27-06-2014 1_24_32 PM

So I decided to rewatch Death Note. In the first episode, there's a motorcyclist called Shibuimaru Takuo - Light's second victim. In the scene where he is about to kill him, according to my subtitles, he writes:

Shibuimaru Takuo: car accident

And we see this:

I don't know Japanese, but it seems to me that all the lines are the same, except for the two last ones.

Since that guy is just his second victim, what exactly happened in that scene? What do these lines say, and why did Light several of them, over and over?

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From what I remember (although I don't know enough Japanese to confirm this), he was trying every possible different spelling for the name of the victim.
The Death Note wiki page on the first episode also states this as a fact (in the sixth paragraph in the synopsis.

Now, if you've already watched the series and are currently re-watching it, you're already familiarised with the rules. The one that is significant in this particular case is rule #2 (highlight by me):

This note will not take effect unless the writer has the person’s face in their mind when writing his/her name. Therefore, people sharing the same name will not be affected.

This means that Light was trying every possible spelling of the name, because at least one of them would match with the face pictured when he wrote the names. This also means that no collateral casualties would occur, as that particular person's face was being pictured in his mind.
If I'm correct on this, the first column are different spellings for Shibuimaru, the second for Takuo, and the third column refers to the death ("accidental death" (事故死) is what it says).

He did not have to try this out with his first victim because he got both his face and name from TV.

Long story short, he was trying to match a name for that face by going through every possible spelling.