His good side?

May 29, 2009


Panel 1:Like I said yesterday, Sherlock Holmes.

Panel 2:Again, why not just show us the problem? Oh wait, I know why. Because it's just easier to photoshop Mark's face in with a bit o' dialogue:









Panel 3:Wow, if this panel doesn't capture the child-like naivete of Mark Trail, I don't know what does. His bafflement at why someone might engage in illegal dumping (and on private property!) is laughable. Has he never heard of disposal fees? How about profit margins? Even for those of us unschooled in economics and unfamiliar with the term "externality," it's possilbe to conceive of scenarios in which firms seeking to maximize their profits might seek to minimize their operating costs by engaging in illegal behavior. Of course, most (all?) of us are not androgynous naturalists and men of action and, thus, most of us have the 2-3 spare minutes required to contemplate such things. Mark, on the other hand, is both the androgynous naturalist and a man of action and is waaaaaaay too busy kicking ass, taking names, and avoiding the sexual advances of the frustrated Cherry to waste his time thinking.

Real life.

May 28, 2009


Panel 1: He's a regular Sherlock Fucking Holmes, that Mark Trail. No doubt, he's made an extensive study of tread patterns and correlated them to the track depth created by a wide variety of vehicle body types and weight. This, of course, explains how he knows a van made those prints and not a heavily-laden Oscar Mayer Weinermobile parked for the evening.

Panel 2: Now, I'm no artist, but is all this exposition really necessary? Couldn't the JS have adopted the novel (for it) bird's eye persepective and shown us the tracks backing up to the cliff with Mark saying something ludicrous (but brief!), such as: "Hm. The van backed up to this cliff. Why?"

Panel 3: Having adopted my artistic and textual suggestions for panel 2, the JS would be well-advised to use the following panel for panel 3:

I think you'll agree that this is a much more appropriate response to finding a gigantic toxic dump in the middle of the woods than whatever Mark is going to say tomorrow...

It's bad, but it's not Rusty.

May 27, 2009


Panel 1:"Look Andy, I can make it flap it's wings. Fly away, little birdie, fly away, the ReAnimator has freed you from the bonds of death!"

Panel 2:I don't quite get Mark's logic as I'm unaware of squirrels having any special susceptability to toxic substances. Nonetheless, I'll over look that, given the total awesomeness of the dead squirrel in question. If I didn't know any better, I'd say the Jackelrod Sphere took a pre-existing picture of a running squirrel and lay it on its side on the ground...

Panel 3:Okay, so using facial expressions to determine where a particular event lies on the scale of things that sends Mark into a tizzy, I think we can identify the following two-step hierarchy:

The Elf getting kidnapped is worse than squirrels dying.

If I have the time, it might be worth reviewing the archives to refine this a bit. I'll see what I can do.

Toxic schlock.

May 26, 2009


Panel 1: "I know this because the giant, spiny phallus tells me so."

Panel 2: Mark, we went over this already. It was the lead...in the study with a revolver.

Panel 3: Really fucking smart Mark. Animals are dropping like flies due to lead poisoning and you let Andy off-leash to find the source? What's wrong, tired of his shaggy ass always hanging around? Looking for an easy way to get rid of him?

May 25, 2009


Panel Zero: I'm eschewing the three-panel format for my comments today to point out what a fucking mess this strip was on Monday. I mean, the art is adequate as always, the dialoge in each panel is more or less sensible, but taken as a whole the strip is nonsensical. Consider: In panel 1, Mark is going to try and find out why animals are dying. There's an admirable lack of certitude there, not to mention the recognition that stuff is dying. Jump over to panel 2. Suddenly, Howdy-Doody is wondering whether death is serious and Mark's camera is brimming with confidence that Mark and it WILL find out what's going on. Get to panel 3 and Mark has caught whatever it is that Howdy-Doody has and is now wondering whether something that can kill you is dangerous. Moreover, throughout the strip, it's pretty clear that everyone has forgotten that extreme lead toxicity has already been identified as the culprit in the animal deaths. The only thing Mark needs to find out is the source of the lead.

This is my "lab"

May 23, 2009


Panel 1:Wait! Doc, don't answer that. Let me guess. Ummmmm.... On the ground?

Panel 2:"It wasn't too close, either. It was just right."

Panel 3:Ahhh...the joys of the rustic science lab. The antiquated three-lens, single eye-piece microscope. The lonely Erlenmeyer Flask. The empty ephedrine boxes and rusty tins of paint thinner. The syringes....you know, I wonder if Doc is feeling kind of itchy and irritable right about now?

A little whine with your superfluous adverbs?

May 22, 2009


Panel 1:The Jackelrod Sphere has taken an interesting approach to today's panel. It has, more or less, cut and pasted yesterday's panel 3 into today's panel 1. However, it has also taken the time to erase the talking skunk, replace it with a jogging rabbit, and then, perhaps to add an air of authenticity to the entire enterprise, drawn in some stem and grass details in the foreground. In the process, the truck hasn't perceptibly moved and, yet, our silhouetted malfeasor continues to "direct" the truck. All in all, this panel leaves me feeling a bit unsettled this morning. I mean, why all the effort if the the end result is essentially unchanged?

Panel 2:Our midnight bandits are unloading 55 gallon drums of toxic waste by pushing them by hand. A gallon of water weighs roughly 8 pounds and the materials in those drums isn't going to weigh much less than that. As a result, a 55 gallon drum of liquid, toxic or otherwise, is going to weigh upwards of 440 pounds. These, fair readers, are some super macho criminals we're dealing with here. Mark Trail is going to have his hands full trying to beat them into submission.

Panel 3:When you go to a bagel shop do you say, "I'll have a sesame bagel, and also some cream cheese." When your spouse asks you to go to the grocery store does she say, "Please get some chips and also some salsa." When you describe your vacation in Florida, do you say, "I went to Disney World, and also the Epcot Center." No, no and no. Normal english speakers do not use "also" when describing two related ideas, notions, desires, etc. We just use "and." It gets the point across, it's grammatically correct, and one doesn't end up sounding like an android when they talk. I know I regularly complain abou the Jackelrod Sphere's abuse of the english language, but today's example is particularly annoying.

The Squid is vindicated.

May 21, 2009


Panel 1:"Very, very serious! But not as serious as the lung cancer that killed him. Turns out, this deer smoked three packs a day!"

Panel 2:"Those goddam cigarette companies! Advertising their filthy cancer sticks to innocent children, small animals, and other defenseless creatures."

Panel 3:Okay, fine, maybe this strip isn't going to be about the dangers of smoking. Judging from this panel, I feel safe saying that it's going to be about the dangers of illegal dumping of toxic substances (or maybe that's a truck full of prions!). As a civil enforcement* attorney for the EPA (really!), I hold the faint hope that this could turn into an interesting story arc. On the other hand, it's been done before...by Steven Segal...and it sucked. And while Steven Segal can at least bring the camp, I'm not sure what the Jackelrod Sphere is going to add here. The faint hope I just mentioned mostly revolves around the thought that anybody who drives a 70s-era semi is likely to have an accordingly archaic moustache which, as we all know, is to Mark Trail as a red flag is to a bull. If our heretofore invisible truck driver does have a moustache, perhaps we'll have fewer precious moments and more peach-colored fist bombs.

And, incidentally, that is one talented fucking skunk.

*The violation we're witnessing here would fall in the criminal realm, which is dealt with by a different office in the Agency from mine.