No. Except that it totally is. Maybe. Development and creation [edit] Development and creation of the Death Note serialized manga Ohba said that he decided to create a suspense series because he did not feel that he could have created a "normal fight-style" series and that the genre had few suspense series. Ohba said that he did not derive the Death Note concept from any single source. He said that one day he thought of a concept involving Shinigami and "specific rules." Due to positive reactions to the series Death Note became a serialized manga series.