Didn’t Rivera cover this on Thursday? I mean, this would be acceptable as a “getting back to Mark’s story” filler if we had just spent the week on Cherry’s own adventure, but this is a Friday strip and there hasn’t been any break in continuity.

More of the same back-and-forth, but not moving the story at all. Cherry continues to be worried about train explosions when it’s chemical fumes that are the real danger. Of course, Mark has not bothered to mention that little detail.

Art Dept: The one interesting feature today is in panel 1, showing a conventional split screen of Mark and Cherry on the phone. The point of interest is Rivera having Cherry “look across” the split at Mark, as if they are in the same room. In fact, the “looking at each other” seems to have been an emerging gag during the week. The Tuesday panel has the communications split as they talk, but they are not both looking at each other. Mark appears to be “looking back” towards Cherry.

In the Wednesday strip, Mark and Cherry are in separate panels and not really looking across. When we get to Thursday, the split panel is back. Their faces are in a 3/4 pose with their eyes shifting towards each other. We can see the “progression” of visual interaction continue in these two strips; at least, for Cherry, who is practically looking agog at Mark. Okay, maybe I’m stretching the point a bit. Still, it’s a more sophisticated piece of humor than a lame pun plugged into the last panel.