October is Spookey Month: Cindy Lee's scary alien encounter!

What is Halloween without creepy aliens from space?  My close friend, the late Orson Welles, forever linked the holiday to space invasions with his infamous 1938 radio broadcast of H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds.  Orson (or Mr. Welles, as we used to call him during our monthly poker games/discussions of magic and illusion) once confided in me-- while we were in Morocco shooting some footage for his proposed film version of Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days-- the panicked public reaction gave him quite a thrill and his supposedly chagrined mea culpa the next day was largely tongue-in-cheek. 

Welles was always fond of hoaxes and trickery (witness his F For Fake), so it's quite fitting to present once again a little look at the very first episode of that ever-popular Saturday morning children's show Isis, "The Lights of Mystery Mountain.  This one features spooky UFOs, or as they're popularly known, "flying saucers."  Just in time for Halloween and a million re-broadcasts of War of the Worlds!

This particularly Isis installment, which aired on the comfortably non-Halloween date of September 6, 1975, probably comes closest to eliciting anything approaching genuine fright, or at least menace, than any of the others.  While a later Isis would feature an Old West ghost town-- but nary a ghost-- this program was not given to horror or even weird themes.  Plots usually involved more down-to-earth elements such as troubled students, automobile safety, horseback riding and SCUBA safety.

Unlike the writer of this blog, the Isis folk don't waste any time getting down to business.  In the opening scene, Larkspur High School's star student Cindy Lee displays rather alarming photographic evidence of eerie lights of unknown origin.  She took them herself on a hiking trip and breathlessly relates the story to school principal Dr. Barnes and her favorite teachers Andrea Thomas and Rick Mason.  After a discussion of the UFO phenomenon during which Mason scoffs at the idea of alien visitation and both Barnes and Thomas remind him they're not necessarily talking about interstellar spacecraft but simply the more general term "unidentified flying objects."  But it's Thomas who ties the lights to the strange disappearances of two campers and a tourist.

His curiosity piqued, Dr. Barnes asks the two teachers to accompany Cindy back to the rustic mountain town of Mountain Park adjacent to the aptly named Mystery Mountain and there undertake a thorough investigation.  As scientists and educators and proponents of rationalism, Thomas and Mason demand empirical evidence before accepting the rather outrageous hypothesis suggested by the wild stories and rumors surrounding the recent incidents.  Extraordinary claims, they declare, require extraordinary proof.  Well, they don't declare this so much as they kind of hint at it.  With Cindy Lee acting as their more open-minded foil, the group journeys up the mountain, quite like the trio led by the character Professor Armitage in H.P. Lovecraft's 1929 tale "The Dunwich Horror." 

Armitage and company soon reach the inescapable conclusion there are indeed supernatural forces at work and engage them in a life-or-death struggle to prevent their entering our world or dragging it into their own dimension to serve their unspeakable ends.  The events recounted in "Lights" are their Saturday morning analogue.  For once atop Mystery Mountain, Cindy Lee experiences a moment of terror so stark I feel compelled, as if by the memory of my late friend Mr. Welles, to present here.  Witness then, the most shocking events of "Lights" as they unfold in front of Cindy Lee's very eyes!

Cindy Lee remembers her camera is still in the car...

The mysterious lights over the mountain.

Gotta snap some photos!

Oh no!  I'm out of film!

The frightening alien tones continue.

Ms. Thomas!  Mr. Mason!  Where are you?

I need you!

A few moments later and Thomas and Mason sense something amiss.  They parked the cars only a few yards away.  Cindy should have returned by now.  The teachers clamber down the mountain trail after her only to find...

No one.  No Cindy Lee.  A moment later, Thomas comes across this...

It's just like the burned spots found at sites where the campers and tourist disappeared.  Have bizarre, inhuman beings from another world spirited Cindy Lee away?  Kind of...

It looks as if this is a job for...

Isis eventually presents a prosaic explanation for all these strange happenings, but not before our favorite goddess swoops to the rescue and uses her magic to give a mean old real estate baron a fright of his own.  Of course, one might expect a universe that allows for the existence of magic and ancient Egyptian goddesses living dual lives entwined with 20th century pedagogues to also allow for the existence of life on other planets, and to posit this life as a regular, if secretive, visitor to our own humble world.  Indeed, Isis does leave open this very possibility even while suggesting what we must chiefly concern ourselves with are terrestrial threats-- corrupt old men who would employ fun-loving pranksters to help them achieve nefarious goals.  And scare nice kids like Cindy Lee.

A typical afternoon at Larkspur High...

There it is-- my old alma mater, Larkspur High!  Just as I remembered it.  And what about Ms. Thomas and Mr. Mason, the hardest working science teachers in the district, if not the entire state?  Do they still work there?

Hey, they do.  Look at them.  Busy as can be.  They're the reason Larkspur High leads the state in science scores and achievement awards.  But what about their favorite student, Cindy Lee?  What's she doing while these two teachers knock themselves out preparing lesson plans?

Cindy Lee loves bike races!

Saving Private Doberman

It's hard to imagine now, but there once was a time when I lived in ignorance of Pvt. Doberman. Those foolish days ended when Eddie Fitzgerald posted a bunch of comically ugly pics on his wonderfully fun blog, Uncle Eddie's Theory Corner.

A Pvt. Doberman comic book? Who is Pvt. Doberman, I thought, and why does he deserve a comic book (with a photo cover, no less)? Pvt. Doberman... dare I follow this thread, no matter what horrors I might uncover? No matter that it might lead to a nightmarish re-evaluation of my worldview?  According Nietsche, when you gaze into the abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.  According to Pvt. Doberman, "Aw, Sarge."


This is the image that started it all.
One of my life's goals is to own this comic.
That is one aged private. Maurice
Gosfield was 42 when he started playing
this character. He's 100 now. And dead.

Actually, it just led to my finding out DC published eleven issues of a series based on a supporting character from the old Phil Silvers sitcom, You'll Never Get Rich, also known as The Phil Silvers Show (That's Sgt. Bilko to you and me, Russ).  The program ran from 1955-59, and featured Silvers as a scheming Army sergeant, with Maurice Gosfield as Pvt. Duane Doberman, a character evidently so popular DC had to spin him off from their Sgt. Bilko tie-in book into his own four-color comic series.  To put Doberman's popularity into perspective, Bilko itself ran for eighteen issues (several of which feature either a drawing of Doberman or a photo of Gosfield in character on the cover), while a generation later, Welcome Back, Kotter would last ten issues and The Mighty Isis only managed eight.  Of course, Sgt. Bilko never had a supporting character like Cindy Lee.  Then again, Isis never had one like Pvt. Doberman.


On The Phil Silvers Show, the lovable Doberman's comic misadventures
include appearing pantsless at the annual WAC Dance.


Here's Sgt. Bilko's comic. At one point in
the 50s, he was so popular he was appearing
in not one but two comics! And so was Pvt.
Doberman! Discerning kids bypassed Sad Sack
in favor of this title.


Pretty good caricatures of Silvers and Gosfield.


This one is fraught with subtext.

In 1960, the Golden Age of Pvt. Doberman comics came to an end as DC cancelled both Sgt. Bilko and Sgt. Bilko's Pvt. Doberman. Some theorize that Stan Lee, over at Marvel, decided to take advantage of this lapse with a service humor comic of his own devising, but realized it was foolish to compete with the genius who created the Pvt. Doberman comic book. Instead, Lee went in a different direction with some some nonsense about four costumed adventurers or something. I seriously doubt that one ran even as long as Sgt. Bilko's Pvt. Doberman.  In the aftermath, Gosfield would go on to portray Benny the Ball on Hanna-Barbera's Top Cat cartoon before passing far too soon at the age of 51.

Also, I'm upset that I'm not the first person to latch upon Pvt. Doberman and his stellar comic book career, but I want to suggest to DC they might go a long way towards incurring my renewed goodwill by offering an Archive Edition of the complete run of Sgt. Bilko's Pvt. Doberman and sending me a free  review copy here in Japan.

The Mighty Isis #8: When Cindy Met Rennie

Rennie Roberts, that is.  It happens in The Mighty Isis #8 (Dec.-Jan. 1977-78), the comic's final issue.  The story is called "Darkly Through the Mutant's Eyes," written by  Jack C. Harris, pencilled by Mike Vosburg and inked by Marvel stalwart Al Milgrom.  Rennie is an unusual name, so it's safe to assume this is supposed to be the TV character and they just made a little mistake with her surname.  But you know, that kind of carelessness isn't enough of an explanation for a hardcore comic book geek like me, so I've put way more thought into this than most would consider sane.

Here's what I've come up with.  The DC Comics version of Isis and her supporting cast are alternate universe versions of the characters familiar from the live-action show and they live on one of those numbered or lettered DC earths where things are subtly different.

How different?  Well, I'm not sure, but I doubt Andrea Thomas works at Larkspur High in the comic.  And Isis spends a lot more time fighting sorcerous foes than helping kids get over losing their beloved dogs or reconcile with their Chinese heritage.  There's also the Rick Mason-Thomas romantic subplot, which at one point is actually a love triangle with a Mason-smitten Cindy Lee; none of this occurs in the live action show.  So perhaps this Rennie Roberts person is the DC universe Rennie Carol.  Different parents, occupying roughly the same place in dimensional continuity.  After all, she looks nothing like Ronalda Douglas, who played Rennie-Prime on TV.

Another explanation is way back in 1977, no one particularly cared as much as I do now about consistency between the comic and the Filmation show.  Someone told Harris there was a new student assistant on the show named Rennie, he shrugged and said, "Far out, but I've got some Wonder Woman to write.  I can't be wasting my time learning all these characters' names."

Which is kind of a shame.  This panel offers the tantalizing possibility Cindy Lee actually was around for the second season of Isis, but the stories that aired were just the ones involving Rennie.  In some ghostly alternate vision, Cindy and Rennie were pals and good-natured academic rivals trading shifts as Ms. Thomas's student assistant.  The Mighty Isis might have benefited from a regular back-up feature where Cindy and Rennie team to solve minor mysteries such as what's in the hamburger patties in the Larkspur cafeteria, because it sure ain't any kind of beef.  You know, with Ranji, C.J. and Feather dropping in from time to time.

Then again, that's probably a stupid idea.  Nothing would have helped sales and by the time Rennie appeared, it was a moot point anyway.  An editor's note in the letters page tells us there just weren't enough fans to keep the book afloat financially, but what few there were could keep watching the Saturday morning TV show for their Isis fix.  With the show already out of production, that wouldn't be true for long.

You gotta believe!

Class! Class! Let's compare the live action Isis characters to their comic book counterparts...

Okay, class.  Good morning, glad to see you're all here.  We're going to do something a little different today.  That's right, Cindy, this will be on the test.  So pay attention all of you and take notes.  Let's take a look at the DC comics versions of our favorite characters from the Filmation live action TV series Isis-- also known as The Secrets of Isis-- and see how alike or different they are from the real thing.  Yes, Cindy, it will be fun.  Everyone look at the screen...

Here's Andrea Thomas in her everyday guise as a teacher:

(Mike Vosburg/Vince Colletta, Isis #3, Feb.-March 1976-77)

She is smart and pretty, Cindy, and a model teacher.  I completely agree.  And here she is in her Isis identity:

(Dick Giordano, Shazam #25, Sep.-Oct. 1976)

What's that?  How many times has she saved you, Cindy?  Amazing!  Yes, if you'd like, you can write an extra-credit essay about Isis and what she means to today's young women.  Here's Andrea Thomas's colleague Rick Mason:

(Mike Vosburg/Vince Colletta, Isis #2, Dec.-Jan. 1976-77)

Thank you, Cindy.  You're so right.  He is a dedicated teacher and his mustache is quite snappy.  Here's Dr. Barnes:

(Mike Nasser/Frank Giacoia, Isis #2 Dec.-Jan. 1976-77; Mike Vosburg/Vince Colletta, Isis #3, Feb.-March 1977)

Good question, Cindy.  We'll talk about that in just a moment.  Anyone besides Cindy have a question?  Anyone?  No?  No one has a question?  Okay, I hear some talking but no questions.  Let's hold it down and look at the screen.  I think we'll all recognize...

(Dick Giordano, Shazam #25, Sep.-Oct. 1976)

Yes, Cindy, that's you!  And no, Rennie Carol never appeared in The Mighty Isis comic.  The closest anyone came was the depiction of a character named Rennie Roberts (although I could have sworn her first name is lettered as Pennie) in the final issue.  That's also the one where the writer labels you "class president" of Larkspur High, Cindy.

Now, as to your question about why Dr. Barnes looks so different.  Compared to the main cast, the character wasn't on the show that often and some of the artists probably never saw even a single publicity photo of actor Albert Reed.

Actually, as you've noticed, none of the likenesses are exact.  They're more general than perfect caricatures.  I think Dick Giordano's take on the cast Shazam! #25 comes closest, but I have a suspicion this has something to do with licensing.  If you've read Marvel's Planet of the Apes adaptations, you'll notice at no time does George Tuska make Taylor look like Charlton Heston, nor does Alfredo Alcala give his Beneath the Planet of the Apes astronaut more than a passing resemblance to James Franciscus.  To do so would have involved other legal and financial arrangements and it just wasn't considered worth the time, effort or money.

Another good point, Cindy!  As you say, Marvel did occasionally use exact likenesses of the Star Wars actors in that title, and DC made a point of at least trying for perfect likenesses in their Star Trek titles.  Yes, even now at Dark Horse, artists draw Buffy as close to Sarah Michelle Gellar as they can.  These things depend on legal departments and the artist's hand, but sometimes licensing means "make 'em look consistent with all appearance in every medium."  Luke Skywalker looks just like Mark Hamill on every book cover, Captain Kirk is always either William Shatner or Chris Pine these days and so on and so forth.

Anyway, back to Isis.  My guess is we're looking at a similar deal here between DC and Filmation and as long as Isis had long dark hair, Rick Mason his mustache and Cindy Lee her pigtails, no one probably gave a rip.  As for Dr. Barnes, he could be anything or anyone depending on who drew him.

You're right again, Cindy.  I am just a speculating fool.  Still, that was a lot of fun, wasn't it, class?  Comparing these?  We enjoyed it, didn't we?

Class?

The Secrets of Isis Episode 16: "Seeing Eye Horse"

The title, "Seeing Eye Horse," (September 11, 1976) is no metaphor.  This episode delivers exactly what it promises.  Award-winning equestrian Noah Schuster has lost his sight, and when surgery does nothing to improve his situation, Andrea Thomas and Rick Mason arrange for the lad to receive a seeing eye horse.  It's a lovely gesture from some caring people, but it also leads to a lot of complications.  Noah's a bit horse-shy after having a riding accident (Isis saves him) and feeling a bit angry as well.  When he blunders into a water cooler and the broken glass reflects enough sun to start a smoldering fire, it's going to take both the horse and the Egyptian goddess to save the day-- unless Noah figures out a way to do that for himself first.

Confined to a single location and apparently taking place over the course of two eventful days (or else one really long one), this is one frantic Isis episode.  And you probably want to stay as far away from Noah as possible in the event his lousy luck is contagious.  Poor guy endures bad news from his doctor (veteran character actor James Griffith, who was once a musician with Spike Jones and His City Slickers, with an acting career spanning decades), a runaway horse incident, the kindness of Ms. Thomas, starting a fire, falling in a lake, being rescued by a horse, then tumbling into a small hollow and briefly losing the ability to walk.  That is one unfortunate kid.  Or, if you prefer optimism, a very fortunate kid when you consider he has friends like Thomas and Mr. Mason.  And let's not forget Rennie Carol, as Ronalda Douglas makes her Isis debut in this episode, replacing fan favorite (this fan anyway) Joanna Pang as Cindy Lee.

Pang's bubbly presence is certainly missed.  I couldn't help but feel a little sad not seeing her in the credits.  Her absence is even more apparent because Douglas only has a few brief scenes and maybe three or four lines total, which means there's a lack of student sidekick action.  Douglas does, however, boldly wear denim overalls in what seems to be a visual challenge to Pang's baby blues.  Shocking stuff for Isis!  My first impressions of Douglas involve her soft voice and gracefully soothing presence.  Pang might have played the same scenes in a more chipper, upbeat way, but Douglas is just so very gentle.  Remember-- Cindy Lee had her own storyline in the show's second episode before settling into the sidekick role.  Let's see if Rennie gets a similar spotlight, and if they develop her personality as distinct from Cindy's.

I only wish the show told us where Cindy went to establish a little more continuity.  Speaking of-- Thomas is still driving that yellow Firebird.  But this year is all about change, and not just switching out student assistants.  Isis gets a new wavy/curly goddess wig, one that isn't as successfully integrated into the character's look as the long, straight one she wore in the first season.  This one appears to be a sort of fall, with Joanna Cameron's real hair parted in the middle and combed back on the sides in an effort to disguise it.  Unfortunately, the wig matches neither the shade nor the texture of Cameron's natural hair.  Her Isis transformation gets a glamour shot cutaway and her flying take-off features a close-up this time, rather than re-using that overly familiar stock footage we're probably all tired of already.  There's a new flying shot as well, but it's a bit clumsy, with Isis viewed in profile.  The head-on view is much more effective.  Still, it's nice to see the producers spending a little more money on the effects, if only for variety's sake.

Brian Cutler must have enjoyed shooting this episode.  He gets to be a little heroic himself.  When Noah's horse-- spooked by a sonic boom from a passing jet-- bolts wildly down the lane, it's Mr. Mason who cowboys up and gallops in pursuit, doing that cool "rein whip" move you do when you're trying to head 'em off at the pass (I hate that cliche!).  Cameron also demonstrates her horseback skills as Thomas shows Noah how to operate Sunny, the seeing eye horse.

Overall, this is a solid sophomore season debut, with the leads providing their usual grounded performances and the guest stars doing their best despite a busy script.  Gregory Elliot as Noah has to flail around helplessly and interact with a horse but he acquits himself well enough.  Kathleen O'Malley as Mrs. Schuster, his mom, has an incredible filmography stretching all the way back to the 1920s, when she was a baby.  She played a nurse in the 1955 Henry Fonda/Jack Lemon/James Cagney classic Mister Roberts, acted in two episodes of Leave it to Beaver, appeared on The Munsters, Twilight Zone, Bonanaza, Emergency!, Mary Tyler Moore, Columbo and Baretta just to name a few.  She managed a western star bi-fecta by showing up in two Clint Eastwood flicks-- okay, Dirty Harry isn't a western-- and John Wayne's The Shootist.

What I don't understand is how they could let Noah just wander around when he storms off after rejecting Sunny.  No one bothers to look for him.  In fact, thanks to some wonky editing, it's almost as if everyone simply disappears from the farm at one point.

Notes-- Thomas drives around with Tut in the backseat of her car, on a bird perch.  She leaves him in there for hours, perhaps even overnight.  Even with the windows down, that's not the proper way to treat your
animal companion.

The scene where she demonstrates Sunny to Noah is pretty neat.  Cameron handles herself in the saddle like a regular Annie Oakley.  I'm guessing Annie Oakley rode horses as well as doing all those trick shots with Buffalo Bill's show, but I'm not old enough to have witnessed any of that first hand so I could be wrong.  Whatever the case may be, Cameron looks comfy and that's saying a lot for someone acting atop an animal, even a highly trained one.  At one point she has to let go of the reins and just sit there while Sunny does his (or her) stuff.  And I'm thinking she and Cutler relished the chance to do that kind of physical stuff.  Looks like fun.

The Secrets of Isis Episode 15: "Dreams of Flight"

Chela Montoya dreams of flight.  She's made a neat little red glider that soars freely above Larkspur High the same way she dreams of doing.  Well, not so much above Larkspur High as above the earth itself as an astronaut.  She's quite the young aerodynamic engineer, but feels hindered by her brother Raoul, who thinks she's wasting her time.  Meanwhile, cocky Mark Dawson in his surplus army shirt with PFC chevrons on the sleeves wants everyone to know he's Larkspur's top gun, cockily declaring to a disapproving trio of Andrea Thomas, Rick Mason and Cindy Lee he plans to win the school's Aerodynamics Day.  "No lack of confidence in that boy," Thomas observes.  Then she's off to convince Raoul to let Chela enter the contest.

Raoul's struggling with a problem of his own.  He's supposed to paint a huge mural for the barrio, but he's got artist's block.  A quick talk with Thomas and then another more heartfelt one with Chela solves both her problems and his.  But that dastardly Mark just won't leave well enough alone.  Several foot chases ensue, a thrilling runaway truck misadventure with Raoul trapped in a trailer and then a tense moment where Mark, having stolen Chela's remote control airplane, finds himself hanging on for dear life above certain death with only Raoul to... WAIT!  HERE COMES ISIS!

"Dreams of Flight," which aired December 13, 1975, has a lot on its mind.  Too much.  It completely lacks focus, almost as if at some story conference the production team decided to combine two unrelated scripts about a bright young woman into airplanes and a talented artist intimidated by too large a canvas.  Maybe the first felt too slight and the second didn't present enough Isis action, so instead we get this mishmash.  It's heavy on the action, but that action is somewhat repetitive, with Raoul chasing Mark on foot not once but twice.  The first chase leads to one of the more exciting Isis rescues-- the goddess has to stop a runaway semi-truck because Raoul's gotten himself locked in the back-- but it feels kind of random.  Getting stuck in the trailer is bad enough, but then the sequence extends as the driverless truck careens down a mountain road (conveniently hugging the curves) until we've almost forgotten all about poor Chela.

I have to admit when the show established the Chela-Raoul conflict, I expected Raoul to be a macho ethnic stereotype.  Instead, he's a gentle artist who quickly sees reason and comes to understand he has to back his sister's dreams.  Even when Mark shows up and taunts him with a lot of racist insults and ignorance, Raoul takes it in stride.  He's too good natured to let this goon upset him with pure foolishness, but when Mark starts dicking around with Chela's plane, Raoul chases the coward away.  As played by Fabian Gregory, Raoul's one of the more pleasant characters on a show chock full of them.  Cynthia Avila as Chela ends up shortchanged as the show shifts its focus to the conflict between Raoul and Mark.  If only they'd allowed the story to climax at the Aeronautics Festival!

That's the episode's major flaw.  We expect Chela to prove her mettle by beating Mark fair and square in front of the entire student body, but instead we get trucks and rescues with Chala shunted aside.  She wins her victory without even being present and we never get to see her in direct competition with Mark or anyone else for that matter.  I feel like Milhouse whining, "When are they going to get to the fireworks factory?"  You just don't introduce a story element that huge and then refuse to deliver.  It's the story's natural climax and logical end game for Chela's character arc, not this footchase nonsense and Mark's accident and patently phony turnaround with its dubious message-- if only people of color could save each and every bigot from almost certain death, we'd live in a more progressive world.  I do like the denouement with Raoul's mural displaying elements of Chela's dreams, from a boy playing with a model, to Chela herself swinging in a tire, a winged Aztec warrior, a paper airplane, to a bold astronaut figure.  It's actually quite a lovely creation.

And there's ol' Mark, sitting in the bushes, all covered in multicolored splotches of paint.

After all these years having her character denied a real triumph is probably no big deal to Avila.  Her career continues to this day, and she's peachy in her few scenes, ably conveying the sweetness and smarts of a young woman with big dreams.  Gregory and Hinckley didn't fare as well professionally.  This was Gregory's last credit as far as I can determine, and Hickley disappeared after a one-episode appearance on The Krofft Supershow, which gave us Electra Woman and Dyna Girl, certainly more colorful but in all other aspects inferior to Isis as far as I'm concerned.  No, I don't really care about people entering puberty with the help of Deidre Hall, thank you very much.  Krofft nostalgia is very 1990s and way too easy, like hacky jokes about Shaggy and Scooby Doo smoking pot or Smurfs having sex with Smurfette.  Cindy Lee wouldn't listen to that kind of crap and I suggest you practice mental hygiene and do the same.

Where was I?  Oh yeah.  The guest actors on Isis.  Tom Williams, who has a quick scene as a helpful hobby shop owner, still does a lot of voice over work, most notably as a baby in approximately ten thousand TV shows and movies.  I guess that's his specialty.  He's also played cops and the like, which is probably to be expected of a tall middle-aged guy.  At least I hope he's still able to work.  He's in his eighties now, and his most recent credit was in 2006 as "Baby Ella" on the UPN sitcom Eve.  Guy's been in everything from Punk Brewster to The Torkelsons to Night Court to The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

Notes--  Larkspur High sure has a lot of science events.  They all seem to be fun as well as educational.  That's Andrea Thomas and Rick Mason for you-- the school was lucky when those two joined the faculty.  They're involved in the students' lives, knocking themselves out to make learning science enjoyable for everyone.  Any school would be thrilled to have two teachers like that!

Speaking of our teacher characters, I can't praise Joanna Cameron's performance as Thomas highly enough.  Whether she's encouraging Chela, verbally jousting with Mark, or giving Raoul a lesson in sibling support she's pitch-perfect in this episode.  Cameron easily could have headlined a prime-time TV show about a concerned and dedicated young teacher changing lives and boosting test scores even without the goddessy-superheroic trappings, and she still would have made it watchable.  There's never a sense of "Lord, I wish my career would take off and zephyr wind me out of here," just tons of charisma and complete commitment to making Thomas as believable as possible and Isis a dazzling role model.

Brian Cutler gives able support in his few scant scenes as well.

Sadly, we've come to the end of the Cindy Lee era.  She's not in this episode much, just at the beginning where she helps out with a little exposition and at the end declaring Raoul's painting to be "terrific!"  And wouldn't you know it-- she goes out the way she came in, wearing those baby blue overalls!  Sure, she starts the episode in a swinging blue miniskirt that Marcia Brady would kill to wear, but I can't think of a more fitting send-off for Cindy Lee than a last scene in those overalls.  Joanna Pang should have had them bronzed as a keepsake.  She might have if only she'd know this would be her final bow as Larkspur's perpetually cheerful factotum.

But don't worry, Isis fans.  We're going to keep on watching and commenting right through the Rennie Carol episodes.  I'm looking forward to them.  As I've noted before, I tuned into the second season of Isis only to feel let down by Cindy Lee's unexplained disappearance (that's still my only specific memory about watching this show).  I guess I just didn't like change.  Now I'm excited to figure out what Rennie Carol is all about.  Will she be as earnest and enthusiastic as Cindy Lee, or will she present a more low-key personality?  Whichever it is, she's definitely change the lead trio's chemistry.  And dietary habits.  No more deviled egg sandwiches for Rick Mason.

The Secrets of Isis Episode 14: "Scuba Duba"

Rick Mason is thoroughly disgusted with student Steve and his blatant disregard for scuba diving safety.  Steve lacks the patience and self-control necessary for scuba diving's many pre-dive checks and holds the buddy system in disdain.  This leads to a potentially tragic situation and only Larkspur High's resident goddess-- Cindy Lee-- can save the day.

No, just kidding again.  Of course it's Isis who help Steve learn a valuable lesson.

This is an episode heavy on the Rick Mason, which isn't a bad thing.  He's not like mayonaise, delicious in the proper proportions on a sandwich but ultimately overwhelming and muting even the sharp tang of mustard.  You can dollop Rick Mason on freely and he only brings out the best in your crisp, leafy greens such as lettuce and your thinly sliced deli meats.  I'm thinking turkey, but some of you may prefer ham or even roast beef.  Whatever you like, Rick Mason has you covered.  Brian Cutler gets to stretch a little and show greater range, within the still limited parameters of Isis.  It's not as if we're going to see an episode where Cutler gets to cut loose when Mason loses his fiance to heroin addiction or suffers a crisis of religious faith after witnessing a plane crash.  And that's okay.  We're not here for that.  We've seen flashes of the generally genial Mason's temper but "Scuba Duba" (airing December 6, 1975) shows him consistently frustrated with Steve, a nice enough but somewhat hard-headed guy who just seems determined to alienate the science teacher/scuba club sponsor.

When we first see Steve, he's excited about the possibility of photographing a rare eagle's nest.  His enthusiasm seems genuine and even endearing, and soon he's clambering down the side of a hill to get that snap.  Despite his apparent mountaineering experience and a stern warning from his more sensible friend Nancy (although practically everyone is more sensible than Steve; he makes show off Steve Elwood look like model citizen Cindy Lee), the danger-prone dude relies on a ratty old rope as his "safety" line.  It doesn't take long for him to come to grief, but luckily Andrea Thomas is on the scene with her own camera.  A quick change to Isis and Steve is free to bedevil poor Mr. Mason once more.  Twice more, in fact.

Born in 1953, Eileen "Nancy" Chesis had already been a series regular on The Tom Ewell Show (your guess is as good as mine) and clocked time on Bonanza (twice), but she seems to have made her debut on none other than Lassie.  After a guest appearance on Matt Helm, she apparently left the business, at least in front of the cameras.  Brian "Steve" Byers was a newcomer, having recently made his own debut on The Bob Newhart Show and he stuck it out long enough to play "Male Reporter #1" and "Medic" on two different episodes of Beverly Hills 90210 (although just thinking of a plot where he could have played "Male Reporter-Medic #1" on a single episode might provide fun for those of you stuck on the toilet for long periods... just waiting for something to happen).  Other credits include M*A*S*H, Three's Company, Joanie Loves Chachi and Full House.  Both give the solid, professional performances we've come to expect from Isis guest stars.  They aren't there to blow us away with flash and prove themselves the next Meryl Streep or Al Pacino.  They just have to be believable and sympathetic, and that's just what they do.

The show's underwater climax is quite exciting and the setting is a pleasant change of pace from the mountains and hills used in most episodes.  It has a novelty and a level of difficulty that appeals.  The scuba club appears to be diving in a very large lake or perhaps a cove or inlet, and once under, they encounter all kinds of underwater life, tall fronds of aquatic plants and whatnot that look more native to the ocean.  But what do I know about scuba diving?  My only experience with the sport is having some acquaintances who are PADI-certified.  I've always wanted to get certified myself, but despite my lifelong love for and interest in sharks (I've spent personal time studying them on my own, and fishing for them-- strictly catch-and-release-- off the Florida coast), I also have a strong phobia of them.  Specifically, being devoured by one while scuba diving.  I know fatal shark attacks while diving are at least as rare as fatal lightning strikes, but they're rarer still on land.

Notes--  Mason ultimately proves too nice for his own good.  Or maybe that's for the best for Steve.  It's not as if Steve's endangering anyone but himself, and this is one scare that directly impacts that aspect of the guy's personality; in this case, I truly believe he's learned a life lesson that will stick.  Although one thing that bugged me throughout the episode was the danger to the school's funding.  Kind of cold-blooded, you think?  Well, hear me out.

Mason and Ms. Thomas obviously have made Larkspur High one of the top academically performing schools in the state, which is why they get to have things like a scuba club in the first place.  That equipment is relatively expensive.  So Steve clowns around, gets himself seriously injured, or worse, killed-- then what happens to Rick Mason and Larkspur High?  Lawsuits, recriminations, possible firing, that's what.  Even though Mason has done everything humanly possible to prevent the tragedy, he's the one who will bear the brunt of the blame, and I seriously doubt the school board is willing to go down with him.  End result:  loss of a fine teacher, the collapse of the state's top academic program, the breaking of Dr. Barnes's mighty heart and declining resources left for Ms. Thomas.  Mason's career is on the line here, but so are the futures of many students like Cindy Lee and Nancy.

Sure, we worry (as does Mason) about Steve's young life, but it's also important to think of all the other consequences beyond just the grief counseling needed for his friends and classmates-- not to mention the devastation wrought on the guy's family-- if he'd managed to drown himself under Mason's supervision.  those are other reasons Mason is so angry at Steve, and why you should take some rules very seriously.  There's an Isis episode for you.

I think this way now that I'm an old person, but I probably would've been a complete Steve when I was 16 or 17.  Worse, even.

We also learn at the start of of this episode Andrea Thomas is a much better tennis player than Rick Mason.  I have to say Joanna Cameron looks like someone who knows how to handle a racket and I wish they'd thrown in a scene where she and Brian Cutler actually play a game.  Larkspur High's best science teachers are pretty well-rounded people when you think about it (and you should, rather than try to do something productive with your time).  Not only are they highly intelligent and motivated professional educators, but they're athletic and have their own outside interests--  Mason with his boating, scuba diving and pizza-eating and Thomas with her tennis prowess, trekking, bird-watching and nature photography.

The Secrets of Isis Episode 10: "The Outsider"

Former child star Mitch Vogel (he had a recurring role on the last seasons of Bonanza and appeared with Tim "Otter" Matheson in Yours, Mine and Ours, the 1968 film where Henry Fonda and Lucille Ball play two people with a thousand children each who marry each other and populate an entire town with their offspring) guests as Wayne Moss, the titular outsider of Isis episode 10, "The Outsider," which aired November 8, 1975.  Wayne is a nature-loving newcomer to the big city and Andrea Thomas is so beside herself with joy at having a brilliant new biology student she's hitting up the school for more science equipment.  All this fuss over one measly guy when there's still Cindy Lee!  Cindy's not to upset about being bumped from the top of the teacher's pet ladder, though.  See, jealousy and sour grapes just aren't in her nature.  She's just too nice, so nice that when Wayne comes under suspicion for stealing the raccoon mascot of a rival school's football team, Cindy follows him to his private spot, a secluded lake area teeming with wildlife.  The two students bond over a mutual love for little critters such as ducks and snowy owls.  Cindy's admiration for the seemingly gentle Wayne is apparent in the starry-eyed way she gazes at him.  At least until Wayne finds out the area's slated for development into a ritzy subdivision.  Then he goes on a destructive rampage, first attacking a sign and, when he can't get the more sober and responsible citizen Cindy to help him vandalize it, atop a bulldozer.

"Jump off!  Jump off!  Get off before you get hurt!" Cindy shouts, but it takes Isis and a giant boulder to save Wayne.  Ms. Thomas and Rick Mason soon join Wayne's environmental crusade, but the real raccoon-nappers have a problem-- the little furry fella is sick as can be.  Only one person can help them.  Former California governor Ronald Reagan.  But they'll settle for Wayne Moss.

This is a rebound to glory episode, kind of heavy handed, but it benefits both from a lack of fake gorillas and from an incredibly intense performance from Vogel.  His Moss is equal parts John Denver, Huckleberry Finn and barely suppressed rage until he spots the sign advertising the real estate development and turns into a complete maniac.    Despite being kid-vid, Isis doesn't shrink from showing this side of him and making it frightening.  At times it's almost as if he wandered in from a show aimed at a more mature audience like The White Shadow or Family, or even a 1970s horror movie about a bullied teen with supernatural powers.  When the kids tease him, his glower is so intimidating you almost expect him to Carrie White-out on them and telepathically command the animals of the forest to emerge and rip everyone to shreds.  But once he realizes he's going about things the wrong way and calms himself, most people end up respecting the lad's passion and affinity for wildlife.  Pretty soon even the construction foreman is offering to delay draining the lake-- a process that involves dynamiting a dam-- until Mason can use his powers of persuasion on Mr. Winstead, a rich land tycoon who loves golf as much as Wayne Moss loves snowy owls.

The runaway bulldozer scene is pretty wild and provides a mid-episode action spike that contrasts nicely with the gentle scenes of Wayne and Cindy Lee holding hands as they wander around the meadows and forests near the lake viewing stock footage of squirrels.  It almost seems at times the out-of-control machine is going to crush Cindy beneath its treads while Wayne protests the controls "are frozen" and "won't work."  Or maybe the problem is a bulldozer is a fairly complex piece of machinery you don't have any business trying to operate, kid!

Interestingly, there isn't any real antagonist in this episode.  It's more a story of ideas.  Even the two oafs who bully Wayne and try to frame him for raccoon-napping quickly repent when the animal gets sick and the foreman folds after just a few words from Wayne.  Meanwhile, Rick Mason must be a silver-tongued devil indeed because it doesn't take him long to convince Winstead to eat the millions of dollars he's already spent on the land and even more he stands to profit from his plans.  The biggest moment of suspense comes when Isis has just a few seconds to stop some lit dynamite from going off, but instead of flying up to it quickly, she takes the long way around by running.  Well, she knows what she's doing.  And wow, what an explosion they have for us, folks!

A recurring element in Isis is whenever a student wanders off, all Thomas and Mason have to do is ask Cindy about his or her habits.  She knows everything there is to know about each and every one of her classmates.  I say classmates because all along I've been assuming she's a student (I love the idea of a Cindy Lee who admires Thomas and Mason and loves her school so passionately she wants to spend every waking hour there, kind of like a girl Max Fischer, but with excellent grades), but I have to admit at times her position at Larkspur High is a little ambiguous.  Supporting my student theory is her response to Thomas's assertion that Wayne knows more about plants and animals than any student she's ever taught:  "The rest of us could learn from him."

Speaking of ambiguity, Mason appears to be somewhat senior to Thomas in this episode.  The DC comic states outright he's her boss, but perhaps the show's Mason is merely assigned to the budget committee or acting as Dr. Barnes's hatchet person here. 

And I wonder about "the pond on the old Wilson property."  It looks an awful lot like the lake where Andy Taylor used to take Opie fishing.  I should ask Cindy Lee.  She'll know.  By the way-- yes, she rocks the overalls again!

The Secrets of Isis Episode 7: "Bigfoot"

The Larkspur High kids-- including some we've never seen before and will probably never see again because they're already old enough to be parents of high schoolers themselves-- enjoy a school picnic complete with a mellow performance of "Home on the Range" on guitar by Rick Mason.  Of course who else but center-of-every-event Cindy Lee (wearing her baby blue overalls, an outfit that gets quite a workout in the first ten or so episodes) and a male classmate also named Lee come running back with reports of having seen Bigfoot.

Actually, I should point out Cindy first sensibly suggests it may have been a bear; a rational, down to earth explanation despite her hectic state of mind.  One can understand her reluctance to commit to cryptid species identification when considering her association with the science faculty and her recent misadventures involving the worst bear costume ever captured on film.  Also, take into account Mason's openly irritated response to Lee's insistence what they saw was, in fact, Bigfoot.  He is pissed!  Cindy Lee's fun-loving and outgoing, but she's been around Mason long enough to judge his moods.  No fool that Cindy Lee.

But even the science teacher's remonstration can't stop Lee from becoming obsessed with obtaining photographic evidence of Bigfoot's existence, to the point of endangering his own life.  Once again it's Isis to the rescue.

"Bigfoot" (aired October 18, 1975), features some solid guest star work from Scott Colomby, later to play Tony D'Annunzio in Caddyshack.  He's got a cool James Franco-ish vibe.  But gosh darn it, when you promise Bigfoot you have to deliver Bigfoot, not a bearded 7'3" Bill Engesser in a floppy hat and plaid shirt along with a lot of sermonizing (with a melancholy harmonica on the soundtrack no less) about how people can be cruel to those they think are different, but you should still give them a chance.

I mean, yeah, I agree with the message; respect and cherish each other for the things that make each of us unique and all that.  Joanna Cameron certainly delivers it in a stately cadence befitting a wise goddess.  But Bigfoot, man.  Bigfoot.  You promised us Bigfoot and then you wimped out on us.  Although considering the show's bad luck with animal costumes, perhaps I should be a bit more charitable.

I haven't talked much about Albert Reed, Jr. as Dr. Joshua Barnes.  Mainly because he's not exactly a major character-- after all, the DC comic based on the show couldn't get his age, race or even his academic credentials right most of the time.  Dr. Barnes's function is to appear, offer a few words of wisdom, then glide away and let the rest of the episode bear out his gentle admonitions.  His air of calm, benign authority probably has something to do with his steady, longtime gig at Los Angeles International Airport where he retired as its Chief of Security in 1983.  Reed even played a version of himself and his job in the 1969 air-disaster flick Airport.

Nowhere is Reed's presence as Barnes felt as much as it is in this episode where he espouses a gentle, leave well enough alone philosophy regarding Bigfoot.

"Too many people think that anything they don't understand is dangerous," he tells Lee, who's ready at this point to join an armed mob to hunt down Bigfoot without really knowing why.  "That's wrong.  If you don't know what something is, you should be cautious, but not afraid.  Not set out to hunt it down.  As far as we know Bigfoot is only a fable, just like vampires and ghosts.  So let's not have anymore idle talk about it, okay?"

Words worth remembering, and Reed is convincing.  If only all our leaders were as sensible and open-minded as Dr. Barnes.  Could Larkspur High ask for a better principal?

The Secrets of Isis Episode 5: "Rockhound's Roost"

Kevin, a surly, lazy jerk, dislikes Fabian, the geology-loving (he also loves "everything in America, especially hamburgers and baseball," so right away I'm on his side) exchange student who also happens to be the prince of an unnamed African nation.  Why?  No reason; Kevin hates everything, especially chores.  To get out of doing some yard work, he forges his dad's name on a permission slip and joins Andrea Thomas's class on a field trip to Rockhound's Roost, the bear-infested park that's supposedly way out in the wilderness somewhere but features a busy street visible just beyond its trees.  Rick Mason and Ms. Thomas have their suspicions about Kevin's motives, which prove valid when Thomas catches the kid tossing the picnic dishes into the stream instead of washing them.  Things come to a head when Mr. Mason calls the school and learns of Kevin's deceit.  Kevin rashly runs away, pursued by a concerned Fabian.  Lurking nearby-- a hungry bear, desperate to protect its honey tree!

"Rockhound's Roost," which aired October 4, 1975, is the show's first outright dud.  It's preachy and heavy-handed in ways previous episodes haven't been, and its lesson is a snoozer-- yet Kevin's dad and Fabian both manage to lay it on us, using almost the exact same phrase.  Your responsibilities have a way of catching up with you.  Once again Isis is on hand merely to reinforce what Kevin learns through hard-won experience.  But over-emphasis on the moral isn't the fatal misstep here.  Because "Roost" features as its climax the least convincing bear attack since that episode of Help!... It's the Hair Bear Bunch where they have an acid flashback to the day they mauled those cops in Haight-Ashbury back in '67.  Really, a bear costume?   A bear suit is the only thing more ridiculous than an ape suit, and this one is particularly bad.  Always a mistake, and one from which this episode never recovers.

Thomas Carter as Fabian has a winning smile and maintains his fake accent well enough, but he's hamstrung by a lot of "In my country..." dialogue.  His character is vaguely reminiscent of just about every prince or princess who ever went out among the commoners in a TV sitcom.  Steven Paul as the troublesome Kevin really seems to lack conviction in the early going, which probably accounts for his character's lethargy.  Playing a moody jerk is no easy task.  Too far in one direction and the audience despises you and doesn't buy or care much about your eventual redemption.  Too far in the other and what's the point of the story?  It may be the plodding script that does him in, but it doesn't help that his performance is eerily similar to Hayden Christensen's in the Star Wars prequels.  They're sound-alikes anyway, with the same flat delivery.  By the time Kevin does his about-face becomes likable, we're already in bear country and he's fatally upstaged by the ridiculous bear.

Brian Cutler touched on this in his interview on the Isis DVD, but this episode is a perfect example of how the show acted as a starting point for a lot of youngsters who went on to successful careers both in front of and behind the camera.  Carter acted in 37 episodes of TV's The White Shadow and later directed multiple outings of Hill Street Blues, St. Elsewhere, Amazing Stories and the critically-lauded miniseries A Year in the Life, plus theatrical features like Coach Carter and Save the Last Dance.  He's a three-time Emmy winner as a director and producer and a 6-time nominee.  While he was one of many producers on the Nicholas Cage Ghost Rider and its sequel, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, Paul's major contribution to world cinema is as director of Slapstick (Of Another Kind) starring Jerry Lewis and Madeline Kahn, perhaps the single most bizarre adaptation of a Kurt Vonnegut novel we're ever likely to see.



We're not talking prestige projects here, but Paul's got some lengthy producing credits, mostly of family-oriented fare with titles like The Karate Dog.  He's apparently taking the reins of the Baby Geniuses franchise-- yes, it's a franchise now, in that they're completed a new entry in the series and are hard at work on numbers four and five-- from the late Bob Clark.

According to the IMDB, Paul bought his own building in Century City and "has a full bar in his office."  Okay, no joke-- I'm officially impressed.

Brian Cutler's Rick Mason becomes more and more interesting, with each episode adding little facets to his character.  The premiere didn't give him much to work with, just simple declarative statements for the most part.  But part of the fun of Isis is watching Cutler get into a groove as his character become the show's understated comedic relief.  He never plays Mason as a clown, but he gets in a zinger or two here and there.  Mason's the kind of teacher who doesn't mind farming for corn and chuckling at his own jokes.  But he turns serious and capable in a crisis.  Cutler may not transform into a hero, but he's obviously comfortable in the role of male Lois Lane at this point.

In fact, by now the show has developed consistent good chemistry among the lead trio.  Joanna Cameron continues to rock (get it?) her dual role even when faced with the horrific Ursus arctos horribilis.  You have to give her mad respect for maintaining her dignity during that sequence, which features a ring of fire that's all too obviously artificial, but proves effective at holding the slow-moving (possibly dying from some kind of ursine motor-neuron disease from the looks of it) bear at bay.  Joanna Pang as Cindy Lee is a total charmer as class spokesperson.  Literally.  Not a single classmate besides the two guest stars has so much as a single line of dialogue, leaving Cindy to do all the heavy lifting in the background.  "Don't worry, gang," Mason tells the class as he dashes off with Thomas to find that dick Kevin, "We'll get out in the field yet."

"You know what, gang?" Cindy says as soon as the teachers are out of earshot and her classmates gather around her to listen.  "I am worried!"
 
But the most amazing thing about this episode has to be Rick Mason's kick ass rayon-- you know, art silk-- shirt, the one he wears on the field trip.  What is that print?  Is it simply abstract, or is it some kind of an animal/peacock feather thing?  Whatever it is, it is happening.  It is 70s gold!  Fabian's dashikis are pretty cool, too.  I've always loved dashikis.  I've never worn one because I've never felt it would be culturally appropriate, but yeah.

As long as we're on this costuming kick, in her DVD interview Joanna Pang poked a little fun at Cindy Lee's light blue overalls and now I understand why.  It's not that she looks bad in them; she's cute as a bug.  It's that she wears them practically in every episode.  They're on fine display here, both in the classroom and in the forest.

Winner of the coveted "Costume of the Episode" prize goes to the poor stuntperson in that threadbare bear suit.  This is one of those times when cutting the already minuscule budget would have been a good idea.  "Hey, I don't think we can afford the top quality bear suit rental, but we can get this shoddy one for less because the last person to wear it died of the bubonic plague."  "Oh, that's too bad.  Bears and Isis just don't mix.  Let's come up with some other form of jeopardy for Kevin and Fabian... one that doesn't look quite so tacky."

Maybe they actually did try to rent a trained animal performer, but if they'd been thinking straight the producers would have realized a third act re-write was really in order.  Fabian gets his ankle caught conveniently in some rocks-- ironic, eh?-- and Kevin taunts the lethargic bear with a handful of what's supposed to be honey (should have used Post Super Sugar Crisp cereal instead) from about a foot away.  Ask Timothy Treadwell if that's such a good idea.  Of course with this particular bear, the biggest danger is being overcome by the twin menace of mothball fumes and the unbearable odor of the sloppily sweating stuntperson inside.

For those of you in the audience who are actual rock hounds-- you do get some rock lore here, but it's not going to help you pass that geology test.  Ms. Thomas fills us in on obsidian, Cindy Lee marvels at various stones, and Kevin's dad-- who earlier bonded with Fabian over the young fellow's rock collection-- teaches his son and the viewers at home the recipe for granite.

The Secrets of Isis Episode 2: "Spots of the Leopard"

Episode two?  But we just watched episode four.  Yes, this one is out of order.  Wait!  YOU'RE OUT OF ORDER!  YOU'RE OUT OF ORDER!  THE WHOLE BLOG IS OUT OF ORDER!  THEY'RE OUT OF ORDER!

Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Al Pacino.  On with the review.

Can Isis help restore a girl's faith in her ex-con father when he's the main suspect in a crime spree?  That's what we're here to find out as we discuss the second episode of Isis, "Spots of the Leopard," which aired September 13, 1975.  Jenny Nelson and her dad Chuck have to fend for themselves because Mom's out of town.  Chuck recently got out of prison and when someone starts using his M.O. (that's crime talk for modus operandi, or "how the heck it's done") to steal industrial diamonds, and his alibi proves bogus, even Jenny suspects her dad's gone back to his thieving ways.  Cindy Lee tries to get her to discuss it with Ms. Thomas, who apparently has the answer to everything, at least according to Cindy.

The girl's reluctant, then her father takes her on a spur of the moment camping trip.  This does nothing to soothe her, especially when she sees his wallet stuffed with money.  Off to the woods again.  People are always going into the woods in this show.  Was Henry David Thoreau on the writing staff?  Only Jenny doesn't go there because she wants to live deliberately; twitchy because he's under scrutiny from the insurance investigator who sent him to the big house once before, her father gives her little choice, and she's not happy about it or him.  To make matters worse, she gets her foot caught under a fake log which conveniently rolls down a hill onto her ankle just when Isis flies in to talk to her.

Jenny is played by Debralee Scott, who was the 1970s version of the great Clea DuVall.  Like DuVall, Scott was one of those everywhere faces in the 70s and 80s, one of those actors you sort of recognize because they turn up when you least expect them and always seem to do solid work.  She seemed to specialize in baby sisters, though.  Scott played Louise Lasser's little sister on Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman (was there some kind of special casting relationship between that show and Isis, or were the Hartman actors simply up for every part in town at one point?), Rosalie "Hotsy" Totsy in a few episodes of Welcome Back, Kotter, then another younger sister to Donna Pescow on Angie.  After with Kotter, I probably remember her most from Angie, having been a major fan of that show as a kid for reasons my adult self cannot fathom.  She even had parts in a couple of those Police Academy movies.  Her own older sister produced for Robert Altman, by the way.

Sadly, while doing some background research on this episode, I discovered Scott passed away in 2005, followed shortly by her sister.  It's a strange story and upsets me to no end.

You won't get any complaints about Scott's performance here, even if she has to act opposite a papier-mache log, which weighs a couple of pounds at least, and pretend it has her foot pinned.  That set up is pretty contrived and silly, but the rest of the show is fairly solid.  I love the casual opening scene where Jenny teases her dad about buying too much at the supermarket.  Veteran character actor Lou Frizzell looks nothing like Scott (maybe she's adopted?) but because they're consummate pros, they create a believable father-daughter chemistry.  Due to the plot machinations that require him to be shifty and suspicious when being forthright would have solved his problems within the first five minutes, father Chuck comes across as a bit of a bonehead, though.

Thanks to Roger Ebert's Law of the Conservation of Characters the true culprit fools no one.  Even Chuck figures him out, but then he stupidly takes things a step too far when he rashly attempts to crimebust on his own and nearly pays for it with both his freedom and his daughter's respect.  Which is the real crook's plan all along.  Pin it on the obvious guy, then...  Well, after that it's not exactly clear how he plans to make himself wealthy with the diamonds, which will still have to be accounted for.

One thing you'll notice about Isis is the stories aren't really about Isis, or Rick Mason, and only rarely about Cindy Lee.  They're about the guest stars.  It's a formula pioneered by shows like Bonanza and The Fugitive.  The lead characters remain in stasis because they have to maintain the show's premise week after week.  And since all fiction involves conflict and change-- I mean character growth, not Ms. Thomas into Isis-- all the lessons have to be learned by various students and/or their families and we never see them again.  Ms. Thomas remains cool and collected, Rick Mason jovially dedicated and Cindy Lee enthusiastic about her studies and pro-Andrea Thomas.  Like the Cartwrights, they are transformative agents, popping into the story here and there to help things along.  Any personal growth they experience happens long term and off-screen.  But essentially, not at all.

But I'm troubled.  There's a little matter that really bothers me.  Chuck Nelson grills up some burgers for the gang, then goes off to confront the burglar.  In the meantime, there's a police stake out and people driving (or flying on zephyr winds) from location to location.  This is before anyone actually attempts to eat a burger.  So my question is, how long were those hamburgers lying around in the sun?

And yet they must be safe to eat because Ms. Thomas and Mr. Mason would never--  Oh, that's right!  Cindy, Jenny and Chuck settle in to eat, but the two teachers order theirs to go.  Probably to dump the contaminated meat patties in a wastebasket somewhere.  Their excuse is they have to paint Thomas's apartment.  Now there may or may not have been a little romance between them, or perhaps they maintained their professional relationship all along.  But asking someone to help paint your apartment is a pretty big step in a relationship of any kind.

Because I've been trained to by so many subsequent TV shows, I keep looking for signs of sexual tension or flirtation between Thomas and Mason, but these fine teachers remain merely colleagues no matter how much time they spend together investigating UFOs, looking for Cindy Lee or discussing crime waves.  The DC comic tries desperately to pair them up, but in this day of "shippers" and fan fiction pairings of every imaginable combination, it's kind of refreshing to think both Ms. Thomas and Mr. Mason date outside the show's onscreen cast in between episodes and just keep their private lives largely to themselves when they're on the job, or the case.  Every male-female duo doesn't have to be David and Maddy or Lois and Clark or Mulder and Scully or Booth and Bones, for Isis's sake.

Let's all give Cindy a hand for being nonjudgemental.  You can imagine the pressures faced by a teen who has to show up every day when everyone knows her father's a jailbird.  Kids can be cruel about things so seemingly inconsequential as a pimple or pooping your pants on a long bus ride during a field trip because you're too embarrassed to tell a teacher you're in gastric distress, so you can imagine how having a prison parent affects Jenny's social life.  And yet there's the popular and peppy Cindy Lee making it a point to sit with Jenny at lunch.  A true friend!

The Secrets of Isis Episode 4: "The Sound of Silence"

Andrea Thomas proves herself an absolute genius when she invents a uranium pellet-powered force field device she calls the “Circle Guard.”  Both Rick Mason and Cindy Lee refuse to throw a baseball at Thomas to demonstrate—Mr. Mason kids his insurance doesn't cover "beaning teachers who think they're invulnerable," while Cindy jokes, “Not me!  I don’t have enough friends as it is!” 

It’s no problem for the school’s other genius, Bill, played by actor-artist Leigh McCloskey.  Old timers like Bill Haverchuck and I remember him as Lucy Ewing's husband on Dallas; dude has an incredible voice, by the way (I'm jealous because I sound like Wallace Shawn on helium).  McCloskey is handsome, with a patrician air about him that reminds me quite a lot of Armie Hammer's dual role as the Winklevoss Twins in The Social Network.  Maybe because I think he looks like Armie Hammer.  That McCloskey gives such a polished performance is a plus because he's onscreen more than the series regulars, apart from Cameron.  

Bill helps Ms. Thomas with her baseball demonstration, astounding everyone in the room.  Brilliant student that he is, he quickly grasps the scientific principals involved and wonders out loud (mistake) if “the other side” might pay a pretty penny for it.  Later, in private with Ms. Thomas, Bill reveals his anger at having not only lost a science contest but also at having made a fool of himself by bragging to his classmates about the car he planned to buy with the cash prize.  See?  I'm not crazy to make this Social Network association.  It turns out Bill even has the movie Winklevoss's sense of outraged white guy entitlement, if not their wealth.

When the Circle Guard vanishes, Bill is the prime suspect.  The only suspect.  And yeah, he’s the thief.  His brilliant plan is to sell the Circle Guard to Jack Evans, boss of an organized crime gang of one or as many as two members.  But he must be a bad, bad man because the very name of Jack Evans strikes fear in the hearts of our three Larkspur High crime-busters.

All poor Bill wants to do is make a quick score and buy a sharp car to impress his friends so he can once again feel like a BMOC.  But the conniving Evans (veteran character actor Philip Bruns-- later of Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman and many others-- plays Evans with a touch of comic menace without ham-fisting it) has other plans.  Meanwhile, Ms. Thomas realizes the Circle Guard’s uranium fuel leaks radioactivity whenever someone activates the device.  Can Isis save Bill from himself, and the deadly effects of radiation?

"The Sound of Silence" (the title seems to be a non sequitor; silence plays no role in the plot, nor does sound in any unusual way) is more exciting than the three previous episodes put together (See?  You guys really needed to open “Fool’s Dare” with that bike race!), with a crime lord, action, comedic relief plus a smidgen of something resembling science.  Or, as Rick Mason would have it, science fiction.  Nothing beats watching Joanna Pang and Brian Cutler do the infamous mime bit, “The Invisible Box” while pretending to press against the Circle Guard’s force field.  The baseball richocet effect is surprisingly violent and convincing, though.  Later, Jocko, Evans’s lunkheaded hulk of a bodyguard (he loves comic books so he can’t be all bad) injures his shoulder trying to smash through the force field as Bill demonstrates it for the criminal duo.

The idea a high school teacher, even one as talented and dedicated as Andrea Thomas, could create a force field device-- much less power it with uranium pellets-- is ridiculous, of course.  If Andrea Thomas really does have the know-how to produce a hand-held force field generator, she’s wasting her time teaching chemistry at Larkspur High School.  She needs to be at Fermilab or the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.  There’s a Nobel in her future!

But we have to overlook that because the Circle Guard is merely a macguffin that gets us to the crux of the episode-- Bill's choice between right and wrong.  Wrong offers immediate rewards, right offers immediate punishment. All Bill has to do is activate the force field that will prevent the goddess from capturing the two criminals and he can have a different car for every day of the week.  Isis boldly encourages Bill  to make up his own mind.  No threats, no violence.  Just that goddess-like poise as she saunters into the forest clearing.  "It's a big decision, isn't it, Bill?  Maybe you ought to think about it for a moment before you make it.  Because once you do," Isis tells him, "there's no turning back."

Decent people like Bill sometimes make stupid, rash mistakes from momentary weakness or anger, but these don't have to define them for a lifetime.  And unlike, say, Batman's violent and arrogant presumption he has to beat everyone into correctness-- granted, it's in the face of an aggressively cynical strawman argument that the world is lousy enough to require him-- it's not Isis's job to take away from people the ability to make these choices.  Instead, she gently nudges them, then steps aside.  The show wraps these moments in the trappings of superheroics and magic, but the real secret of Isis is the show isn't really about Isis.  It's only occasionally about Cindy Lee.  It's really about the Bills of the world, the true heroes of their own lives if they wish to be.

A clever touch comes when the show re-works the denouement of the famous “Do you feel lucky punk?” scene from Dirty Harry into a nicey-nice kid-vid moment.  Curious to the last, Bill asks Isis if the force field really did stop her and could he have escaped by pressing the button, just like the bank robber “gots to know” if Harry Callahan has fired his last bullet or not.  And Isis, with a knowing smile, obliges him.

The uranium leak proves to be something of a red herring.  It’s referenced exactly once during the climactic chase and in the end, turns out not to have had an effect on anything other than Rick Mason’s photo negatives.  Despite Ms. Thomas’s—and Isis’s—apparent health and public safety concerns, Bill uses the Circle Guard approximately a million times without any ill effects.  Other than falling and breaking his ankle while trying to escape through some woods with Evans and Jocko.

Speaking of Jocko (Wayne Storm), the guy is hilarious.  He won’t stop calling Evans “Boss,” despite being asked and while holding Ms. Thomas captive—in a child-safe sort of way; even without her ample resources (and Tut's interference) she’s never in any danger—he gruffly offers her a “funny book” to read.  That’s probably his way of playing nice.

As for the Circle Guard itself?  Well, it’s just a metal box.  It looks like some kind of off-the-shelf electronic equipment you’d find at a Radio Shack and features some dials and switches, plus what looks like a telescoping radio antenna on the side for some reason.  But my favorite feature is one of those analog rolling odometers like on your grandparents’ 1973 Caprice Classic.  What the heck do those numbers mean?  Objects repelled?  Kids helped to catharsis by Isis?  Number of times Cindy Lee has risked death?

The Secrets of Isis episode 1: "The Lights of Mystery Mountain"

Sorry! I accidentally hit the wrong button and released my review of episode three, "Fool's Dare" into the wild before I gave it a thorough fact-checking. Certain online info led me to believe it was the second episode, and I needed to fill in some names. So now everything is pretty well bolixed up. No matter. Isis would have some comforting words about doing your best but understanding your limitations.

 This is the premiere episode of the Filmation live action TV series Isis, or The Secrets of Isis. It aired Saturday morning, September 6, 1975 on the CBS Television Network.  I was largely an ABC-NBC sort of kid, but I usually flipped over to watch this and Shazam!  Unfortunately, I retained very little of my impressions of either show.  Re-watching Isis now is revelatory.  So I'm going to review them all right here in this very blog, and you can watch with me and see what I get wrong.  Let's begin.

When high school student Cindy Lee takes photos of strange lights in the sky, teachers Andrea Thomas and Rick Mason accompany her back to a small mountain town where they investigate burned spots, abandoned cars and possibly missing tourists.  When Cindy involves herself with a couple of local teens and their shady boss, can Isis save her and solve the mystery?

I don't know about you, but the first ten minutes or so probably scared me out of my pajamas when I was 7 years old.  At one point our intrepid academics see the strange lights and Cindy runs back to the car alone to retrieve her camera.  Yikes!  Then again, I was the kind of kid who, if I'd read a horror comic the day before or watched a TV commercial for The Exorcist that night during M*A*S*H, would have to fight the screaming terrors simply walking into my darkened room at bedtime.

Even though logically Cindy is roughly a football field's length away from her teachers and the cops, for just a moment the danger seems real, as if UFOs truly are soaring around making those creepy noises and vanishing people into pocket universes or space-napping them for hideous experiments like buttocks transplantations between humans and animals.  You know, the usual alien gimicks.  The true culprit turns out to be much more banal.  Just an old dude in a western shirt, with motives that were probably a Saturday morning cliche even in 1975.  The tension seeps out of the show as we realize Cindy was never in any real danger and Isis can easily handle the greedy chump with a couple of rhyming couplets and arms akimbo poses.

JoAnna Cameron displays a ton of easy charisma here, both as teacher Thomas and goddess Isis.  It certainly helps that she's gorgeous-- obviously she was in great shape.  But she doesn't cop out on her performance.  If she had any doubts about maintaining her dignity while pretending to fly in what was probably a low rent Chroma key blue-screen shot hardly more advanced than a local station's weather news technology, she doesn't let them show.  In fact, she does a fantastic George Reeves impression throughout, finally giving the camera a knowing glance as she parries Cindy Lee's Lois Lane/Jimmy Olsen-like observation that she's never around when Isis soars into action and sarcastically agrees with Rick Mason's old fashioned ideas about women in times of crisis.

The supporting actors are fine, too.  Beefy character actor Kelly Thordsen plays the villainous Mr. Moss with just the right note of mild menace-- jerky enough to seem committed, but ultimately hapless in a way that soothes young psyches.  He passed away in 1977, but wow, he played a lot of cops in his career.  Joanna Pang conveys Cindy's youthful enthusiasm with a breathy voice and jittery energy, and the show quickly establishes her danger-prone personality.  Brian Cutler doesn't get much to work with here, with Rick Mason functioning mostly as the thick-skulled skeptic to Cameron's open-minded teacher.  Later episodes give Cutler the opportunity to portray Mason with a more engaging personality and a self-deprecating sense of humor.  The conflicted teens-- they initially work for Moss as a joke but become increasingly disenchanted when they realize the consequences of their actions towards Cindy-- are a nice touch.

Few people in the Isis world are truly bad, simply misguided and they usually provide their own conscience-based epiphanies.  The heroic character Isis therefore becomes a device for reinforcing lessons learned from the situation at hand-- usually involving Cindy Lee in a dilemma.  Isis helps and her remonstrations are gentle; she doesn't force issues, or impose.  In this way, the show's philosophy tends toward a positive view of humanity.

In terms of kid-vid, and despite its paltry budget, Isis is vastly superior to most of its contemporaries and even flashy schlock with Power Rangers or whatever the hell kids got into in the 90s.  It may lack the colorful, trippy acid-rush quality that makes Sid and Marty Krofft's offerings perennial faves of the post-modern deconstructionist crowd (you know, like me), but unlike a typical episode of Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? or The New Adventures of Gilligan, Isis doesn't assume its audience consists of tiny idiots on a sugar-rush from Fruit Loops cereal.

This episode never condescends or talks down to its young viewers as it presents simple yet thoughtful concepts such as a short debate over the existence and nature of UFOs ( with Dr. Barnes wisely pointing out that term isn't synonymous with flying saucers but simply implies the unknown), or coming to the realization you've made some bad decisions and doing the right thing to fix them, even if it means owning up to your responsibilities and accepting punishment in the end.  It features characters capable making mistakes, of inner conflict and change.  All with a spunky, positivistic vibe and an appealing lead.

As such, it doesn't descend into camp enough to charm the college kids, but it still provides some solid entertainment even to someone like me.  It beats ironically appreciating poorly animated hijinks and brainless slapstick.  You know, the kind of absolute crap we try to pretend isn't an entertainment nadir or wasn't a complete waste of our lazy, privileged, suburban childhoods.  And inspires insipid live-action remakes that inevitably drive Internet fan rage.

One thing bothers me, though.  The show never explains why the two dudes leave yet another burned circle for Thomas, Mason and a couple of cops to ponder after they pick up Cindy.  Cindy says nothing about it, yet she must have noticed.  I doubt I questioned this the first time I watched it.  I just felt worried for Cindy Lee.  Mr. Moss would stop at nothing to get her camera!  Well, if "stop at nothing" consist largely of shouting ineffectually as the kids drive away.

The Secrets of Isis episode 3: "Fool's Dare"

Who is the greater fool, the fool or the fool who follows him?  Cindy Lee tries to find out in this turbulent episode of Isis.  It's "Fool's Dare," which first aired Saturday, September 20, 1975.  Car theft runs rampant and it's got the Larkspur High School faculty worried.  Not far from the school, Cindy handily (or foot-ily) defeats two friends in a bike race.  The sore loser dares her to spend one hour in an abandoned junk yard.  Her pride wounded, Cindy hops the fence.  Right into danger.  Can Isis rescue the injured girl from a couple of (tepidly) desperate characters?

This otherwise adequate episode could have been improved with one simple addition.  The bike race!  We only get to see its aftermath.  While Cindy's adventure behind the junkyard wall provides child-appropriate suspense, there are just too many shots of the girl limping around and between old wrecked cars.  Opening with even a short action sequence with quick-cuts of the kids speeding along on their bikes would have provided a better visual hook to lead viewers into the talky first half and they could have cut the fat down to the real meat of the junkyard sequence.

We do get some Isis staples.  Teacher Andrea Thomas as a natural-born sleuth, Rick Mason's low-key sense of humor, Dr. Barnes's calm wisdom and Tut providing forced comedic relief.  Tut the talking crow is one of the few pandering elements here, an out-of-place touch of Saturday morning juvenilia on a show that generally avoids it.  I mean, avoids it as much as a children's show can with its main conceit a crime-fighting Egyptian goddess who works magic through rhyming couplets.

And Cindy.  Perpetually chipper.  Sunny.  The girl is so positive and trusting, so confident in the people around her and their motives, she's completely caught off guard when embittered loser Ernie first accuses her of cheating.  "I didn't cut you off," she insists, laughing innocently because she has no way of judging his wounded ego or how far he'll go to salve it.  She's backed up by boy #2, who seems squirmily uncomfortable about the whole thing, and cheerfully tells Ernie, "It's just a bike race.  It's not important!"

Not to you, Cindy.  You have your sincerity and self-esteem.  Others aren't so lucky or secure in themselves.  Like Ernie, who issues his petulant challenge.  He must have felt emasculated by his loss because he first employs the gender superiority stratagem.  Cindy knows girls are every bit as capable and curious as boys.  She's stung by Ernie's foolish assertions, but not fatally.  Undaunted, Ernie goes with that tried and true favorite:  threatening Cindy with the "chicken" label.  This, Cindy finally decides, is completely unacceptable.  Plus, for our own selfish entertainment needs we must have her in jeopardy so we can call in Isis and solve the car thefts.  Cindy can't do it all by herself, but she can spy on the crooks as they paint Ms. Thomas's car yellow.

The show's view of crime and criminals is a signifier of both a simpler time and its target demographic of Saturday morning kids.  When they realize Cindy's spotted them, the two car thieves' inclination is to run away before she can call the cops.  Actually, that's a pretty smart idea as far as criminality goes.  In our darker time or on a more adult-oriented show (or a hypothetical gritty hardnosed comic book reboot), they'd grab her and either beat her or kill her.  They'd at least threaten her with injury or death.  But then they'd go from theft to violent crime and more serious penalties.  Smarter to cut your losses.  After all, this is Isis, not The Dark Knight Returns.  All it takes is our hero tossing quips, old tennis nets and tires to put an end to car thievery forever.

Notice too how Ernie realizes on his own the disservice he's done Cindy and comes back to put things right. Without a prompting from Isis he apologizes.  Cindy, being infinitely kind-hearted, instantly forgives him.  "And I realize you're a better bike rider than I am," Ernie tells her.  "Some of the time," Cindy quips.  When Ernie admits he shouldn't have dared her, Cindy accepts her share of the blame for taking him up on it.  Ms. Thomas gently reinforces what the kids have learned for themselves, and the two boys help the injured girl walk away to get medical aid or ice creams or both.  The end of an Isis episode leaves its audience with positive vibes about just about everyone in the story.  Except the car thieves, and even they're apparently good at painting cars because the next time we see Ms. Thomas's car in the series, it's still yellow.

Makes you wonder if they shouldn't have just opened a legitimate paint and body shop.  If that's not an oxymoron in itself.

Speaking of cars, Ms. Thomas has a sweet ride, doesn't she?  It's a '74 or '75 Pontiac Firebird, baby!  No wonder these guys targeted it.  The car must have strained the show's meagre budget because they display not one but two of them-- the original in red and the re-painted yellow one.  It's impressive for Isis.  Did they rent two or actually find one in need of re-painting and work things out in trade?  Maybe it belonged to a crew-member or actor and the paint was in lieu of pay.  I'm not sure it was intentional, but giving the straitlaced science teacher a hot rod hints a bit at her dual nature.  Teacher and goddess.  And yet Ms. Thomas has her own skill set that should be appreciated-- she cracks the car theft ring using ordinary high school science equipment and strong observations skills.  Even Rick Mason scores on that one.

A couple of trivia points.  Joanna Pang slips up and refers to her teacher as "Miss Andrea" while spying on the thieves.  We can probably forgive her because Cindy seems to have the privilege of referring to her teachers by their first names.  And the two boys-- we never see them on the show again-- are played by Josh Albee and Jeff Tyler, a reunion because they earlier essayed Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn in a 1973 TV adaptation of the Mark Twain classic Tom Sawyer.