But we have been told neither of these things, and therefore (logically) either or both of said variables might just as easily be something else altogether... yes?
And we don’t know what his problems were beforehand. He obviously had some.
I fully agree with this, based upon what little we've been told thus far. Pre-existing problems of such magnitude, however, could just as easily have been set off by a television show, or a movie, or -- cripes -- a bad box of McNuggets; and what scant info we do have, as of this writing, comes to us via the decidedly askew filter of a (supposedly) reformed junkie. In the absence of anything more concretely reliable, then: I'm more than a little reluctant to broadjump all the way over to sudden belief in the existence of A Japanese Comic So Unutterably Vile, It Corrupts All Those Who Gaze Upon It. ;)
I don't think that the comic made him crazy. It may have been very violent and if he had problems to begin with he may have become obsessed......But this is just supposition. Too bad the "reporter" wasn't of a higher quality. ;-)