Kong Tower
is a webcomic that started in 2015 by Townsend S. Wright, hosted on his blog of the same name, which chronicles the day-to-day lives of people living in the titular high-rise apartment building. The main characters include socially awkward young artist Tim, his somewhat aggressive, IT tech new neighbor April, Aya, a reserved, but very sweet teenaged girl, and her schizophrenic older half-brother Steve.
Oh, and everyone in the building has superpowers. Or can do magic. Or is a Badass Normal.
That awkward artist has telekinetic powers and a tragic backstory involving a vat of toxic waste (which are largely unrelated). That snarky IT girl is a Winged Humanoid from the future who's had to spend her life dealing with being the only member of her species around. That teenager got the butt end of the combination of her Superhero parent's powers and ended up looking like an Anime character. And her brother, well his delusions have a specific quality to them.
Other Characters include various Expy versions of Marvel and DC characters, such as the martial-artist billionaire-playboy owner of the titular tower, his various former sidekicks, and awkward waitress with spider-powers, as well as some more original characters, like a restauranteur and former Jetpack-wearing Science Hero, a Zombie Private Investigator, and an inept Supervillain group attempting to infiltrate the building. The Comic makes a point of parodying, playing with and deconstructing tropes endemic to the Superhero genre, and frequently references This Very Wiki. New pages go up every Tuesday, along with strips put up on Fridays when Superhero movies come out to parody them specifically.
The archive can be found here.
Kong Tower contains examples of:
- Affectionate Parody: Of the Superhero genre.
- Animal-Themed Superbeing: Monkey Man and Arachne.
- Animesque: The closest thing Aya has to a superpower, stemming from her father's power being Cartoon Physics and her mother being a Samurai
- Art Evolution: Noticably, particularly with the shift to color in comic #50.
- Badass Boast: On behalf of Strong Lass.Strong Lass: [held at gunpoint] Heh. Word of advice when you're fighting me, kid... if it can't kill an elephant… and then maim the elephant behind that elephant... [one gunshot to the chest later] Ya need a bigger gun.
- Badass Longcoat: A few characters so far, including Necroma and Rob Mc Cobb. The Author has stated a preference for these.
- Badass Normal: Several, naturally, including Monkey Man and his various former sidekicks.
- Bad Powers, Good People: Lampshaded with Necroma and Arachne in the comic "Power Alignment", in which the latter questions the apparent evilness of the former's Necromancy. Neuroma then points out that Arachne seems to take an odd amount of joy in using her ability to telepathically control spiders.
- Big Ol' Eyebrows: Tim.
- Blatant Burglar: The Striped Shirt Gang. A criminal organization of Mooks who's signature dress is Exactly What It Says on the Tin.
- Cannot Talk to Men: Nancy can't seem to bring herself to communicate with her crush, Peregrine. She jumped onto the ceiling when she thought he was about to notice her. Tim is a lesser example.
- Captain Ethnic: Bugeisha, a japanese woman with Shinto-based abilities and a Samurai getup.
- Captain Patriotic: Sergeant States, fitting for an Expy of Captain America.
- Captain Superhero: Subtly parodied with various heroes and villains being named Sergeant.
- Cartoon Physics: Sergeant Acme's power, apparently a function of Reality Warping. The versions of his power he passed on to his kids are... less impressive.
- Casanova Wannabe: Tim's roommate Gene, who persistently and blatantly flirts with every woman he sees (even the ones who have already tried to stab him).
- Clark Kenting: A few characters, such as Stu Sterling/Sergeant Omega. Parodied in this comic. Also used by villains, with varying effectiveness.
- Cut Lex Luthor a Check: Subverted here. In the setting of the comic, it's pointed out that few Mad Scientists are so Mad that they don't realize how "successful and un-punched" their inventions could make them, resulting in there being benevolent weather control stations, and the moon landing occurring roughly twenty years earlier than it did in the real life. It should be noted there are still Mad Scientists who really are that Mad, there just aren't that many of them.
- Expressive Mask: Necroma manages hers with Spirit Gum. How this guy does it is a complete mystery.
- Expy: Several.
- From the start you have Sergeant Acme, a Palette Swap version of Superman.
- The man sitting across from his is later revealed to be Sunny Wu, AKA Monkey Man an obvious version of Batman, complete with references in the dialogue and titles.
- Arachne is obviously meant to be Spider-Man, except without the web-swinging, and with the addition of controlling spiders... and, you know, being a black woman.
- The Friday strips parodying movies are especially fond of these, most notably this one which presents Expies of every character in Captain America: Civil War.
- This character wasn't originally conceived of as a Deadpool Expy, but the author realized with a Healing Factor and general snarkiness she fit the bill well enough for the parody comic.
- This character
- Agents Muldrake and Lesky here.
- From the start you have Sergeant Acme
- Flying Brick: Sergeant Omega. Also Emmerson.
- Four Is Death: Referenced in the title of this comic. Everyone living on the fourth floor of Kong Tower is a super villain who caught word that the building might be housing superheroes.
- Freak Lab Accident: Subverted with Tim's Superhero Origin. He describes what at first seems to be his own story of a man who, after being startled by a bright flash while stargazing, falls into an open vat of toxic waste surrounded by feral escaped lab animals. It was his uncle, who died in that accident and left Tim a Power Crystal in his will. Double Subverted in that this is later explained to be the cause of numerous heroes' powers through the so-called "Sklodowska Reaction".
- Medium Awareness: Steve is distinctly aware of the fact that he's a character in a comic book, due likely to the fact that his parents' powers were Reality Warping Cartoon Physics and Psychic Powers. Unfortunately, this reality is terrifying to him, and others interpret it as schizophrenic delusions hampering lesser versions of his parents' abilities, hence his being introduced in a mental facility.
- Most Common Superpower: Parodied in the third comic with April, who only looks like she has this due to the massive lung capacity and musculature she needs to fly. Played straight with this Wonder Woman Wannabe.
- Most Definitely Not a Villain: Unfortunately for the bad guys trying to infiltrate the tower, this only works on other villains (and Sergeant Omega).
- Mutants: Both versions are described in the "Professor Exposition" strips here and here.
- Mutates are commonly called "Curios", and the phenomenon that creates them is scientifically termed the "Sklodowska Reaction", which causes the "cascading cellular metamorphosis" and "Anomalous Energy" which accounts for a number of Superhero's powers. College courses that teach about the reaction have to lock the doors so students don't run off to experiment on themselves before the lesson's over.
- Mutants are also described, termed as Aberrants, and their abilities are kept fairly realistic, at most stretching the limits of biology and materials science, without violating conservation of energy.
- Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: Rob McCobb, Zombie P.I.
- Our Zombies Are Different: Lampshaded in this comic, in which Rob Mc Cobb cites more or less every possibility listed on the page.
- Painted Tunnel, Real Train: Subverted here, in that Arachne actually slams into it. Then Double Subverted, of course by Sergeant Acme.
- Power Crystal: Tim gets his telekinetic powers from one of these, worn prominently on a necklace. It apparently only works for him and he inherited it from his uncle, who had it for unknown reasons.
- Psychic Powers: Apparently Steve's mother, Mambo Doubye. Steve himself has some flavor of this stemming from his Medium Awareness.
- Raygun Gothic: Max's former persona, The Atomicist, a jetpack-wearing, laser-wielding hero from the early age of american superheroes.
- Required Secondary Powers: A common topic. Several characters are presented without them, such as Peregrine, a speedster who can't get a hold of the ground well enough to actually use his power to its full extent, as seen here and here (note the titles)
- Samurai: Aya's mother, Bugeisha.
- Science Hero: Max, a.k.a. The Atomicist in his youth.
- Superpowerful Genetics: A downplayed version of Type 2 with Aya and Steve, with both of them receiving what could be interpreted as lesser versions of one or both parent's powers. Invoked in this comic with Max suggesting that Peregrine (a speedster who lacks the Required Secondary Powers of getting enough traction for his power to actually function) date Arachne in the hope that their offspring would receive both their power-sets. Whether this sort of thing would actually work has yet to be demonstrated.
- Super Zeroes: The Bulk of the main cast, and several active heroes.
- Teleportation: Gene's power. It goes off automatically and randomly if he's about to be injured. The main characters have quite a bit of fun with this.
- Those Wacky Nazis: Starting here, complete with Humongous Mecha.
- Webcomic Time: Taken to the extreme, with the first year's worth of strips adding up to…slightly under 24 hours in universe. Lampshaded here.
- What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: The main cast all either failed miserably or never even tried to be actual heroes, their powers less than useful when dealing with criminals expecting the likes of Sergeant Omega.
- Zombie Apocalypse: Deconstructed here.
