CALEXIT
What if California refused to be ruled?
A comic book series.
The next issue
hits your local shop
November 2025
“It’s not Wish Fulfillment,
It’s warning…
But that’s not all.
It’s Superb.”
-Cory Doctorow, Boing Boing
In CALEXIT, the citizens of California struggle to seize power back from an autocratic government. Jamil, a warzone courier (aka smuggler), and Zora, a young leader in the Mulholland Resistance, attempt to escape Occupied Los Angeles, where martial law has been in place for the past year -- ever since America's President signed an executive order to deport all immigrants, and California responded by proclaiming itself a Sanctuary State.
THE
TIMELINE
A United States President, who lost California by millions of votes, puts forth a draconian executive order to deport all immigrants.
California’s government in Sacramento refuses to enforce the law, declaring California a Sanctuary State.
Not only does the standoff endanger the state’s relationship with the union, but it creates internal friction between California’s liberal metropolitan cities and its conservative exurbs, who control the majority of water, power, and agriculture.
The conservative regions declare their own independence from Sacramento’s governance, naming themselves the Sovereign Citizens Coalition.
With support from the White House, the SCC cuts off resources from Los Angeles and San Francisco (the two most flagrant Sanctuary Cities), essentially imposing a siege on the metropolises until they enforce the President’s immigration policy.
In response to the siege, coastal cities from Tijuana to Vancouver form the Pacific Coast Sister Cities Alliance, providing aid to Los Angeles and San Francisco.
Infuriated (not least by Tijuana's participation), the President sends the National Guard in to occupy Los Angeles and San Francisco and force them to comply with the law.
The occupation sparks an armed citizen uprising called The Mulholland Resistance…
Which in turn inspires a counter-resistance known as The Bunkerville Militia, plunging California deeper into chaos.
Now, California is embroiled in an insurgency of American citizens in armed combat with American soldiers... and that is where our story begins.
“drop-kicking fascism.”
-ROLLING STONE
Written by Matteo Pizzolo,
Illustrated by Amancay Nahuelpan, Carlos Granda, Elisa Pocetta, and Butch Mapa.
Colored by Tyler Boss, James Offredi, Brad Simpson, and Lauren Affe.
Lettered by Jim Campbell and DC Hopkins.
With guest covers by Ashley A Woods, Soo Lee, Maria Llovet, Tim Smith 3, Luana Vecchio, and Winston Smith.
Flags designed by Robert Anthony Jr.
Maps designed by Rich Nisa.
Published by Black Mask Studios.
“Thoroughly entertaining,
Fully engaging, and
Entirely Relevant…
Never lets the Politics Overwhlem the Story.”
-Multiversity Comics
“The year’s most dangerous comic.”
-ABC News
After seeing real-world events mirror CALEXIT’s dark-future speculation (rebel leader Zora is radicalized when ICE raids the Dunkin Donuts where she works, written a year before that story felt all too real), the creators released the story at San Diego Comic Con 2025 as a benefit with profits donated to organizations helping families impacted by the real-world ICE raids.
When the dual WGA-SAG strikes were impacting the creative community, the creators contributed CALEXIT to a special comic book anthology benefit donating profits to the Entertainment Community Fund.
When immigrant families were being separated at the US-Mexico border, the creators wrote a special story about new character Emmie-X, a skater / pirate radio DJ outside San Diego. The comic was surprise published at San Diego Comic Con 2018 with profits donated to not-for-profit organizations helping families affected by the border crisis. The creators also hosted Indivisible to run Voter Registration at the Calexit booth at San Diego Comic Con, and Emmie became a face of the Get Out The Vote campaign in the 2018 midterms.
“Powerful, visceral, sometimes funny and sometimes hauntingly realistic.”
-Graphic Policy
CALEXIT took comics by storm in 2017, with its first collected edition breaking sales records in 2018.
It went on to expand with spinoffs EMMIE-X: All Systems Go, CALEXIT: Our Last Night In America, The Battle of San Onofre, and L For Luigi before launching the first direct sequel CALEXIT: The Battle of Universal City in July 2025.