Archive: Mark Trail

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Rex Morgan, M.D., 6/19/07

Every time he opens his mouth, Hugh serves as a further indictment of the English public school system, keeping in mind that in the crazy mixed-up world on the other side of the pond “public” means “private and very, very exclusive.” At whatever posh boarding school he went to, he clearly didn’t pay very close attention in Introduction To Talking To The Lower Orders So That They Can Almost But Not Quite Tell That You Hold Them In Contempt.

The last two day’s worth of this soap opera strip actually achieve something that most gag-a-day strips flop at, which is good timing. Yesterday, June curtly informed Hugh that she was in the medical business but wasn’t a doctor; clearly he’s been standing in the doorway, gears grinding in his blond, mop-topped head, trying to get his mind around the concept, before he amusingly stumbles in and continues the thought in panel three.

Crock, 6/19/07

I have long been concerned about the Desert Sage’s home, which I think is supposed to be a cave but is always depicted as the same unnatural bright yellow as the rest of Crock’s desert setting. It’s as if he’s living in a sand castle, one with an entrance so large as to render the whole thing structurally impossible. Today is the first time I can remember seeing this hovel from the back, which makes it clear that it’s really about the size of a single person; it also appears to only be about forty feet from the Foreign Legion fortress, which sort of takes away a little of the Sage’s isolated hermit mystique. On the other hand, given how tiny his sand castle/cave/whatever it is, it’s probably for the best that he can just go knock on the Legionnaires’ door when he has to use the bathroom.

Mark Trail, 6/19/07

There’s something heartbreakingly tender about the Mark’s facial expression and the way he’s cradling that dead duck. It’s as if he’s saying, “Gosh, you sure were a noble and beautiful creature! If things were different, you’d be flying free, a gorgeous bird up in the sky! I’m going to give you the dignified funeral you deserve, just as soon as I finish tearing open your torso and poking around inside your digestive tract.” Frankly, I expected that when he found the duck he’d immediately start punching the corpse and shouting “WHERE ARE SAM’S EYES? WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH SAM’S EYES?

And yes, as many of you have pointed out, that “female” mallard clearly has male markings. Can anyone who gets this strip in the paper tell us if the coloring is implied in black and white, or was added later by non-animal-loving colorists?

Family Circus, 6/19/07

The Family Circus children are always unnaturally small, but the trend has reached a really disturbing point today. Either Jeffy is only eighteen inches from head to toe or Grandma is a terrifying giant. Either way, she can probably just crush him like a mosquito with her book if he keeps nattering on like this.

Mary Worth, 6/19/07

From: Dr. Jeff Corey <jefffcorey3@yahoo.it>
To: {undisclosed recipients}
Subject: EXPECTING YOUR REPLY

My name is Dr Jeff Corey ,”special friend” to Mary Worth, widower to Jack Worth, accountant of REPSOL PETROLEUM AND GAS company in Equatorial Guinea. I am 69years old, suffering from long time cancer of the prostate. From all indications my condition is really deteriorating and it’s quite obvious that I won’t live more than expectations according to my doctors.This is because the cancer stage has gotten to a very bad stage. I want your pity but i need your trust.

My “special friend” is wealthy from her husbands ill-gotten gains and has allowed me to manage her finances,but she only spends the money on cravats and pool parties,she does not care about the poor or needy.The doctor has advised me that I will not live for more than few months, so I have now decided to use my access to her accounts to spread all her wealth, to contribute mainly to repairing CLEFT PALATES in VEITNAM.

Before my “special friend’s” late husband died he was a major oil tycoon as I said,and deposited the sum of US$14,000,000.00( Fourteen million dollars) in one of the Security Finance Firm in the Netherlands. i need you to collect this funds and distribute it according to the God wishes and for charity . so that when i die my soul can rest in peace, instead of being doomed to hell like my “special friend”.

The funds will be entirely in your hands and management; i beg you to send them to “peace village hanoi” in VEITNAM. i hope God givesyou the wisdom to touch many lives,that is my main concern. 20% of this money will be for your time and effort,while 80% goes to charity. So if you know you can assist me then forward to me immediately the following informations to my email (drjeffc0rey@yahoo.es): FULL NAMES AND ADDRESS, PRIVATE PHONE, YOUR NATIONALITY, OCCUPATION, AGE and your Marital Startus.

May God bless and protect you always.
Dr. Jeff Corey

They’ll Do It Every Time, 6/19/07

Curmudgeon domination of TDIET continues! This one comes from faithful reader Dan B. “Hoo-ray for generalizations!” he says.

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Gil Thorp, 6/15/07

“I got a haircut … from the aliens that abducted me! I don’t think they understand the concept of ‘haircuts,’ actually, but it was free and all.”

I successfully called this one yesterday, not that being able to predict the twists and turns of this simultaneously obvious and moronic storyline ought to garner me anything but shame. Pissy little whiny baby Brynna will still be mad, since Lisa Wyche seems to have scored a wig that looks more or less like her actual hair rather than some cancer turban. This battle won’t end until the upcoming unfortunate mutual decapitation incident.

Family Circus, 6/15/07

“Of course, we made Grandma into jerky! She’ll stay good for months.”

Mark Trail, 6/15/07

There’s something unutterably creepy about panel three, in which Mark is gazing lovingly at the blinded Sam while sexily straddling a chair, and it’s not just because I saw Crazy Love the other night, either. Meanwhile, as usual, the forces of good prove to be less dumb than the forces of evil by only a miniscule amount. Despite the fact the Evil County Commissioners are open about their quest to get a new airport built, Mark will need to go back to the scene of the crime and find some revealing eyehook before his feeble synapses start to fire and the punching begins.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 6/15/07

Ah, the old “my father never loved me” routine, eh? It’s a bold move, but when you’re trying to bed your lookalike stepmother when they haven’t even fished your father’s cold corpse out of the North Atlantic yet, you’ve got to pull out the big guns.

Pluggers, 6/15/07

So pluggers watch movies to see the non-human mammalian characters? This may be the most reasonable and logical Pluggers ever.

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Pluggers, 6/11/07

Plugger moms are going to kill themselves within the hour … but only after they have the satisfaction of killing their kids first.

OK, that’s horrible, but you tell me what else that facial expression could possibly lead to. This officially is the most horrifyingly depressing Pluggers ever, outpacing even the “Rhino-man plugger hocks his decades-old TV to keep the bill collectors at bay for another week” installment.

Speaking of horrible, I don’t want to take this in a direction that will lead to anyone, anywhere producing Pluggers porn (and if you do produce it I will not link to it you cannot make me) but I’m a bit confused by this plugger mom’s bustline, since I’m reasonably sure she’s supposed to be a kangaroo. Shouldn’t she have a single nipple in her pouch? And shouldn’t her kid actually be a tiny, salamander-like embryo, nestled safely in said pouch leaving both of her arms free? It sure would be a lot easier on her if that’s how it worked, I’ll tell you that.

Gil Thorp, 6/11/07

I’m sorry, I simply cannot abide the hideous claw-hands in Gil Thorp (see also here (where my prediction was totally borne out, by the way, not that it was very difficult) and here). Other than the fact that Coach Mrs. Coach Thorp looks like she’s about the scratch off her Joker-like face in panel three, though, this is pretty nifty. I particularly like the fact that Ponytailed Girl Whose Name I Forget (I Think She Works For The School Newspaper Maybe?) appears to be holding back her friends in panel one, as if they’re so enraged by their coach’s cancer-free state that they’re planning to hold her down and beat some cancer into her.

Thanks to a faithful reader (Uncle Lumpy?) for the new nickname “Yul Brynna” for the newly shaven-headed former Brynna Antenna. Unfortunately, I’m probably never going to get a chance to use it, as she appears to have fled the softball diamond, and, presumably, the greater Milford area, due to her shame.

Mark Trail, 6/11/07

The fact that Sam Hill has been blinded by a high-speed blast of shattered glass and shredded duck viscera flying right into her eyes is awfully convenient — not for her, obviously, but for Mark. This way, he’ll be able to take his new lover back to Lost Forest; because she can’t see, she won’t even notice that Mark already has a wife and adopted son. Cherry won’t notice the new order of things either, of course, because she’ll be ’luded to the gills, as always. Rusty’s electronic ankle bracelet will ensure that he never leaves the backyard pen.

Hagar the Horrible, 6/11/07

Somebody help me out here. The “joke” in this strip is supposed to be that Hagar’s supposedly fierce company of Viking warriors have fled in terror at the mere mention of Attila’s name, right? So, what’s the deal with the tall grass? Have they been killed and laid low in the grass by Attila’s short and stealthy warriors? Does the grass merely serve to evoke the limitless steppe, home to nomadic peoples like the Huns? Is it meant to make an otherwise dull panel interesting, or, conversely, to save the trouble of drawing Hagar’s disturbingly potato-like feet? What? What?

Slylock Fox, 6/11/07

You might think that being a fox detective is glamorous, that it’s all high-profile media events and fancy tea parties and exclusive nightclubs. But be warned: you will occasionally be called down to the trailer park to figure out just who is throwing rocks at whom. It’s probably a good thing that Slylock’s there to keep the peace, as Rachel Rabbit looks pissed, and I have a feeling that her screams of “You’re lucky my bunnydaddy ain’t here!”, echoing throughout the park as she kicks the thin metal side of Chez Rat, would soon be immortalized in a heavy-rotation episode of COPS.

This strip deserves kudos for not going with the classist but all-too-obvious “Reeky Rat obviously lives in filth, and thus would not under any circumstances be engaged in ‘housecleaning'” solution.