Queen Bee
Written By: Erik Sandoval & Michael Rousselet
Three teenagers, Trenice, Deborah, and Carlos (Olivia Hawthorne, Hannah Kepple, and Nico Gomez) are spending the night lounging around in Deborah's room. The trio are also huge fans of world-famous pop star Regina (Kaelynn Harris), and after Carlos draws Trenice's attention away from one of Regina's videos, she and Deborah begin feuding among one another over who Regina's number one fan, with Deborah claiming the title because she is the only member of the trio to have seen her live. While bringing up the fact that Regina is currently nine months pregnant, Deborah warns Carlos to put out his joint, since she doesn't want her mom to smell it. Despite Trenice's claim that Deborah's mom is currently at work in the local hospital, they hear her approaching and hurriedly try to air the room out. While explaining that her mom's shift got canceled at the last minute, Deborah blurts out that Regina has gone into labor.
Before anymore can be said, Deborah's mom (Monica Louwerens) enters the room and judges by the smell that the trio are hungry, offering to make them some dinner before she goes to bed. When Deborah declines her offer and decides to just snack on some leftovers, her mom refuses to let the kids eat a cold meal, so she gives them her wallet to order pizza. Getting back to the topic of Regina, Deborah is forced to admit that her mom went home because Regina is bringing in her own private doctors and shutting down the entire fourth floor of the hospital to keep out the paparazzi. When Carlos admits that he wants to take pictures of the baby and sell them for profit, Trenice reprimands his greed, saying that such a beautiful moment between a mother and her baby should be private. In spite of this, she quickly decides that the trio go to the hospital themselves and witness the birth. While Deborah is hesitant about the idea, Trenice and Carlos goad her into accepting their offer by reminding her that she's Regina's number one fan. With that, the trio swipe Deborah's mom's employee key card and drive to the hospital. During the trip, Trenice calls her own mom to let her know that she's planning to stay the night at Deborah's, throwing her off the track of her true intentions.
When they arrive outside the hospital, Carlos manages to use his phone and Trenice's selfie stick to trick a security camera so the trio can sneak in through the back door. Making it to the fourth floor, the trio spot Regina being wheeled through the hall on a gurney, before they themselves are spotted by a security guard (Bryce Anthony Shepperson) and told to leave. When the guard discovers Trenice carrying the stolen key card, the two engage in a struggle that ends with the guard being pushed down the stairs and possibly dying. Deciding not to stick around, the trio gain access to the sealed off floor, which has all the lights turned off and a strange sound echoing throughout the halls. The elevator then opens, prompting the teens to scatter. A surgeon wheeling a corpse on a gurney travels through the halls. Trenice, after accidentally knocking over a magazine rack and alerting the surgeon, discovers that they have mysterious, glowing green eyes. After the surgeon adjusts a nearby thermostat and walks off, Trenice finds Carlos and tells him that she wants to leave. Deborah suddenly reports to Trenice and Carlos that she has found Regina, drawing their attention away from the ordeal. Trenice gets scared again when she finds more corpses, but is again diverted by hearing that Regina is nearby.
The three soon discover Regina in an operating room, being tended to by more glowing-eyed surgeons. One of the surgeons injects Regina with something that causes her great pain. Suddenly, antennae, segmented eyes, and insect legs gruesomely burst out of Regina's body, revealing her to be a giant, heavily-pregnant, wasp-like insect queen. Captivated by the scene, Carlos absentmindedly takes a picture, alerting Regina to their presence and momentarily snapping the doctors out of their trance. Regina gives off a high-pitched screech that breaks the window the teens were watching her from, which contains a frequency that re-hypnotizes the hospital staff. Deborah and Carlos are similarly hypnotized, but Trenice, who has her earbuds in, is immune to the sound. Taking advantage of this, Trenice manages to unhypnotize Deborah by stuffing cotton balls in her ears, but she is too late to save Carlos, who wanders into the operating room and is killed when Regina stings him in the forehead.
The two remaining teens proceed to make a break for it as Regina sends her makeshift drones after them. Making their way back to the way they came, the pair discover that the murdered guard has been brought back to life by the hypnosis, prompting the teens to run in the opposite direction and hide. One of the hypnotized doctors nearly manages to apprehend the duo, but they are able to fight them off by ramming a cart of medical supplies into them. The two remaining doctors robotically guard the elevators out of the building. Deborah is able to fight them off by stabbing one in the eye with a needle, then using a defibrillator to electrify the other before they strangle Trenice. Inside the elevator, Trenice shares a relieved hug with Deborah, then tells her that they can use Carlos' picture to expose Regina as the monster she truly is. Deborah suddenly stops the elevator and tells Trenice that doing so would destroy Regina's career, having bought tickets for her next tour and paying no mind to the fact that her idol is a murderous monster who recently killed one of her closest friends. Seeing that she and Trenice aren't on the same page, Deborah removes the cotton balls from her ears and willingly submits herself to Regina's hypnosis as Trenice screams.
Sometime later, Regina has partially converted the operating room into a hive, where her "children", large carnivorous grubs that feast on human flesh, are housed in various cells. A hysterical Trenice has been stuck to the wall of the hive by wax, only able to glimpse the various corpses that make up the grubs' food supply. The hypnotized Deborah approaches Trenice, mentioning that while she genuinely feels bad about Trenice's predicament, she also mentions that Regina has (somehow) promised her "backstage passes for life" and has allowed her to act as a nanny for her "children" in exchange for her assistance. She picks up one of the grubs to show Trenice, and explains that all she has to do is feed them, then drops the bombshell that she told Regina that they could start with her. After reminding her that nobody likes eating a cold meal, Deborah approaches Trenice robotically, her former friend only able to scream in mortal terror before the grub devours her face.
This episode contains examples of:
- Abandoned Hospital: The hospital the trio visit appears to be one. It's later revealed that it isn't actually abandoned; Regina just had her floor shut down to keep out the paparazzi.
- Accidental Murder: Trenice shoves the security guard down the stairs and kills him in the process. As further proof of their already dim and vapid natures, the trio completely forget about killing him as soon as they reach Regina's floor.
- Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: The main trio definitely have shades of this. Any mention of Regina and their goal of seeing her give birth will draw them away from the obvious red flags about their situation, even at times where they're absolutely terrified and ready to leave. Deborah has a valid excuse for this, since it's revealed she's basically Regina's Manchurian Agent, having been subliminally programmed to worship her at all times.
- The Bad Guy Wins: Regina gets to remain alive and, along with her children, feast on the human race as she pleases.
- Bee People: Regina is revealed to be one, though she resembles a wasp or hornet more than a bee.
- Beware My Stinger Tail: Regina has a massive stinger at the end of her body, which she uses to stab Carlos right in the head.
- Big Creepy-Crawlies: Regina is revealed to be a giant insect disguised as a woman, complete with larvae that grow as big as household pets.
- Big "NO!": Trenice gives one as Deborah voluntarily submits to Regina's influence, and several more as she becomes baby bug food.
- Brainwashed and Crazy: Anyone brainwashed by Regina at close range is turned into a killing machine.
- Camera Spoofing: Carlos manages to use his phone, Trenice's selfie stick, and a little ingenuity to trick the security camera at the hospital's back door so the trio can sneak inside.
- Chekhov's Gun: Trenice's earbuds, which allow her to block Regina's hypnosis-inducing frequency.
- Compelling Voice: As part of her insect nature, Regina's voice contains a frequency that hypnotizes everyone within earshot to act as her servants. Deborah is mentioned to have seen Regina live, and as such, it's hinted she was subliminally hypnotized from the very beginning.
- Downer Ending: Carlos is dead, Trenice is eaten by a giant grub, Deborah submits herself to Regina's influence, and Regina and her children remain free to hypnotize and feast on the world's populace as they please.
- Evil All Along: Deborah is revealed to have been subliminally brainwashed by Regina to worship her, and she sacrifices Carlos and Trenice to her idol in exchange for unlimited backstage passes.
- Evil Diva: Regina, a world famous pop star by day, a giant, murderous insect by night.
- Eye Scream: Deborah kills one of the hypnotized surgeons by stabbing them in the eye with a hypodermic needle. She proceeds to kill another one by zapping their head with a defibrillator, which causes their eyes to burn.
- Regina's human eyes burst to make way for a pair of short antennae as she transforms.
- Face–Heel Turn: When Trenice opts to use Carlos' pictures of Regina to expose her true self to the world, Deborah willingly submits to Regina's hypnosis and feeds Trenice to her "children" since she bought tickets for her next tour. Even though Deborah was brainwashed from the very start, this is basically the moment where she admits to it.
- Face-Revealing Turn: The first hypnotized staff member glimpsed in the hospital, slowly turns around to reveal their ominous glowing eyes.
- Foreshadowing: The Reveal that Regina is a giant insect disguised as a woman has quite a few hints dropped about it:
- Insect-themed words such as "buzz", "bug-out", and "colony" are peppered throughout both the dialogue and the scenery.
- Carlos makes a passing reference to how Regina's figure, which he is sexually attracted to, is "inhuman".
- Trenice and Deborah also make passing comments on how Regina's voice is "hypnotic" and that seeing her live "changes you". This makes much more sense when it's revealed that the latter was brainwashed into a Regina-worshiping sleeper agent at one of the star's concerts.
- Regina's latest hit is titled "Hungry For You", hinting that her species feasts on human flesh.
- Glass-Shattering Sound: Regina's screams of pain as her transformation takes place manage to crack and eventually break the window the trio watch her through.
- Glowing Eyes of Doom: Anyone who is hypnotized by Regina's frequency at close range gains glowing green eyes.
- Hell Is That Noise: Regina's hypnotizing frequency, which keeps playing throughout the hospital.
- Hive Queen: Regina, who hypnotizes anyone near her with her voice to fulfill her every wish, including letting her eat them.
- Homage: The episode can be seen as one to The Outer Limits episode ZZZZZ, which also featured a woman named "Regina" who was revealed to be a giant insect.
- Hope Spot: After fending off the hypnotized hospital staff, Deborah and Trenice share a relieved hug and prepare to escape in the elevator. When Trenice reveals that the duo can use the pictures Carlos took to reveal Regina's real self to the world, Deborah reveals herself as a sleeper agent working for Regina, who takes Trenice back to her hospital room and makes her into a meal for her "children".
- Hornet Hole: Regina ends up turning her hospital room into a giant hive, where Trenice is held prisoner and ultimately killed.
- Hospital Gurney Scene: A hypnotized doctor carries a corpse on a gurney towards Regina's room. They nearly find Trenice, who knocks over a rack of magazines, but they ignore her for the time being.
- Idiot Hero: Our protagonists are a bumbling motley crew of super-fans willing to break into a hospital just to see the birth of their idol's child. They're also one-track minded and can get pretty dumb at times, such as when they accidentally murder a security guard and forget about his death seconds later, and repeatedly overlook the glaring red flags about the creepy hospital they're stuck inside just to see Regina for themselves, even when they admit they want to go back home.
- I'm a Humanitarian: Regina's species feeds on human flesh, whether dead or alive.
- Immediate Self-Contradiction: As Deborah and Carlos plan to sneak into the hospital to see Regina and her baby, Trenice instead opts for Regina and her child to be left alone. It doesn't take long for her to change her mind.Trenice: This is a beautiful moment between a mother and her child. It should be private. Just Regina, and her staff,... and her three biggest fans!
- I'm Your Biggest Fan: Trenice and Deborah spend a good chunk of the episode competing over who is the bigger Regina fan. Deborah undoubtedly wins by sticking with Regina even after watching her transform into an insect and murder Carlos, then proceeding to sacrifice her best friend to her. Given that she's actually a sort of sleeper agent that was subliminally brainwashed by seeing Regina live, Deborah does indeed have a reason for being number one.
- Instantly Proven Wrong: As he impulsively snaps pictures of the transformed Regina against the girls' orders, Carlos believes that she didn't see them. Regina's head then turns toward them in an instant.
- Invincible Villain: As long as Regina's frequency keeps going on uninterrupted, no one can stop or even touch her.
- Ironic Echo: "No one likes a cold meal." First said by Deborah's mom when she disapproves of the kids just snacking on leftovers, then said by Deborah herself as she feeds Trenice to one of Regina's "kids".
- Loony Fan: All three teens share an obsession with Regina, but Deborah, thanks to her hypnotized state, is murderously devoted to her. It gets to the point that she doesn't care about the fact that she is a giant insect, and is willing to murder her friends to save Regina's career.
- Loophole Abuse: While debating who the father of Regina's baby is, Carlos mentions that the trio could get so much more money for a picture of him than of the baby. When Deborah and Trenice remind him that they agreed not to take any pictures, he reminds them that they said no pictures of the baby, nothing about the father.
- Similarly, after Trenice wraps up a call with her own mother to cover her and her friends' whereabouts and griping about how she feels like she doesn't trust her, Carlos snarks about the fact that she didn't tell her that they're planning to break into a hospital. Deborah reminds him that since they have her mom's key card, they technically aren't "breaking in".
- Manchurian Agent: Deborah is revealed to be one at the end, since seeing Regina live is hinted to have subliminally brainwashed her to bring her friends to her so she could eat them.
- Meaningful Name: Regina's name is Latin for "Queen".
- Mind Control: Regina's voice is able to instantly hypnotize anyone who hears it. A victim at close range is rendered a glowing-eyed drone that can usually only follow simple commands and serve as enforcers. Those who are farther away are essentially turned into sleeper agents, programmed to worship Regina at all times and do anything to protect her image, including murdering their closest friends and relations.
- Multinational Team: It's more of a multiracial team, technically, but Deborah is Caucasian, Trenice is African-American, and Carlos is Hispanic.
- Mythology Gag: The ashtray makes an appearance on the floor of Deborah's room, the teens huddling around it and Carlos using it to hold his joint.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: While Regina could easily pass as a parody of any flash-in-the-pan pop star, she's mostly seen as a spoof of Beyoncé, given that she has both a queen-based nickname and a religiously devoted fanbase who can get pretty toxic at times.
- No Name Given: The security guard who catches the teens and the doctors tending to Regina.
- Not Quite Dead: The guard who Trenice accidentally kills is brought back to life by Regina's hypnosis.
- Obfuscating Stupidity: While our main trio are largely total idiots, Deborah is implied to have been faking a good chunk of her idiocy due to her status as a Regina-worshipping sleeper agent.
- Obvious Pregnancy: Regina, both in human and insect form, is shown to have quite a bulge in her stomach.
- One Dose Fits All: Whatever the substance Regina was injected with to trigger her transformation, one syringe of the stuff was apparently all it took.
- Open-Minded Parent: Deborah's mom. Her sole appearance has her figuring that her daughter and her friends are smoking weed, but only guesses that they're hungry due to the smell of the room instead of reprimanding them. If that isn't enough, she proceeds to give the kids her wallet so they can order pizza before going to bed, which provides them with the perfect opportunity to swipe her key card and sneak off to the hospital. One can only wonder if she was turned into a similarly brainwashed sleeper agent as her daughter was, given that she looks at her daughter in an almost expectant way as she leaves her room after giving her her wallet.
- Orderlies are Creeps: Every doctor on duty in the hospital becomes one after Regina's hypnosis invades their brains.
- Painful Transformation: Regina's transformation to an insect is shown to give her great pain.
- Pun-Based Title: The segment's title is a play on Beyonce's nickname "Queen Bey". It's fitting, considering the segment is centered on a pop star with a monstrous secret.
- The Quiet One: Regina has no un-sung dialogue in human form, and only chitters and screeches as an insect.
- Rewatch Bonus: Deborah's out-of-nowhere Face–Heel Turn seems to have been added just for the sake of a gratuitous last minute twist. But if you watch the episode again, the truth for her treachery becomes apparent. Seeing that she lets her friends know that Regina is pregnant in the first place, staying at the hospital where her mom just so happens to work, and being the one to report whenever she sees Regina combined with her confession at the end, this reveals that she was actually brainwashed by Regina long before the episode began, and was acting as a sleeper agent to bring her friends to her idol as food.
- Riddle for the Ages: What exactly did the doctors inject Regina with that caused her to transform?
- Saying Too Much: Deborah blurting out that Regina went into labor causes her friends to pressure her for information, after they deal with her mother first.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: As soon as Regina kills Carlos and sends her drones after them, Deborah and Trenice don't hesitate to beat feet.
- Serious Business: Deborah's devotion toward Regina and her pride in being her number one fan, thanks to the hypnosis. So much so that she willingly turns on Trenice and feeds her to Regina's children even after seeing her transform into a giant insect and kill one of her closest friends.
- Shout-Out: The hospital where Regina is having her child is named "Haddonfield Meyers Hospital".
- Skewed Priorities: When Trenice accidentally pushes a security guard down a flight of stairs and breaks his neck, the teens quickly exit the scene and get back to their search for Regina, completely forgetting about the dead guard after they leave.
- Squee: Deborah and Trenice do this when they spot Regina, or when they learn she's nearby. What else would be expected from a pair of super-fans?
- Staircase Tumble: As the security guard struggles with Trenice, Deborah and Carlos come to her rescue and end up pushing the guard down the stairs, which unfortunately breaks his neck.
- Take That!: The main characters are an allegory to toxic super-fans who are willing to follow every fact and/or rumor about their idols reported by the likes of of Facebook, Instagram, and TMZ to the point where they perceive them as gods, willing to disregard any negative thing said idols say or do and eventually begin stalking them, as the teens do. Deborah takes the cake on this concept at the end by sacrificing her best friend to her monstrous idol, albeit through hypnosis.
- Too Dumb to Live: The teens have shades of this trope, but Carlos is the worst offender. His response to watching Regina transform into an insect after receiving an injection is an oblivious "Is that supposed to happen?", and the first thing he does after she finishes transforming is take pictures of her, alerting Regina to their presence even after Trenice and Deborah tell him not to. If that's not enough, he then proceeds to blame Trenice for the pictures, giving Regina even more incentive to want her specifically dead.
- Undying Loyalty: Deborah to Regina, which is taken to murderous extremes by the end of the story. It's justified because she's brainwashed.
- Ungrateful Bitch: Thanks to her hypnotized state, Deborah doesn't hesitate to sacrifice Trenice to Regina's "kids" once the hypnotized surgeons are killed, even though they saved each other's lives in the span of a few minutes.
- Villain with Good Publicity: Regina is one of the hottest musical artists to date, with everyone from radio DJs to doctors willing to serve her and grant her every wish. The main trio soon discover that this is actually because she's a giant wasp-like insect who uses a frequency in her voice to brainwash the populace into worshiping her so she can eat them.
- Villain Override: Regina is able to completely control anyone who hears her hypnotizing frequency to do as she wishes.
- Wicked Wasps: Regina's insect form heavily resembles a wasp.
- With Friends Like These...: Deborah's brainwashing means that once Trenice loses all faith in Regina and wants to expose her to the world, she's all too willing to throw her best friend before the pop star in question as a sacrifice, even after she just saved her life.
- Would Harm a Child / Would Hurt a Child: Regina isn't above hypnotizing young fans into her drones. If they resist long enough, she won't hesitate to turn them into food, either.
