About Scanhua

Last updated: January 2026 · Author: Giovanni Picaro, Founder & Editor-in-Chief

Scanhua is an independent editorial publication that covers Japanese manga, Chinese manhua, and Korean manhwa for an international, English-speaking audience. We publish reviews, scholarly notes, reader’s guides, glossaries, and long-form features written by people who have spent years — in some cases decades — reading these works in their original cultural contexts and in translation.

We are not a streaming platform. We are not a piracy aggregator. We are not a corporate brand owned by a holding company. We are an editorial project, run by four people from Italy and Bulgaria, with the kind of small-team focus that only a fully independent publication can afford.

Where we came from

Scanhua was founded in autumn 2020 by Giovanni Picaro, who had been keeping disorganized reading notes since 1999 — the year his father gave him a battered copy of Dragon Ball volume one, in the Star Comics Italian edition, when he was six years old. By the time the domain was registered, those notes had grown into a private archive of opinions, sketches, and translation comparisons that no longer made sense to keep to himself.

The original site was Italian-language only, written for Italy’s vibrant but underserved manga community. As traffic grew and reader emails started arriving from Singapore, Brazil, the United Kingdom, and the United States, it became clear that the editorial perspective — an Italian one, formed by decades of imported manga read first through Italian translation and then in original languages — had something to offer English-speaking readers who often only encountered manga through American or British editorial filters.

This English section is the result. It is not a translation of the Italian site. It is a parallel publication, written from scratch in English, with its own editorial voice and its own reader audience.

What we believe about manga criticism

We believe four things, and they shape everything we publish.

First, manga is literature. Treating it as disposable pop content does a disservice to the form and to the reader. We write about Vinland Saga the way a serious literary publication would write about a Booker Prize finalist, because that level of attention is what the work deserves.

Second, cultural context is not optional. A reader cannot fully appreciate Vagabond without some understanding of Edo-period swordsmanship culture, or Mo Dao Zu Shi without an introduction to xianxia cosmology. We provide that context, briefly and without showing off, in every review we write.

Third, opinions should be argued, not asserted. We do not give numerical scores. We do not pretend objectivity. We tell you what we think, why we think it, and what kind of reader will agree or disagree.

Fourth, the editorial wall is real. Advertisers do not influence our reviews, ever. When we have a commercial relationship with a publisher we are reviewing, we disclose it in plain English at the top of the article. Read our Editorial Standards for the full set of rules we follow.

What we publish

Our editorial output covers four core areas:

• Reviews — long-form, argued, and spoiler-controlled. We review completed works, ongoing works at meaningful checkpoints (volume milestones, arc conclusions), and historically significant titles.
• Reference material — series profiles, author retrospectives, our manga glossary, and our reader’s guide for newcomers.
• Cultural features — long essays on themes, traditions, and intersections between manga, anime, gaming, and other media. The kind of pieces that take a month to write.
• News with editorial judgment — we cover important industry news, but we do not chase every press release. If something matters to readers, we cover it; if it does not, we ignore it.

Our editorial principles in one paragraph

Honesty over hype. Cultural context over name-dropping. Reasoned arguments over scores. Independence from publishers and advertisers. Transparent corrections when we are wrong. Respect for the original creators and for their copyright. Support for legal editions wherever they exist. A reader-first orientation that puts the lived experience of finding, choosing, and enjoying these works ahead of every other consideration.

Who runs the site

The editorial team is small and stable: four people who know each other personally and who have been working together for years. Giovanni Picaro is the founder and editor-in-chief; Letizia C. curates the manhwa section after spending eight months living in Seoul; Marco T. handles manhua and brings a sinology background; Dario M. keeps the technical infrastructure running. The full bios are on Our Team.

How to get involved

If you want to write for us, see the Our Team page for our submission policy. If you have found an error in something we published, the fastest path is the Report a Problem page. If you want to advertise with us, we explain what we accept and what we reject on the Advertise with Us page. For everything else, the Contact Us page lists the right email address for the right kind of question.

One more thing

This site exists because four people care about manga, manhua, and manhwa enough to spend significant portions of their lives writing about them. It is sustained by a mix of advertising and reader generosity (when readers buy the official editions of works we cover, the entire industry that produces those works survives, and in turn we have something to write about). It will continue to exist as long as we believe we are adding something to the conversation.

Thanks for reading.

Related pages: Our Mission · Our Team · Editorial Standards · How We Work · Contact Us