Cover Artists: Mike Vosburg & Jack Abel

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“The Creature from Dimension X”

Writer: Steve Skeates; Penciler: Mike Vosburg

Inker: Vince Colletta; Letterer: Ben Oda

Editor: Dennis O’Neil; Managing Editor: Joe Orlando

From DC Wikia:

Two of Rick Mason’s students, Roger and Gini, are working on a project for the school science fair. When they activate the experiment, it produces a black hole hanging in midair. While Roger takes notes on how it happened, Gini goes to tell Rick and Andrea. A creature from another dimension steps out of the black hole. Behind Roger’s back it sneaks out of the room, then blasts an opening in the wall so it can escape.

Hearing the noise, Andrea, Roger and Gini, rush back only to find the hole in the wall and a puzzled Roger wondering what the noise was all about. Andrea sees smoking footprints on the outside and suspects some monster created the hole. She slips outside the building, changes into The Mighty Isis, and takes to the air in search of the creature. When Isis finds it, the creature blasts her out of the sky. Quickly recovering, she commands the water in a nearby fountain to spray the creature. Because it is made of pure electricity, the creature is in pain and it runs back to the high school. The creature returns and leaps back into the black hole as Roger continues with his experiments. Its foot catches part of the machinery and it explodes. Hearing the blast, Isis flies back to the school and takes Roger to the hospital.

Next day, when Gini visits Roger, he tells her about the monster, but Gini refuses to believe him. Later on, Gini recreates the experiment for Rick and more of the creatures appear. Andrea hears the commotion, changes into Isis, and magically activated the school sprinkler system to drive the creatures back to where they came.

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“Lost and Found”

Same creative team as above but with art also by Frank Giacoia.

From DC Wikia:

Flying over a lake during a thunderstorm, The Mighty Isis rescues two children from their capsized canoe. She brings them back to their worried parents and flies away to change back into Andrea. She goes on to a faculty/student party at the High School.

At the party, Rick and Dr. Barnes tell Andrea about a scavenger hunt that got called off because of the bad weather. Cindy was the only person they couldn’t reach. Looking over the hunt checklist, Andrea finds that Cindy was sent to find a sea shell on the shores of the same lake Isis rescued the children from. Sensing danger, Andrea transforms herself into The Mighty Isis while running down the high school corridor. Isis soars like a falcon towards the lake and saves Cindy from being swept over a waterfall.

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The text page by Denny O’Neil introduces the creative team and discusses the history of Isis from TV show to comic book.

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This comic was on the shelves in the second week of September, 1976. That same weekend the TV show Isis was debuting its second season (comprising only seven new episodes – such a small number was typical of Saturday morning kid’s shows). Fans of the comic would be watching the show for the first time and fans of the show are enjoying this sophomore entry.

Steve Skeates is a legendary writer. He would be in any Comic Book Hall of Fame for his run on Aquaman alone. I’m always pleased to see his name in the credits!

Mike Vosburg was everywhere in the Bronze Age. From Wonder Woman in Adventure Comics to the later issues of Secret Society of Super-Villains. He was stylized – dark, sketchy and moody. A great artist, but an odd fit for a Saturday morning cartoon strip. He gives Isis a grittiness missing in her prior two appearances. Oddly, his art looks completely different in these two stories if only because of the inking – in the first story his style is hidden in the first few pages – although it comes out in the last two-thirds of the story. Vince Coletta was given the first credit in the second story; which it why it looks more like his work than Vosburg’s. But that is expected for an inker who stood up to Kirby’s Bronze Age style.

“Lost and Found” was much more like the television show with its lack of singular menace and moral at the ending. “The Creature from Dimension X” … well, even the title smacks of a Young Adult science fiction tale. It could have been a 1950s sci-fi radio drama.

Not an outstanding second effort, but a good one. Hopefully with the third issue the creators will find more solid footing with the characters; so far characterization has been a bit … thin.

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About the author: Michael Curry is the author of the Brave & Bold: From Silent Knight to Dark Knight, The Day John F Kennedy Met the Beatles and the award-winning Abby’s Road, the Long and Winding Road to Adoption and How Facebook, Aquaman and Theodore Roosevelt Helped.  Check his website for more releases! Thanks for reading!