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No, I won’t ask you to rewrite today’s narration box!

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Well, snark was the popular choice in my informal survey. Thanks to all who played along.  And any of those entries would have worked out better than the original comment. As for me, I voted for “We don’t need no stinkin’ narration boxes!” I had seriously thought of coming up with a dramatic comment, such as “Is Cherry walking into a trap?” or “Watch out, Cherry! Ellis likes to use hunting decoys!” But in the end, I thought Cherry’s response was about as much of a cliffhanger as we’re likely to see. So let’s see what’s hanging today …

Once again, Rivera has come up with an interesting, if goofy, storyline that could have some depth to it, as well as an off-the-wall group of characters. Okay, the premise seems absurd: Members of a female book club need to start hunting feral hogs. And once again, Ellis is shilling for Teen Girl Sparkle, one of the few rags in his publishing empire for which Ellis believes Mark (or Cherry) is suitably matched. That doesn’t say much for Mark’s credibility as a serious nature journalist, does it? 

I also believe you are already ahead of me on what Cherry’s hesitation is all about. Will she or won’t she inform her brother? And will she take the assignment, knowing that if she turns it down, Bill will just move on to another call, with Cherry losing a paycheck. There is another question that I wonder if Rivera has put into this story: What about her job with the Sunny Soleil Society:  Will Violet Cheshire give her the time off?

Art Dept. I can’t, in good faith, give a passing grade to the drawing found in today’s strip, or other recent ones. I mean, panel 2 is, frankly, an embarrassment. Not that panel 3 is much better. But I also don’t see any signs of a garden there, either.

Cherry’s assignment slowly gets revealed …

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A writing assignment!? Did Cherry sign up for the Bill Ellis Correspondence Course, “Make money by writing at home, in your spare time!”? And Mark’s “in a while” comment (panel 1) sounds like Cherry had done this before. Anybody recall that earlier time?

But I’m not sure Jules Rivera’s snarky comment in panel 4 is really appropriate. Cherry’s response wasn’t an overlay dramatic answer, so the sarcasm was uncalled for. I’d have thought Rivera could have come up with something more useful or clever; or maybe not say anything at all.

So, here is that fourth panel again, but with an empty narration box. Let’s have a class project of our own: Assume Jules got called away because of a report of good surfing waves. But the deadline looms and it’s up to you to finish today’s strip in time!

If you think a narration box is unnecessary, just report “We don’t need it!” If you think the narration box could have a better snark or maybe a comment that might move the story along, what would it be? 

Meanwhile, I’m still wondering what happened with the peacock and that dinner. Aren’t you?

In case you missed Saturday, we’ll go through it again.

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After putting all of that writing in front of you yesterday, I’ll take it easier on you today. I hope.

So here’s another popular Rivera practice: Wasting Monday’s strip to reiterate what happened on Saturday. Some people call this “padding the story,” though Rivera is not the only Mark Trail artist to do that. Other people might label this “Rivera assumes the readers have the attention span of 6 year olds.” But a few might be more charitable and claim “Rivera is just being considerate! Weekends can be tough on people who are just trying to relax and get themselves ready for another workweek at the plastics injection factory.”

The Week in Review and the Sunday Nature Chat

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The Wheel of Fate spins, and having spun, sometimes goes sideways. This past week saw our happy, giddy, love-smitten Mark & Cherry take one of their post-story nature walks (which have largely replaced the post-story flapjack dinners), where they expressed their near equal devotion to the enjoyment of nature’s bounty and to each other. And that’s fine as far as it goes.  But doing this for an entire week gets a bit much. If the strip ever gets dropped by King Features, maybe the STARS Network can buy it, make it live action, and give it a more hip, racy title: “Cherry & Mark get off on Nature.”

Just when we thought these two might melt into a blob of organically-certified orgasm, Cherry’s phone started ringing. It was Bill Ellis calling, not for Mark, but for her! Bill has an assignment that really needs “a woman’s perspective.” We’ll find out what that means when the story resumes.

But this is quite the novelty. I can find no instance where Cherry has gone on any kind of assignment for Bill Ellis. Of course, there is the chance that this is just another practical joke by Jules Rivera, as we might discover that Bill called to get advice on a wedding present or help with some relationship issue. So, I’m hoping this call is legit. It will be another innovation to the Mark Trail strip, of which there have been several. For those who came in late, let’s review some:

  • Expanded frequency of stories centered on other family members. There have been stories by previous cartoonists that featured Cherry, Rusty, Doc, and even Andy. But Rivera promoted Cherry to co-star status, rather than her former “and featuring” credit.
  • Expanded or reshaped family personalities. As new blog follower Doghouse Reilly noted, Rusty is more like a real kid and less like an introverted, zombie-sock puppet pining to go fishing with Pop. In fact, this Rusty hates fishing! Rivera’s Cherry started as a feisty, elbows-up owner of her own business, with three siblings: a welcome change from the “I’m waiting for Mark” version. Doc shows up infrequently as a reactivated veterinarian and banjo player.
  • A “closed set” of opponents, rivals, and knuckleheads. Rivera has developed a rotating cast of largely incompetent troublemakers for Mark and Cherry. Like villains in the 1960s Batman, not much happens to them when they are disarmed, defeated, or arrested.
  • Parody. At first, Rivera took delight in poking fun at Mark and other traditions of the strip. It was refreshing to see Mark out of his depth or lose a fight. Rivera took the ubiquitous daily animal, and stuck it awkwardly in a corner like a statue, looking at us. However, this has all become normalized and annoying.
  • A dramatic change in the artwork. Aside from complaints about stories, this gets the most bad press. Rivera’s earliest work was edgy, like a graphic novel, with creative perspectives, layouts, and a more representational style. Even a talking snake! The art soon morphed into a more flat, sketchy, and feckless style. There are several likely reasons for the change in artwork. But now is not the time or place for that discussion.

Another contribution from Rivera is the customized title panels on Sundays. Today’s panel is a good, if expected, design. The webbing is heavy-handed and not convincing. The pun is better than average.

Turnabout is fair play

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Wow! I certainly didn’t see this call coming! I’m not sure whether to be excited or fearful. Will Mark be the one this time to see off Cherry as she goes on assignment? Will this be a Mr. Mom story? And why wouldn’t Bill Ellis call Mark’s rival, Kelly Welly, who also fits the female profile? There’s a lot that could happen as a result of this phone call, so it may be best for me to just shut up and wait for the dailies to resume on Monday.  Looks like we’re moving into uncharted territory!

Art Dept. After all this time, I can’t get over how Mark’s facial anatomy changes so easily from frame to frame. Not sure why. Rivera recently posted on BlueSky “It’s been five years since I took over Mark Trail and my cartoon son has never looked better.” I’d beg to differ, and I’d have to ask, which image did you have in mind?

And so “The Call” finally comes in!

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From the appearance of Mark’s hair in panel 4, I’m going to guess they actually found that big bush I suggested yesterday. As far as things go, it’s a bit late in the week for Mark to get a call from Bill Ellis. Normally, a Bill Ellis conversation consumes at least two days of strips. Oh, I just realized:  Rivera could dedicate most of next week to Ellis’s phone call!  

Maybe Mark and Cherry wouldn’t get interrupted so often if a) they left their phones back at the cabin (which they’ve done before); or b) they didn’t spend so much time on nature walks.

Art Dept. The art today is disappointing, not only with regard to odd human proportions here and there, and the inclusion of another flattened cutout animal image, but also the persistent use of those vague, autumn-colored trees. But golly gee willikers, Rivera could at least take the trouble to make the foliage look more naturalistic. On the other hand, from a purely design point of view, I think the drawing of Cherry’s hair in panel 3 is a nicely stylized arrangement of black and red contrasts, enlivened by the curves and pointy shapes in the hair. But it kind of sticks out from the rest of the drawing, which could not keep up.

Maybe these two should just go find a big bush for a while.

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You remember what I wrote on Monday about the relationship of Nature to humans and vice-versa? Well, maybe we need to put that thought aside for a while. And for the record: No. I cannot explain the anatomy of that yellow tree in panel 1.

Art Dept. As we know, consistency is not part of the Mark Trail aesthetic. For example, various aspects of Mark’s head and face can change from day to day, panel to panel. Take Mark’s eyebrows. Please! I can’t figure out if Rivera is using Mark to channel Groucho Marx, Eugene Levy, or Ayushmann Khurrana. I’m leaning towards Groucho, who infamously painted on his moustache and thick eyebrows. Just check out panel 2, where Mark’s left eyebrow wraps around the head, but is completely flat. This is repeated in panel 4, where the eyebrows are also almost 50% taller.

The itsy, bitsy spider

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Jules Rivera continues her campaign to move Cherry Trail away from the one-time self-reliant, “put up your dukes”, creative thinker that she once was. Instead, we see total panic take over today. Now, I admit that arachnophobia is a real condition. But, living in the forest as she has been doing for many years, Cherry should already know that the venomous brown recluse usually builds nests in darker, isolated locations, not out in exposed, open areas. She’s more likely to run across that spider in a closet of her cabin, in a work shed, or a woodpile. 

There are several reasons this phobia has persisted through the centuries. One leading hypothesis is that it is based on longstanding reinforced cultural and social influences. Many people also seem to have a general dislike of spiders and get rid of them, perhaps because they think of them as insects, in spite of the fact that spiders are not insects, but help control insect populations, even in the home. But there are positives to keep in mind!

Less than 1% of the 43000 spider species around the world are venomous. Also, the spider is a popular subject in literature and storytelling. Anansi is a spider of great importance in African folklore and storytelling, often used to teach life lessons or just entertain. The spider as trickster and instructor is also found in various Native American cultures. We have the modern superhero, Spiderman, whose powers originated from the bite of a radioactive spider. Oh, I don’t want to forget to mention the 1930s pulp-era vigilante, The Spider, a more violent version of The Shadow. Certainly, his name was chosen to reinforce fear in the criminal underworld he worked against. He did not dress as a spider, however.

Rivera managed to work in a reference to bears and we wind up talking about Chinese painting

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Wow, Cherry’s exclamation in panel 4 was really unexpected, right!?  I mean, who would expect that after all of this nature talk, something ironic would occur? 

One might be given to thinking that, after so many years being married and living in Lost Forest (even ignoring the pre-Rivera years), Mark and Cherry would have long run out of platitudes and affirmations about nature by now. However, one high note is that we can hope Mark admonishes Cherry for her destruction of a spider’s (temporary) domicile and meal factory. Mark can’t play favorites, can he?

Art Dept. I’m glad to see, at long last, a bit more variety in panel layouts. We get a bird’s eye view in panel 1 (complete with the required bird) and a worm’s eye view in panel 2 (minus the worm, because it must have been consumed by the cardinal). 

But there is more to this than just adding different viewpoints! 

The first two panels visually emphasize Mark and Cherry as figures within nature, as they rhapsodize over its many splendors. This reminds me of classic Chinese landscape painting, where nature predominates and people are just very small travelers and nature lovers. 

The last two panels zoom in on Mark and Cherry to deliver the unneeded joke. The focus shifts to Cherry’s personal interaction with, and reaction to, the spider web. So, the position of Nature moves from the macro to the micro. And very importantly, it is in the service of reinforcing the dialog. Now, that is good design!

Nerdy Art History Note: Am I saying that Rivera was influenced by Chinese art or philosophy? I have no idea. It is a rather grandiose comparison, after all. It may be nothing more than the commonality of ideas that transcend time, place, and ethnicity. If you are not familiar with Chinese landscape painting, do an online search for “Travelers Among Mountains and Streams” by Fan Kuan, a painter of the Northern Song dynasty. Find some good images. You’ll likely need to view separate detailed images to find the travelers.

A week without a story can sometimes be a welcome change.

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Nature walks are becoming the new “flapjack dinner” post-adventure Mark Trail ritual. There is some merit in that, insofar as it promotes a more healthy lifestyle than wolfing down flattened pieces of fried dough smothered in liquid sugar and butter. Not that a plate of hotcakes and bacon isn’t a wonderful breakfast from time to time. Yum Yum!

Mark and Cherry’s nature walks might even encourage readers to get off their duffs and enjoy the diversity of lifeforms, the smells of flowers and leaves, and simple pleasures of a walk in the woods or even a local park. So, do you feel adventurous yet?

I’m not going to predict the rest of the week, but …  oh well, we can at least assume this week will consist of Mark and Cherry hanging out with each other until one or both of them gets called on by their bosses. Or their relatives. Or something happens.  I just hope we don’t see another bear this week.

Art Dept. It’s already well into Fall down in Lost Forest, though I think Jules Rivera is a bit premature. Easy mistake to make, living in southern California. That landscape sure looks to be one of the scruffiest areas in Lost Forest! I can’t say I appreciate the 2D interpretation of vegetation we see here in panel 1, as if the trees were cut out of construction paper and pasted onto the panel. The landscape in panel 3 is almost surreal, or rather, a heavy-handed attempt to create a George Herriman-style landscape, as if Krazy Kat lived in the American southeast, rather than the southwest. I might be looking at this with a too historical eye.

The Week in Review and the Sunday Nature Chat

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Miss this past week? The polluted lake story finally came to an end. Finally! Rivera even spelled it out, so clumsy doofs like me don’t miss it.

In any event, Mark and Happy worked like high school kids doing class reports the night before they were due. Happy found out that Chedderson had a granddaughter (sporting a similar hair feature) who might shame Chett into doing the right thing once she read their article in Teen Girl Sparkle. That’s a lot of assumptions for somebody he doesn’t even know. But wouldn’t you know it, she does read the magazine and did, in fact, called Gramps to complain. And just like that, Chett Chedderson went on the air and reported that his company would clean the Lost Forest waters. 

I’m not especially satisfied with the perfunctory way the story moved to its conclusion, since it relied on the off chance a young girl would act as Happy predicted. But as we have seen, time and time again, Rivera is not interested in serious storytelling as far as actual drama and sophisticated plots are concerned. Instead, it is all about simple storylines, bad jokes, and weird characters. Not that those are bad techniques that should be excluded, or that the story ideas are bad. It’s fine to include these features, but they shouldn’t be the extent of the plotting. Instead, they all get blended into some kind of story smoothie that lacks seriousness, real drama, or depth.

Looks like the prediction of groundhog/gophers/prairie dogs being the Sunday topic didn’t pan out. But bears, again!? There are thousands of animal species, along with countless natural sights and features, so I don’t know why Rivera keeps returning to bears, both on Sundays and in regular stories. Well, at least it gives Rivera more opportunities to improve her bear drawing, which appears to be working! I’ll also add that today’s strip shows a greater attention to detail and layouts than we’ve seen lately (excluding Mark’s ubiquitous presence).

Still, I’m all in for more diversity/variety in the Sunday topics.

The Cheddersons cave as the Trails cheer.

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Does Happy’s patronizing comment in panel 4 reflect Rivera’s own general opinion of the male of the species? Of course, it is completely unfair of me to make that observation, since writers/cartoonists are under no obligation to make characters adhere to their own social, political, or religious viewpoints. And rightly so! In fact, I’ve often advised people to not try to learn about the private lives of their musical, artistic, or thespian favorites. Just enjoy their work and create your own private view of the artist. But Happy’s comments are still embarrassing. 

Can we say that Happy’s statement was made in order to cast a negative view on the readers of this comic strip, by assuming they (we) are a bunch of old, chauvinistic, out-of-touch males? 

Or do we just accept it at face value that Happy Trail, himself, is some obsolete relic of the 1950s?

However, I think this whole ending sequence, suggesting that their article’s success was based primarily on a little girl’s prodding, is unfortunate. This is not a swipe against granddaughters (even though I only have grandsons). It’s just that it comes off as some kind of deus ex machina. It trivializes what was supposed to have actually happened (or what would have happened) if the story had been given any degree of gravitas.

Mark questions his influence

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I’m puzzled by Mark’s motivation about getting justice for Rusty. I mean, it seemed he was initially concerned about the source and effects of pollution on the lake, itself, which is proper, not so much assuaging Rusty’s feelings. I must have missed something along the way. As for any influence of an article published in an online teen magazine, who knows, in spite of Happy’s optimism. Shouldn’t Mark also be sending his research on to the regional and state pollution boards (or whatever they call it over there)? Well, the comic strip world and the Trailverse have their own laws of reality that we, in the real world, can only marvel at. Or laugh at.

Art Dept. I think the composition in panel 1 is an interesting departure from the closed-in, eye-level layouts we’ve been seeing. Having Mark talk a walk outside with Happy behind him is a cinematic trope that reinforces Mark’s doubts as he airs his feelings. It would have also been nice to get some advice from his old confidant, Ralph the rat snake.

On the other hand, I am physically put off by Happy’s facial expressions in panel 3 and panel 4. The “smile” looks positively lecherous, and the heavy-handed inking of the mouth doesn’t help. 

And the winning publication is …

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Well, as I suspected, Bill did turn to one of his other magazines and went with Teen Girl Sparkle. Of course, Mark should not be surprised (panel 4), given his publishing history with that magazine. So, why does Rivera go the route of causing Mark (never mind Happy) to look gobsmacked? Maybe it was to continue her joke (ha-ha) about Mark Trail—the macho wildlife writer and fisticuffs aficionado—publishing articles in a magazine dedicated to adolescent and teenage girls (like the old 16 magazine).

I suppose that we could also be puzzled by Mark and Happy’s seat swapping that happened between panel 1 and panel 4. Or maybe it was an unconscious transfer of position by Rivera that happened between panel 3 and panel 4, instead. Having drawn Mark and Happy from the point of view of the monitor, Rivera could have absently maintained the left-right seating when she composed panel 4. Some conspiracists might argue that there was a time warp caused by an occurrence of the chrono-synclastic infundibulum that allowed Mark and Happy to go get refills on their coffee and sit down in each other’s seats, all at once.

We’ve all been there, right? I say that in jest but consider those Tik-Tok (Bik-Bok in the Trailverse) vids where the videos are published “backwards”, in mirror image of the originals (e.g. all text is backwards). Is that relevant? Maybe, maybe not; but it’s what popped into my head while searching for something actually useful to say. And it just takes too much effort to come up with anything more clever at this point.

Is this a question of professional ethics or just realpolitik?

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Well, this is a side of Mark Trail that we don’t see too often, and possibly never saw in the pre-Rivera iterations: that getting articles accepted sometimes took a lot of work or just got rejected out of hand. Mark offers an unsolicited article, of course, so it has a steeper acceptance hill to climb over. Regardless of how we feel Rivera has portrayed this situation, it’s a noteworthy expansion to the Trailverse Tradition. 

This is the second time Mark’s work has been rejected. His earlier rejection happened at the end of his New York visit, where he sat in on an AI roundtable discussion (“AI-AI-Oh!”). But it would certainly get tiresome to see this become a regular bit. 

I think we also have here a situation in which Rivera satirizes the current trend of corporate influence in mass media. Bill Ellis is the “man in the middle”, trying to keep afloat between Boardroom Pressures and the writers who just want to have their work criticized on their professional merits, not for adherence to the owner’s political agenda.

As far as the plot, itself, goes, I’m wondering whether this golf criticism excuse is going to be the end or whether Rivera will have Ellis come back to say that not all of the magazines have golf sponsors, so Mark should start checking his bank account for a deposit. 

Art Dept. Okay, I’m not sure what the specific animal is in panel 4 (other than some kind of rodent) and I’m especially bothered by that strange black patch. But after studying it, I’m thinking this “rodent of unusual size” is staring up at a great horned owl, based on the shape of that black patch on his body and worried that he is about to become its dinner.

Who didn’t see this coming!?

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As expected, roadblocks from Bill Ellis. So, the hoped-for publication choice, Outdoor Living, seems to be a dead end. As a reminder, Bill Ellis is no longer simply the editor of Woods and Wildlife, but more like the managing editor for F.E. and Cook, the company that acquired Woods and Wildlife, along with 16 or so other periodicals. So much for the background, as I know it. 

This must be a “dramatic point” in the story: What to do? Will Ellis simply choose another one of the magazines he represents or do Mark and Happy peddle their work elsewhere? Again, let me remind everybody that Mark is considered only a freelancer for F.E. and Cook. Oooh! The suspense is palpable.

Mark opens negotiations from a position of strength by announcing his dad will participate.

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I give up! The story continues, after all. Anyway, this is not a phone call! Certainly Teams or Zoom. The history of video conferencing actually goes back about 100 years, with phone hookups popular in the 1990s and later. Heck if they had been using their smartphones and cameras, Rivera’s opening comment would be more accurate. But all this is really beside the point. Let’s get back on track.

Mark and Happy are trying to sell their article to magazine editor and publisher, Bill Ellis, who is so perplexed that a father and son share the same name that he falls back on repeating hackneyed Mark Trail snarks.

But for now, sit back, ladies and gentlemen, as we (possibly) get to watch how Mark tries to sell an uncommissioned report and earn some money.

Is there any doubt whether Ellis will buy Mark and Happy’s report? Will Ellis once again insist that Mark obscure the Chedderson’s names as well as the name of the resort before he will accept and publish it?

Art Dept. We get another view of the Trail cabin, this one looking more like the earliest version of the cabin Rivera drew, complete with prominent front porch and a greenhouse in the back yard. 

The Week in Review and the Sunday Nature Chat

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This was “investigation week” in Lost Forest! That’s one week. The story began in late June. Omitting a few weeks for Cherry’s peacock adventure, the rest of the time was devoted to a backyard party at Ranger Shaw’s house, followed by the “vacation” at Chedderland. That would be around 8 weeks, though I didn’t do an exact count. The point is, little time was spent on anything approaching an investigation. To be fair, it’s not as if the pre-Rivera “Mark Trail” was an orthodox nature reporter, either. We rarely saw him taking photos on assignment, much less writing his stories and articles. 

So this week showed summary views (I presume) of taking water samples, conducting interviews, and working and writing on the laptop. At least, this investigating sequence presents a part of the Tradition we rarely see, even if it was severely truncated. But is it actually the end of the story? I don’t know. Happy Trail did proclaim they were finished. 

Cherry was impressed by Mark and Happy’s energy and father-son bonding. Rusty, acting his age, thought they were nuts for working during a vacation.

I will revise my grade to a “C” on the basis of this last week. I have already commented on what I think was a bad choice in the order of events, as well as over-emphasizing the entire Chedderland experience, which Rivera used to sandwich in a week of Cherry’s peacock story. But the story lacked any real sense of drama, suspense, or seriousness.

Leaving out the obvious and repetitious puns, this is an informative snapshot on a bit of otter anatomy. The link of otters and water pollution certainly ties into Mark’s current adventure, though they have no presence in Mark’s story, as far as we’ve seen.

Happy is feeling it. Do you feel it, too?

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Rivera leaves out most of the details and skips to the wrap-up of the investigation. But what are the results? Do they confirm Mark’s suspicions or point elsewhere? Maybe we’ll learn more next week.

I wonder: Would it make a more effective story if she did include more of the investigative details, other than the symbolic first day of testing and the brief interview with Ranger Shaw? I’m thinking there could be some drama with Mark and Happy sneaking around the perimeter of the golf resort at night, for example. And what about those hikes!? Where did they go and what for?

Well, this is Saturday, so Monday would be the turnover to Cherry for her face time. I got fooled the last time, thinking the story ended. This might be the end of the scene, but it doesn’t feel like the end of the story, itself. Do you have a different opinion?

Otherwise, I reckon I can’t complain much. Rivera did have Mark perform an actual investigation, even if we only saw a few highlights. I still think the golfing chapter was more or less a waste of time as it was presented. As I noted before, it should have been placed after this investigation. So who knows, maybe they’ll return to the golf resort and give Chett and Brett a copy of their article. I may say more on Sunday and try to not be repetitive about it.

Going where the evidence leads or leading the evidence where you want it to go?

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Sure, for the purposes of the story, it certainly looks like the Chedderson family is going to be the guilty party. However, for the sake of honesty and journalistic integrity, shouldn’t Rivera ensure Mark maintained a more-or-less neutral position, at least until he found enough inculpatory evidence? 

As we know, Mark believed the golf course was the polluter from the moment he heard about its existence at the start of this story. A good team of lawyers could probably tie Mark up in any court proceeding for months, if not years, based on his premature accusations on the golf course and his prior relations with Chedderson. “A personal and professional grudge”, they will claim. “Obviously tainted evidence cherrypicked to cast doubt and blame, etc.”

Sorry, Mark: The Cheddersons are not brothers or “bros.” They are father-and-son. 

As for Cherry, I’ve come to believe Rivera is working on turning her into the conventional Cherry of old:  nice, pretty, but somewhat dim. A loyal wife who can’t put 2+2 together and is mildly overwhelmed by masculine exuberance. And that’s a shame.