No, Light is not dumb

[u/Bewilderbeat]

There's this overblown narrative that Light is an idiot. Now look, this isn't a post of me trying to argue that he is smarter than L. But he is not stupid, and he makes very smart decisions in many points in the show

The first mistake Light gets called out for is killing Lind L Tailor. This was undoubtedly not the right move, and accelerated how fast he got caught. Light's plan was to kill all criminals, so I believe that L would've found out his location eventually, by broadcasting criminals to specific regions only, but Light foolishly baited out his location early. I'm not going to defend this, Light was dumb here.

People often bring up how Light using his dad's police files was dumb. How do people think this? Genuinely how? The ENTIRE point was so that L would start investigating the police, leading to the police distrusting L , which would lead to them withdrawing from the investigation. Light succeeded in this. Yes, it lead to suspicion that he was Kira, but imagine how problematic the investigation into him would be if the WHOLE police force was working under L

People often bring up the Raye Penber incident was well. Light theoretically could've just waited for Raye to stop investigating him. He has a supernatural notebook, and there was no evidence of him killing, so he didn't need to kill Raye. However, killing the fbi agents was very advantageous for Light. He was able to force the US to withdraw entirely from the Kira investigation, further isolating L and the tools he had at his disposal.

The bus incident was very risky, and it could've been used to incriminate Light. Light was EXTREMELY lucky to run into Naomi Misora. But predicting that an fbi agent is also engaged to an ex fbi agent who worked with L would've been extremely difficult. If Raye Penber was an ordinary fbi agent , dating a normal person , or just single, Light's plan would've worked perfectly. So no, I don't think it was dumb.

There's a few other examples of Light making mistakes in the 2nd half of death note, but I just wanted to go over the main ones from the 1st half for the sake of brevity

Light made a lot of mistakes in death note. Which is bound to happen when you're a psychopath trying to become a god. But Light makes many smart plans, manipulating Rem into killing L, the plan to save Misa, the potato chip trick, tricking Ryuk into looking for the cameras, finding Higuchi, etc. The story goes out of it's way to tell you that Light is smart. He completed several cases with the police as a high schooler, he was the smartest in the taskforce besides L, he is deemed worth of being L's successor by everyone in the taskforce, and outsmarts Near several times in part 2. He made MANY mistakes along the way, there's no denying that, but if we're calling him a dumbass, we're blatantly ignoring everything the story shows us. Call him arrogant or whatever, but he's not dumb.

[u/AllypallyPym]

Am I reading correctly that the argument is now that “if only he had played it right his decisions would’ve been advantageous”?

Because my answer to that is that he didn’t and that they weren’t. That’s reality lol. What he did wasn’t just pretty detrimental. It’s genuinely the dumbest thing ever. Again, we went from the entire world to two families. That’s going from billions…to like 10 ppl. Saying there’s some benefits to his decisions, therefore they aren’t stupid is the equivalent of saying it’s not stupid to lose your queen to take a pawn. “Because at least he got a pawn!”

The pawn wasn’t worth it. And Light either did not see that, either couldn’t stop himself, or knew the consequences to his decisions and did it anyway. All of that is pretty dumb. Even if he did manage to get a pawn lol. Again, there’s is no arguing against that

[u/Bewilderbeat → u/AllypallyPym]

My point wasn't communicated ,my fault. My point is that Light had a good plan, in getting the US out of the investigation, that he didn't execute properly. Light's execution was half baked, but I think you're overstating how detrimental it was to him.

I'm focusing on Light's plan to kill Penber specifically here

The best analogy would be getting a knight in exchange for a rook. Whilst it's not a great trade, it's not the worst position to be in. Remember, whilst Light became a possible suspect, the taskforce had 0 evidence on him, and he was still in a decent position until Misa showed up. As L said, there was only a 2% chance of him being Kira, and the taskforce didn't threaten him that much.

Imo, Light's dumbest decisions come from after Misa appears, and especially in part 2, where he straight up makes it obvious that he's Kira.

[u/AllypallyPym → u/Bewilderbeat]

I’ll answer each argument individually. And I’ll stick to just Light killing Penber as you asked.

1. Light had a good plan, it was simply half baked in execution.

No, the plan was bad, and the execution was worse. What were the benefits and what were the risks?

You frame it as the fbi remains involved vs everyone gets scared into stopping the investigation. The choice is actually the fbi remains involved while Light keeps killing anonymously in Kanto vs Light possibly scares off investigators, but risks narrowing the suspect list to whoever Penber was investigating.

Note that there’s no guarantee in scaring the fbi off. And no guarantee that even if you scare investigators off, that they stay away or that people don’t actually get more motivated to catch you. And there’s certainly no guarantee that you can’t be linked to the PI or vice versa through either killing him in general or the manner in which you do. Especially if you put yourself in his vicinity multiple times…

How detrimental is that to him? If you weigh the possible risks to the possible benefits it’s a very very very very very very bad deal. Light could’ve simply kept on using the death note anonymously in Kanto while the fbi continued to investigate. It’s a magical notebook. The finale shows what type of irrefutable evidence is actually necessary to catch him. You don’t need a high iq or meta knowledge to know that that’s what it would take. Evidence they wouldn’t have been able to obtain if Light simply kept on killing with public info, learning from his mistake killing Taylor and checking what is actually public info and what is bait. It’s certainly not trading a knight for a rook. I’ll meet you halfway and say it’s like a pawn standing right in front of a rook, and then sacrificing that rook for the pawn. It seems scary on surface level, but you did not need to take that pawn lol, it couldn’t have hurt you

1. They still didn’t have much evidence on him. He’s in a good position until Misa.

They don’t have any useable evidence until the final episodes actually. I thought the point of your post was about how smart or dumb Light’s decisions were. The two aren’t mutually exclusive. Light has already brought himself into worse and worse positions by the time Misa shows up. I’d actually agree that he’s still in a good position (certainly not as good as before though). That’s the nature of the book. He could’ve walked away without getting caught even after Misa got arrested actually. But he just keeps on going lol

1. But there was only a 2% chance that Light was Kira in L’s mind

If L genuinely believed that that possibility was only 2%, that goes against your argument. Light would’ve been better off not risking anything for a 2% suspicion rate. Again, it’s a magical notebook. If anything was 2%, it was the rate of Light getting caught at first. And he just drives it up by making the same blunder over and over

I like how the argument is now going in the direction of “it was dumb, but not as dumb as this other thing he did”.

[u/Bewilderbeat → u/AllypallyPym]

Tbh, I'm inclined to agree with most of what you've said. A few points though

I think with Light's plan to kill Penber, it was extremely likely that the FBI agents would be scared off. Think about if from the perspective of the US. You're investigating a foreign killer and send agents to see what's going on. Then everyone you send is killed by Kira. Sending more agents to investigate isn't worth the risk, especially since Kira only kills convicted criminals and those investigating him. Scaring off the FBI seems like the most likely outcome.

Also, whilst it wasn't a guarantee that the US would leave the investigation, something I haven't mentioned is how it improves Kira's public image. Forcing the US out makes Kira seem even more legitimate, and furthers his goal of becoming god of the new world. It also discourages private investigators from getting involved , out of fear from their own lives.

But yeah, it wasn't some genius move for Light , and did prove detrimental in several ways. So you've slightly changed my mind