Look for a future Sunday page on mustangs. Their status is controversial. Their heritage is not native, but linked to horses introduced by Spanish colonists. They are formally known as “feral”, not “wild.” This distinction carries a fair bit of baggage. Regular roundups are carried out by federal agencies and done to maintain a quality of life for the horses that roam freely. Captured horses are normally sold to private parties. We’ll see if Mark Trail actually deals with any of the issues and nuances of mustangs and horse management in this adventure.
“Nothing to see here, folks. Move along, move along.” Wait! I hear there’s actual drama going on in Gasoline Alley.
So this is the third day of Mark and Bill Ellis’s phone call and we still have no details about the incident or Mark’s assignment. How tedious to waste a daily strip just to push another pun. I’m with Mark. Enough is enough!
Art Dept. Rivera repeats her “Aquarium View ” meme, the repetition of which also does nothing to advance this story.
Hmmm, how about this different point of view for the narration box in panel 1: “Mark’s period of unemployment and lack of income finally comes to a welcome halt.” Because he’s not going to make the mortgage payments on the family cabin with small-time fishing seminars.
Art Dept. The art seems to continue moving towards a more naturalistic view, away from the expressionistic style that Rivera has been using. Even Bill Ellis doesn’t look like the cardboard image that Rivera usually employed (perhaps it was done for satirical value). Do you see that bit of shadingortexture in Mark’s cap? That’s something Rivera would usually ignore in earlier drawing.
I also like the way Rivera composed Panel 1. Adding insets of Bill and (a concerned) Mark looking at each other provides a visually interesting “micro” view contrasting with the peaceful “macro” view of the fishing boat and its surroundings in the background.
We had a surprise (to me) epilog to Mark’s “Men’s-Only Nature Retreat and Fishing Expedition Extravaganza” story this past week, where everybody decided to become friends for life and go fishing together every weekend.
That aspiration floated for about 30 seconds then sunk to the bottom of the river when Mark got a call from Bill Ellis—on the verge of apoplexy—concerning a wild horse rampage taking place somewhere (presumably out west), but needing Mark’s personal onsite attention. One might assume that, as the managing editor of a publishing empire consisting of several magazines, Ellis would have more than one reporter on call, if not at least one reporter living somewhere in the western states who is more familiar with—and closer to—those crazy wild horses. But then again, the name of this strip is Mark Trail, not Hopalong Cassidy. So I’m afraid (I’m really afraid!) Mark will once again be flying out to some western location. Let’s hope he learned his lesson earlier and does not wear his embarrassing “western” Square Dance costume to the job!
Art Dept. A crowd of commenters (well, at least one) remarked on a noticeable improvement in the artwork, specifically the fish and water scenes that excluded people. I concur. I also noticed a marked improvement (or reinvigoration) in the drawings of Mark’s face, especially close-ups and mid-range views. I’m thinking that Rivera may have upgraded her model sheets for Markey. We’ll have to see how all of this plays out.
“…cats never stop hunting because they’re always well-fed.” I’m not certain of this logic. I grew up around cats. They are inherently hunters and carnivores. Cats will hunt or even just practice hunting because it is in their nature to do so. They will certainly hunt to feed themselves. Misguided pet owners who try to conform their cats to “vegetarian” diets could harm them; but that also encourages cats to hunt small animals (e.g. mice and birds) to fill in their missing nutritional requirements, assuming they are let out.
Rivera is rewriting history even as we read. Yesterday, it was Mark’s idea to get back together the following weekend for more fishing. Today, it is Cliff prompting Mark for a redo. I also noticed that the group jumped back on the boat. I’m hesitant to suggest some late editorial changes for this apparent continuity issue, but I don’t know how else to explain it.
Meanwhile, why does panicky Bill Ellis think this is urgent? I mean, wild horses are found in western states. That means Mark could not get on site for at least another day, maybe two. How long can these horses rampage!? Perhaps Bill Ellis is thinking back to that elephant who rampaged from the east coast all the way across the southern states and into Texas to take revenge on Tess Tigress.
Art Dept. One “secret” to making partial forearms appear accurately is to draw the completearm starting at the shoulder, and including any part that extends beyond the visible zone of the panel. And the angle of the torso must match up, as well. That way, you can avoid weird-looking results, such as we see in panel 1. There’s just no way that arm connects to Ranger Shaw. On a more positive note, I think we’ve been witnessing an improvement in Rivera’s depiction of Mark, specifically in his close-ups. Not so much in distant views.
Moving On … Are we finally at the end of the story? With luck, this week-long epilog should end on Saturday. And right on cue, that better-late-than-never phone call usually means Bill Ellis and the start of an actual paying gig; unless it is Cherry calling to remind Mark to pick up some pizza on the way home.
I think that once you have gotten your characters to form a common bond in your storyline, spending extra days reiterating that accomplishment starts diluting its value. That is the case here, where the characters fall to pointless chatter as the storyline bobs and goes nowhere, like their fishing boat. That is why I thought this story concluded a few weeks ago, in the hospital. Mission accomplished…Not!
So the nicely illustrated underwater scenes begin to look merely repetitive. I agree with commenter Mark that the panels dealing specifically with the boat and the river are artistically of better quality than the flat, simplistic panels of “the men.” Are they drawn by a different artist? It might seem so, but I disagree. Compare these current panels to some of Rivera’s earlier work, such as this panel from January 2021:
Rivera uses the same compositional devise of combining the top and underwater views, along with a close attention to detail. They are not exact matches, of course; but after three years, there will naturally be differences. Of course, I could be totally wrong and it could be that a ghost artist today has simply updated Rivera’s original take on water scenes. A few non-related observations here:
In her inaugural Mark Trail adventure (“Happy Trails“), Rivera already had Mark arguably breaking the law and fleeing from the cops, as was recently repeated (“Something Fishy“). Also, these days Rivera has all but abandoned her original and innovative “Doctor Doolittle” relationship between Mark and various animals (think also of Ralph the rat snake). I rather enjoyed that feature, and I’m sorry she moved away from it.
I’m trying to be fair, readers. Really! But how can I resist such low-hanging fruit? While Jules Rivera won’t show us how bats were removed from Violet’s music hall, we do get to enjoy these heartwarming scenes of symbolic fishing and symbolic male bonding.
Would you say Rivera has done much fishing? In panel 1 good ol’ Cliff looks like he’s hauling in a big one, though his line is only slightly more taught than cooked pasta. But maybe they’re all just taking turns playing the boy-bonding pastime, “Mine is bigger than yours!”
I’m not exactly sure what the heck is going on in panel 2, either, as Cliff and Mark make a rookie’s mistake of holding their rods outside of the boat. What a great technique to teach the noobs!
As for panel 3, we have an impressive underwater scene. Maybe Rivera could move over to a comic strip version of the old TV show, Sea Hunt.
My, my, my, that boat seems to have shrunk today! More surprisingly, this fishing boat now sports a new, second mast behind the cabin (panel 2). Still, panel 1 displays a nicely balanced composition.
Okay, we had a bucketful of comments yesterday, which I enjoyed very much, thank you. Clearly Monday’s strip caused some interest.
Commenter Mark opined that Monday’s strip was Rivera’s best drawing so far. High praise, indeed, but it implies a relativistic judgement. Comments from readers regularly disparage Rivera’s art when compared to the representational style of pre-RiveraMark Trail. It also seems as if Rivera is moving (or has moved) Mark Trail from a serious adventure strip into some kind of joke-a-day comic with an undertone of absurdist-based continuity (sort of like Doonsbury, but minus the political and social satire). Today is no exception. Clearly, Rivera is aiming for a younger audience, not the long-time, older Trailheads.
Rivera’s irreverent approach would naturally be reflected both in storylines and drawing. We can certainly see masculinity-bashing and parodying of the strip’s historic social and aesthetic ideals taking place in her work. But for many current and former readers, whatever Rivera’s motives really are (including her interesting innovations), they may be entirely irrelevant: People just don’t like or understand what they see. And that’s the problem.
Okay, I got fooled. The Saturday January 13 strip certainly looked like a typical end-of-story sequence. I bet you thought so, as well. Right? After all, the bonding rituals were made, so what was left to say?
We now see that Mark’s “fishing retreat” is back in action for a fishing cruise. What could go wrong? Observant readers that you are, you only see Mark and Cliff, so we should assume the students are fishing on the other side; or maybe they are stuck in the cabin taking a multiple-choice quiz on types of fishing bait.
The “survivalist” dialog here makes it sound as if they just lived through a significant natural disaster or military action. As we have been seeing lately, Rivera completes the daily strip (panel 4) with a non-sequitur. That is, what does the joy of fishing have to do with hospital trips? We can pass this off as a silly nonsense joke people make from time to time, something my wife will tell you I indulge in, as well. I expect cartoonists to do better than I can. But Mark doesn’t look like he’s joking.
Art Dept. Those are well-drawn fish and wisely swimming away from the boat. They form an odd comparison with the overtly cartoonish appearance of the human figures. Do you think there is some kind of philosophical or metaphysical symbolism behind this?
This past week saw an abrupt shift in story- and time-lines about mid-week. It’s a bit unusual, as if higher-level editorial decisions were made to shorten the story. The week began with Mark and Ranger Shawn showing up with homemade bat houses at the Sunny Soleil Society to help Cherry and Violet remove the bats living in the “Great Hall.” While Mark once again promoted bat houses, Honest Ernest was drafted to help carry them to the site.
Thursday was the big switch. How they got the bats out of the Hall and into those bat houses was skipped over. Instead, the storyline suddenly jumped ahead to the evening of the festival and talent show! I dunno, but learning what Mark and Ranger Shawn did might have been educational.
We learned that Violet had stage-fright, but Cherry was there to cheer her on. Good on Cherry! Turns out that Violet was in her element and doing a fine job with her harp. Suddenly, Cherry inexplicably interrupted Violet’s performance by walking on stage to bleat out the next act, as if she was calling Rusty in to dinner. That next act happened to be her dad, Doc Davis. From offstage, a humiliated Violet was none too happy and gave the evil eye to Cherry.
Unless I totally misinterpret things, Cherry’s abrupt change in behavior is the bigger mystery. Will we learn more on Monday? Well, let’s see what we can learn today….
I thought that Rivera’s title panel for the September 24 (2023) Sunday strip on spotted lanternflies was more creative, don’t you? But I do think that using lanternflies in the pail to spell out the name of the strip today is not too bad, either.
Okay, what is the reason Rivera is posting the same subject a second time: Is it just to give out more tips on getting rid of lanternflies!?
Did Rivera forget she already devoted a Sunday strip on this invasive species or did she hope that we forgot? You’d think that Mark would have at least explained to us that he is merely providing new information for a topic he previously covered.
Let me get this straight: We are to believe that one minute Cherry is the comforting, supportive friend helping Violet get over her stage fright; but the next minute, she turns into an inconsiderate boor, cutting Violet off before she’s finished, by yelling out the next act from behind her back: Cherry’s dad and his cornball vaudeville act.
What are we to make of all this? It is out of character for Cherry to be portrayed as some kind of Jekyll & Hyde character, so I’m befuddled. If Rivera wants to inject more conflict into the story, this seems like a tawdry, unrealistic way to accomplish it. Otherwise, I’m on Violet’s side and glad she’s not looking at me the way she eyes Cherry.
Hoo-boy … do you think Rivera should have stopped at panel 2? Sure, we all know this is just a light, comedic story, nothing serious; and that’s just fine. The humor is built into the storyline and doesn’t really require anything more. That’s what I’m trying to get at.
Sometimes writers don’t know when to stop and just go too far, such as the time I wrote a story that … er, sorry.
Getting back to my point, I think gratuitously “irrelevant (and bad) jokes” (e.g. panels 3 and 4) to fill out a strip only tarnish a story that should not need the extra help. It’s like gilding the proverbial lily. At least, let’s come up with better jokes.
Art Dept. In spite of the strip’s writing today, I like the drawing of Cherry in panel 4, where the sway of the curtain Cherry stands behind is echoed in her pose and enhanced by the long coat she wears.
For some reason, Rivera chose to not burden us with exactly how Mark and Range Shaw removed the bats from the concert hall, in spite of showing us Honest Ernest’s foolish attempt. Are we to think that the bats willingly flew into those bat houses, merely on sight? And where did the houses get placed?
Well, tempus fugit once again, as we move directly to the festival and concert. Cherry is certainly elegantly decked out. Yet it is fascinating that Rivera forces her characters to act foolishly or just ignorantly, simply to make a weak joke. Cherry welcomes “everyone”, but Violet is concerned whether there will be a good turnout.
What, if any, significance does a raccoon rearing up signify here, other than to check for predators or maybe Mark’s approach? It looks a bit defeated, but that is just anthropomorphizing. Perhaps it is a taxidermist’s display?
As is justly fitting, Honest Ernest has been relegated to support staff status. Time has clearly passed if Ernest has received all of his shots. They take two weeks to complete. Regular readers know that time is a fluid marker in the Trailverse and its passing is often ambiguous. It’s remarkable that Violet Cheshire would wait that long to get her Grand Hall cleared of bats. She doesn’t seem the patient type.
Mark covered bat houses on a Sunday page back on October 15, 2023. So it is not surprising to see Rivera (Mark) use them in this story. That’s good planning on Rivera’s part. Otherwise, today’s strip adds nothing new to Cherry’s bats story. Filler strips like this one are annoying because they do not move the plot along or reveal new information. They just artificially expand the story to use up more calendar time because it is easier than having to create more stories.
We already know Ranger Shaw has a reclusive life style. But since he told Mark he was glad to help assemble the bat houses (panel 1), it makes no sense why Mark suggests (panel 3) the Ranger come over to learn how to do it again. Mark fairly gushes as if he is a showing off a school shop project to his parents. Rivera might want to study crafting puns from her comic strip predecessors, such as Darby Conley’s Get Fuzzy and Stephen Pastis’s Pearls Before Swine. Or maybe just quit trying.
Art Dept. Sometimes I wonder how Rivera puts these strips together. Out-of-proportion figures in Mark Trail are not unique, but do stand out. First, Ranger Shaw in panel 1 is suddenly so much broader than Mark, as if he is being played by John Candy. It isn’t as if he is simply “in front” of Mark and “closer to us.” He stands behind the bat houses held by Mark! Second, Mark’s head in panel 3 is mysteriously and laughably smaller than his body, to say nothing of his right arm being about 6 feet long, based on the angle of the forearm. Sure, these may be picky criticisms, but it’s my job as unofficial critical comic strip analyst and part-time know-it-all to tell it like I think it is (or isn’t). Feel free to quibble!
We return to Cherry’s bats-in-the-belfry story, accompanied by one mangy looking cardinal. Cherry’s adventures tend to be a bit lighter than Mark’s if you can imagine it. Well, Mark’s most recent story is an exception. Anyway, having Mark and Cherry’s interface in each other’s stories happens a lot, though mostly it’s Mark involved in Cherry’s affairs. I suppose it’s to keep The Brand as recognizable as possible. So, will Mark and Ranger Shaw work out any better than Honest Ernest? Any bets?
Art Dept. It is difficult to overlook the confusing scale of the figures in panel 1, especially Violet. Perhaps it’s like one of those trick rooms where the proportions of the surrounding spaces fool the eye into seeing people or objects incorrectly. Or maybe not. But it’s harder, still, to not look at that cardinal, which looks like it just came from a fight. Perhaps it isn’t getting along with its spouse. Good thing Mark showed up!
Everybody rallied around Eli at the hospital, where he received the first of several rabies shots for being a doofus. Interestingly, nobody rallied around Connor the week before for his self-inflicted thumb wound. I’m not too sure what warranted a hospital bed for Eli, but it’s a small hospital and maybe they thought he might have a reaction. Mark took this opportunity to apologize to everybody for his incompetent teaching and leadership, which should be a clear signal for him to stay in his safe lane. In the end, Mark was happy that his students were nice (or gullible) enough to accept his apology and share in his kumbaya gratitude by agreeing to go fishing with him. Quietly, one presumes.
Wrap Up: Well, even for Rivera, this was not your typical Mark Trail adventure. It was not based on a job-related assignment. There were no clear villains or environmental issues to resolve, other than Mark’s consternation at perceived dangers from bad survival guides. Mark pledged to create a survival school to teach men how to survive by providing real and accurate information. Good intentions, to be sure, and a sure-fire plot setup for useful information and even some drama. Unfortunately, Rivera dumbed down the survival concept to a fishing seminar. Also, why did Mark want to limit the retreat to only men? It was not at all clear at the start. It became apparent when the De-Bait Team talked Mark into focusing on helping men express their feelings to help them with their domestic issues. Why was this a good idea, anyway? So this story changed course and became a soap-opera parody of how men (like Mark) don’t like expressing their feelings. Did the story resolve anybody’s emotional issues? No. Did the men learn to deal with their feelings any better? No. Did any student actually learn to fish? No. Was this story worth our time? No!
Let’s see if today’s nature talk is more worthy.
This is a nice bite-sized piece of information, focusing on the contrast between the LMB’s invasive status in U.S. waters and its popularity for fishing. In other words, fishing for LMB is actually good for the environment and local water species! I may have to dust off my cane pole and bobber this summer.
“We’re game”? Oh, game fish. Yeah, got it. So Mark is optimistic about this not being a total loss, in spite of two injuries requiring hospital visits and virtually no instructional time. But toss in a box of bagels and provide some happy talk and they’re good to go! I guess that is why it looks like he’s ready to move on to a group kiss in panel 3.
Rivera has wrapped up this story of Mark’s failed dream of creating a men’s-only survival retreat, a venture doomed to failure from the moment he got the De-Bait Team involved. It’s doubtful that Rivera will have Mark reconsider his approach and try again. She has accomplished her task. But what was that task?
She stacked the deck against Mark’s dream, shrinking it down to a fishing seminar, all so she could contrive some goofy injuries that provided scenarios where Rivera’s foil, Cliff, could force Mark into a corner to confront the importance of sharing personal feelings with other men. That is, this was not a story about a survival retreat or a fishing seminar at all. That was just window dressing, men’s eye candy to keep the male readers interested (or distracted).
As people who fish know, being quiet is a normal requirement for good fishing. If you want to talk about feelings, go to a bar and get drunk or go home to your spouse. I have a new theory: The de-bait team deliberately sabotaged Mark’s survival retreat by conning him into including this “discuss your feelings” component. Why? Because they don’t want competition for their own fishing business.
The art today is not as erratic as it was earlier this week. In fact, I very much like the depiction of Mark in panel 3 (that is, the adult, not the remembered child or father). It’s quite naturalistic, expressive, and well-drawn without being too cartoony (e.g. unlike the prior two panels and the too cartoony flashback figures in panel 3 ). But I still prefer Mark’s original beard.
The Daily Trail 