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Since there is a large variety of manga available to readers, it's inevitable that some of them share the same plotline with other published works— either by coincidence or just plain plagiarism. In this case, maybe the existence of the Death Note was borrowed from an unusual manga published prior to the series. In 1973, a manga called Fushigi na Techou (The Miraculous Notebook) was released.

Written by author Shigeru Mizuki, this story centers a middle-aged worker who comes across the notebook that (surprise, surprise) kills anyone whose name is written on its pages.

Though Ohba never credited a specific work for his inspiration for the plot of Death Note, we have to wonder if he knew of this story's existence. Hmm...