L Staring at Kira

Submission 21,088

Part of a series on Death Note. [View Related Entries]

About

L Staring at Kira refers to a memorable scene from the anime series Death Note in which the character L intensely stares at the character Light Yagami (Kira). In mid-August 2019, the video, accompanied with the soundtrack composition "L's Theme," gained significant popularity as a reaction on Twitter and Instagram, often used to illustrate mistrust.

Origin

On November 28th, 2006, episode nine "Encounter" of the anime series Death Note premiered in Japan.^[1] In one scene of the episode, character L, a detective, reveals himself to his suspect Light Yagami, Kira, and studies him intensely.

Spread

The exact first person to use the scene as a reaction is currently unknown. On August 14th, 2019, Twitter user @MemeDeIncognito posted the earliest known viral tweet using the scene as a reaction, with the tweet gaining 1,100 retweets and 3,200 likes in two weeks (shown below).^[2]

On August 15th, 2019, Twitter user @animxe posted another meme using the video, with the post receiving over 2,300 retweets and 7,800 likes in two weeks (shown below).^[3]

In the following days, more memes based on the video were posted on Twitter, with the format also spreading to Instagram in the following days.^[4]^[5]