The Exotic Originals story: In Dave Milligan’s poster prophecy, we trust

COVID crashed. The world slowed. Streets emptied. And in that stillness, Exotic Originals was born.

Since the quiet of March 2021, Exotic Originals has been ripping open hidden vaults, handpicking rare movie posters pulled from the shadowed archives of Japanese and Thai cinema.

And behind this is Dave Milligan. Irish-born. London-raised. Bangkok-found. Asia-roamed.

Back to the raw beginning. Before the titles, before the trotting, there was five-year-old Dave chasing visual sparks down video store aisles. Japanese pop culture slipped into his bloodstream among those movie sleeves – fast and forever. 

Akira was a hugely defining moment for me.

he tells us.

Years down the line, a gaming magazine featuring Japanese posters and promotional art dropped a lovebomb on him: ‘I saw a Star Wars piece by an artist called Noriyoshi Ohrai – It blew my mind. I’d stare at it for hours.’

It was one of those pre-WiFi stretches so Dave still hadn’t figured out how to get his eager hands on those posters. Then luck landed in a cramped London shop when he was 12.

‘I found a small shop in London that sold animation cels and a couple of posters – an Akira and a Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back.’

Dave bought Akira animation cels used in the film itself, now tragically vanished somewhere between teenage drift and cardboard box purgatory. They haunt him still. ‘Something I still kick myself about constantly – they’re worth an absolute fortune now!’

And that’s the genesis of Exotic Originals.

But before this, Dave was deep in Asia’s electronic music trenches. Deep in a world of throbbing lights, pounding basslines and endless nights bleeding into blurred mornings. 

For years, he lived the ‘manic’ lifestyle of a scene architect in neon and noise. Travel was clockwork and the party never stopped – until it simply did.

The truth of it is, I fell out of love with doing electronic music events. It got too big for its own good. The music kids wanted was godawful and when it really did blow up, it attracted a lot of the wrong sort of people.

Misplaced fascinations had poisoned the well. A raw devotion to drum ‘n’ bass and jungle had mutated into something unrecognisable, wearing the skin of its former glory.

‘When it became corporate, the magic was mostly lost.’

Then came the pandemic and with it, a eureka moment. Touring flatlined. Cash dwindled. Dave found himself staring at walls that doubled as shrines to decades of his own obsessively curated film art – and in crisis came clarity.

The answer was on my walls! There’s not much else I have such an incredible amount of love and knowledge of as film and its artwork and I never imagined it would turn into something I could monetise.

So off to Instagram he went, conjuring up Exotic Originals – ‘and it blew up pretty quickly.’ And right there beside him, orchestrating this explosion, is Khun Nudd – Dave’s right-hand conspirator.

Jolted into the present tense, Exotic Originals just hit year four and is launching its first-ever website. But are we still holding out for walls, windows and a street address?

‘Never, ever physical! A huge pain in the ass and I just can’t see it being worthwhile financially.’ 

Dave planted Exotic Originals in cyber earth and it’ll keep blooming between screen and scroll.

His culturally rich romance with Japanese cinema has blossomed to embrace the bold colours and raw emotion of Thai movie art too. 

Dave landed in Thailand in 2002 and after wandering some local market and picking up the occasional vintage Thai poster, his private collection slowly grew into a hall of classics.

I don’t think people realise what treasures they really are,

Dave says, talking about Thai posters as paper archaeology that most people walk past without a second glance.

The math is brutal.

A minuscule amount was printed and so very few have survived. It’s almost impossible to find the vast majority of them.

While Hollywood mass-produced thousands, Thai distributors printed just enough for local theatres. Once the film’s run ended, posters got trashed.

Dave rescues what’s left with his aesthetic philosophy that crystallizes around two poles each representing a different visual universe.

Japanese posters can often be very zen and organised whereas Thai posters can be beautifully chaotic – the more you look the more you see – the level of hand painted detail can be absolutely astonishing!

Both dissect the human mind’s architecture from opposing ends. It’s this very duality that drives him.

But Dave’s tastes do skew dark, even running blood red in this venture. Horror is his sweet spot, especially the grisly pleasures Thailand boldly dared to do.

I’m a big horror fan and the Thai horror posters are particularly gruesome due to the censorship laws being very lax about this sort of thing. 

Retro horror fans around the world are very often into Thai horror posters of the 70s and 80s.

Now, a drizzle of his business sauce lands us in an exclusive chamber known as ‘the authentication game.’ In a world where forgeries run wild, Dave’s authentication process is deeply personal.

‘In Japan, there is an antiques type license which is difficult to obtain and very easy to lose.’ 

I’ve built up a good network there through regular visits. I only buy from licensed suppliers.

But Thailand operates differently: The locals have kindly let me into their inner circle and I can even go as far as asking the actual artists for help! Can he sniff out fakes? Dave says,

‘Well... shit sticks and then they’re cast out!’

This is where Dave’s expertise becomes invaluable. His practice moves beyond one-sheet collecting to honour a deeper artistic communion. He forges genuine connections with the artists, the devoted few, the quiet guardians of these visual stories and that human element might be what counts most.

Ask Dave about his heroes and two names emerge:

The Thai artist Tongdee Panumas is an absolute master – one of my top two in the world alongside Japan’s Noriyoshi Ohrai.

Ohrai’s art swept across global campaigns, you’ll spot his face etched deep in the DNA of epic sci-fi and fantasy. But back home, Tongdee Panumas remains Thailand’s design luminary, a conjurer of dreams, nightmares and all the surreal spaces in between.

Curious about which prints the poster prophet refuses to part with? Two sit locked on his NO SALE list. First, a nearly mythical Thai Mad Max print by Tongdee Panumas. Then there’s the poster that called to Dave across three decades (and more). 

It’s a Japanese poster for the ‘80s sci-fi series V by Noriyoshi Ohrai – took me over 30 years to find it.

And what about the weirdest, most obscure piece that ever slid into his hands?

‘Oooooh... that’s a tough one,’ he says, before landing on a Thai poster for Scum, a brutal, blistering British cult classic starring a baby-faced Ray Winstone.

We used to quote that film non-stop at school and it was very bizarre that it had a Thai theatrical release... with a great poster!

While Dave’s got a keen eye for art, his tongue is just as sharp when it comes to his principles.

‘I'll absolutely use my platform – as anyone with an ounce of decency should – to make noise about it. I want, sorry, need to stand on the right side of history and I will always use any platform I have to do so.’

Recently, a potential investor suggested he tone down the politics. Dave’s response was, ‘Not a chance.’

In this age of vanilla messaging, Dave’s not on this train to roll with the usual crowd.

Exotic Originals sells posters as well as saves souls, equal parts time machine and preservation vault for the hand-painted hours of Asian cinema.

While others inflate prices and prey on collectors’ blind spots, Dave’s built following on radical transparency. He factors in the brutal reality that ‘condition is obviously a huge factor with such delicate items.’ It’s as much cinephile activism as it is commerce: ‘Our prices are massively competitive. We research every one of them to see where they are elsewhere and we make sure we’re beating those prices.’ 

Collectors, cinephiles and investors all find their way to him. Among all types, Exotic Originals’ soul lies in a purely curatorial instinct to pull these celluloid ghosts from the shadows and slip them into the hands of those who truly feel their cultural gravity.

Consider these parting words your final scroll before crossing the threshold into discovery at Exotic Originals: Yes, it’s a coven for collectors but also a forge for new ones – as Dave says,

We create collectors too. Many started as casual film fans, found our page and fell in love with the art.

The art hollers, heals, then grabs hold – it always does.