Super-Mundane: Atomic Laundromat

Someday I’m going to run the superhero campaign I’ve always dreamed of, where there’s more  character development and more soap operatic storylines than fight scenes. I want to explore what a world with superheroes looks like, without doing yet another post- Watchmen deconstruction of what it means to be a superhero or what defines a hero in the 21st century. I just want to tell stories about people who happen to have superpowers, and people who live in a world where superpowers exist. I want superheroes that are boring and regular people (and the mundane secret identities of supers) that are interesting.

That’s why I like Atomic Laundromat. It’s a humorous webcomic set in a superhero world. One of the main characters, David, owns the eponymous laundromat, which caters to “capes”.  He has no powers, but his father is a seemingly-immortal Golden Age hero and his mother is queen of a galactic empire. His brother is a super, his sister takes after their alien mother, and he’s, well, owner of a laundromat. It’s comedy that stems from familial relationships, rather than a barrage of superhero jokes. It just coincidentally happens to be set in a supers world.

One of the other major characters, Angela, is a lawyer who represents supers and dreams of having powers of her own, missing the point that she’s an incredible person as-is. We rarely get to see the actual action that leads to cases, and instead focus on her, in her office, prepping to go to court. It’s law comedy, the just happens to be set in a supers universe.

Other characters include Juno, a super who works in the laundromat rather than fighting crime — because really, why does having powers automatically mean putting your life in danger. There’s also a robot named Bob, and Duck, a teleporting duck — again, why is it that only humans get superpowers? These characters drive home the fact that first and foremost this is a humor strip and not a supers comic, and they make for an interesting supporting cast.

Unfortunately, there are no print collections of Atomic Laundromat, or I’d buy them and make my theoretical players of my theoretical future supers game read them. I’ll try to get them to read the webcomics, though, with as much success as an gamemaster who tried to force required reading on players. It’s a cute little strip, and worth your time to check out.