Riot police used batons and pepper spray early on Feb. 9 to quell crowds after authorities tried to move illegal street vendors out of a district in Hong Kong, marking the worst street clashes since pro-democracy protests in late 2014. (Reuters)

They're calling it the Fishball Revolution.

On Monday evening, a municipal crackdown on street vendors selling Chinese new year treats -- including fish balls, a local favorite -- devolved into violence in the heart of Hong Kong.

Demonstrators lobbed bottles, garbage pails and bricks at police, and the police retorted with batons, brute force and warning shots, television footage showed. Dozens were injured and arrested.

The clashes were the worst outbreak of violence since the 2014 Umbrella Revolution brought tens of thousands of Hong Kong people to the streets to vent anger over China's growing influence in the city and to call for full and fair elections. Though that student-led occupation of several Hong Kong streets finally ended, the issues raised remain unresolved — and many in the former British colony no longer trust the local authorities or the police.

Questions about law enforcement have been at the forefront since the disappearance of five booksellers in Hong Kong specializing in gossipy reads about China's Communist Party elite.

One of the men, a British citizen named Lee Bo, appears to have been spirited across the border by Chinese security personnel. While missing, he sent a series of strange, presumably scripted letters telling his wife he was "fine" and "assisting with an investigation."

While the frightening farce unfolded, Hong Kong officials seemed either unable or unwilling to act, denying that the men were in China, making vague calls for information -- and ultimately getting nowhere.

In the wake of Monday night's violence, a comic strip by a designer known as Dim Sum Graphics captured the growing sense of anger over how the territory is governed — and unease about the future.

The top square features a picture of missing bookseller Lee Bo. Below, a photograph of a Hong Kong official at a news conference. "There's nothing I can do," he shrugs.

The third square shows fish balls on a stick, a symbol of the move to shutter street vendors, but also of the vibrant local culture that many Hong Kong people feel is under threat by China.

The final image is of police officers rushing to thwart the great fish ball menace.

"Spare no effort," it says.

Xu Yangjingjing reported from Beijing.