(warning for glitch and eye strain with the below image)
Before we begin, I want to admit that this is as much of a review as it is a “why you should be reading SUPERPOSE” post. I am going to overhype and severely undersell just how much I adore this comic and every bit of sweat and digital ink that goes into this. SUPERPOSE hits a very significant sweet spot that I’m going to try my absolute damnedest to describe. Even if you don’t dig the sci-fi elements that the landing page promises, just stick with me. I promise it’s worth it.
This is going to be long; this is going to be a little ranty, but I need to get my thoughts out to give this the praise that it deserves.
With that being said, let’s dig into this.
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When you first hit the landing page, SUPERPOSE hits you with a simple explanation, and that it’s an ongoing queer sci-fi horror comic about physics.” I can’t say that I’ve gotten to the intentional horror just yet (but I know I’m getting close), but at this point, I’m completely invested in the journey. Here’s the synopsis before we dig in under the cut.
On the Atlantic coast, in a town called PORT CITY—
“a place out of time”
While a tourist destination boasting a popular beach and boardwalk, Port City is also home to ROMAN LABS, an aerospace-turned-tech company now floundering in the tech boom of the early 1980s.
Rafael and Royal are longtime locals, and Kas is recently beached here. Each of the three are struggling and desperate for some kind of change, and they seize a brief opportunity to alter their future, finally shaking the town, and their lives, from standstill...
Changing history begins with the machine.
I’m going to make something pretty damn clear from the outset: SUPERPOSE is irrefutably, unapologetically trans. It is the trans and queer experience in both broad strokes and in personalised filigree. Taking place in a world years before the AIDS crisis, SUPERPOSE is a time capsule of people, technology, and being outwardly trans and queer in a world that just can’t figure you out. While there is the outloud violence of name calling and “not around my children”, there’s the quiet ignorance of cis people trying to puzzle out the curiosity in the room. It’s uncomfortable in a familiar way that makes you sit in your skin, nod, and say “Yeah, I get it.”
The best thing about this kind of experience is that it’s from rgw the perspective of trans people who have figured it out, who live their truth, and often times just barrel through and adjust. One character might pretend not to hear it; another will correct with a smile on his face and keep on going. One more might grumble under their breath because they have someone right in front of them who is trying, who is like them, and who is with them.
And you read that right: three trans leads take the draw.
And I am putting this big trans in front of you as a sign of celebration for a number of reasons: it’s an Own Voices piece of work; it is an important part of the story; it’s also merely a facet of the story; and it means a lot to see this type of original story told over and over again.
The characters are also adults with one being fresh out of high school and about to navigate the world around him. This is told from an important intersection of “trying to figure out how to move through the world as myself” but also “trying to figure out how to move through the world while also deciding what the fuck to do with my life.” I’m at the prologue of Act III, and even though this story has been eating me up with curiosity, I had to stop to talk with you about it.
We start with Rafael “Rafi” Padilla who is a primary main character for the beginning stretch of the story. As our star, we get to watch the moments leading up to and past his high school graduation. He’s at that point of life where his friends start looking for new opportunities, like college, that can take them out of their home town. Rafi, on the other hand, is rooted to the spot by family and a number of other things that will, inevitably, keep him around Port City for a while yet.
The routine of Rafi’s life feels wildly familiar. He’s the rock, the go-to. He’s watched the neighbourhood kids grow up. His family, both blood and in name, that’s all spread out around the city, relies on him to help with this and do that — even if parts of his family and their family friends don’t quite cotton to who he is or how he conducts himself. Rafi is big, strong, and steady, and I adore him. Some of us might be him, but more than likely, most of us know someone who is like him. He longs for a life where it’s not so hard to just be, and if he can’t get that, then a one-way trip out of Port City ain’t a half-bad second.
But he can’t leave yet. Not now, maybe not ever. Some things are worse than dying.
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| SUPERPOSE Arc I Chapter I |
He was also part of the Talented and Gifted Program in school, and I can practically hear the soft groan from my generation as they think about their honoured and gifted classes. Rafi’s smart, but school isn’t always the perfect frame to display one’s intellect, especially if you just lose steam and, eventually, the ability to care the closer you get to getting the fuck out. His two best friends Tiff and Theo feel like friends of my own, so close that they might as well be family, and the three of them are a perfect trio that you can see staying together—or eventually drifting apart because that’s just how life goes sometimes.
The second of our protags is Royal Romanenko, and he reminds me of a lot of people I know. He has immigrant parents who came to America, yes, but where his similiarities strike me is that he had one semester of college left before he suddenly dropped out. I’m a college flunk myself, but I’ve met more and more people who never finished college and they were a credit or two away. The struggle is real.
Roman is interesting in that he’s that kind of guy you just can’t get away from. He’s the type of guy you have one off interaction with and you never see him again, but the second you think that, you start running into him everywhere. Fate just has a way of putting you two in orbit, like how cats stray to people they know don’t like them.
He’s intense. His eyes are too wide, he intensely focuses when he engages in conversation, but he’s more than just smart and intense and focused: he’s honest with himself and what moves him. He may not always know what he wants or how to get to it, but he knows that there’s a way, and he’s going to tear up the pavement and study every possible system that can bring him closer to “it”.
The gateway to his dreams rests in ROMAN LABS, the failing aerospace-turned-consumer-electronics lab. The business his father built in 1958. Royal’s father, Roman, cut him loose and gave him a chance to prove himself, a chance to stop his useless wandering, and removed the safety net. “This is it,” Roman said to his son as he handed over the keys.
It’s time.
And finally, we have my love Kasra “Kas” al-Ridha, a disabled genius who got flown in from across the world to participate in Royal’s wild chase for “the future”, for “the change”. ...Whatever the fuck that means. In the chapters Kas has been in so far, I haven’t gotten a chance to know them very well, but their stress and genuis feel so... genuine. They have that tired air of Scar’s “I’m surrounded by idiots” that you understand.
They feel as if they’re being put on a wild goose chase. Royal’s big, vague dream feels like one big joke, as if life itself is trying to make them relive a sour spot in their career that went almost the exact same as this. But Royal believes that this will be different. They can make something together; they can pave the wave for tomorrow. They can make a difference for the common people, change the shape of the world—
Kas doesn’t buy into the bullshit, but since they’ve no other choice here, they might as well give it a go.
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| SUPERPOSE, Arc II Chapter V |
This comic is so character rich and satisfying that it's unbelievable. Its world tells a tale even in small gestures. It’s important to read SUPERPOSE because it’s a perfect time capsule of what was. It shows a world before gun scares, before the dot com bubble burst, before the all-consuming sprawl of social media. It shows that even soft and quiet pain can cut deep, that it has facets. This, to me, hits a perfect balance of stumbling life. Sometimes, there's inescapable humiliation; sometimes, you pull others into your orbit and build quiet solidarity. Most times, it’s about living your life as you are with no other ripples with the only exception that you want to throttle your fellow queer because they’ve done nothing but cause you headaches.
Queerness is the identity and the message of SUPERPOSE, but it’s not the box. It’s not the only shape that SUPERPOSE holds, and it’s hard to keep a barrier around something so grand and beyond itself. Something so glitchy and to-the-left that is SUPERPOSE’s narrative. This comic doesn’t stop you in your tracks just because of the realism of the people.
You’re joining these people on the eves of discovery. You are going on a journey that’s as superhuman and beyond like figuring out how to go to space. You, Kas, Rafi, and Royal are all about to open yourselves and experience first hand a new level of truth that is hard to describe to anyone who isn’t there. I am on the cusp of what the sci-fi element is, and whether the path is “hard” or “soft”, it doesn’t really matter to me at this stage.
I’m with them on their journey. I watched Royal teach kids how to exploit a glitch in an arcade cabinet, and I sat with him in the aisles of the local library as he read for hours about te— Well. For that, you’ll just have to join us, won’t you?
What do I love about SUPERPOSE? Everything. The colours, the composition, the art style, the story, the themes, the character, the identity in front of me, the mystery ahead of me. As of writing, the story’s still being told, and I highly suggest you give it a chance, even if sci-fi isn’t your thing.
SUPERPOSE eases you into it, feeds you in a way that will satisfy you in a quiet way but makes you wonder how it’s all going to turn out when you finally decide to close the tab. I love this comic. Unabashedly love it. It took me a while to properly start, and I’m finally glad I sat down and give it the chance it deserved.
Join me—join us—on an experiment of a lifetime. Read SUPERPOSE on the official website or Tapas (😒), and show it some love on Tumblr. Stories like this deserve to be told, need to be told, and I’m more than happy to listen.
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