This is gonna be one hell of a science project...
Long Exposure is a Science Fiction Romance webcomic by Mars, currently available in Tapastic
and Tumblr.
As described by the author and artist themself: "[It's a] webcomic about a nerd and a bully who are forced to work on a class project together. The story revolves around them developing super powers after an incident at a strange research center, and finding themselves followed by a mysterious car, overcoming personal challenges, and (most importantly) discovering how gay they are for each other."
Tropes present in Long Exposure
- Abusive Parents: Both Jonas and Mitch deal with physically and emotionally abusive fathers, which impacted their childhoods and personalities in wildly different ways.
- Jonas's foster father is controlling, homophobic, and hit Jonas across the face during an argument. And he's later revealed to be a pedophile who has taken pictures of the foster children naked.
- Mitch's stepdad was also abusive towards his son but only physically so. Mitch eventually stabbed his stepfather after he learned he was also beating his mother. Doing so elevated his dangerous reputation and marked him as the aggressive bully everyone sees him as now.
- Affectionate Nickname:
- Mitch starts calling Jonas "Joey" in an affectionate matter as their relationship evolves.
- Likewise, Javier calls Jonas "little bro".
- All There in the Manual: The wiki which catalogs interesting factoids not revealed in the comic.
- Aloof Big Brother: Freddie, Mitch's deceased older brother, who was a bit of a bully towards Mitch but also loved and cared for him. He also had an inkling that Mitch was gay.
- Ambiguously Brown: Jonas and Sidney, who probably don't know their race/ethnicity due to being abandoned by their birth parents at a young age.
Word of God says that they're most likely Saudi Arabian since they referenced actors of that ethnicity when designing Jonas. - Belligerent Sexual Tension: Might be the nature of their relationship, at least from Mitch's side.
- The Bully: Mitch is an endearing variation of it. Neil, though is far more of a jerk.
- Bully and Wimp Pairing: Mitch and Jonas, emphasis on pairing.
- Colour-Coded Emotions: Whenever Jonas uses his powers and or feels an emotion really strongly, his powers are colored in accordance.
- Yellow - the default color that represents a mixture of emotions, or neutral.
- Orange/Red - anger. The more angry Jonas is, the more purely red the light is.
- Pink - flustered, embarrassed. Or infatuation.
- Blue - Sadness
- Green - Fear, scared
- Sometimes his powers will be a combination of a bunch of colors, signifying how he's experiencing a ton of emotions at once and doesn't know how to feel about the situation. Notably, the biggest mix of colors happens when Jonas first realizes he even has powers.
- Deliberately Monochrome: The whole comic is in gray monochrome... except when the author wants to call attention to a really important scene. Or Jonas's powers.
- Fat and Skinny: Jonas and Mitch, respectively. While Jonas isn't exactly fat, he is definitely more pudgy than Mitch.
- Foregone Conclusion: The fact that Mitch and Jonas will eventually be together is literally written in the description of the comic. Some of the extra material shows them still together by their early 30s.
- Gang of Bullies: Mitch and his friends.
- Hard Light: The wispy ribbons of light Jonas can make can also turn into solid whips and shields.
- Holy Hand Grenade: When Jonas first plays around with his powers, Mitch startles him for a joke. Cue a ribbon of light almost decapitating Mitch and cutting into solid rock.
- In-Series Nickname: Jonas gets called "Joey", "Jojo", "Wagnerd", and "Spots" (the last one referring to Jonas' freckles) by Mitch. It also serves as Insult of Endearment as Mitch has feelings for him, and later graduates to Affectionate Nickname as they grow closer to each other.
- Insult of Endearment: Mitch calling Jonas "Spots" becomes this.
- Jerkass: In contrast to Mitch, who's a Loving Bully to Jonas, Neil has no redeeming qualities whatsoever. He picks on Jonas when he talks with his girlfriend — never mind that said girlfriend was the one who went talk with Jonas in the first place.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: There are signs that Mitch and his friends are this, or at least will develop into this.
- Light 'em Up: Jonas, whose powers look like long exposure photography light.
- Luminescent Blush: Mitch and Jonas are prone to this in extra material when flirting with each other.
- Open-Minded Parent: Mitch's mom. In a sketch, the author shows that she was very supportive when he came out to her.
- In the comic proper, she loudly cheers on Jonas at his high school graduation while a thoroughly embarrassed Mitch sits next to her.
- Opposites Attract: Mitch is a violent bully who scares even the teachers and Jonas is a shy innocent boy who used to be his favorite victim. They are the main couple of the comic though.
- Polar Opposite Twins: Jonas and Sidney; Jonas is meek and shy whereas Sidney is more laid-back but brave.
- Psycho Knife Nut: Mitch wields a knife, and what elevated his dangerous reputation as an aggressive bully was the time when he stabbed his abusive stepfather with a knife to protect his mother. Neil also goads him based on this, though it's unclear if Mitch acting like a knife-wielding psycho is just a facade to make himself look scary.Neil: What're you gonna do? Stab me?
Mitch: That's what I do, right? - Punny Title: Long Exposure is an effect in photography that is used to capture movement, particularly the movement of light. The effect of moving light in this kind of photography is the very same effect that shows in Jonas's powers.
- Strong Family Resemblance: Jonas and his sister.
- Their First Time: Mitch and Jonas have sex in Chapter 7.
- Toxic Waste Can Do Anything: While investigating a fenced-off area of a nearby forest, Mitch and Jonas slip into some weird puddle. Next day, they develop powers and discover people in hazmat suits trying to clean the mess up.
- Violently Protective Girlfriend: Gender-inverted with Mitch, who will definitely rough anyone up if they dare mess with Jonas. And when he learns that Dean sexually abused his foster children, he became murderously enraged.
