The air in the streets and alleys of Hong Kong Island seems to be filled with an unusual sense of anxiety.
The anxiety did not come from the scorching heat that had just arrived in June, but from a pirated weekly comic book called "Dragon Jump".
Uncle Zhang Jinshui, who runs the newsstand at the entrance of Temple Street in Yau Ma Tei, was annoyed by the complaints from his regular customers early in the morning.
"Iron Head" Li, a dock porter who had just finished work, ran over angrily.
He threw a crudely printed copy of "Dragon Jump" with curled corners onto the stall, kicking up a cloud of dust.
"Asshole! Uncle! Look at what you're selling! The Monkey King in Dragon Ball looks like he's been haunted!
The paper used for the Sailor Moon prints is so thin it's transparent and it smells like chemical water! It's worse than toilet paper!
Tietou Li poked at the blurry picture with his rough fingers angrily, and his saliva almost sprayed on Zhang Jinshui's face.
"Three dollars and a half for this? This is robbery! I've never been so ripped off when I bought Youth Daily or Little Rascals before!"
He cursed and picked up the new issue of "Xi Bao" weekly magazine by local cartoonist Shangguan Xiaobao.
"Look at them! Their paper is good! Their painting is solid! How can foreigners compare to us?
These Japanese things were pretty good in the first issue, but how come the second issue is so terrible? Even if I gave them away for free, I still think they take up too much space!
Zhang Jinshui smiled apologetically, but he was also furious: "Brother Li, I don't know either. This batch of goods is like this when it is wholesaled. They said it was the latest hot-selling Japanese product, but who knows..."
He didn't dare say that he couldn't return the goods.
The same angry voices were heard all over Hong Kong Island.
In a cubicle in a Central office building, several young clerks gathered at lunchtime, with a pirated copy of "Dragon Jump" spread out on the table.
Peter from the computer department frowned after flipping through a few pages, pointing at the page about Fist of the North Star: "Outrageous! The shadows of Kenshiro's ripped muscles are all blurred together, and there are even a few lines of dialogue printed wrong!
I ordered the second issue of the original, and now I haven't even seen a shadow of it. I can only be blinded by this pirated garbage."
Mary, who just started her career across from him, said, "Yes, I've seen the original Japanese version at a book fair. The paper quality is good, the printing is exquisite, and the story is great!
It's a pity that it's too expensive and hard to buy. These pirated copies are an insult to the original.
But I think with so many complaints now, maybe they'll be forced to release the official version soon, right?"
Anna, who was a bit more experienced, curled her lips and picked up another local magazine, Yulang Comics, from her handbag and started flipping through it: "Japanese comics?
The plot is full of fighting and killing all the time, and the beauties all look like big-eyed dolls, which is out of touch with reality!
Take a look at Master Yulang’s "Chinese Heroes", which depicts family and country, chivalrous spirit and loyalty, and has a bold style!
You can't even support local products, and you still patronize Japanese products?"
She paused, then added with a hint of disdain, "If you really like those Japanese-style movies, forget about watching pirated copies. Saving some money and having a good meal is better than encouraging them."
In the back alley of a middle school not far from the office building, several middle school students in school uniforms gathered together.
The short Chen Wei clutched a curled-up pirated copy of Dragon Jump, his eyes filled with anger and longing. "This is totally worthless! I saved up all my savings for two weeks to buy this!"
I wanted to watch Ash's adventures after capturing Pikachu in Pokémon! But... the colors were red, then yellow. It might as well have been a black and white comic. The characters all looked like dogs! Charizard's mouth was crooked!
He was so angry that he almost tore up the book.
His tall best friend Liu Zhiqiang, who had just bought the local magazine "Comic World" at the newsstand, was reading it with great interest. Upon hearing this, he looked up and sneered, "I told you long ago that you're stupid! You only patronize the Japanese devils' comics!
It's a poorly drawn comic, and it's what they deserve! Aren't our Hong Kong kung fu comics good? If you want action and excitement, wouldn't Bruce Lee be more exciting?
So authentic! So powerful! "
He slapped the comics in his hands, his tone full of local superiority.
Aunties on the street, office workers waiting for the bus at the bus stop, and even old men playing chess in the park, even among these groups who don’t read comics, there are people talking about it.
The topic all revolves around "Dragon Jump", which has poor workmanship and castrated content, but is advertised as the latest and fastest introduced.
Anger, disappointment, contempt and some distorted understandings, such as supporting piracy and cracking down on genuine products, mixed with support for local comics, fermented among the crowd.
It's like a cheap smoke bomb, polluting the air of Hong Kong Island in summer.
Next to the pirated books piled up at almost every newspaper stand, there were scattered fragments of pages that had been discarded in anger, with blurry images of beautiful girls or qigong waves printed on them.
…
The top floor of an unremarkable old factory building in Kowloon Tong, with iron bars on the windows.
The air was filled with the smoke of cheap cigars and the faint stench of residual ink.
Shangguan Xiaobao had his feet up on a desk piled high with drawings, the entertainment editions of several major newspapers spread out in his hands, his mouth grinning almost to his ears.
Sitting opposite him was another "big boss" in the Hong Kong comics industry - Wong Yuk-long, who had a slightly yellow complexion, a shiny slicked-back hair, and a look of business acumen in his eyes.
There was a quick knock on the door, and a fat man with a bloated figure, wearing a gold chain and sweating profusely rolled in like a ball. It was Fatty Kun, who was in charge of this "operation".
"Two big guys! A great victory!"
Fatty Kun was breathing heavily, and the fat on his face was glowing.
"Hundreds of newsstands and book stalls across Hong Kong! Hundreds of thousands of pirated copies sold out in just a few days! My brothers say that this 'masterpiece' of ours is often found in street trash cans!
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