Panel 1: Rusty is ecstatic. With Mark gone, he gets to eat.

Panel 2: We're reminded for the hundredth time that a wetland is being drained away, but now we know that Many Miles Away is south of Lost Forest.

Panel 3: Mark is an insensitive bastard, pointing out how old Pop is. He went and got his hair dyed and everything. Way to crush the bones in his hand to powder, jerk.

Every time Mark Trail does his job, Bambi dies in the arms of a child from Many Miles Away. Needless to say, Mark enjoys his job.

Of course Rusty is fine with coming back early. Look at him: gaunt, weary, wafer thin. Mark Trail clearly forgot to feed him. Still, we all learned a valuable lesson. Stay away from Kelly Welly. She's got VD. It's about time Rusty and Mark were taught about the birds and the bees.

Mark Trail of Tears

It's been two weeks since an update. Two weeks. I'm kicking myself for being lazy, but I had no internet in New York and no real desire to blog right afterward. Now I get to run through all of the Mark Trail I've missed in the last two weeks, because I'm a swell kinda guy...the kinda swell that mocks American Indians, I guess.

8/1/08

Mark was just commenting on how stupid his wife, Kelly, and all women are when, out of freakin' nowhere, a horse appears. Mark can't believe it, so he goes to investigate with his skillet of bacon, which doubles as a dandy murder weapon in case the horse is really a monster.

8/2/08

Mark is woefully in the dark about the events of the past few months, because all he's going to find at home is an angry old man drinking beer with a shotgun on his lap, sweating about the fate of his daughter.

8/4/08

A recap, then Moss Green admitting that he's not fast enough to keep up with Kelly. Big shock. Panel three is awesome though, this totally dejected look like Moss and Kelly slept together but he couldn't get the job done, so, as soon as he was asleep, she was gone.

8/5/08

The wind is getting stronger. The horse thinks that the rocks could be dangerous. Kelly's horse has been tied to a huge chain of sasuage links. This means one thing: Kelly is climbing higher.

8/6/08

The valley below the mountain is of the opinion that it is safer down there.

8/7/08

Kelly and Cherry are pretty much fucked, while the lion leads her cubs to shelter. Perhaps the two parties will join together in a bid for survival, with each learning about the other as their struggle goes on?

8/8/08

That's what she said.

8/9/08

The rock slide found Cherry and Kelly's hiding place just in time. Now all they've got to do is block them inside and seal them away from society forever!

8/11/08

There's plenty of space to crawl between, and hell, some of those rocks look easy to push out of the way. Kelly just doesn't feel like putting any effort into her rescue.

8/12/08

The mountain hopes that it didn't kill the horses. Kelly points out that they won't know unless the mountain frees them from its cave.

8/13/08
Moss Green is getting stoned rather than looking for Cherry and Kelly. I like how "Buck" Roger is pretty much an afterthought, even though he's Kelly's right hand man.

Gah! Mark Trail! In his own strip! Extolling patience during this extremely long, drawn out, boring storyline! Mark! Don't leave! Punch Rusty, punch the dog, just please, please don't leave.

Also: Why is Roger such a fucking bitch?

The Terror of Kelly Welly

For those of you not up on your Mark Trail, the current storyline involves Mark taking his youthful charge Rusty out on a camping trip, but complications appear to be rising, as Mark's wife Cherry has invited free wheelin' 'tang Kelly Welly along to take pictures, which creeps mark out, because her name is really Kelly Welly and he would rather punch the hell out of dog nappers than have sex with anybody, wife included.

It would also appear that Kelly talked Cherry into some explicit filmed action outside the parameters of taking pictures of the animals. Perhaps tasteful adult postcards. For no reason at all, we switch to an outside view where two birds appear to be carrying on Mark and Cherry's conversation (I really like the name "Cherry Trail"), where Cherry demands to take care of the situation herself.

Cherry would, in summation, like be molested on film by her rival for Mark's affections (or something like that), so that Mark can "have fun" with his adopted son.

The name "Rusty Trail" is just gross.