Hitting readers with all the force of sumo star Akebono, the zine Giant Robot has developed a fanatic following of Asian trash-culture junkies over four issues. Attitudinal editors Martin Wong (top) and Eric Nakamura span a dizzying range of Asian and Asian-American topics. "We don't have a game plan," Wong says. "Giant Robot just seems to have a life of its own." A sampling of its latest obsessions: Hello Kitty, explosives, filmmaker Gregg Araki, and Asian culinary oddities. The zine's fractured Angeleno-meets-Asia travelogs offer a machine-gun spray of offbeat observations.
But despite Giant Robot's rapid growth to the size and scope of a magazine, the individualist zine mind-set still reigns: both Nakamura and Wong came from LA's punk scene, and it shows. What will they cover next? "A lot of that's secret," quips Nakamura. "But I just found a Thai Elvis." On the Web at www.netvoyage.net /~grobot.
ELECTRIC WORD
Robotic Charm
