Light Yagami from Death Note approaches the ring accompanied by the orchestral music from his series and the Shinigami Ryuk. Light wastes no time insulting Cell and calling him a joke, which Cell responds to by condescendingly mocking Light's age and asking Light if he's there looking for help with a thesis. Cell offers to provide Light with one; Cell's theory is that if Light doesn't walk away from the ring for the Cell Gamesnote right away, Cell will kill him. Every theory needs evidence to back it up, and it turns out that Cell has thought of that. Cell calls Light's attention to a squirrel peacefully searching for food near the ring, and then blows the squirrel's head off with a small ki blast to show Light he is absolutely serious about killing Light if Light doesn't leave.
However, while Cell's attention was briefly diverted, Light has taken a crucial step towards victory; he has opened the Death Note and written Perfect Cell's name there. Without any further details provided, as per the rules of the Death Note, Cell should die of a heart attack just forty seconds later. It appears that the only question is whether Cell will catch on to Light and kill him first before Cell's own time runs out. (Or just kill Light out of simple petty malice before the notebook's effect kicks in.)
Light, confident of victory, proclaims himself the god of the new world he is creating, which makes Cell chuckle and shake his head at the boy's arrogance and hubris, with Cell commenting that even he thought proclaiming himself to be a god was going a little too far. Cell returns to mocking Light as precious seconds tick away, each one seemingly bringing Light closer to victory. Suddenly Cells cuts off in the middle of speaking... but rather than collapse in pain clutching his chest, he just seems confused, asking "Did one of my hearts just stop?"
Light can do little but stare in horror as Cell ditches the clowning and jokes and quickly realizes that Light is responsible for his heart problems. In his last moments a panicking Light turns to Ryuk for support, but Ryuk just smiles at Light and does nothing to help. Moments later Light is engulfed by a ki attack from Cell, utterly vaporizing Light. Afterward there is a brief moment of silence where Cell seems unusually serious... until he suddenly thinks of what would have been a better punchline for one of his taunts towards Light and comments that he should have said that instead.
At that point Cell shrugs off the events of the day and goes back to waiting for the tournament to begin.
Tropes include:
- Accidental Pun: Ambiguous. When Cell joked about him and Light taking selfies together, did he mean a selfie or a Cellfie? Since he doesn't say either way, the world may never know.
- A God Am I: If you're familiar at all with the source material, it won't surprise you to see Light reveling in this trope.Light: I am no mere schoolboy. I am the god of this new world.
- Artifact of Death: The Death Note, as always. But unlike usual, it ultimately doesn't work on Cell, who is decidedly not human.
- Bizarre Alien Biology: Cell apparently has more than one heart, and between that and his healing factor, the Death Note is ineffective against him, causing him only temporary minor inconvenience instead of death.
- Call-Back:
- Once again Cell mocks an antagonist in this series of videos due to their young age, as he did with Yusuke and Kuwabara, and to a much lesser extent, Yugi.
- Cell mentions his fairly subtle A God Am I moment from Episode 54.
- Crippling Overspecialization: Light's an entirely normal human aside from his possession of the Death Note. Without it he has no powers and no special abilities. While the Death Note is lethal against humans, it is ineffective against Cell. At that point Light has no fall back options and is promptly killed.
- Evil Versus Evil: Super smart mass murdering narcissist who wants to Take Over the World and rule it as a dictatorial god vs Physical God mass murdering narcissist who wants to destroy the world after wringing some entertainment out of it. No matter who wins, a bad guy is coming out on top.
- Hope Spot: If you're rooting for Light, you get one. After writing Cell's name in the book, the clock is ticking until the effects kick in and Cell has a heart attack. As it gets closer to that point, the Death Note music swells, Cell abruptly reacts to something happening mid-sentence... and then it turns out only one of Cell's multiple hearts stopped beating and Cell is perfectly fine. Cell then kills Light mere seconds later.
- Left the Background Music On: Cell can hear the classical/orchestral music accompanying Light and approves of it.Cell: Ooh, what am I listening to and can I buy it on Amazon?
- Make an Example of Them: Cell uses a random squirrel to show Light what will happen if Light ticks him off. Cell winds up following through on the threat.
- Manipulative Bastard: Ryuk's smile at the end implies that he always knew that Light would get killed facing off with Cell.
- Mythology Gag:
- Cell initially compares Light to Justin Timberlake, then later thinks that he should have said Zac Efron. In the late 2000s there were a multitude of memes about Efron either being or playing Light in a live action remake, which continued even after the project was scrapped. At the time it was noted that Efron had a distinct resemblance to Light.
- Willem Dafoe's face is syncro voxxed over Ryuk. Dafoe played Ryuk in the 2017 live action adaption of Death Note.
- No Fourth Wall: Cell somehow knows that Light is responsible for his heart attack and that Light used a "magical notebook given to you by a death god" to do it. He has absolutely no In-Universe way to know so specifically what happened. Also, he can hear Light's leitmotif.
- No-Sell: Not quite a true No Sellnote , but rather than collapsing in pain before dying, Cell reacts to a heart attack effecting one of his hearts with mild confusion and treats it as a passing inconvenience when it would have killed just about anyone else in the series, though given that he regenerates an entire torso multiple times over the course of both the Cell Vs. and DBZ Abridged as a whole, a single heart stopping really isn't that big a deal.
- Oh, Crap!: After his attempt to kill Cell fails, Light gets a couple of moments to feel true terror before Cell kills him.
- Pay Evil unto Evil: Light is the Villain Protagonist of his own story, and the only non-hero (with the arguable exception of Deadpool) who will challenge Cell in the Cell versus series of videos. He's also the only person Cell is confirmed to kill in the entire series.
- Politically Incorrect Villain: Cell makes a couple of somewhat homophobic comments at Light's expense.Cell: Then suddenly Justin Timberlake here straddles up with his tie too tight and locks so luscious... tell me, is that for the ladies, or do you go to an all boys school and meet with the other student behind the bleachers?
- Pretender Diss: Cell does a downplayed and subtle one when Light does his A God Am I routine, basically saying that Light is a delusional punk trying to play way out of his league.
- The Quiet One: Ryuk doesn't speak a single line. His only action in the video is to smile to Light at the end, just before Cell kills Light.
- Real Time: Almost. After writing a name down in the Death Note, if no other information is written about how a person will die, they will have a heart attack 40 seconds later. 37 seconds after Light finishes writing Cell's name in the book, Cell reacts as one of his hearts stops beating.
- Smug Snake: Light, a mass murdering narcissistic normal human, is entirely convinced that he can easily take down an evil mass murdering Physical God and doesn't even bother to take any precautions to protect himself. He soon comes to regret those choices.
- Too Dumb to Live: Light has everything he needs to write Cell's name in the Death Note at home or in some other secure location where he can be safe and anonymous. Instead, he proceeds to have a face to face showdown with Cell, which includes insulting Cell before even writing Cell's name in the Death Note. He has absolutely no way to protect himself, no escape mechanism in case something goes wrong, no defense against Cell (who is known to be a fickle mass murderer) killing him on sight, and no preparation for what happens if the obviously non-human Cell isn't taken down immediately by the Death Note. Light is already quite lucky just to live long enough for the Death Note's effects to kick in. No points for guessing what happens when the Death Note doesn't work on Cell.
- Tranquil Fury: Cell is obviously angry over Light's attempt to kill him, but speaks to Light afterward in a calm voice... and then murders Light on the spot.
- Wham Line: Light attempts to kill Cell via a heart attack. Then Cell casually reveals after it takes effect that he has multiple hearts and won't be killed off so easily.Cell: Did you... did one of my hearts just stop?Light: [Gasps in shock and fear]
- Light: I am no mere schoolboy. You're speaking to the god of this new world.Cell: [amused] Wow. And I thought it was a little gaudy when I said it.
