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It’s not a worldwide conspiracy, after all … it’s …wastewater.

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I have to admit that it was painful to put together yesterday’s blog, contrasting Rivera’s early work on the strip with what she is producing today. That feeling persists.

Not sure why Rivera is dragging out this particular scene, like something from Mary Worth, unless she means to fill out the entire week just to let Mark know about the wastewater contamination. This also tells us that the Trails have not gone swimming much lately. Well, Mark has been on the job for the most part, so he’s excused. Tomorrow might we expect Mark to follow-up his interrogation with “And just what are you doing about it, Ranger Shaw?”, which should take Shaw two days to answer, filling out the week.

Apparently, Lost Forest does not have a good wastewater treatment center! I’d send them my youngest’ son’s contact information, as he’s a senior environmental engineer. But he’s quite busy with the seven country metro area he works with. Looks like Mark will have to solve this one on his own!

Art Dept. Mark’s expression in panel 4 seems a bit over-reactive, unless he’s thinking that his septic tank might have sprung a leak. Can’t say there is much difference in Shaw’s expression, which borders on the psychotic. But I think we might agree that Ranger Shaw’s personality is enigmatic. Rivera could look back at her earlier work as we did, and start reusing some of those more nuanced expressions of concern, doubt, and angst that Mark exhibited back then.

Click image to expand.

Mark butters up Ranger Shaw for the Big Question.

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Mark employs his professional journalist interrogation, er, interview tactics on Ranger Shaw:  First, disarm the subject with flattery and politeness; discuss mundane events to build rapport; then finally, slam the subject with hard-hitting questions before he has a chance to prepare a defensive response.

Well, that appears to be the goal, but for some reason, Mark’s odd expression (“Ohh! A bee stung me!”) in panel 3 dilutes the dramatic moment, so Range Shaw seems more concerned about that, then being taken aback by the qestion, itself.

Art Dept. The function and appearance of the current art has been the subject of recent discussion. Intent, ability, purpose all come into play. As regular readers know, we have discussed this topic many times. It is no secret that Rivera’s art has changed over time, where the art now looks like a mashup of storyboard drawing techniques and TV cartoon-inspired simplicity. Or worse.

from Jan 23, 2021. Sorry I don’t have a more detailed version.

It wasn’t always this way. Look back at Rivera’s start. The “cool dude Mark” pose is from a series of early publicity images Rivera drew in late 2020, when she took over the strip. The strip, above, from January 2021, is part of Rivera’s first story. You should easily see here a greater attention to detail, naturalism, and even dramatic sequencing in Rivera’s use of a single, continuous landscape to portray a sequence of events over time. In art history circles, this is known as “continuous narration,” so this concept is not original, but it is rare to see in comic strips. It is a grittier style like that sometimes seen in graphic novels. So, considering what we see these days, the question arises: What happened?