Queen Bee (comics)

Queen Bee is the name of six different DC Comics supervillains.

Publication history

The Zazzala version of Queen Bee first appeared in Justice League of America #23 and was created by Gardner Fox and Mike Sekowsky.

The first Bialyn Queen Bee first appeared in Justice League International #16 and was created by J.M. DeMatteis and Keith Giffen.

The Tazzala version of Queen Bee first appeared in Creature Commandos #1.

The Beatriz version of Queen Bee first appeared in JLA: Incarnations #6 and was created by John Ostrander, and Val Semeiks.

Fictional character biographies

Queen Bee (Zazzala)

The leader of the hiveworld Korll, Zazzala lives only for the interstellar expansion of her species. Zazzala first appeared in Justice League of America #23 (November 1963). She clashed with the original Justice League several times during the 1960s and 1970s, but largely disappeared for several decades.

Zazzala reappeared in JLA volume 3, #34 (October 1999), when Lex Luthor contacts her to join his Injustice Gang. She agrees, freeing The General from his asteroid prison in exchange for a percentage of Earth's population to become her drones. She also participates in other battles against the League. Her main effort is concentrated upon the city of New York. She forces many of the citizens to craft an 'egg matrix' out of local supplies as a way to secure even more mind-control. She attempts to brainwash Green Lantern and Steel to serve her using 'hypno-pollen', but both heroes are able to fight it off; Huntress encouraged Green Lantern to resist the pollen, and Steel's suit's data-protection immune systems protected him from the pollen's effects (Although Steel still pretended that the pollen had affected him in order to wait for the right moment to figure out what he should attack in order to do the most damage). Using the Queen Bee's inability to see the color red, which many of the superheroes had in their costumes, Wonder Woman and Big Barda keep the Queen's forces occupied while Steel and Plastic Man get the drop on the Queen, Plastic Man covering Steel to render him virtually invisible to the bees. Utilizing a Boom Tube, technology controlled by Barda, they teleport the Queen and her army back to Korll.

Later, Zazzala and her drones join Lex Luthor's new Secret Society of Super Villains. The Queen becomes the leader of the H.I.V.E., a multi-national criminal enterprise. She appears in the six-part "Villains United" limited series. A small team of villains, known as the Secret Six, attack her base as part of a war against the Society. Her forces are defeated, the base's prisoner, Firestorm, is freed and Zazzala herself is badly wounded.

One Year Later, Zazzala appears in JLA volume 4, #20, fully healed from her injuries, and attempting to steal a matter transportation device that will appear to allow her to transport her troops to earth. She is defeated by Wonder Woman and captured by The Flash.

Queen Bee of Bialya

An unrelated Queen Bee was introduced in Justice League International #16 (August 1988). She was an ordinary human femme fatale, who gained control of the terrorist nation of Bialya by forging an alliance with its former ruler Colonel Rumaan Harjavti then assassinating him. She solidified her power by brainwashing the Global Guardians into serving her. She has clashed several times with Justice League International and Justice League Europe.

Justice League Europe found out that the Queen Bee was behind their recent troubles, and that she had a Dominator named Doctor working for her. They invaded her palace and came to an agreement; she would cease hostilities against them if they kept quiet about the unethical things she was doing as Queen. They also demanded she sever relations with the Doctor. After they left, she killed the Doctor. The Queen had far-reaching influences, managing to put one of her own operatives in charge of the League via the United Nations.^[1]

The Queen Bee was eventually defeated by the JLE and the Guardians, who learned of her brainwashing plot. She was assassinated by Rumaan Harjavti's brother Sumaan, during the events of the JLA/JLE crossover Breakdowns (1991).

Queen Bee (Tazzala)

Queen Bee appeared in the 2000 Creature Commandos series. On the otherdimensional world of Terra Arcana, Zazzala's sister Tazzala joined Simon Magus's Terra Arcana Army with the ultimate goal of conquering Earth. The U.S. Army faction known as the Creature Commandos stopped the invasion plans. Tazzala herself was killed by Simon.

Queen Bee of Bialya (Beatriz)

The sister of the second Queen Bee, Beatriz was introduced in JLA: Incarnations #6 (December 2001, but set around 1996) as the new ruler of Bialya. She is using humans forged with machinery and passed off as the robot Extremists to police her country. Her fate since Captain Atom's Extreme Justice team brought an end to these activities is unknown, but she was presumably toppled from power as she no longer rules Bialya.

Queen Bee Impersonator

Wild-child socialite Marcia Monroe dons the guise of Queen Bee in The Brave and the Bold #64 (Feb/Mar 1966). In this story, she discovers her father is a reluctant member in the international criminal organization CYCLOPS. Fearing for both his life and her own, she agrees to take the role of Queen Bee to team up with Eclipso in an attempt to control the Gotham City criminal organizations. They are thwarted by Batman with whom Marcia, in her normal identity, has fallen in love. She rescues Batman from an attempt on his life by Eclipso and then is not seen again, telling Batman that she can't turn herself in as she has to continue to try to clear her father's name and save him from assassination.

The New 52

In "The New 52" (a reboot of the DC Comics universe), Queen Bee is revamped and renamed the H.I.V.E. Queen. She makes her debut in Superman #21 as the leader of H.I.V.E.^[2] She claims to be Brainiac's daughter.^[3] She is a member of the Twenty, a group of otherwise ordinary Metropolis citizens who are infected with a virus by Brainiac that grants them each psionic powers. However, her worldview is distorted and she becomes a zealous devotee of the alien. She creates H.I.V.E. using the façade of a benevolent social media company. Her plan is to actually kidnap other people with psionic potential and use their harvested mental energy to enslave the world in preparation for Brainiac's return. After trying to bend the telepath Hector Hammond to her will but inadvertedly unleashing him, her entire plan is thwarted. She comes into conflict with the latter as well as another telepath, the Psycho Pirate, also a member of the Twenty, during the Psi War storyline. Superman and Lois Lane, who had also been infected with the same psionic virus, manage to defeat them. The H.I.V.E. Queen diappears in the aftermath of the battle.

She reappaers much later in Teen Titans, where she takes control of the entire city of New Orleans. She then has the mind-controlled citizenry build satellite dishes that are actualy psionic amplifiers that will allow her to take over every mind across the United States. However, the Titans are in the city at the same time and manage to resist her mental influence thanks to Raven's magic. Robin and the latter eventually assault her base and defeat her, freeing the city from her control.

Powers and abilities

The first Queen Bee, Zazzala, has insect-like superhuman strength and speed, can fire venomous stinger darts from a set of glands on her right wrist, or release mind-confusing "pollen" powder. She and her drones are unable to perceive the color red. She is a capable enough combatant to fight Big Barda to a stand-still.

Zazzala's sister, Tazzala, presumably had similar abilities.

The Queen Bee of Bialya had no superhuman powers or abilities, aside from her beauty and cunning. Her sister Beatriz was also an ordinary human, but was nowhere as resourceful as her sister.

The sixth Queen has great psionic powers including telepathy, mind control, empathy, casting illusions that look and feel real, telekinesis, projecting harmful blasts of psionic energy and feeding off the mental energies of others to fuel her own powers. She also displayed some sort of healing factor, being able to reconstruct her entire body from scratch after she was blasted to pieces by the Psycho Pirate. Her intellect is also increased to a 12th level, courtesy of the psionic virus she is infected with by Brainiac.

Other versions

Flashpoint

In the alternate timeline of the Flashpoint event, Queen Bee was part of a team led by the Canterbury Cricket to fight the Amazons which ended in failure with the demise of every bug hero except the Canterbury Cricket.^[4]

JLA/Avengers

Queen Bee is among the mind-controlled villains who attack the heroes as they assault Krona's Stronghold in #4. She is shown being blasted by the Wasp.

In other media

Television

• In the Smallville 1st season episode "Drone", a girl named Sasha Woodman has the ability to control swarms of bees; though she is not referred to directly as Queen Bee, the term is referenced to describe her powers. She is later killed in season 7 episode "Cure", by Dr. Curtis Knox.
• In Justice League Unlimited, Queen Bee (apparently in her Zazzala incarnation) is seen as a background member of Gorilla Grodd's Secret Society in the third season premiere, but she does not make a full appearance in the series. However, in the episode "Far From Home", Supergirl fights robotic duplicates of Zazzala and Doctor Cyber for training purposes. The "real" animated Queen Bee has thus far only appeared in a major role in the Justice League Unlimited comic (issue #29), in which she is the primary villain. She is defeated by the combined efforts of Animal Man and B'wana Beast.
• Gail Simone has revealed that the teaser segment to her Batman: The Brave and the Bold episode "The Mask of Matches Malone!" was supposed to feature Queen Bee as the main antagonist. However, due to issues with the runtime, the segment was shortened and rewritten to feature Poison Ivy instead. Nonetheless, a draft of the original short featuring Queen Bee was made available on Simone's message board.^[5]
• The Bialyan Queen Bee appears in Young Justice voiced by Marina Sirtis.^[6] According to Greg Weisman, the Bialyan Queen Bee used in this show is the first Bialyan Queen Bee.^[7] According to Batman, this Queen Bee possesses the ability of persuasion over most men and some women. She was referenced multiple times as the episode "Bereft" took place in Bialya. In "Revelation," it is revealed that Queen Bee is L-4 of The Light (Project Cadmus' Board of Directors). In "Image," Queen Bee convinces Quraci President Rumaan Harjavti that Qurac and Bialya used to be one country (later revealed to be Psimon manipulating Harjavti). Queen Bee's soldiers move their way through the Logan Reserve causing a wildebeest stampede only to be halted by the team in their stealth mode. One of Queen Bee's jets end up attacking the Logan Reserve injuring Marie Logan's son Garfield while he was releasing a sick oryx and an injured wildebeest from the barn. When Robin and Superboy catch up to Rumaan Harjavti, they are attacked by Bialyan soldiers using Apokoliptan technology. The next day, Rumaan Harjavti tells Queen Bee that he has changed his mind about giving up Qurac to Bialya. Queen Bee is taken away vowing to get revenge on Qurac. This was later revealed to be an act by Miss Martian (who was imitating Queen Bee to make her scheme public knowledge before she imitated Bruce Wayne to meet with Rumaan Harjavti). Miss Martian later finds Queen Bee in Garfield Logan's room and states to Miss Martian that Psimon isn't the only one who knows what Miss Martian really is and that she'd better cooperate with her if she doesn't want the rest of the team to know her true form. She also states that should any of her team attack her personally or should she command it that Garfield would physically hurt himself to protect her. In "Usual Suspects", Queen Bee accompanies Lex Luthor, Sportsmaster, Bane, and Blockbuster to Santa Prisca. Miss Martian is also summoned by Queen Bee. Queen Bee then tells Miss Martian to attack Artemis after she immobilizes Blockbuster. Miss Martian ends up knocking out Queen Bee. Lex Luthor manages to carry Queen Bee to his helicopter enabling them to get away. In "Auld Acquaintance," Queen Bee appears with Ra's al Ghul, Lex Luthor, Ocean Master, and Brain when they raid Cadmus and steal all the clones. In "Earthlings," it is shown that at some point during the five years between the first and second seasons that Queen Bee orchestrated the death of Marie Logan. In "Beneath," Queen Bee was shown learning that the shipment of runaway children that Psimon, Icicle Jr., Mammoth, Shimmer, and Devastation were guarding were stopped by the female members of the Team. She isn't worried since they had a second shipment of runaway children that will be delivered to The Light's Partner. In "Intervention," Queen Bee learns about what happened in her lair and gives Mammoth, Shimmer, and Devastation her sympathies. Queen Bee then states that the Light's plans for the Reach, the Justice League, and the Team may proceed ahead of schedule.

Video games

• Queen Bee is one of the major bosses in the Xbox, PlayStation 2 and PlayStation Portable versions of Justice League Heroes voiced by Abby Craden.
• Queen Bee appears as an early boss in DC Universe Online voiced by Cyndi Williams. She and the H.I.V.E. attack S.T.A.R. Labs and LexCorp Exobyte Transports near the Metropolis Metrodome. It is later revealed that she is in cahoots with Brainiac in order to deliver the stolen Exobytes to him. The players manage to defeat Queen Bee. Queen Bee later hypnotizes Booster Gold to fight the players.

References