What would you say is the most successful comic-book series in history? If you’re thinking Tintin you’re not even close. (Curiously enough, even the now largely forgotten Lucky Luke scores higher.) If you’re thinking Peanuts, you’re getting warmer. And if you named Asterix, good try but that’s only number two. No, the hands-down winner, with total sales exceeding 516 million, is a Japanese manga called One Piece.
One Piece? Me neither. It’s quite unusual these days to chance upon a massive cultural phenomenon – the series has been going since 1997, with 1,093 chapters so far – of which one has never once even heard. But this, I suspect, will be the experience of most viewers approaching the Netflix adaptation.
It’s unusual these days to chance upon a massive cultural phenomenon that one has never heard of
The series is set in a fantasy world ruled by a world government and policed by implacable, yet curiously camp marines.
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