Forbes magazine just published my latest article for them, a piece for a special on global pop culture about the "otaci" — Romanian manga enthusiasts who remix French, Japanese and American comic styles, language and stories:
The artwork in the individual panels veered from traditional Japanese manga to surreal, "adult" images seemingly lifted from the French classic magazine Métal Hurlant to stuff that could have come from the pages of the latest Marvel comic. The text, too, was a glorious linguistic salmagundi, mostly Romanian, but with English, French and Japanese phrases sprinkled liberally throughout.
"What the hell is this thing?" I shouted at Stefan, over the din of the monstrous, grinding automated mojito machine that was attempting to crush lemons beside us.
"They choose different languages and styles based on the kind of stories they want to tell," he said.
