Heh!Heh!Heh! Just some good old fashioned father-son camaraderie from daddy Happy, who was the “Mark Trail” before the current Mark Trail, according to current legend. “What legend?”, you ask.
As Rivera outlined in her first Mark Trail adventure, Happy Trail preceded our current Mark. And Happy was preceded by his father, and so on. It was like the dynasty of Walkers who successively donned the purple costume to take their turn as The Phantom, the Ghost Who Walks. Rivera’s visual mythology was actually a clever way to pay homage to the three artists who preceded her: Jack Elrod/Tom Hill; Ed Dodd; and James Allen. I think Rivera did okay mimicking their styles. Yes, I also realize a lot of readers wish she had continued to pay homage by adopting one of those earlier style(s).
This is not the place to get in yet another talk/screed on styles, but I will say that Rivera adds elements the other artists rarely dreamed off. For example, in panel 1, Rivera does a good job of composing a panel showing Mark looking back over his shoulder at his dad, seen from just below eye-level. It’s a subtle difference from how a similar composition would usually be defined, as seen here in this Jack Elrod submission from 2013.
Regarding the current story, Happy’s advice is wrong (panel 1)! In fact, Mark really needs to get off his routine of nut-ball stories and get back to some actual nature journalism. And Rivera needs to get off of her gag-a-day comic strip kick and focus on building stories, not jokes.
The Daily Trail 