Manga writer Kazuo Koike, who influenced directors like Quentin Tarantino, dies

Kazuo Koike was best known for Lone Wolf And Cub, a samurai series that debuted in 1970 with art by Goseki Kojima.

Kazuo Koike, a Japanese manga writer whose dark samurai and action serials - most notably Lone Wolf And Cub, Lady Snowblood and Crying Freeman - influenced films by Quentin Tarantino and Sam Mendes, died on last Wednesday (April 17). He was 82.

His Twitter account said he was hospitalised with pneumonia, but it did not say where he died.