Practical Mark wears a flight pillow, just in case. Or maybe a fashion statement. Cherry sees no need, in any case. Anyway, where is the Family Trail at this point in their flight? Probably not the Smokey Mountains, but possibly crossing the Rockies. I reckon that puts them well under 3.14159 hours from Oregon. Based on panel 1, it seems the Trails decided to fly First Class. A wise choice, but pretty expensive for them, unless Pappy Happy is footing the bill. I suppose he and Rusty are sitting in Coach?

Hey, Cherry! There’s no need to “sneak” pie or almost any food onto an airplane any longer. It’s a common occurrence and perfectly legal. What’s amazing is how she got it onto the plane without it getting smushed.

I think panel 1 is well conceived and executed, and I especially like the image of Mark. He has a non-nonsense, determined expression that looks like what a lot of readers had hoped for in the new Mark Trail. It certainly plays more to type than the teary-eyed, boxy figure of Mark in panel 3. I’m not backing off in my appreciation of the fact that Rivera toned down Mark’s flat, heroic posture and purebred moral nature; but I would like to see more grit and determination in Mark that does not arise from emotional outbursts and revenge.

I know there is a problem with a story when I can predict what will happen; not that this was a high bar in the first place. But really now, I keep hoping we’ll move on to new adventures with new people. Instead, we keep getting “guest re-appearances”, like being stuck in a locked room watching the same two episodes of Jeopardy and Bonanza in an endless loop.  Even Rod Serling would not conceive such a hell.

“Well, actually, he did, George.”

Huh? What do you mean!?  

“He wrote an episode (‘The Hitch-hiker’) about a driver who keeps seeing the same man on the highway in front of her, trying to hitch a ride.”

Ah, I remember that episode! I was a kid when I first saw it. It was scary! Speaking of which, who the heck are you?

“…”

Okay, then. Moving on… So now the trip to Oregon is no longer just a vacation, but a rescue mission to recover Happy’s stolen investment. This is starting to sound familiar. I can’t wait to see how Cherry reacts to this turn of events.

Nice of Mark to offer a little consolation, as he is the one who put his dad into this emotional state in the first place!  I think they call that “passive-aggressive” behavior? That “weird” piece of Mark’s anatomy in panel 1 is likely meant to be his left hand wrapped back across his shoulder and around the back of his neck. Nice image of Mark in panel 4, however.

Anyway, it appears that my fears are correct and that this Jadsen Sterling character is the link to Cricket Bro. So, we can expect Mark to blow his top in Saturday’s strip when he realizes who Happy is doing business with.

And like dads everywhere, Happy has no clue who Mark’s friends really are.

“Once I was just your son, Dad. But now, I’m the Father….” so Mark now instructs his old man. Well, Portland finally comes into the conversation stream. Should we overlook the technical foobah in panel 2 and just go with the Big Picture? It pays to be accurate when talking about science. And Rivera was more on the ball in her Sunday panels of January 2^nd. On the other hand, there is only so much text you can cram into a single comic strip panel. But I think she could have edited the speech balloon more carefully.

Is it too much to fear that Happy’s business partner will be Rob “Cricket Bro” Bettancourt, who must have taught Happy to use the pejorative “Marky” Trail nickname? Last we saw, Rob was in Palm Springs, trying to launch his NFT enterprise. He could have another home up in Oregon. However, for variety’s sake, I hope we get a new Trail Villain, somebody with black hair, beard, heavy eyebrows, and… oops!

By the way, I just noticed that the new spokes-monkey for Happy Trail is possibly the same monkey that Rivera used as an example of an NFT in her January 2^nd Sunday panels. Well, the same red shirt, at least. Go look it up. I’ll be around!

It seems like there’s always at least one such person in any crowd or family. Decorum and context usually have no meaning for such people who will stand up at a Thanksgiving dinner and pontificate about the conditions of turkey farms; or lecture everyone at a picnic about how much carbon was emitted by people who traveled there, while children in poor countries could only choke on their auto exhaust fumes.

So, we are also forced to witness—once again—Mark’s emotion-driven diatribe on NFTs. Not that Mark is wrong, of course. But what’s the point here: To piss off the old man right before taking him on vacation? So nice timing, Mark. Speaking of timing, Mark, can we finally get this vacation on the road!?

We readers have heard/read Mark’s “NFT lecture” several times already, including a Sunday installment; so, we really don’t need to go hear it again. Cherry’s interruption is a hopeful sign that we’ll depart with her and not have to hear Mr. Morality issue forth from his pulpit, yet again.

If Pappy Happy is sharp, he’ll immediately surrender his plan and fall in behind Cherry, while he can. On the downside, looks like we are going through more story padding. Certainly, the trip to Portland will provide plenty of opportunity for incidents, not to mention what happens after they get there. Why do we need four weeks of diddling around the Happy Trail house gunning our engines and not getting anywhere?

You see, I’m trying to find some purpose here, other than a) picking up Happy for the vacation; b) having Rusty meet Reptilionnaire; c) getting the family together; d) getting Rusty a Cryptid adventure helmet; and e) confirming Happy and Jolly are still friends. Hmm…that is a lot of things.

So, okay. Maybe I’ve become a victim of modern mass media tropes, which emphasize quick edit cuts and non-stop action over story development and character interaction. Perhaps I should be applauding Rivera for a slower-paced story that lets characters breath and is something other than a sequence of conniving crooks, car chases, forest fires, kidnappings, avalanches, fights, and cave escapes. But we will get something along those lines soon, right, Rivera? Remember, Jules, there are already plenty of soap opera and family strips around, but too few adventure strips.

Somehow, Pruneface must have escaped Dick Tracy’s clutches and elected to hide out in Florida, disguised as Happy Trail. I thought Rivera would follow the time-honored Trail Tradition of skipping over details and move us directly into the next phase of the story. Instead, the lecture on NFTs continues.

Of course, time in comic strips is infinitely elastic. And it’s possible that all of the cookout activity, including the Trail’s drive down, took place in a single day, even though it consumed 3 weeks of comic strips. In any event, it is nice to see that Rivera is once again using “Batman”-style sound effects.

Admittedly, I’m wondering what all this is leading up to; or what it has to do with the vacation/story. I suppose it was important for Rusty to get that special cryptid-hunting mask from Aunt Olive. But did we need three weeks to do that?

Okay, who is the Mark Trail impersonator in panel 2?

I suppose if you want to resurrect that NFT rant, this is one way to do it; though I thought Rivera covered it well enough in the prior story. Still, it seems like an unnecessary pothole in the road this story is traveling on, though I’m getting more and more confused about what this story is really about.  I worry that this NFT issue (that Mark foolishly brought up) is going to consume several days next week, further stalling this storyline (whatever it is).

And I still wonder why Rivera moved away from her original stylistic vision where inventive layouts, attention to detail, and mood were so important. For example, here is a late January 2021 installment from Mark’s first story, investigating his dad’s business: (sorry for the somewhat fuzzy image below, but it’s the best I could get)

You don’t have to be an artistic wiseguy (as I am) to see a clear difference. I hope you can agree that the January installment is so much more interesting, stimulating, and strongly composed, compared with today’s strip and with much of the work over the past several months (with a few notable exceptions). I would bet money that even Rivera’s strongest critics would have been won over had Rivera kept to her original vision. (Also check out the December 8, 2020 strip, especially the trees and shrubs.)

While not every panel is a work of great invention, the important thing is that Rivera was bringing her talent and imagination to the table to build a new aesthetic, which includes her efforts to expand personalities and update Mark’s traditional plots. That’s a lot to juggle. But even Dodd and Elrod used assistants. I’m not trying to sound a death knell or anything of the sort. I really do want Rivera to succeed.

In spite of kind of getting back on track with the Rusty story, today is another throwaway joke strip.

“Is that a face shield?”
“No, doofus, it’s a jock strap. Put it on so I can test it!”

Okay, so I was wrong this past Tuesday. Aunt Peach is not the Cryptid fan. But where did Aunt Olive get a backpack from? And a big face mask? Maybe it’s standard cryptid hunting gear.

Auntie Olive informs us that the Seaside Specter is the spawn of Medusa, where one look will turn the viewer into…uh, well something not nice. Hey, maybe the mask will let Rusty see into the 4^th Dimension! Or scan the infrared band. Maybe it’s really a recycled 3D helmet from years ago when people thought 3D-TV was going to be The Next Big Thing.

Hah!Hah!Hah! So, Rivera tried to be clever yesterday by suggesting this had to do with Mark’s childhood fears of Rob Bettancourt, when it turns out it was the commercials he did.  And in this Twilight Zone Reality, young Mark looks kind of like…pre-Rivera Rusty! Talk about Alternate History, call my shrink, quick! But maybe Mark needs the shrink. He certainly has his share of flashbacks.

Hmmm: Monk Trail. Monk Trail. Monk Trail! I can’t help thinking of a monkey with Asperger’s going around solving crimes, but dressed like Mark.

Why does he wear Mark’s shirt? Is this the childhood bullying come back to haunt Mark, or just Dad’s well-meaning joke?  We’ve already heard about his potato salad. Or is this a reflection of another Internet meme? I don’t hang out on Instagram, Twitter, or social networking (in general), so I’ve got no ideas. Anybody know?

Apologies for the belated post. I wrote this last night, but I must have forgot to complete the process to publish it! So, here it is.

Oh, great. I see where this is going: With the text box and the floating “MARKY!” comments in panel 4, we have a blatant setup to trot out the next foe from Mark’s past, as if we are watching Mark be the guest of honor on the ancient TV show, “THIS IS YOUR LIFE!” No surprise that the mystery voice in Markey’s head is Rob Bettencourt (aka Cricket Bro, as he is lately known). Talk about a bad case of PTSD. C’mon, Mark! You finally humiliated Rob in his own corporate HQ. Get over it, already. This is not Mary Worth!

By the way, I noticed that, in spite of the renewed Jolly-Happy Friend Fest, Happy’s business venture is still mentioned only as “Happy Trail Farms.” So, what role does Jolly play? What is the business split? Is Happy playing a more subtle long game?

Uffa! I think I’d rather hear more of the cryptid conversation with Rusty and Aunt Peach.

NOTE: Finally got around to checking out the site and fixed the image.

Otherwise, looks like Rusty’s fun rhyming time with Reptilionnaire didn’t last very long, as here he is, by himself on the lawn. He’s brooding, as if channeling Kenneth Branagh. Hey, we have to give Rusty credit for that nice burn in panel 2. But really, Rusty, having Mark as your dad, jail should be a well-known topic in your house.

We learned that Aunt Peach is also into Cryptid fantasy. How cool is that? And a nice segue back to Rusty’s primary raison d’être for this trip.

Closing Observation: With those fruity girl names—Cherry, Peach, Olive—it’s amazing that Doc Davis didn’t change the family name to Pitt.

<Sigh!> A second week devoted to this cookout!? Can there be any importance in this extended interval before we get to any hoped-for action and intrigue? Well, I don’t see any storm clouds approaching or alligators crossing the lawn, so ho-hum. In fact, today’s panels look “mailed in”, as the saying goes, without much thought or design. A shame, as Rivera can clearly do a lot better. Sometimes I wonder if she is already getting tired of this gig. Well, I hope not.

And I hope Rivera remembers that this is an adventure comic strip that focuses on nature and the environment, and not simply a comic strip that focuses on nature and the environment. Mark Trail is one of the few surviving adventure comic strips still produced, so it’s time for adventure!

And exactly how did Happy get RepRap’s contact info? Anything public would surely be a drop box at an agency or just a virtual trashcan. I suppose Happy knows people. Anyway, I’m wondering if Rivera has the moxie to show Reptilionnaire actually performing. This could make up for not showing the video he and Mark made.

In Panel 2 Mark assumes Reptilionnaire would not have shown up just out of friendship. Is Mark being cynical or just revealing his opinion about their friendship? All I can say about panel 3 is that it is a good capture of what an old fart might actually think is a funny rap on rap.

Oh, has anybody noticed that Happy Trail wears the old double-pocket pink work shirt that Allen’s Mark Trail wore? Well, that’s pretty much what he wore in his first appearance, too, although it was more of a dark mauve. Well, too bad you cannot see that in the b/w newspapers. This leads to me ponder “if I was the clothing supplier to comic strip characters, I’d go out of business really quickly, as they usually wear the same clothes. Comic Strip Land must be really stinky.”

Rhyming and rapping Reptiliannaire makes his surprise (to Rusty) visit, thanks, no doubt, to Grampy Happy, Mark, and Cherry. And he came with his ‘70s-era boom box backup band, too. Will we see a performance?

Moral of the story: Kids, have some faith in your parents once in a while.

Rusty is going through hard times? He’s not the only one, I think. Okay, this is something of a minor squeak to most adults. But if this is truly a “Rusty” story, then we have to accept that this could be a big deal to the kid. I remember one of my major disappointments as a kid. I was 12 and wanted to see The Beatles perform in Washington DC back in 1964. I was too young, my parents said, and it was a 4 hour drive one way. And I could not go on the bus, either. I was devastated for several days.

I never got over it. I became neurotic, a loner, and eventually turned to crime and eating Hostess Cupcakes. I started stalking Lois of Hi and Lois fame. She was a dish.

Well, only the cupcakes part of that confession was true. I did get over it. Still, it was traumatic for a teenager-in-training. In short, those negative vibes we see in panel 4 could very well express the anxiety and conflicting feelings “Russ” is experiencing.

I thought I’d try and show today’s strip as close to a newspaper format as possible (they are not all exactly the same, of course). I think it is good to keep that in mind when we’re looking and critiquing the panels. That is, when the strips are published online, they tend to be so much larger than they are when printed, and cartoonists, by and large, draw with the understanding that they will be significantly smaller than the original drawings. So here is the same strip, as seen on the Comics Kingdom web site:

The proper “focal point” for viewing a drawing is important. The famous 19^th French artist Georges Seurat painted small dabs of complementary and contrasting colors laid side-by-side and overlapped so that, when seen at a proper distance, they visually blended into other colors and shapes. This was a deliberate technique on his part.

My thought is whether we should continue to post and view these panels in their online size or the newspaper size. I think in the latter case, a lot of complaints about artistic style or quality are minimized, so to speak. That is, images do not look so stark or odd. And that is likely deliberate, as Rivera is well aware of newspaper size reductions. Anyway, is this a valid observation or am I just talking myself into a rhetorical corner?

Hey, I almost missed it:  Mark is wearing a short-sleeved version of his standard red-and-black checked shirt. Maybe he really does have a closet full of them for all seasons.