Calexit, Vol 1

by Matteo Pizzolo, Amancay Nahuelpan (Illustrator), Tyler Boss (Artist)

Overview

What if a fascist, autocratic President took over the United States? And what if that President lost California, the sixth largest economy on Earth, by nearly 2-to-1...a margin of almost 3 1/2 million votes? What if the day after that President took power, the largest mass demonstration in history occurred, and the state with the largest turnout was California. And then, the following week, two of the largest international airports in the world, California's LAX and SFO, were blockaded by protesters?

What if California refused to be ruled?

From the creators of YOUNG TERRORISTS, Matteo Pizzolo (GODKILLER) and Amancay Nahuelpan (CLANDESTINO), comes this tale of resisting oppression, punching Nazis, protecting each other, kicking ass, and demanding liberty for all.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781628751819
Publisher:	Black Mask Studios
Publication date:	08/14/2018
Series:	CALEXIT , #1
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	160
Sales rank:	1,107,087
Product dimensions:	6.60(w) x 10.00(h) x 0.60(d)
Age Range:	16 Years

About the Author

Amancay Nahuelpan (pronounced Aman-kay Na-well-pan) is a comic artist who was born in Vancouver, Canada and grew up in the south of Chile. He graduated from University with a Major in Interior Design. He began his career working with independent Chilean publisher Caleuche Comics before breaking into the US market as a participant in the Zuda Comics Competitions. His first US published work was in OCCUPY COMICS. He has worked on NIGHTWING, BATMAN, Wonder Woman, JUSTICE LEAGUE DARK, and CRSH & LOBO for DC Comics, ROBOCOP for Boom!, BOY-1 for IDW, co-created YOUNG TERRORISTS and CALEXIT and created the tale of revolution CLANDESTINO for Black Mask which he writes, draws, colors, and letters.

Editorial Reviews

★ 06/25/2018
This topical ongoing series, collected in a first volume, presents a scenario in which a thinly veiled Donald Trump is reelected and orders the deportation of all immigrants who are living in California illegally. California subsequently secedes and becomes a sanctuary state, leading the government to cut off resources and declare martial law as the region divides into several disparate factions. Fugitive refugee Zora Donato, a resistance fighter with a half-million-dollar bounty on her head, enlists the reluctant services of drug dealer/courier/smuggler Jamil to transport her to a safe house. They’re dogged by Homeland Security enforcer Father Rossie, a sadistic nationalist. The insightful script is drawn with taut, four-color artwork, as Pazzolo (Godkiller) and Nahuelpan (Young Terrorists) weave a tense too-close-to-home nightmare with visuals that ground it in gritty detail. The collection is supplemented with interviews with the author and artist, a cover gallery, and other materials that bring into focus the political climate and factors that inspired the series. This rock-solid dystopian comic is thought-provoking and highly recommended. (July)

Publishers Weekly

"It's not wish fulfillment: it's warning — and a scarily imminent and salient warning at that. But that's not all: it's superb."

Boing Boing - Cory Doctorow

CALEXIT is at the forefront of a range of comic books reacting to the current political climate. Far from a grim portrait of a country under siege... a hopeful and optimistic message about people and their relationship to political power."

The New York Times - George Gene Gustines

"Really spectacular... startlingly realistic... a high octane war story."

Entertainment Weekly - Christian Holub

"You don’t have to reach out more than an inch to grasp how writer Matteo Pizzolo’s [work] fits into today’s political discourse... and there is nothing wrong with that. It’s only fair and right that art in all its forms would strike back with unmitigated f

Salon - Gabriel Bell

"Best Of The Year List: Calexit is both an excellent comic and a striking thought experiment. 'What if,' the comic asks, 'in response to Donald Trump’s draconian presidency, California simply decided to secede from the rest of the US?' It’s an idea that f

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"Black Mask is drop-kicking fascism with Calexit."

Rolling Stone - Dave Maass

"Best New Comics List: “Calexit may sound a bit on the nose. After all, it’s a tale about the establishment of a breakaway Californian republic in the wake of a presidency not too dissimilar from our current one. But trust me, it works. There are no easy gags about Californians, no silly jabs at Trumpism, and no over-the-top satire of our current state of decline. Instead, the creators have opted to tell a terrifyingly straightforward suspense story about the intrigues and crackdowns that ensue when governments decay and societies rot. The scariest thing about Calexit is how lived-in it feels — after all, every dystopia is just an accurate description of how things are for other people somewhere in the world, and this story just reminds us that we’re always a hair’s breadth away from the very bad things that we assume only happen in failed states.

Vulture - Abraham Riesman

CALEXIT is a book that hits your brain like a slug to the chest. You finish it and your ears get a little hot. 10 out of 10

Newsarama - Pierce Lydon

A brilliant piece of political fiction.

The Mary Sue - Daryl Sztuka

LA WEEKLY - Black Mask Cover Feature — Black Mask Studios Is Dragging the Comic Book Medium Into the Politically Aware Era...
At Comic-Con, Calexit will be working with the grassroots organizing group Indivisible: San Diego on a voter registration drive. Pizzolo is also doing a special panel with the Indivisible organizers. He's determined to not only tell important, all-inclusive stories but also to make sure that translates into important, real-world work.
Yeah, this isn't The Avengers.





ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY — The studio behind Sam Esmail's just-announced Mr. Robot comic is also the publisher of Calexit, a comic that envisions life in a near-future America where California has all but seceded from the United States. Black Mask is marking this year's Comic-Con with a special issue, Calexit: All Systems San Diego, with all profits being donated to the San Diego Rapid Response Network to aid immigrants and their families in the San Diego border region. All Systems San Diego is written by Matteo Pizzolo and illustrated by Carlos Granda, with colors by Lauren Affe. It takes place in the same universe as the other Calexit comics (there's even a specific reference to the young rebel Zora) but features all-new characters. The most prominent character in the story is a young girl named Emmie who's trying to make the most of her life in military-occupied San Diego. When Emmie's makeshift record store gets seized by government agents who need more facilities to hold detained immigrants (not too different from real-life immigrants being detained at former Walmart stores), she pivots to pirate radio, broadcasting newly outlawed music instead of government-mandated right-wing talk radio. In doing so, she befriends a Homeland Security troop with good taste in music - but wonders if she can convince him to actually rebel against his fascist government masters. “All Systems San Diego is more about resistance than revolution,” Pizzolo said in a statement. “Calexit's main ongoing comic is a high-octane war-story, so it was refreshing here to have the opportunity to slow things down and focus on characters who aren't shooting their way through urban street warfare but instead are peacefully resisting and inspiring their neighbors to stand beside them against tyranny.”
Each episode of Calexit includes a non-fiction interview between Pizzolo and real-life activists and local candidates for political office. For the third issue, he spoke with organizers from the San Diego branch of Indivisible, who told him the San Diego Rapid Response Network would be a good organization to work with and donate the profits from this secret issue.





SAN DIEGO UNION TRIBUNE — Dozens of San Diegans will arrive at Comic-Con this weekend to register voters for the midterm elections. The drive will be led by comic book publisher Matteo Pizzolo, of Black Mask Studios, and the local chapter of the political group Indivisible.
The drive's theme will be 'Voting Is My Superpower' and volunteers will be wearing capes as they seek to register voters inside and outside the convention center each full day of Comic-Con.
Pizzolo - who authored a comic book about an effort for California to secede from the nation know as 'Calexit' - will also headline a panel discussion at Comickaze in Liberty Station on Saturday at 2 p.m. on the local effects of the nation's immigration policy. He'll be joined by representatives of Indivisible, the ACLU and the Council on American-Islamic Relations.





ORANGE COUNTER REGISTER — Comic-Con 2018: 'Calexit' imagines a California civil war, but sees hope in resistance:
CALEXIT tells the story of a near-future California, following the election of an authoritarian president, that erupts into a civil war between its red and blue factions over how to respond to an executive order to deport immigrants. The author had a voter registration drive for people on the Comic-Con floor and even put a voter registration form on the cover of one of the comics. As well, Black Mask published a surprise San Diego edition of the comic this week and will donate all profits from it to Rapid Response San Diego to help support families separated at the border.
So is he hopeful about the future?
'I remain,' he says with a wary laugh. 'Hopeful.'





SAN DIEGO CITY BEAT — Although it's set in a brutal near-future, CALEXIT is a comic book struggling to outpace the vicious present... Pizzolo says the story emphasizes the characters and not polemic, but the comic is, indeed, a form of political activism: Each issue includes interviews with progressive candidates and community organizers.





ROLLING STONE — Black Mask Draws the Resistance: LA-based anti-establishment comics company Black Mask Studios kicked off Comic Con with the announcement they'll produce an official Mr. Robot prequel penned by the show's writing team. “I feel like Mr. Robot has that punk vibe to it, so we thought an indie publisher would fit nicely with that,” showrunner Sam Esmail said. But fsociety isn't the only way Black Mask is drop-kicking fascism: They ran a voter registration drive on the convention floor and debuted a one-off issue, CALEXIT: All Systems San Diego (a riff on the Rocket from the Crypt album), about a young woman fighting DHS internment camps through pirate radio. The publisher also dedicated precious panel time to amplify brand new work from subversive creators such as Vita Ayala (The Wilds) and Kwanza Osajyefo (Black [AF]).

From the Publisher