Rex Morgan was missing from his namesake comic

The doctor was not in.

He hadn’t been for months.

The last anyone saw of Rex Morgan, M.D., he wasn’t in scrubs or a white coat or making a house call.

Instead, he was living large on a cruise ship headed to Barbados, and somehow, even at sea, his services just happened to be needed. Then he was gone.

The story shifted back to dry land – and Rex and his loyal wife, June, weren’t a part of it.

That was on June 29.

Five months. That’s how long Rex Morgan was gone from his own comic strip.

Five months. That’s how long “Rex Morgan, M.D.” centered on Becka, his nurse, as she tried to find escaped Alz­heimer’s patients Henry and Pearl while simultaneously staving off the subtle advances of the not-so-suave Tim.

Five months. That’s how long it took someone to ask Woody Wilson if he had ever done anything like this in his 19 years of writing the strip.

His answer: “I have not.”

The doctor is back in

A new storyline that began Sunday found the doctor was back in the house – only to discover someone has moved in since he’s been gone.

“It’s all a question of timing,” explained Wilson by phone from Tempe, Ariz. “They’re out at sea. We couldn’t bring them back right away. So I just let them keep going.”

The character’s reappearance was just in time for two local “Rex” readers – Hertford’s John Matthews and wife Darla. He’s a 68-year-old lawyer who can’t make himself retire. She’s a 66-year-old school librarian – retired and loving it.

Some months back, they started reading the strip only to see the title character take an extended cruise and then vanish.

“I kept thinking he would reappear,” John Matthews said. “I (hadn’t) seen Rex injected into the story by phone or even by e-mail. He disappeared. Maybe he entered the Bermuda Triangle.”

Physician, heal thy strip

It’s hard to imagine any comic working without its star for a day, much less five months.

What would “Hägar the Horrible” be without Hägar? Just horrible. “Mary Worth”? Worthless. “The Phantom”? Non-existent.

Unlike most strips, though, “Rex Morgan, M.D.” has evolved into an ensemble. Think of it like a comic-strip version of “Grey’s Anatomy” with Becka Hanson as Izzie, her doctor/husband Peter as McSteamy and Rex as – you got it – McDreamy.

“You try to create a back story, a story where Rex and June are not the only compelling characters but the rest of the cast as well,” Wilson said. “We’ve got a lot of good characters – Becka being one of them.”

But there was another reason to feature her. Call it a case of art imitating life.

Wilson had a family member stricken with Alzheimer’s. He felt compelled to address the condition in the strip.

Besides, the ageless doctor has been thrilling readers with his bedside manner nonstop for 61 years. He needs a break every now and then.

So does his handler.

“You’ve got to change things up,” explained Wilson, who also pens the venerable – and still visible – “Judge Parker.” “You have to keep it fresh. You have to give people another vantage point, something to come back to each day.”

But does that mean Rex will be gone again? You’ll have to keep reading.

Mike Kernels, (757) 446-2732, mike.kernels@pilotonline.com