Sure why not? Why wouldn’t Mark receive a prestigious award? But the Dodd Award? It appears to not be a thing… And what better option do we have than to revisit an old story line that introduced tedium in our time? Not to mention that Mark would have had to be clairvoyant to know that is little trip with Professor Gabe into the caves would somehow come full circle to include his trip to investigate Aztec ruins and Dr. Carter’s use of LIDAR, but then Mark was probably busy and never goat around to writing the White Nose piece until after his brush with the traffickers… But I digress…
Bill, are you talking to yourself? Are you the only one in the office? It would seem that the magazine industry is such that you probably had to lay everyone else off… Now you get to play all the roles, even to the point of being your own errand-boy and sounding board!
Marne Spencer… Enter the Siren! Who seems to have a Thing (already) for Mark… And that Action Hero, Jeremy Cartwright, who hasn’t heard of him? Who has, no doubt, wanted to play the role of MARK TRAIL his entire life!!
Who owns the rights to Mark’s stories? That’s the real question here…
The Daily Trail 
Well, good enough analysis, Dennis, but really: A movie (not a “documentary”, as this is going to feature an “action movie star”) based on “white nose syndrome and human trafficking”? Oh, I suppose Ellis realizes it’s really an action movie with the science as the lame excuse for the trip to the cave. But who is confused here: A move about the “Bat Cave” in New Mexico or a movie about an artifact Smuggling Ring in the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico? As I recall, the human drug trafficking angle of the Bat Cave story appeared in only about a week’s worth of strips, and only then as an excuse to trap Trail and his two associates so they could have their Indiana Jones adventure.
Well, THIS should be a really interesting adventure for Mark. Care to indulge in some speculation about how this will work out?
Here are my mutually exclusive contributions:
a. Cartwright (who is a somewhat arrogant and animal-indifferent lout) comes out to Lost Forest to get the measure of Trail; This becomes the basis for the adventure.
b. Mark is invited to Hollywood to act as “technical advisor” and watch the movie being made. Hijinks ensue as the action star gets injured and Mark is hired to play himself. Maybe the family trails along, so to speak.
c. Mark declines all of the offers and decides to go off on another lame adventure, perhaps about the growing issue of flying squirrels getting picked off by bald eagles. Heady stuff!
Wait…Hollywood producers read “Woods and Wildlife” magazine for movie ideas?