Adventure Comics #410 (On Sale: July 29, 1971), has a
Supergirl cover by
Bob Oksner on this the first official post-Sekowsky issue.
We begin with Supergirl in "The Nature of the Beast" by John Albano, Bob Oksner, and Vince Colletta. Linda Danvers is visiting Nasthalthia (Nasty) at her apartment. Nasty is hopeful that Linda will agree to move in with her so that she can keep her under surveillance and prove she is Supergirl. While touring the apartment Linda spots a horrifying scene in the apartment next door, quickly changes into Supergirl, and bursts in next door where a man is being attacked by strange manbird creatures.
She subdues the creatures and pursues them as they fly out the window but she loses her superpowers. Her powers have been coming in and out since swallowing a drug in issue 404. Supergirl falls from the apartment to the street but manages to catch herself. She returns back to the man's apartment dressed as Linda and finds Nasty coddling the handsome young man, Mike Merrick, that had been attacked. Mike thinks that it was Nasty who saved him from the bird creatures. He invites both girls out to dinner and they dine at the Club 500 where Mike devotes most of his attention to Linda instead of Nasty. Mike and Linda spend most of their time on the dance floor and find that Nasty has left apparently out of jealousy and boredom. Mike and Linda leave the club where they are both abducted once again by the bird creatures.
The bird creatures fly them to their island where they are brought before the leader who accuses Mike of stealing jewels. The chief bird explains that they used to be villagers with normal human appearances until a professor came accompanied by Mike and performed bizarre experiments on them. The injections they received from the Professor and Mike altered their appearance into bird-like creatures. The Professor and Mike also stole a jewel from a sacred idol as they prepared to leave the island. The Professor was later found dead on the beach, supposedly murdered by Mike.
Mike denies the accusations so the bird creatures threaten to drop Linda into a volcano to make Mike confess. At that point, Mike reveals that the jewel is back at his apartment. He and Linda are imprisoned in a cage until the jewel is recovered, but Mike tries to escape by setting a fire. As they escape, Mike is attacked by the bird creatures once more. Linda changes into Supergirl and flies Mike to safety off the island. As she is flying, Supergirls powers fade away yet again.
She is rescued by Mike who swims her back to the beach. He lays Supergirls unconscious body down and confesses that he knows that Supergirl and Linda are one and the same. He also reveals that he lied about the location of the jewel and admits that Supergirl will eventually have to hunt him down as he walks away from Supergirls unconscious body on the beach.
The reprint backup is the Legion of Super-Heroes in "The Revolt of the Girl Legionnaires" by Jerry Siegel and John Forte and reprinted from Adventure Comics #326 (1964). Saturn Girl summons all the female Legionnaires to the Super-Hero Clubhouse to begin laying plans to destroy the male members. Ultra Boy, Mon-El, Sun Boy, Lightning Lad, Colossal Boy, and Matter-Eater Lad, returning from a mission are diverted elsewhere by Saturn Girl. The remaining male Legionnaires are selected as victims by the various girls, who plan to pair off romantically with each and kill them at the Interplanetary Fair.
The next day at the fair, Light Lass causes Element Lad to be stranded on a mountain peak, while Triplicate Girl, assisted by Shrinking Violet, splits into three girls who use ring devices to reduce Invisible Kid, Cosmic Boy, and Brainiac 5 to a tiny size, and entombs them inside a matchbox. Saturn Girl lures Superboy into fighting a robot lead creature, which bursts open to reveal deadly Kryptonite. Supergirl teases Chameleon Boy into becoming phantom-like, then uses a cancellite spray to keep him from changing back, and Phantom Girl tricks Star Boy into making himself super-heavy so that he sinks into the ground.
Back at the Clubhouse, the girls celebrate their success with a wild party. Queen Azura of the planet Femnaz, a world controlled by man-hating women, suddenly appears on their space monitor and releases them from the super-hypnotic command she'd put them under. She explains that the other male Legionnaires, while on their mission, had saved her people from disaster, and thus changed her attitude toward all males.
Normal once again, the girls release the boys from their traps, and all is explained and forgiven.
We end with Supergirl in "The Ruler Without a Planet" by John Albano, Bob Oksner, and Vince Colletta. Supergirl is on patrol in search of Mike Merrick from the first story. She encounters a huge ape creature causing havoc on the city block below. She notices that the beast is clutching a small boy in its hand. Supergirl quickly subdues the creature and rescues the boy. As she is setting the boy down, Supergirl notices flames coming from a nearby storage room. She tries to blow the flames out using her super-breath but finds that her superpowers have disappeared again.
Suddenly a young girl appears out of nowhere and seemingly blows out the flames with a super breath of her own. Supergirl is amazed at the little girl's power. The girl explains that she does not have any parents, only a stepfather and that she had accidentally traveled to earth on a spaceship. The craft exploded once she landed and now she is trapped on earth. She demonstrates her powers of flight and offers to help Supergirl fight crime on earth. She also reveals that she knows Supergirls secret identity. The girl's name is Judy and Supergirl allows her to assist in crime-fighting adventures.
One night Judy receives a telepathic message from her stepfather telling her that she was sent to earth to destroy all superheroes starting with Supergirl. The stepfather encourages Judy to shoot Supergirl with a green death ray gun but she refuses. Enraged, the stepfather attempts to shoot the girl with a death ray of his own but Supergirl blocks it from hitting Judy. In the meantime, the United States Air Force has detected the stepfather's ship hovering in the sky. They shoot it down with their weapons as Supergirl and Judy view the night sky. Judy points to the trailing flames of the craft and remarks that it is a falling star. Supergirl responds by saying it was a falling star that climbed too high and burned itself out.
Edited by Joe Orlando.
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