Okay, so this must be “Epilog Week”, as Mark and Bill Ellis flesh out the aftermath of this tawdry episode. Bill seems fixated on the elephant, in spite of the fact that Mark was actually there to investigate Tess’s tiger zoo operation. And where is Amy Lee, Mark’s assignment editor for this adventure? As for the losers who Tess recruited, I predict many will just find another charismatic charlatan to follow.

One possibly new development in comic strip anatomy (as far as I know) is the text balloon acting like a text box (panels 3 and 4), but with quotation marks. This is another method of distinguishing the present time while referring to the past, like the outlined Mark in panel 2. However, as a meme, its function is not so obvious. Perhaps italicizing the font (or changing the font) would help distinguish it from normal text balloons.

Still waiting to hear about Diana Daggers and/or Rex Scorpius!

It might be interesting to see Mark focus his Sunday spotlight on Ralph the rat snake. At least then, Mark might pay more attention to him. Those two haven’t had a good chat for a very long time! (At least, since August 20, 2021) Earlier on in the strip, Mark periodically communicated with Ralph and a few other animals. I rather liked the Dr. Doolittle shtick, as it gave Mark an eccentric quirk where you weren’t sure if this was real or just a fantasy in his mind.

Once again, Rivera uses a white border, this time around Mark in panel 2, to emphasize that the background image is a visual recollection, not current action. As a reminder, on the right is an example from the Trail Family vacation in Oregon, on June 30, 2022.

Mark debriefs Bill Ellis, very likely entertaining him with exaggerated claims about the significance of his personal involvement and importance in this adventure. Meanwhile, for those who like to contrast Rivera with her predecessors, let’s pay attention to the abrupt jump from Texas to Lost Forest, completely omitting the aftermath of the Tiger Touch Center debacle. That’s spot-on Classic Mark Trail story closure for you!

Did Touch Center employees get their last checks? Did Tess outrun Gemma or wind up as toe jam under her feet? Did Rex go back to his regular job or become an alcoholic, singing to his dog? Did Diana Daggers kick Mark in the gonads for failing to get enough video for the show? And did Gemma find her way back home, without anybody once again able to capture her?

As I wrote earlier, Diana Daggers has been getting shafted more and more in these stories. From a once-potentially deadly ass-kicker with a sharp tongue, she is now reduced to a compliant and innocuous chauffeur with little to do.

So, Diana—in her new, exciting chauffeur role—suddenly appears at the usual opportune time. At least she is not wearing livery. In the background, Gemma must have already dealt with Tess, since there are scavenger birds circling overhead. She is probably plodding back to her home. And nobody cares.

But why does Mark want to bring along two growing tigers, presumably still in a cage? They take up a lot of space, and Diana isn’t driving a Ford Explorer, you know. And what about all of those cubs, Mark? Are you leaving them behind for the coyotes? Maybe we’ll learn the answers to these, and other, questions next week.

I’m sure many of us have wanted to see some deserving politician or other chiseler literally run out of town. Maybe in small towns that is still possible, I hope. Still, Tess must have Olympic-level training behind her, as even with a full-length dress, she is outpacing Gemma. On the other hand, our desperate pachyderm has just crossed four States, so she might be a tad run down.

But how did that cage of tigers remain undisturbed after Gemma ran through the trailer? They certainly don’t look upset. As all tigers now originate in SouthEast Asia, they could be progeny of Buddhist tigers trained in meditation.

There will be a little more soul-searching and cleanup, but I think this story is all but concluded. In most cases, Mark would contact State conservation agents to rescue the abandoned animals. However, owing to the State they are in, Mark and Rex might be told to simply release the animals and let them fare on their own.

Ah, Rex turns out to be another quick-to-judgement moralist. How unfortunate for Tess. But Gemma has returned to Center Stage by crashing through Tess’s secret trailer, the one that everybody already knew about and could actually see. Not really a secret. Of course, we know that Rivera really meant “the trailer that holds a secret”.

I think Rivera wastes valuable drawing space with a redundant textbox. How much more functional it would have been, had Rivera instead used the space as a teaser for the next day: “Mark saves Rex, but who will save Tess?”

When I see whole figures drawn in Mark Trail, sometimes it seems that Rivera uses old-fashioned action figure dolls as reference models. You know, the kind that swivel at the hips and whose arms tended to rotate like the blades of a windmill. There’s a definite sameness you can see.

Anyway, is the end for Tess Tigress? Will Emma finally be fed up and put her foot down?

Shouldn’t the real question be: “That’s terrible, Tess! How could your parents (or the zoo management) put you in that no-win situation!?” It doesn’t sound like Tess volunteered to put down Mama Elephant. But it also looks like lover boy Rex has some kind of absolutist morality which doesn’t discount age or maturity. Oh, poor Rex, moaning and condemning, like some upper-class snob discovering that his date does not a family pedigree equal to his own. Go ahead, Rex. Start casting stones.

I am curious to see how Rivera develops this scenario: Will she put forward the notion that this pachyderm put-down formed the basis for Tess’s current alleged animal mistreatment? Will Rivera try and show that Tess is a victim of circumstances out of her control?  Or will Mark suddenly pop up as a voice of wisdom, and come to Tess’s aid, rebuking Rex for his unrealistic moralizing? Or do we go down the usual path where Rex disavows Tess and walks off into the night, a disillusioned and broken shell of a man?

The syndicate’s servers crashed yesterday, as many (figuratively speaking) of you know, so time to catch up. And we’re back to the Mark Trail Whining Zoo adventure. Seems Emma the Elephant really did have a hard-on for Tess and somehow was able to zero in on her location, even crossing through four presumably unknown States. That’s pretty incredible orienteering.

So what is Tess busy with? Looks like the elephant is actually prancing away from the humans.  This would have made quite the illustrated report, had Mark remembered to bring a video camera and leave it on. But Mark has a habit of rarely taking photos on assignment, as far as I’ve been able to determine. Doesn’t seem like Rex is concerned about the business operation as much as the one-way relationship. Perhaps Rivera is winding this story down, as well, though there are more threads to account for.

On a side note, there is a new time-travel adventure strip from KFS: Mara Llave: Keeper Of Time. If you like classic illustration-style drawing (and who doesn’t?) and don’t mind a bit of sci-fi, check out this strip on Comics Kingdom. Perhaps the adventure strip format is not yet completely dead!

Wondering how Mark knew the elephant’s name (“Gemma”)? Me, too! I found it mentioned back in the July 19^th strip when Bill Ellis was trying to sell the assignment to Mark.  Ellis never said exactly where the elephant was, except that it was in the South. Rampaging Gemma could have trotted over from Arkansas, as far as we know, except that Bill also stated there were sightings across four (unnamed) states. In the end, who knows and who cares. Emma is In the House!

Nice tiger drawings, by the way. Sure, Rivera might be borrowing from web sources, but cartoonists have collected and used “swipe files” as reference material for at least 100 years. You didn’t really think the prior Mark Trail artists drew their animals from memory, did you?

Anyway, it seems Tony the Tiger got pretty docile once Gemma showed up. I think Rex should win the test by default, don’t you? He didn’t try to run away, and wasn’t that the point of the test?

The grammar today is careless. In panel 1, the phrase should be “Mark can only look on in horror….” And panel 2 is ambiguous. It should be either “…Buzz, your dog?” or “…Buzz? Your dog!”

Still, I think I’m on Tess’s side here. She can’t be too happy to see that Rex might throw her over for a dog (which he could continue to have, even if he stays with Tess). Still, I’m hoping Rex sticks it out.

But as I (and most of you, I bet) was counting on, the Runaway Bunny, er, Elephant has shown up at just the right time to change the course of this adventure. And it sure knows how to make an appearance!

Side note:  Based on the dietary needs of elephants, we should expect to see a very long, virtually plowed, path behind Dumbo, emptied of grasses, trees, and bushes, but replaced by piles of pachyderm poop. Yet surprisingly, nobody could track this animal!

When you design an adventure strip around “the absurd”, the whacky, and the just plain strange, it becomes harder to deliver an acceptably dramatic, potentially dangerous scenario.

But somebody has been misled:  Rex stated that his ordeal was to prove his devotion specifically to Tess, whereas Tess just declared that Rex is actually pledging himself to the Tiger Touch Center. I think there is a crucial communication problem that Rex needs to resolve. Mark seems to be at a loss for what to do. How un-Mark Trail. Just as well.

I am impressed with Rivera’s drawing of the ground-level, foreshortened tiger approaching Rex. Well done, Rivera!