Slightly Misplaced Comic Book Characters Case File #497: Bumblebee

You know, if I opted to cover Mal Duncan last week, it only makes sense that I cover his wife Karen Beecher this week.  It only makes sense, I suppose.  I’m not sure how recognizable either are outside of Teen Titans fans anyway.

So, here’s Bumblebee.  And not the Autobot.

Karen Beecher first appeared in Titans #45 by writer Bob Rozakis and artist Irv Novick in December of 1976, but she didn’t appear as Bumblebee until June of 1977’s Titans #48 by Rozakis and artist Jose Delbo.  Karen was a scientist dating Mal Duncan at the time, and in an effort to make him look better in front of his teammates, Karen donned a tech suit that granted her various bee-like powers like flight and stinger blasts.  She did manage to escape from what sure does sound like a stupid plan, but she then confessed what she did to Mal and the other Titans.  However, they were impressed enough to offer her membership on the team, so there you have it.  Sometimes you can join a superhero team if you fake being a villain and attacking one of them to make him look good.  At some point, I am not sure when, Karen added the ability to shrink to her bee powers, and there you have it:  someone copied Marvel’s the Wasp.

Well, maybe not entirely.  Sure, like Janet van Dyne, she eventually married her superhero boyfriend, but she was the scientist, not him.

But yes, Karen and Mal got married at one point when the Titans broke up, coming back for various missions to help out, but when Karen and Mal both went into space during one of the big Crisis Events, a Zeta beam brought them back wrong.  Mal was dying when the Gabriel Horn exploded in his face until emergency work fixed him up, but Karen was stuck at six inches high.  Both subsequently joined the Doom Patrol and were miserable.  They even seem to have gotten divorced during this period, but it looks like the DC Rebirth reboot brought the pair back together again even if the Bumblebee storyline had her gain powers but temporarily lose her memories of, oh, Mal and their baby.  Meanwhile, the sort of retro World’s Finest universe Mark Waid has been working on had her as a founding member of the Teen Titans in World’s Finest: Teen Titans, one where she meets Mal when she stops by to see Donna Troy in her apartment and Mal is Donna’s roommate and platonic pal.

That said, there may not be as much about Bumblebee as I would generally like, but she does appear frequently in animated form, notably in Teen Titans (voiced by  T’Keyah Crystal Keymáh), Young Justice (voiced by Masasa Moyo), Teen Titans Go! (voiced by Ozioma Akagha), and DC Super Hero Girls (voiced by Kimberly Brooks).

However, it is worth noting that Bumblebee is often cited as the first Black woman superhero at DC.  Or it’s Nubia.

Oh.  Nubia.  I think I know who I am covering next.