Ever have one of those dreams that seems to last all night?  Even upon waking and returning to sleep you pick up where you left off?  That’s what this “story line” is reminding me of…  At least now the grass is green and the lava is flowing red, unlike in previous scenes where the lava has been gray…  And now it looks as though Abbey has regained the lead in the race to get off the island…

…in time to cash in on the always-available trope: Abbey is a woman and therefore clumsy and prone to tripping over things…  of course she’s been without glasses since the Boar/Tree incident, and we’re pretty sure she needs them to see with clarity.

It would appear that the entire island exploded in the second panel.  Maybe James Allen is trying to tell us something… like he’s sick and tired of Mark Trail and it’s “time to move on here, people…  nothing more to see…”

To think it all started with a wealthy, white yacht-owner and his penchant for fires made with real logs.  Not caring a lick about his “footprint,” ecological or otherwise, he set in motion a chain of events that would lure the likes of a millennial do-gooder and a sucker for anything that would take him to his next “story.”

…or at least the alarms have gone off… One would suppose.

I appreciate the comments!  Yes, that damned Finch has no doubt taken flight, the Ants are going to be toast, the lost civilization will be lost for real, and the last installment made it look like Mark’s back was erupting…  reminding me of the movie Gremlins, and how they reproduced…  if you got one of them wet, baby gremlins would erupt off its back.

Now it appears as though they will have to leap across a fiery chasm in order to make it out…  despite the fact that they are mere strides away, this should resolve by Friday…

Forgive me for getting sucked into this protracted and only moderately interesting story arc, but when Mark utters his now familiar UUUNNNGGH!, you know he’s in trouble.  Our intrepid USDA agent seems to have found the way out and Mark has been slowed to a crawl (or a coughing crouch…)

The silhouette in panel one is reminiscent of Christ on the cross, which is also reminiscent of the Willem Dafoe character in the 1986 movie Platoon… Panel three could be taken from any one of the many Bruce Willis Die Hard(er) vehicles…

Like Jeff Spicoli in Fast times at Ridgemont High?  Or “Whoa” as in “Stop?” Speaking of “Whoa,” I recall that I started  club in one of my old neighborhoods when the kids were young and all parents would tend to gather on a Saturday night while the kids played capture the flag or jailbreak or some other backyard game… The club was called “WHOA” which stood for “Worthless Husbands of America…” a tongue-in-cheek reference to the fact that Husbands/Fathers never do quite enough in this world… We thought it was funny, but the wives didn’t appreciate the joke, as I recall…

As Abby completes her transformation into a dude and exhibits broad jumping over fire skills, Mark is left for dead in the fiery mess.  But it’s about time that Mark started taking direction from someone else…

While many of the other strips are leaning on the holiday for content, Mark Trail remains timeless, oblivious even, to what’s happening in th real world.  So despite the goodwill that generates as people gather to celebrate and renew family ties and invite new friends into the fold, we are left to witness the cruel forces of nature at work as new crust is formed from the molten contents of our geothermally active planet.  Oblivious to current events, that is unless all this KABOOMING is a long, drawn-out metaphor for the recent Presidential election, but I digress…

So here’s to you all, all residents of the Trailverse, on this Thanksgiving Day 2016.  May your blessings be many and your day spent well.  BOOM!

…the island.  Remember that iconic line from the series Lost? Uttered by would-be-strong-man Benjamin Linus?  I think it was two winters ago I needed a binge-worthy series to make it through the cold, dark northern winter.   And Lost it was…  I had totally avoided the show in real time, when it was the subject of so much water-cooler speculation and morning-after  palaver…  But to consume an entire season in one weekend… to not have to wait a week between episodes, suffer through commercials, get teased by the scenes from an upcoming season… well, I was totally Lost myself…

So it appears that Mother Nature is having Linus-like thoughts about the “unstable atoll” overrun by Red-imported-fire-ants.  This is one way to reset the clock and take care of an unwanted infestation.  But much like the Cave-saga that (supposedly) centered around White-nose Bat Syndrome, the reason for going to the atoll has been quickly forgotten as terror and doom befall our main characters.

Bets on whether there will be another explosion in tomorrow’s installment?

As Abbey Powell, Peace Corp Vet, Anthropology Major, Adventurer, begins to break down for lack of breathable air, it’s Mark Trail that falls in behind her and gives her that last push to “get to the beach” where salvation awaits… or so they think.  Must.  Keep. Moving.

As Hell-fire continues to rain down upon them, I am reminded of another reference I heard on the radio…  what’s it raining?  It’s raining tacos!  You’re welcome.

Really.  I am on pins and needles.  not.

The Tedium-Meter® is back in full…

No use being an idiot.  This strip ain’t named for you.  Mark has survived worse scrapes, and well, you have visions of the ‘Nam coming back to you.  You saw too many of your brothers get taken out in the searing heat of a firefight to know that running toward the danger only gets you kilt…

So as Cal continues to channel Jim Brown, head down arms and legs pumping (thanks, George A…) he heads for the boat… of which wee have only seen the bow… I mean, what’s it packing in the back?  a motor?  will Cal be rowing?  sailing?

And what about that random reference to the movie The Fog?  The wreck of the Elizabeth Dane?  Was that just a head fake?  That was, of course, months ago in real time, when Abbey was awaiting Mark’s arrival.  For those living in the Trail Matrix, though, mere hours…