Oh no he didn't
So currently... I am obsessed with Bleach. The kind with the BFS, penchant for people losing the odd hand here and there and where the colour spread pages look like they're GAP ads, not the kind you use to clean your bathroom with. There is a long rant into the WHY of it, but basically I'm a big big fan. Naruto? Isn't that a fishflake thing? Oh wait, you mean that manga about the emo with family issues! You must be mistaken, that's called 'Sasuke'.
So cue my disgust when I read this article at Bleachness. You should read this even if you don't know anything about the series, because it is readily apparent what the problem is.
Now listen here my good man: I don't care if your father is Gene Simmons. I don't care if your father is the goddamn Batman.
YOU SIR ARE AN ART THIEF AND A PLAGIARIST
Seriously, someone must have taken stupid pills with his cornflakes for breakfast. How exactly does a person assume that this would go unnoticed? And to have the UTTER IDIOCY to plagiarise MAJOR series like Bleach and Hellsing, which have an international following for god's sake, is just lunacy in its most banal form. And not only that, it looks like he's ripping off FANART too.
If you have an idea and you lack the ability to express it through the medium of visual artistry then find an artist to draw it for you. Good god. Look at Neil Gaiman. Stan Lee. Ouba Tsugumi. These men are all brilliant story tellers, but they are not so fucking GREEDY that they'll rip off someone else's work to keep their profits all to themselves. They found artists to do their illustrating for them. (Although... it looks like he kind of had that idea, reports say he got SOMEONE ELSE TO DO THE TRACING FOR HIM. *smacks head repeatedly against desk.* )
Not only is it theft, it's a smack in the face for genuinely talented artists who put time and effort into their own work and may never see it get published that this lazy brat and his inability to copy someone's art without at least TRYING to make it look like he didn't. I know I can't be the only one who is SPITTING FIRE.
Newsflash kid: Daddy might be a rockstar, but that doesn't make you immune to copyright infringement. And I hope, when your sorry ass gets sued by Shueisha and Shounen Gahosha, that Daddy won't bail you out a single penny.
Also: is it just me, or are his fucking publishers SERIOUSLY THE DUMBEST, LEAST OBSERVANT PUBLISHERS EVER to not even notice? I mean CHRIST. I am just imagining that conversation:
Crony A: "Sir sir, look at this!"
Boss: "What is this?"
Crony A: "It's American Manga sir."
Slightly more intelligent Crony B: "But this looks a lot like-"
Crony A: "It's drawn by Gene Simmons' son!"
Boss: "STOP THE PRESSES! WE MUST PUBLISH THIS!"
Crony B: "But... that guy looks like that dude Kenpa-"
Boss: "Didn't you hear? GENE SIMMONS!"
Idiots. Just... IDIOTS.